Patience vs. Anticipation

I had a bad day. But I didn't have any one really bad trade. I just had many 25-30 cent losers.

Looking back at some of the trades, it appears that I'm anticipating trades too much and jumping at them instead of chilling out and waiting for them to develop. Same thing with the GGP yesterday. Had I just waited for the break of $34, I wouldn't have lost $500 in the stock.

My goal next week is to just be patient. I mean, I worry that the trade will go through my level and I'll get a bad price so I jump early. Clearly though, a bad fill here and there would hurt me less than consistent jumping.

Overall, I'm feeling hopeful. I've never thought much about my attitude and how it could effect my trading, unlike my friend Attitude Trader. However, after my "hiatus," I had time to gain some perspective and I now feel this is very important. It's kind of a new thing for me, because I really like to indulge in negatives. However, negative isn't helping me right now.

I had a good work ethic this week. I'm working on having a more positive attitude and next week I'm going to work on being more patient.

Okay, enough of that.

My best stock today was AGU.



I bought a couple hundred right before it had that nice run around 10:30. After the morning run, it consolidated, selling off on lighter volume. So when I saw it slowly gain on higher volume, I got in.

My worst, was LNN.



I caught some of the run from $69 to $70 around 10:40. The problem is that instead of selling, I held. The stock seemed to be breaking a downtrend on the daily and I thought it would run more. When it sold off of $70, I bought more and was stopped out. So I turned a winning trade into a loser. Annoying.

Worse yet, I bought back when it dipped below $69, caught a move back above $69 but again, held and added instead of selling. I was bullish. It was tough to be bullish today in any stock, and I got burned when it spiked down from $69 to $68.

Anyway, next week I hope to have my software mastered. The research schedule really worked well for me this week. I felt more involved in the market.

My ethic is good and under my control, the profits will come.

Here's the stats:

P&L, -$633
Best, AGU, $359
Worst, LNN, -$268

25,800 shares traded.
26 stocks traded, 11 winners, 15 losers.