Charles Bukowski, "Dinosauria, we"

I thought this was a little appropriate. You people don't seem to like the music... fine. Eat some poetry.

I need to think up a new poll to bring the masses back.

Luck And Found Money

I was reading Attitude Trader's blog tonight and he put up a bunch of new links that have to do with "luck." He always has interesting stuff over there (especially his "attitude index"), so you should check it out.

Anyway, one of the links he has up is for a site where a guy invests money he finds. Like, he'll find 12 cents a day but he invests it all and keep track of it. Just a lot of fun to read. Here's the link. It's called "Found Money Jar."

Virtual Office, $3454. Dow, +247.44, 13289.29.

Misstrade, $2100 on 10,200 shares traded.
Evolution, $1652 on 65,600 shares traded.
OBAT, $236 on 5400 shares traded.
Tapeworm, $144 on 24 contracts traded.
Bubs, -$280 on 1600 shares traded.
Me, -$398 on 14,800 shares traded.

This market is so wacked out.

However, apparently if you're in the right frame of mind, it's worth trading. Me, I'm on vacation mentally and so I'm not even going to mess around anymore until Tuesday. However it's great to see Misstrade and Evolution making some hay.

Especially Evolution. Check his blog to see how he went through a mini-slump and has busted out of it. That kind of performance should be inspiring to all new or struggling traders.

Misstrade, well if you've been following this blog long enough you know he's kind of like a machine. He'll be off for the next 10 days. That should give some of us other slobs a chance to shine here in the VO.

It's good to see OBAT in the green, he's had a few rough ones recently.

And hats off to Tapeworm. On his first day in the VO he showed us stock traders that he has some chops.

Me and Bubs should have just stayed asleep today.

Anyway... my only market commentary is the following (and excuse me for sounding like a broken record)...Yes, the market rallied today but yesterday it sold off on higher volume... you'd rather see it sell off on light volume and rally on strong volume. Still, 250 points is 250 points... whatever.

It's wacky.

A New Virtual Office Member

We welcome "tapeworm" of Wallstreak and MovetheMarkets fame over to our Virtual Office today.

This worm contacted me a couple of weeks ago about joining the VO. At first, I turned him down because he is a lowly futures trader. I said we already had a "token" futures trader, HPT. However, after watching him post his numbers all alone everyday over at MtM, and after exchanging a few emails, I took pity on him.

Will the VO ever be the same? I doubt it. If I ever start talking about "R" on my site, you'll know the end is nigh.

Meanwhile you may be asking, why sign up another futures trader isn't your site about stock trading? Well, the answer to this question goes something like this... I keep these future traders on a short leash. Should we get a few more stock traders posting their stats here everyday, they will be the first to go. I think I can handle up to 10 traders total... Plus, I charge futures traders 10% of their daily take...

Every site needs a whipping boy. "The Fly" has Slope of Hope, Ducati has "the Fly" and I have futures traders.

NOTE: The Virtual Office post may be late today. Again, everything will be back to normal here after Labor Day. Until then, expect "service disruptions."

NOTE #2: You will no longer see the MtM link under my links. It is now listed under the name "Tapeworm" by the Virtual Office.

Virtual Office, $4711. Dow, -281.10, 13041.03.

Misstrade, $2610 on 24,000 shares traded.
Evolution, $2017 on 20,000 shares traded.
Me, $253 on 11,200 shares traded.
OBAT, -$33 on 3200 shares traded.
Denarii, -$136 on 4400 shares traded.

Wow, well, maybe I picked the wrong week to "take off." But you know, I'm just recharging the batteries.

The market got killed today. And while it got killed on relatively light volume, one should notice that while light, the volume was still stronger than it has been on our most recent up days. That means only one thing, the market is still going through bouts of distribution. It's ugly out there.

Volatility should continue into September. Thank the trading gods.

NOTE: No daily post tonight. I made my money shorting BBD...

Jane's Addiction, "My Time (live)"

I planned on trading this morning, but the surf was just too clean and pretty to pass up.

So instead I barely traded this afternoon. Clearly with the market down 245 points I'm missing some opportunities. However, everyone needs a vacation.

Here's another nice and mellow song to go with my nice and mellow day.

Violent Femmes, "Gone Daddy Gone"

I was gone today... I may be gone tomorrow. One thing is for sure, I'll be here next Tuesday.

Virtual Office, $3915. Dow, -56.74, 13322.13.

HPT, $1800 on 103 contracts traded.
Evolution, $1223 on 30,400 shares traded.
Misstrade, $960 on 12,000 shares traded.
Denarii, $86 on 800 shares traded.
Bubs, $46 on 400 shares traded.
Me, no trades.
OBAT, -$200 on 5000 shares traded.

Damn! What'd I miss?

Out of nowhere... on a beautiful summer Monday the week before Labor Day, the VO turns out a sweet day.

I'm upset I missed the action but it's great to see the market is still moving well for traders as we head into September.

I'll be back trading tomorrow. Let's hope I can find as much as the VO did today.

Beach Day

Perfect weather here so I'll be surfing today.

I'll be back to look at the market tomorrow. Not sure if I'll be trading it though.

I'll still post the VO tonight.

Don't churn out there!

Hannah Takes The Stairs

I don't watch a lot of movies but most people seem to love them. The movies I do like, most people don't. So, for my entire life if I'm hanging out with 2 other people and they start talking about movies I've been forced to do something silly like, say something completely random or pretend to care.

Anyway, so we just watched this movie "Hannah Takes The Stairs" that I thought was really impressive. We knew nothing about it, we just picked it off of the "On Demand" menu because the trailer looked interesting.

The writing was great and the acting was almost so real that it made me feel like a voyeur (it helps that people are dressing and undressing throughout the movie and that they're very normal looking bodies). It was completely different than anything I've seen. Just make sure you get through the first 10 minutes or so... or whenever the first break-up scene is. That's when it hooked me.

So anyway, I'm not going to say you should see it or anything because I have the feeling that it may not suit most people. However, here's the trailer. If you're in the mood for a slightly serious minded movie and you don't want to see beautiful people or things blow up or blood, check it out.

Kevin Coyne, "Marlene" (WTF?)

This is one of the more interesting videos I've seen in awhile.

I mean, I guess this guy was going to perform a song. But the "host" of the show starts off reading poetry or more like, yelling poetry. I don't know... I guess you'll just have to watch it.

Oh, and look for my guest appearance in the video.

Virtual Office, $1202. Dow, +142.99, 13378.87.

Evolution, $1315 on 30,400 shares traded.
Denarii, $95 on 1400 shares traded.
Me, $19 on 2400 shares traded.
Bubs, $13 on 800 shares traded.
OBAT, -$240 on 5094 shares traded.

My goodness! I can't believe the Dow was up so big.

The Bulls apparently are not the ones vacationing in the Hamptons this summer. They are at work bidding up stocks on no volume while the Bears are sipping Corona's on the beach.

I tell you what... I think the Bears are getting good and rested. Once the volume comes back into this market I don't think it will be to the upside.

Anyway, Evolution decided he wanted to make some money today. He's been on a great streak and it's great to see because for a while he was on the rocks. Congrats ET.

Meanwhile, since I barely traded today I won't be posting a daily. See you Monday!

Jack Johnson, "Traffic In The Sky"

Mellow song for a summer Friday. As the traffic in my neighborhood shoots to a peak during the next week, I'll think often of this song.



Words of wisdom all around
But no one ever seems to listen
They're talking about their plans on paper
Building up from the pavement
There are shadows from the scrapers on the pavement
It's enough to make me sigh
But that don't seem like it would make it feel better
The words are still around
But the words are only sounds
And no one ever seems to listen
Instead they'll say

Well how could we have known?
I'll tell them it's not so hard to tell
If you keep on adding stones
Soon the water will be lost in the well

Slow Motion

So we're off to a really slow start today.

10:00 yesterday: 204,379,000 shares traded on the NYSE.
10:00 today: 149,017,000 shares traded on the NYSE.

Things will slow further as this summer Friday rolls on.

People are already gone. Preserve your trading capital. If you have one or two good trades, call it a day. I'm out of here. I'll post the VO later but it may be late again.

Here's a slow motion video. Some of this stuff is really cool.

Barack Obama On The Daily Show

Hudson City Bancorp

Okay, today I've actually made plans in the middle of the day so that I'll be forced to only trade a half day.

Meanwhile, not sure if anyone has noticed, but I removed the Stockalicious thing from my site. Really... who was checking it? I'm awful at the long-term stuff. However, that said, I'm very happy with how my GAIA has held up during this period of market turmoil.

Also, yesterday I purchased a little HCBK. I feel very responsible purchasing a bank stock in my long term portfolio. Banks aren't a fad.



Anyway, here's what I like about it. Check out all that volume that has come into the stock in the last 5 weeks. Basically, it is being accumulated by institutions. That's what volume like that tells you. Your run of the mill retail investor isn't purchasing bank stocks in the middle of the media frenzy over sub-prime. The stock is pennies away from an all-time high. However, look at a monthly graph and you'll see this stock isn't a "growth" vehicle. This is a safety play.

The stock was featured yesterday on CNBC. However, a friend of mine who is very successful in real-estate mentioned it to me a few days earlier. He said that it was the only bank he knew of that didn't sell it's mortgages.

So, if the polar ice caps don't melt and sink the US in the next 100 years, I plan on passing this stock onto my great-great-great grandchildren... that is assuming all of my children don't turn out to be gay.

DISCLAIMER: This post should not be taken as a recommendation for you to purchase any securities mentioned within. And, unfortunately, the polar ice caps are going to melt and all of my children will all turn out to be gay so I will not have any financial responsibility in 30 years. Therefore I can throw my money around purchasing "risky" stocks like HCBK.

Lou Reed, "Perfect Day"

I'm in this video. See if you can pick me out.

Perfect Day

I woke this morning a little depressed that I wouldn't be surfing. Getting up early to go surfing has been a great routine. Wake before the sun, drive to my friend's house, and then drive east to the break as the sun rises. I've seen many colorful sunrises these last few weeks.

So I crawled out of bed a little later and did some extra research. With the CFC and BAC news, I knew the market would be gapping up. I hate trading the open when the market gaps up. Why? Because I often feel all bullish and buy a bunch of stuff pre-open and then lose 25 cents over and over again.

Perhaps it's because I feel fairly strongly that this recent move up is a bull trap, I don't know, I decided to fade the gap up. It worked pretty well. There were two exceptions, I got long FED and DSL at the open because I knew both have large short interests and so I figured they would squeeze on the CFC news. Great logic right? FED worked like a charm but DSL spanked me. So much for logic.

Anyway, after those plays I started looking for shorts. My best of the day was in LDK, a solar company.

The rest of the solars were down or weaker than LDK, so I threw in a short for 500 shares and was filled at $45.20. That was the best part of the trade. My covers were bad. I took 200 off at $45.10 (I was nervous, okay?) 100 at $44.60, 100 at $44.03 and the final hundred at $43.39. I think when things heat up again I'm going to increase my position size a bit so that I can cover a chunk of my positions early and let more ride.

Anyway, I had a bunch of other good shorts too. RWT, AGU, BID and OMG. The problem with all of these positions was that I only threw a few hundred shares of each out there so I didn't really capitalize like I could have. But I wanted to take it easy... heck, I should be on vacation right now!

So by 10:45 I was done trading. I went with my wife and daughter to a natural history museum, a puppet show and out to lunch. After lunch I got a call from my friend saying that the winds had shifted in our favor and I went out to surf for the afternoon. Then, when I got home we had a good friend over for dinner. All in all, it was as great day.

Again, sorry for the lazy and infrequent posting. All will be back to normal here after Labor Day.
Here's the stats:

P&L, $1008
Best, LDK, $397
Worst, DSL, -$197

13,400 shares traded.
14 stocks traded, 9 winners, 5 losers.
81 trades.

Virtual Office, $1567. Dow, -0.25, 13235.88.

Me, $1008 on 13,400 shares traded.
OBAT, $248 on 12,800 shares traded.
Misstrade, $118 on 600 shares traded.
HPT, $100 on 305 contracts traded.
Evolution, $43 on 28,000 shares traded.
Denarii, $30 on 400 shares traded.
Bubs, $20 on 900 shares traded.

Wow, look at all of that green! Everyone reported and everyone made money. Always nice.

The big news of the day was the Bank Of America investment in Countrywide. However, equally newsworthy has to be the way the stock reversed off of its highs to close at its lows.

Volume continues to be low. On the NYSE today we traded 1,375,722,000 shares. Since I think volume is so important, I'll start posting it here everyday.

Anyway, sorry for the late post. I was in the water...

NOTE: Daily post will also be late as we're having dinner guests.

My Site Slow?

Have any of you noticed slowness since I put all this new Feedburner crap on the site? If so let me know. It seems slower to me...