I don't have any great post ready right now, and since it's the weekend and I feel like relaxing, I figured I would just throw up this video of a hot chick doing yoga.
Completely gratuitous and cheap, I know, but worthwhile.
I'm out of here. I may not have a connection until tomorrow or Sunday.
So the VO will be very late, like, probably Sunday. Here's a quickie:
I made $427 on 15,200 shares traded.
Bubs, made $93 on 1200 shares traded.
Akalawoo didn't trade. His ass is on VO probation since he never trades.
Evolution is on vacation.
Have a good weekend everyone.
Hattip, Denarii.
You can check the comic in full size here.
Here's what the panels say:
Panel 1: I have an extra $50 that I have saved. I believe I will put it in my bank account!
Panel 2: No, T-Rex. That is a bad idea. (T-REX says) Explain!
Panel 3: If you leave money in your bank account it gets interest but if it's not as much as inflation, you're actually losing money plus your investments could be making more on the stock market. (T-REX says) Fine! I'll invest my stupid $50 in the stupid stock market. Okay? Happy? I'll invest my $50 in a company that makes neckties for underachieving dogs.
Panel 4: But before you do that, T-Rex, you should consider your investment goals! (T-REX says) Man!
Panel 5: Seriously! This is important. You need to decide: what do you want out of your invesments? Security? Rapid growth? (T-REX says) Listen, all I want out of life is for my bank account to have $58,008 dollars in it, so that when I read my statement upside down it says, "BOOBS."
Panel 6: Worst answer to "What do you want out of your investments?" question. Today's Champion.
NOTE: After getting smoked right off the open, I made it back and clawed my way into the green. I think I'm done for the week. Also, I added TSL to my swing account today at $50.11.
I was trolling the internets for trading commercials yesterday when I found this gem.
For lack of a better tag, I'll just throw it in my "old trading commercials" bin.
Check this out. Hattip to Bloggerdotcom.
Basically, someone bet $900 million that the S&P is going to drop hard and fast by the 21st of September.
Let's hope they're wrong...
UPDATE: By the way, gold hit a 28-year high today.
From some documentary that was made about him. In the beginning, you hear him reading from Desert Solitaire.
Good stuff. Also check out The Monkey Wrench Gang.
I had a great morning today. I was up a couple grand by 10:00am.
Then, at 10:00am, feeling confident, I short 1200 shares of HXM. This was right before the stock spiked up 80 cents on like 400 shares or something ridiculous like that... anyway, that kind of killed me.
I hear you out there saying something snarky like, "Well, duh! That's what he gets for trading thin stocks," and to that I'll say, "You have a point, but that doesn't mean your wife is being faithful." Think about it...
Anyway, so between HXM and a bunch of other trades that I shouldn't have made, I found myself up $150 by 10:30. Making money and then giving it all back is maybe worse than just losing from the beginning. It's a tough call though. Either way it just sucks.
The good news is that I didn't freak out too much. I still felt good about my morning trades (shorts in RDN, MTG, CNH, DSL) so I wasn't completely broken. I stepped away for awhile.
I came back and noticed that RDN was having trouble regaining the $26 price level.
So I got good and short around $25.70. As you can see from looking at the graph, this was a good idea. Of course, I managed to mess it up a bit since I covered the fat part of my position by $25. I let a measly 200 shares run down below $24.50. Ah, patience... I need some more of it.
Anyway, this brought me back to a respectable level on my day and so I decided to call it quits and check for surf (there was none... things have gone flat).
So on the way back from the beach I sat with my surfing buddy and had a frozen drink while the drunk proprietor of the establishment told us about his coming fame.
"I'm gonna be in a book... that's the author right there!" He slurred, pointing to a balding man.
He continued, spitting while he spoke, "I'm not going to read the book until it's published though. He gave me an advanced copy, but it's bad luck to read unpublished books. Anyway, I live in the Caribbean."
And with that, he stumbled away down the bar to hurl non-sequiturs at other patrons.
Here's the stats:
P&L, $1348
Best, RDN, $1026
Worst, HXM, -$734
54,600 shares traded.
21 stocks traded, 12 winners, 9 losers.
193 trades.
Misstrade, $7049 on 19,500 shares traded.
Me, $1348 on 54,600 shares traded.
Denarii, $121 on 2800 shares traded.
Bubs, no trades.
Akalawoo, no trades.
Tapeworm, sick.
Evolution, vacation.
OBAT, -$218 on 5400 shares traded.
Don't think it's lost on me how lame the VO has been lately. Half our guys don't trade anymore!
Anyway, today was a low volume sell off. In the last few weeks, when we've had low volume days, they've come on the rallies. Perhaps this marks a shift in the market where we rally on higher volume and sell off on low volume. It would be nice, if the market is going to go up, for it to do so in a sensible manner...
I'm guessing volume will be low again tomorrow. Rosh Hashanah started tonight...
I just want to note how much volume sucks today...
Yesterday, by 2:30, we had traded, 1,204,017 shares. Today, at 2:30 we hadn't even turned a billion yet, chopping in at just 844,755,000 shares.
That, is pathetic... it also means that we could perhaps rally into the close.
Also, since the other day I said I was going to start keeping track of my daily fees paid to the NYSE and the SEC, I just want to note that yesterday I paid $39.20 split between those two.
You know, I posted this commercial way back on March 23rd, well before my blog reached it's current level of prominence.
So I don't feel too bad about sharing it again, it's a classic. If anyone knows where I can find some of the other old stock trading commercials from around the year 2000, let me know.
NOTE: I'm stepping out. Made a little money, but feel like surfing. So be it. I'll never be a millionaire with this work ethic... so expect a late VO and a later daily post.
If you have an amazon account, you can vote on this list.
You know what to do, people...
NOTE: I have no idea how this thing works... clearly, it is meaningless...
For some reason, if you click play from the window on the right sidebar some of the songs are only playing 30 second snippets. If you click "launch standalone player" this problem seems to go away.
Just FYI.
This is the first morning in a long time that I didn't wake up at 5 to get out and go surfing. I was just too tired. My arms are shot.
Also, I didn't throw up a daily post last night because I was just exhausted.
We went out for a hike after work and then had dinner at this great place where you can watch the sunset. It's always nice to appreciate a sunrise and a sunset in the same day. Helps keep you level.
Anyway, let's see if the extra time for morning research helps, or if I just waste it all reading other stock blogs!
UPDATE: I wasted a lot of time on other blogs... Bluedog has a "Flock Of Seagulls" video posted. "The Fly" has a post on the demise of Ducati. Good stuff!
Misstrade, $14,400 on 16,500 shares traded.
Me, $422 on 49,800 shares traded.
Denarii, $121 on 4300 shares traded.
Bubs, $0 on 800 shares traded.
Akalawoo, no trades.
Evolution, vacation.
OBAT, -$54 on 7000 shares traded.
Well today has to be one of the oddest VOs ever posted. Everyone basically treads water except Misstrade who turns in a big one. Guess he knows some people on the "inside" eh?
Anyway, so it looks like the market wants to keep going higher. For all the money going into mutual funds (according to Bob Pisani $10 billion in inflows yesterday), you'd think there would be a little more upside volume to this rally. We traded, about 1.6 billion shares today. Better than a couple of weeks ago, but still a fraction of what we were trading to the downside in August. Who knows?
Anyway, more earnings tomorrow.
Meanwhile, how about oil? $80.51. People are all talking about the rate cut and forgetting about oil...
Closing in on a new all-time high up at $24.68. I always love it when you can make investments and feel good about them at the same time. This company promotes yoga, healthy living, sells organic clothing and furniture and also sells solar stuff.
It's my longest term holding ever, so I'm pretty happy about the strength of the last two days.
As for today, I'm a little disappointed in myself. I thought I was having a great morning and expected to be up a couple of grand. Unfortunately, it's more like a couple of hundred! I just got a little more chopped than I thought in some crappy trades today, like LNN and RWT...
I'm going to go finish the book I'm reading, Maverick's by Matt Warshaw and come back in the afternoon.
UPDATE: You can read Howard's post about GAIA here.
It was beautiful out there... however, my toes are starting to get cold. It may be time to start looking into "booties."
Check out this really cool site. Basically, it shows in slideshow format images that are being downloaded to blogger. It's just random, but fun to watch.
Anyway, time to get my trade on. Dow 25,000 here we come!
Ah well, get out of the way of the bulls (again).
I'm ready to buy stock again. Bernanke cured me of my bearishness. I'm more convinced than ever that this game is completely rigged in the bull's favor and that really, it's a big waste of time trying to short the market... at least longer term.
They always save the bulls.
Anyway, I'm shot. Oddly enough, I made my best trade of the day in the morning... on the short side in LAZ.
After the LEH numbers, all the financial stocks gapped higher. This provided and excellent and easy opportunity to get short. I got short LAZ in the high $41 area and covered when it slammed below $41 at around 9:45.
It's funny looking at that graph. I mean, why didn't I get massively long the stock at 2:15, right? I had to make things difficult by being all bearish. Silly me!
Anyway, after the FED pasted the bears, I got long UBB and made good money there too. It was hard not to...
Of course, I was still stupid and gave back money trying to short HXM... why would I try to short when the FED cut 50bp? I really, truly thought the market would panic on that news and that after that huge run that we'd pull back and go negative.
I really thought that and it crippled me from making huge money today. I was skittish in all of my longs and looking short!
This really strikes home the point about being neutral-minded when trading the markets. Look at the graphs and let them tell you what is happening in the market. Get any bullishness or bearishness out of your head and just trade.
Anyway, here's the stats.
P&L, $2757
Best, LAZ, $1023
Worst, HXM, -$432
47,200 shares traded.
18 stocks traded, 12 winners, 6 losers.
180 trades.
Me, $2757 on 47,200 shares traded.
Akalawoo, $1785 on 4 contracts.
Misstrade, $1260 on 6500 shares traded.
Bubs, $469 on 2600 shares traded.
Evolution, vacation.
OBAT, vacation.
Tapeworm, -$35 on 4 contracts.
Denarii, -$75 on 400 shares traded.
Has anyone else noticed that the higher the market goes, the shriller Maria's voice gets?
Clearly, today was a crazy fucked up bail out of the banking industry. 50 basis points, Yay! I mean, people make bad loans and the FED comes to clean up the mess. God Bless America.
Anyway, it was a good day for the VO. There was no "pullback." If you bought at 2:15 and held, you made good money.
Tomorrow should be great. In fact, the next 10 years should be good. Dow 20,000 here we come!
Also, if you are a NYSE trader, please see my earlier post from today about the new fees.
Meanwhile, my daily post will be late. I need to get out of here for awhile.
