# Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)



## darkhorse70

As the title suggests I am about to embark on my first real trading experience within the next 2 weeks or so. Starting capital will be around $11,000. Ill keep a detailed diary of my trades, why I made the trade, my hopes, expectations, strategies, thoughts, doubts etc and post them up here.

The purpose of it will just be so that maybe other noobs can learn from my mistakes and maybe from some tribulations haha. Maybe just illustrate how I would look for stocks, filter them etc and manage them.

I will report the price the stock was bought at/sold at etc. I will be a longer term trader, mostly scouting out the "perfect" setups hahaha, in my mind.

I wont really be reading the comments of other peoples made on this thread while I am in a trade just because I don't want my decisions and thoughts to be influenced in any manner.

There will not be any mumbo jumbo formulas and such. Purely based mainly on technical analysis, more so on simple patters, volume and simple trading rules/strategies/management.

Hopefully it will be an entertaining and maybe  an educational thread haha.


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## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorses "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Great to hear.  Wish you well.  You're an interesting character, so I look forward to your take on your trades with your own cash.



pinkboy


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks pinkboy. Hopefully it will kick my learning curve into a new gear.


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## VSntchr

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Darkhorse, I think this is a really good idea and hope that it benefits you greatly. Have fun on the journey 

One friendly tip: try not to write yourself off by adding 'haha' to your sentences (even your thread title).


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## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Anyone who goes live with their trading journey 
Has the opportunity to learn exponentially.

The clearer you can be in your strategy the better.
Keep it simple.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Far out I just typed a long response with an example trade and it didn't save.......

Thanks VS. Point taken. I laugh a lot in real life so I guess it just transferred over onto the net. That plus ive had some arguments/discussions with some people on other threads so for example when I said 'perfect setup' followed by haha I nearly meant no hard feelings.

Tech ill try to keep it as simple as possible. 

Below is a simple trade which I took on, on the ASX simulator on the 11th of august. This is just a simulator but my real trading experience will follow with this sort of structure however much more detail.

I saw a decent opportunity with SEK (SEEK) with a descending triangle. I purchased around 772 shares on 11th of august @ $16.15 with a set goal at $18.50. I was stopped out on the 26th with a trail stop at $16.98 just by another 2cents. Unfortunately I was more obsessed about taking profits then letting the trade run. 

The main lesson which I learnt from this was just viewing trades in terms of % rather than $ figures. I know people mention it all the time but once you accept this fact and set a goal of say 15% as an example as your target for the end of the year in terms of return its much easier to let the trade run IMO then to say to yourself ' I just lost 300$ in profit or whatever.

This trade was an easy decision. There were to main trends in play. A shorter term down trend, a longer term uptrend and a clear defined support level. The other major thing was that the supply of stocks had been overcoming demand and prices had kept rising lower and lower. However the long term trend line and shorter term trend line had intersected and the stock price was fast approaching that intersection point. II took comfort in the fact that the stronger trend line was facing upwards adding some favour to a longer position.

Just as I got in the position, a day or two after the stock shot up through the pattern. It wasn't followed by heavy volume so I was sceptical. $17.50 was in my mind the first spot where resistance could be met. I believed there would be players who were stuck near that level and would want to get out when it came back.

In fact it did and prices did drop but hopefully that overhanging supply has been drawn up. You don't need to understand why it happens or justify your position but I feel more confident in what could happen by trying to understand what's formed the pattern etc.

My real trades will be much more detailed and taken more seriously but I thought id just share this example.

Obviously there are other factors like why to choose certain stocks etc over others. My education is limited and experience however Ill try to explain my process of thought in my real trades soon.


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## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Think in terms of Total risk V Total reward on closed trades.
 By bringing your stop to at least B/E as soon as possible this 
increases your Risk to reward on closed trades ratio.

So initially your risk maybe $300 and your reward $1500 if it gets there 
5:1
If you move stop to B/E and your taken out then your risk was Zero on that trade (Bar brokerage)

After 10 trades your average Risk and Average reward can be calculated.
The higher return the better.
It tips the scales in your favour.


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## Julia

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Good on you, dh.

And the great paragraphing is much appreciated also.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

But tech, how much of your position would you liquidate to cover your risk. If your slightly up in profit then you would have to liquidate more of your holdings to B/E. Is there a certain percentage you aim for or its all dependable on the riskiness of the trade?

Thanks Julia.


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## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> But tech, how much of your position would you liquidate to cover your risk. If your slightly up in profit then you would have to liquidate more of your holdings to B/E. Is there a certain percentage you aim for or its all dependable on the riskiness of the trade?
> 
> Thanks Julia.





Dark,

Tech is talking about moving your Stop Loss to break even (not closing a portion of your trade), so when you are stopped out, the final result of that particular trade on your overall profit and loss will have a minimal negative effect.  If you manage to get a large number of your losing trades to near break even, you don't need near as many winners to make your bottom line attractive  ... and everyone likes an attractive bottom line


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## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I saw a decent opportunity with SEK (SEEK) with a descending triangle. I purchased around 772 shares on 11th of august @ $16.15 with a set goal at $18.50. I was stopped out on the 26th with a trail stop at $16.98 just by another 2cents. Unfortunately I was more obsessed about taking profits then letting the trade run.




You put on a position just before SEK due to report. That can be quite risky as things can come out of the left field. 

If I spot a pattern and I know it's reporting soon, I'd keep a close eye on it and wait to put on a position once the price action subsequent to the report conforms with your chart reading. If you hold a position blindly into reporting... sometimes you can nail it, other times you can get cut badly.... and you will get more volatility in your equity curve.



Julia said:


> Good on you, dh.
> 
> And the great paragraphing is much appreciated also.




+1. I can now look and comprehend his posts without going cross-eyed.


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## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



barney said:


> and everyone likes an attractive bottom




Fixed that for you!



pinkboy


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## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



skc said:


> If you hold a position blindly into reporting... *sometimes you can nail it, other times you can get cut badly.... and you will get more volatility in your equity curve.*




Good advice  ..... (Put that in your black book Dark)




skc said:


> +1. I can now look and comprehend his posts without going cross-eyed.





LOL .....


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## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



pinkboy said:


> Fixed that for you!
> 
> 
> 
> pinkboy




Haha .... I was just being polite .....  There are Ladies present


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Oh that makes sense barney.

Skc I didnt realize. I just remembered I was signed up for the game but wasnt prepared to put all my thoughts into it. I dont plan on trading in aussie markets. I did a quick analysis but I agree trading prior to reports is gambling. But then again the consensus of the price is still made up so I still think that you can tell the possibility of the result through price action before it is reported (sometimes).

Sometimes I type without thinking. If im having a convo with you in real life ill jump from subject to subject. My minds always racing.


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## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> . I did a quick analysis but I agree *trading prior to reports is gambling*. But then again the consensus of the price is still made up so I still think that you can tell the possibility of the result through price action before it is reported (sometimes).




Dark, 

Its not really gambling as such (if at all), but as SKC eluded to, there is more risk involved ......

I haven't traded mid/large caps for a long time, but regarding Reports, I'd say that giving consideration to the percentage that a stock has moved* in either direction *in the days/weeks prior to the Report might be worth taking into consideration as to whether holding or folding is appropriate ....

For example, if a stock has run up 3-4% prior to an impending report, then even a positive report may be already factored in to the price, and vica verca .... 

That is the discretionary part of trading, and knowing that particular Stock's habits might be the only reliable "indicator" to the likely outcome ...... 

Of course that in itself will still only be a decision based on past statistical evidence,  and may end up being totally incorrect

The above, and a gazillion other unknowns are what makes trading difficult, and why,  the only thing we can control (how much we are prepared to risk via a stop loss/the position size we take on) are what we should focus on, because that is the only way we can skew some of the odds in our favour ..... barring plain good luck of course, which personally I would not survive without

Cheers.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Agreed barney. Im trying to think like a contrarian when it comes to report time. My thinkong is that some where out there some one knows some potential insider info and maybe some how I can detect that in some sort of volume pattern leading up to the days of the report. Its volume would be minute so not sure if it would be possible but.


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## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Why worry?

Just take a look at QAN yesterday
2.8 billion loss
Rises 8%


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I saw that tech. Thats why I ill just wait for a report to confirm my thesis and not before if its too close.


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## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I saw that tech. Thats why I ill just wait for a report to confirm my thesis and not before if its too close.




If its at the point of making a decision to buy or sell---then it maybe more advantageous to read what the market is saying coming into a report rather than waiting for the report---by way of price action.


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## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



tech/a said:


> Why worry?
> 
> Just take a look at QAN yesterday
> 2.8 billion loss
> Rises 8%





80+ million reasons to buy

Up almost another 5% today on substantial volume .......   Stay away from the fan perhaps:fan


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Agreed tech.

Haha barney, how so u get info on amount of stocks shorted? Is that through your broker?


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## Sir Osisofliver

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Agreed tech.
> 
> Haha barney, how so u get info on amount of stocks shorted? Is that through your broker?





Short positions are required to be reported....

Here's the raw data at ASIC website  link

So darkhorse, are you planning to share your methodology?

Cheers

Sir O


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks sir o.

I wouldn't say I have a concrete methodology. It's more just adopting successful traders rules and methods and ones which have struck a nerve with me. Once I place an actual trade, Ill explain why I selected that stock, how I plan on managing the trade, etc.

I'm going to be much more selective on entering trades. Since my starting capital will be only 11K I don't plan on having any sort of diversification. Hence I'm only going to enter trades which I believe have a lot of factors in my favour at the time. High Risk/Reward ratios. 

I plan on targeting well known companies which are still relatively knew in terms of outstanding shares. More so because it has the potential of having greater breakouts or having the opportunity to be 'more' spring loaded for a potential huge run. I don't have the exact figure of the perfect outstanding shares number so its more like comparing it to other stocks. I'm thinking maybe in the 100-300M range.

Being a well known company with a product that the average investor can relate to will allow the stock to have greater volatility. More so focusing on speculative businesses such as TESLA or FACEBOOK/TWITTER.

Another factor will be pricing. Not to expensive nor to cheap. I don't want it to be too cheap as the stock price can be manipulated easier and less chance of institutional investing. On the other hand expensive stocks have less upside potential (not always).

I don't plan on fighting the trend. I plan on riding trends when I get in a position. That may only be days or weeks, depending on my target.

Ill be more detailed on every aspect of my methodology once I put on the trade. These methods are just adopted so I'm just using them as a guide and I'll tweak them to what ratios work best for me through experience.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I guess my biggest goal is to find patterns which are yelling out I'm being accumulated by big firms or distributed and just jump on for the ride. Easier said then done though.

Another factor is how the markets are going to possibly affect my trading. Can I survive if the markets turn downwards. How much is purely based on the market carrying me and how much skill do I even have?


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## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Agreed tech.
> 
> Haha barney, how so u get info on amount of stocks shorted? Is that through your broker?





As Sir O mentioned its available via ASIC ..... always makes interesting reading


On the QAN scenario, the data has been updated since I posted. Running a line through it we have ...

*Date and number of Shorts held*
21st August........ 81,629,927
22nd August........81,845,755
25th August........60,269,731

So there was a bit of covering just prior to the announcements.  Its been a good example of why its hard to trade the news.


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## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



barney said:


> As Sir O mentioned its available via ASIC ..... always makes interesting reading
> 
> 
> On the QAN scenario, the data has been updated since I posted. Running a line through it we have ...
> 
> *Date and number of Shorts held*
> 21st August........ 81,629,927
> 22nd August........81,845,755
> 25th August........60,269,731
> 
> So there was a bit of covering just prior to the announcements.  Its been a good example of why its hard to trade the news.




Doesn't that say on the 26th go long?


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## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



tech/a said:


> Doesn't that say on the 26th go long?




The ASIC figures are delayed by 3 days. So the data for 25th isn't available until today unfortunately.


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## DJG

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



VSntchr said:


> One friendly tip: try not to write yourself off by adding 'haha' to your sentences (even your thread title).




This! I strongly advise reading the above again, then again the next day. No offence intended.



darkhorse70 said:


> Another factor will be pricing. Not to expensive nor to cheap. I don't want it to be too cheap as the stock price can be manipulated easier and less chance of institutional investing. On the other hand expensive stocks have less upside potential (not always).




By "cheap" and "expensive" are you referring to the stock price, or to the state of its intrinsic value? I assume the stock price...

I noticed you also said, you want to "set a goal", either a hard $ figure or preferably eg. 15% return per year. Do you think you have the discipline not to over leverage, or enter a trade you usually wouldn't just in order to achieve that given goal? What if you were showing 10% return for the year with a month to go, and you really wanted that 15%?

Nevertheless, I'll look on with interest.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Yea DJG, i meant the price of the stock but every situation/scenario is different. For example even with TESLA trading at around 260$ atm, id still be interested in placing a trade on it. But if I have a bunch of candidates i'd just have to weight the pros/cons of all the stocks then choose the one with the best probability.

Your last point is a good one. I was also thinking, If i did manage to get over my set target early on would I settle for it or try to make as much gains as possible. Just from reading books and stuff I get the impression that there are some really good years where a lot of gains are made and then the market changes and it can be a bad spell of losses or not as much opportunities till you can make a new methodology.

So to sum it up, I don't really know how I'm going to approach that issue. I guess staying solvent for now will be my number 1 priority till I can learn enough. Hence Ill have to keep that in my mind and wait for the right opportunity instead of trying to reach $/% goals.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

^ The point of the 2nd paragraph was that I should take the trades on because they are good candidates and not because I want to hit $/% targets. I dont want to start being conservative because ive hit my targets and i dont want to overtrade because Ive missed targets.
 Easier said than done


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*





An update of the simulator trade of seek (sek). At one point I was up around $750 at the close on the initial $12.5k outlay. 

Review of the trade

After being stopped out some where around $17.45 I re-entered and moved my stop loss down to $16.65 where it still is at currently. Current price of SEK is at 16.80 or so. So basically all my paper profits vanished to thin air 

That being said I didn't want to cut the winner short. I had to go back and read Jesse livermores book. He basically said as long as he was in a profit he could sleep like a baby and that was the houses money he was playing with. Even though I was up around 6/7% and as much as I wanted to cut the trade short I still let it run and believe its the right thing to do.

The pullback was on less than average volume (although ive read stocks don't necessarily need to be accompanied by high volume to collapse). $16.70 and $16 are pivot points (support levels).

I still believe over hanging supply is minimal and was also some what absorbed on the recent up move. Looking at the last 2/3 up moves they bounced off the upward trend line and increased by 30/50%. On that note if the same is to occur this time prices could end up at around $23/26$.

I also believe the general market is at a critical point although its still trending upwards till confirmed other wise.

Overall emotionally I'm trying not to get frustrated at the fact that to lose 6/7% gain is still a big deal and emotionally nerve racking loll.

One last note is that October is around the corner. I'm no expert but Ive heard that October is historically a bad month and the fact that the markets been running up for around 5 years I'd personally just be cautious and could even stay on the side lines.


On another note, sorry for the delay. I should have my live account up and running this week or the next few. That doesn't mean ill be taking on trades. Not till the timing is right.


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## burglar

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> ... Ive heard that October is historically a bad month  ...




“October: This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February.” Mark Twain


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## rb250660

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

A few comments.



darkhorse70 said:


> After being stopped out some where around $17.45 I re-entered and moved my stop loss down to $16.65 where it still is at currently. Current price of SEK is at 16.80 or so. So basically all my paper profits vanished to thin air




Never move your stop down.



darkhorse70 said:


> That being said I didn't want to cut the winner short. I had to go back and read Jesse livermores book. He basically said as long as he was in a profit he could sleep like a baby and that was the houses money he was playing with. Even though I was up around 6/7% and as much as I wanted to cut the trade short I still let it run and believe its the right thing to do.




Sleep well at night? What happens when it gaps down 80% over night like NEN and PBT earlier this year. My point is you aren't safe from over night gaps and the longer you hold the more risk you are taking on through exposure to adverse news and market conditions amongst others.



darkhorse70 said:


> I still believe over hanging supply is minimal and was also some what absorbed on the recent up move. Looking at the last 2/3 up moves they bounced off the upward trend line and increased by 30/50%. On that note if the same is to occur this time prices could end up at around $23/26$.




What trend line? It's basing, either being accumulated or more likely distributed after a gap up. Keep it simple, buy higher highs and higher lows. Sell lower highs and lower lows.
You're only guessing about a further magnitude of move up too.
Also watch out for the gap to backfill. Look at IOH.

SEK looks like it could provide some great swing trading opportunities. Ranging between 16 and 17 odd. Good support at 16.

Keep putting in the hard yards mate, it's worth it when you 'get it'.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Haha burglar that made me crack up. Ill have to steal that quote.

Rb25, my impression of moving your stop loss down applies when you keep moving it down so you dont get stopped out. I got stopped out, re assesed the situation and got back in. I only moved the stop loss down to a more significant level, so I dont get stopped out u necessarily.  However im still figuring out the stop loss stuff and am experimenting with other peoples advice etc.

Hopefully my stop loss could get triggered and I could take minmal damage if it gapped overnight. I tried the intra day trading style but it drove me insane. To much concetration and emotional control is needed for small gains ( it could add up to alot though). I try to choose stocks that arent 'too' wild but things happen. Id play very defensively at the entry of the trade and once in profit be a bit more laid back.

If you go back to the previous page I put up a photo of the longer term uptrend line. Its actually a near image of teslas uptrend line/pattern. Its approaching its trendline and will collide with it by october 14 at this price. The 2 previous times it did so it jumped 30/50%. My only concern is, is this stock over extended and is it being distributed. I havent seen any sort of unusual volume to suggest so but it might be done slower so hard to say.

By the way im not arguing with you, just discussing. Thanks for the feedback. Appreciated.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Its time for me to open a brokerage account. I know theres tonnes of info on the site regarding this but can any one point me in a reasonable direction regarding a good broker. 

My main concern is the fees. I really want to get in tye american equities market so if I can get some thing with low fees then it gives me a bit of an upper hand. Im going to be really selective about the traes I enter so hopefully my win/loss rate will be highER...

Also any advice regarding structure of the business. Should I trade as a business or just as an individual. Obviously its going to take a while before I can earn anything to even be taxed. My consensus is to create a company so my personal income isnt included hence ill be taxed potential profits? I plan on re investing every penny which I generate for a decade. Harder said than done but with my calculations if I add 20k per year it will be around 3/4years before I even reach the first tax bracket.

Any thoughts?

Thanks


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## CanOz

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Its time for me to open a brokerage account. I know theres tonnes of info on the site regarding this but can any one point me in a reasonable direction regarding a good broker.
> 
> My main concern is the fees. I really want to get in tye american equities market so if I can get some thing with low fees then it gives me a bit of an upper hand. Im going to be really selective about the traes I enter so hopefully my win/loss rate will be highER...
> 
> Also any advice regarding structure of the business. Should I trade as a business or just as an individual. Obviously its going to take a while before I can earn anything to even be taxed. My consensus is to create a company so my personal income isnt included hence ill be taxed potential profits? I plan on re investing every penny which I generate for a decade. Harder said than done but with my calculations if I add 20k per year it will be around 3/4years before I even reach the first tax bracket.
> 
> Any thoughts?
> 
> Thanks




Interactive Brokers

You can short most US stocks, hope you can learn how to do that, you might need it soon


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## rb250660

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Any thoughts?
> Thanks




If you set up a company you will probably need the services of an accountant to do it, not sure what the fees are but I reckon you wouldn't get much change from a grand or two. Then there's the annual tax return for it (and I think ASIC compliance guff) and your own annual tax return too. Probably another grand a year.

You'll pay a flat 30% tax on any profits. So by my rough calculations you'll need to make around $180,000pa for a company structure to be superior to a personal taxation setup.

http://calculators.ato.gov.au/scripts/axos/axos.asp?CONTEXT=&KBS=ctax2014.xr4&go=ok

This is not financial advice but merely my own thoughts.


As for brokers, I use CMC but I only trade ASX equities.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks Canoz, that's what I was looking at. Will have to go through the website properly tomorrow. Lol, im pretty sceptical about the market conditions right now. Just going to wait on the side lines till I feel more confident about a setup plus overall market. Actually TSLA (TESLA) is right near its long term upward trend line but I feel its to risky/volatile.

I want to start on a positive note so I don't have as 'MUCH' emotional baggage at the start.


Thanks rb25, your points are true. My aunty is an accountant but she said shed charge me for her service (shes Asian so her mentality is probably different to mine haha). I guess setting up an company is out of the picture for the mean time. 

Thanks for the feedback guys


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## John Swift

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I do some of my trading through a company. The cost for setup is a couple of hundred dollars. The cost for ongoing maintenance is about $500 a year, including accounting fees.

The tax isn't such a big issue. Remembering you can pay yourself a reasonable wage (tax deductible) or franked dividends, it's not really true that it only becomes a benefit after $180k... Aside from the fixed costs for setup, it can be basically the same as an individual up until the end of the 30% bracket when it starts to be more beneficial. This is my understanding, anyway.

My setup is a little more complex than that, but the company is part of a trust structure, which affords even better tax planning avenues for if you have a family. Worthwhile talking to your accountant about it all, actually.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks john, I guess for the first few months ill trade as an individual. Once I become abit more consistant at trading ill speak to an account soley because currently I have no savings. God knows how much these white collared individuals charge per hour loll.


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## John Swift

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Thanks john, I guess for the first few months ill trade as an individual. Once I become abit more consistant at trading ill speak to an account soley because currently I have no savings. God knows how much these white collared individuals charge per hour loll.




Not sure of your personal circumstances, but this just reminded me of an article in Forbes (? not sure, but it was right next to the Economist and TIME) that I was browsing at the airport on Thursday. It was talking about how to get $54000 free of tax through a family trust structure. Good as a basic primer if you're wandering the aisles of the newsagent in the next week or so.


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## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Im starting a new job this week so I can start earning something. I was getting 11$ an hour, working 25hrs a week as a 22yr old so I had no way of saving. I wouldn't even hit the first tax bracket at that rate haha.


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## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Im starting a new job this week so I can start earning something. I was getting 11$ an hour, working 25hrs a week as a 22yr old so I had no way of saving. I wouldn't even hit the first tax bracket at that rate haha.




How do they get away with that?  Minimum wage is more than that surely?

pinkboy


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



John Swift said:


> Not sure of your personal circumstances, but this just reminded me of an article in Forbes (? not sure, but it was right next to the Economist and TIME) that I was browsing at the airport on Thursday. It was talking about how to get $54000 free of tax through a family trust structure. Good as a basic primer if you're wandering the aisles of the newsagent in the next week or so.




Without reading it, sounds like distributing income from a DFT to 3+ people who are not working to sneak under the first tax bracket ($18,200 x 3 = $54,600).


pinkboy


----------



## John Swift

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



pinkboy said:


> Without reading it, sounds like distributing income from a DFT to 3+ people who are not working to sneak under the first tax bracket ($18,200 x 3 = $54,600).
> 
> 
> pinkboy





Yep. Mum and dad as directors of a corporate trustee with three children as beneficiaries. May or may not be relevant, but the way the article explains the concept of trusts is a good primer.


----------



## McLovin

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



John Swift said:


> Yep. Mum and dad as directors of a corporate trustee with three children as beneficiaries. May or may not be relevant, but the way the article explains the concept of trusts is a good primer.




If the children are under 18 the tax free threshold is $416 for most passive income, which most definitely includes family trust income. The rate goes to 66% for income up to $1,307. If the child earns more than $1,307 then the _entire_ amount is taxed at 45%.


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



McLovin said:


> If the children are under 18 the tax free threshold is $416 for most passive income, which most definitely includes family trust income.




Yeah, I know because it was a question I asked when setting my (few too many) DFTs up.  Cant pay Miss. 9 much out of the distributions.  I divert funds to another company that is a beneficiary and that gets taxed at 30%.  Not much else you can do really.


pinkboy


----------



## McLovin

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



pinkboy said:


> Yeah, I know because it was a question I asked when setting my (few too many) DFTs up.  Cant pay Miss. 9 much out of the distributions.  I divert funds to another company that is a beneficiary and that gets taxed at 30%.  Not much else you can do really.
> 
> 
> pinkboy




The problem with the corporate bene is that since they bought in the Div 7A rules you have to physically pay the money out to the corporate. It was much simpler when you just created a distribution declared but not paid.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Pinkboy minimum wage I think is 18 dollars an hour. Its a food business so its all cash in hand. I took what I could get but yeah its slave labour in simple terms.


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

You would have been better off earning minimum wage and paying (little) tax than the cash in hand.

What job are you in now, is it full time and are you being paid legit?


pinkboy


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I'd be far better off ppaying a tiny tax but minimum wage. I think that's how they saved so much money. Im going to work at a nursing home, in the kitchen serving food to old people. My mum, uncles, 2 x aunties and my aunties sister (manager loll) all work in the kitchen. 

It's not a dream job but working 25hrs a week with a wage of 22$ an hour plus 33$ on weekends should make ends meet.

I told my current employers I dislocated my knee and wont be able to walk for 12 weeks. It was the gutless way out but I felt bad contemplating about telling my boss I found a better paying job.

On another note, I was filling out the online stuff for Interactive broker. It said minimum net asset worth has to be above 25K. Also net liquidity worth over 25K. What  could happen if I don't meet those criteria and I say I do. Im not trading with any leveraged tools. Only going to trade in equities. I don't understand why its a requirement other than the law says that's the way it is.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I plan on adding 2k per month or so to the trading account indefinitely hence I should meet those requirements soon enough. I said I met the requirements but worst case scenario I just claim it was up to personal interpretation. I have bikes in my garage which I value at x amount of dollars and MAYBE I have a stash of money under my bed.

I also had to have made atleast a 100 trades to be eligible to sign up for an account. My brother pointed out ' you have, on the simulator'. Haha, on a serious note is there anything serious which could result?


----------



## DJG

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Are you applying for an individual account? I assume not..


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I am DJG.


----------



## burglar

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I am DJG.




How long have you been DJG?


----------



## rb250660

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



burglar said:


> How long have you been DJG?




Hmm, yes, I am interested to know too.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Haha, on another note if Twitter hits 50$, and my account is setup by then I might enter, set a stop loss at 49$ and aim for first target 55$, then 65$ and move the trail stop to 65$ for a potential target of 73$.

That is if the overall markets dont break their uptrend.

I only have currently $7000 but Interactive broker claims on their site that 100 shares cost a dollar brokerage fee.

That makes it a very low risk set up, assuming I can get out at the price I intend. I have wrote pages of analysis work in my diary aboit TWTR. More so on why I believe its a good trade. Nuthing based fundamentally but I will maybe post up a photo as itll take forever to type up.

I believe that its confirmed its upward trend.if you lookat activity its greatly increased since its low, and most likely was accumilated by big players when the weak players were flushed out during the date when ingernal shareholders were legally allowed to sell.

Ive lost some edge as the price has climbed from its 30's to its 50s. However overhanging supply has been absorbed. Only one major spot left to absorb.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Another point of entry would be $55.


----------



## pixel

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Pinkboy minimum wage I think is 18 dollars an hour. Its a food business so its all cash in hand. I took what I could get but yeah its slave labour in simple terms.




After the latest 3% rise in June, the minimum wage is $16.87 an hour.


----------



## DJG

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I am DJG.





burglar said:


> How long have you been DJG?





rb250660 said:


> Hmm, yes, I am interested to know too.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



burglar said:


> How long have you been DJG?





Funny man Burg


D/Horse,

None of my business and just my opinion, but if you have to tell furphies to open an international trading account, I'd be inclined to wait until you have the required prerequisites.  Its your call however.


----------



## DJG

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Darkhorse - here is the commissions/fees/brokerage:

*Fixed:*

Your US trades:



Australian trades:



https://www.interactivebrokers.com.au/en/index.php?f=commission&p=stocks1

*Tiered*

North America trades:



I would look at the all the fee's here (tiered) as there is also clearing fee's etc.
https://www.interactivebrokers.com.au/en/index.php?f=commission&p=stocks2

In regard to the minimum:
If you're under 25 then its the *equivalent* to $3000USD.
If you're over 25, its the *equivalent* to $10,000USD

There is also minimum monthly activity fee's:
https://www.interactivebrokers.com.au/en/index.php?f=4969

I don't know where you found the $25,000 assets you must have (on a side note, you must have some expensive bikes). That is potentially for an individual with a margin account maybe, or a company structure or something else besides what you should be doing - as it appears to me anyway.



barney said:


> Funny man Burg
> 
> 
> D/Horse,
> 
> None of my business and just my opinion, but if you have to tell furphies to open an international trading account, I'd be inclined to wait until you have the required prerequisites.  Its your call however.





That he is 

I would also reiterate the above - you don't want to get into a habit of it, people who tend to do something misleading once, do it twice and so on so forth - would you lie to get a home loan?


----------



## Julia

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



barney said:


> D/Horse,
> 
> None of my business and just my opinion, but if you have to tell furphies to open an international trading account, I'd be inclined to wait until you have the required prerequisites.  Its your call however.



+100.   
Plus the lie to your boss about a damaged knee.   No need for this.  It's entirely reasonable for someone to move on to a better paying job and your ex-boss would appreciate knowing that perhaps he needs to pay more to keep staff.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks for the feedback guys. Dangaff, I think I chosw thw fasttrackpro which gives you more options such as being able to trade internationally, cfd etc. Maybe thats why they need those requirements but I only tickes the stocks box so im not sure. The online chat support said that was the requirements just because. 

I read somethibg about clive palmer when he was young lying about his age to get a job in real estate which was basically what launched his wealth. Point being if there is no harm being done then you have to risk it. I dont see the risk I would pose no threat to IB especially because im trading equities. Maybe its just some legal tape they had to get over?

In regards to would I lie for a loan I dont think so. Im planning on living with my parents till im 40 haha, I need this accounts compounding powers to keep growing.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Julia, they are a husband and wife. The woman is 52 years old. 5 years ago she was a bouncer at kings cross haha. Shes intimidating. I feel me and the boss (the husband) have become friends so I feel like im personally letting him down. 

When I got the job I said I was looking to work for a long time but that was before I knew the pay.

Its a gutless way out but this way it feels as though they wouldnt blame me. Plus they think I should be thankfull for working there. It should be the other way around.

Moral of the story. Keep business strictly business. Dont become friends and emotional.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Trust me they are not your average orthodox boss. They are very out there. Put it this way. The husband talks about how he picked up a prostitute from the streets while his wife is listening to the convo (prior to their marriage) hahahaha.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Trust me they are not your average orthodox boss. They are very out there. Put it this way. The husband talks about how he picked up a prostitute from the streets while his wife is listening to the convo (prior to their marriage) hahahaha.





Fair dinkum Horse .. you are hanging round the wrong crowd .... When old mate finds out you lied to him about your injured knee, I hope he doesn't have the compulsion to come and break your other one!! ..... That's meant to be a joke ... I hope it remains one:1zhelp:


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Hahaha barney im cracking up. Im actually more scared of the woman. The womans son knows a thing or 2 about trading. Maybe he is a member of this site... hahaha


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

(Barney your pm box is full)

Thanks for your concern Barney. I understand the only thing which can be controlled in trading is the 'RISK' aspect. From my one year of paper trading I've come to the conclusion that I want to be as selective and conservative as possible, at least in the beginning. As Paul Tudor Jones said ' Why not make your life a pursue of happiness rather than misery'. I do not want to be in that emotionally roller coaster effect by getting myself into trades that I shouldn't be.

I've changed the way I view trading. I've set a percentage goal of 15% return per year (maybe its an arrogant goal, but after a years worth of trading ill be more realistic on expectations).

I've truly grasped the idea of the power of compounding interest. I've set a long term goal of 40 years and by know means am I setting a 'get rich quick scheme' mentality.

I have to always remind myself that discipline and patience are one of the most important ingredients' to success, at least In this industry. Hence I'm reinforcing that mind set every day.

Again, thanks for the heads up and support. I hope I don't end up just like another statistic. I also ordered a book, Trading in the Zone by Mark Douglas (I think). I need to change the way I view risk. Currently I get frustrated when the trade doesn't go my way but I have to understand that its just an 'expense' of trading and cant be avoided.



Kind Regards

Patrick


On another note, any one who is a member of Interactive broker? Im currently in the application process and I need some proof of identification. Im providing a bank statement and drivers license but it also needs 2 other secondary proofs of address and identity. Can I just get a justice of peace to verify my drivers license and bank statement as I don't really have any utility bills etc for ID.


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I have to always remind myself that discipline and patience are one of the most important ingredients' to success, at least In this industry. Hence I'm reinforcing that mind set every day.




Actually the most important thing is trading *skill*. Newbies always skip this point in the hope that they have been magically chosen to succeed if only they can follow some vague guidelines and plan in spite of them not having one. Which of course leads them up **** creek without a map and this then can only lead you to random unplanned frustrated trades. And joining the masses in complaining about "more discipline" and looking for another easy to read book.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I understand the only thing which can be controlled in trading is the 'RISK' aspect.
> 
> I do not want to be in that emotionally roller coaster effect
> 
> I've set a percentage goal
> 
> I've truly grasped the idea of the power of compounding interest.
> 
> I have to understand that its just an 'expense' of trading and cant be avoided.




Sorry about the PM Box  ... empty now.

Condensed your message  ......  Some good points, especially the Risk!

I'm still not convinced you need to go in via the back door with an undercapitalised IB account at this stage ... maybe get a few more opinions on that

Cheers and good luck.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Haha trembling hand well jesse livermore did say after skill discipline and patience were the most important virtues.

I guess you cant call yourself skilled if you are not patient/disciplined. I just order books because my ego starts to chew me up when im not "advancing my trading skills" in the sense that if im not spending x amount of hours a day doing some thing trading related then im not working hard enough.

I look at successful people and they all seem to be putting in 18 hours a day. I replay scenarios in my head of possible outcomes and try to understand patterns but I fall short in the fact that im not scanning through random charts and getting more xp down.

I always get sucked into a few charts that im interested in and go back to them daily. So hence my dilemma of needing to read books to feel like im doing something usefull.

Barney most of the application is done. As long as there is nuthing which can happen to me by going through the "back door" then im not really fussed. I might give IB a call tomorrow and try to get a better understanding of what the requirement is regarding capitalization.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Barney most of the application is done. As long as there is nuthing which can happen to me by going through the "back door" then im not really fussed. I might give IB a call tomorrow and try to get a better understanding of what the requirement is regarding capitalization.




TH, Tech/a or others will be able to  give you an idea of your margin requirements when holding positions with IB. With a small capital base, you certainly don't want to get into any margin call areas  .... Stay well within your "risk parameters"


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Barney at this current time I wouldnt even attempt to trade on any sort of leverage. Once im consistant enough with minimal draw downs then I guess if capital was an issue leveraging would be a good idea. But thats a very long way away haha.


----------



## burglar

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> ... putting in 18 hours a day ...




If you employed someone, would you be pleased if he were reading SMH within two hours of starting?
Would you rather someone who worked for 8 hours and had to be reminded to take a lunch break?







Careful, it is a trick question!


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I guess you cant call yourself skilled if you are not patient/disciplined. I just order books because my ego starts to chew me up when im not "advancing my trading skills" in the sense that if im not spending x amount of hours a day doing some thing trading related then im not working hard enough.
> 
> I look at successful people and they all seem to be putting in 18 hours a day. I replay scenarios in my head of possible outcomes and try to understand patterns but I fall short in the fact that im not scanning through random charts and getting more xp down.
> 
> I always get sucked into a few charts that im interested in and go back to them daily. So hence my dilemma of needing to read books to feel like im doing something useful.




The world is full of people who put in long hours week after week. Very few of them are successful. Books are easy to read but after a few they stop teaching you much and just entertain and fill in time. Which gets you back to long hours week after week. You don't need capital to build trading skills. You need consistent work on skills,

Learn about the different markets (Bonds, FX, Commods, Futures, Options, Real Estate etc).
Learn back testing (Very important to give you an idea of what/how to skew the odds in your favour(100s of constructive hours)).
Learn about different approaches (Day trading, Swing, Systematic, Divi stripping, Fundie, Arb, etc).
Learn about the big wide world.
Do systematic forward testing of your ideas and keep real stats to prove you deserve to be in the business and under what conditions you deserve to be risking real money.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Haha burglar I think id go for the latter option. But you make a good point.

Trembling hands you're right. I need to broaden my knowledge on other markets such as FX, futures, commodities etc. I have a very basic understanding of what drives them up and down. They are all interlinked so it could give possible clues to the future.

By the way is tgere any books on the different types of trading strategies such as swing trading etc. Know one has really explained the different types of trades. I have a general idea but not enough to give me a clear picture.

General economics interests me. One year ago I didnt even know what inflation was and what caused it. I guess I should thank uni for that one reason loll.

My goal for now will be to keep back testing and forward testing as you suggested (including risk management) as well as increasing my understanding on other markets. Need to order some more books to establish some foundations


Thanks for the feedback guys


----------



## DJG

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

There is probably a thousand books on swing trading, being much of the same stuff. Google or Amazon it.

Here's a 120 odd to get you started:
http://www.amazon.com.au/gp/aw/s/ref=is_box_?k=swing+trading

Go through ASF's "Books & Resources" (or whatever the sub-forum is called) - there will be recommendations in there.

I could be wrong but I probably wouldn't bother trying to draw a connection between 'interlinked derivative markets' in order to predict the future. Perhaps some lag others, but I could guarantee they don't follow each other - otherwise the 10 million people before you would've tried the same thing.


----------



## burglar

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Haha burglar I think id go for the latter option. But you make a good point ...




Just because you put your feet up on the desk and stare out the window, does not mean you have stopped thinking.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

While I agree with the answers shared above---I have my own simplistic view.

Find out how to profit in this business---infact any business.
Understand Reward for Risk and Risk itself as Trade Risk/Portfolio risk/Risk of Ruin.
Understand wether your going to be looking for high % wins and small losses OR
Less Wins and Bigger wins to off set losses.
This will determine to a large extent how you run your business.

Also understand margin and the *CORRECT* use of margin.
The power of Compounding. Pyramiding and the power of 
staying right longer.

Finally learn the* Perato Principal *the most important and least used
truisms of modern business and *LIFE* itself.

Master this and you'll master most things in life!


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks DJG, loll burglar ill have to yet again steal that quote.

Tech, I'm assuming since Ill be more selective with my trades that, that will equate to higher percentage winners but also big winners? I don't know if that is possible but ill be targeting stocks with high R/R ratios. One things for sure Im not going to make the personal mistake of being an impulse trader. Just doesn't work for me. Actually it could work with lower brokerage fees. While I was paper trading I racked up a few thousand dollars worth of fees. I was up around 4/5% - while racking up those fees. But still to much emotional baggage.

That Perato principle is interesting. Nick Radge also said 20% of trades make up for most of your profits.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Thanks DJG, loll burglar ill have to yet again steal that quote.
> 
> Tech, I'm assuming since Ill be more selective with my trades that, that will equate to higher percentage winners but also big winners? I don't know if that is possible but ill be targeting stocks with high R/R ratios. One things for sure Im not going to make the personal mistake of being an impulse trader. Just doesn't work for me. Actually it could work with lower brokerage fees. While I was paper trading I racked up a few thousand dollars worth of fees. I was up around 4/5% - while racking up those fees. But still to much emotional baggage.
> 
> That Perato principle is interesting. Nick Radge also said 20% of trades make up for most of your profits.




You'll find that perceived selection of trades doesn't necessarily equate to a higher % of winners.
Nor to larger winners. logic by yourself and most of the planet has us thinking that way. Somehow we will become skilled enough to get onto 80% of winning Trades and get 80% of the move in our direction.

The truth --- which can only be found through experienced is quite different.

its HOW you trade the TRUTH that will determine profitability.

So your first task is the look at your hypothetical (Ill be super selective and that way have more winners and bigger winners) and find the TRUTH so you can move forward.

Learn about risk reward.
There are 2 calculations---one for position sizing---the one you can manipulate.
and *THE BIGGIE*
One for closed trades ----- The one you cant manipulate--The One that determines how your going!

If no other accounting knowledge---learn this!


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

That makes sense Tech, thanks. Then I guess I have to find as many 'SELECTIVE' trades as I can in order to increase my chance of stumbling across a potential big winner. I'm going to have to deal with the fact that I'm going to be 'wrong' more times than right.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Ok good news. My brokerage account has been finalized. Just have to shift over the funds. Initiall deposit of $7000, then $1000 every fortnightly.

As far as any planned trades, my current consensus is to wait on the sidelines. My chart indicates a break in the current uptrend of the major US equities. Obviously every ones chart is different, hence im just going to wait for some time of confirmation wether its going to continue up or change. At the moment it could swing both ways, so its just to risky.

The stocks I am currently keeping an eye on are presenting oppurtunities for both the long and short side  so waiting for the overalll market to give me some indication of direction is ciritical for my personal strategy.

While I wait, im coming up with a detailed trading strategy/systen which I will be backtesting slowly as well as through actual trading.

Im currently reading a book by Mark Douglas - Trading in the Zone. Personally I have put to much pressure on myself to succeed in trading.  I think it stems from alot of factors but predominantly the fact that money and "success" make you feel superior to your peers/friends.

Ive always been competitive and wanted to be the "alpha dog". My point is that all this emotional baggage will definitely be putting a strain on my trading and clouding my judgement. While I wait for some clarity on market action, hopefully this book provides me on more insight on how to be calm/collected and neutral in viewing data presented by the market.

It should also be an asset which I could use in the real world. Ive always thought of anger/loss of emotional control as a sign of weakness (obviously there are exceptions).

Anyhow ill keep an update on progress. My number one goal is to come up with a strategy to give me an edge. Easier said than done but I should learn alot because of it. I dont mind if it takes years to find one. As long as I keep improving.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

7000$ just been deposited in IB account. Now to wait till an oppurtunity arises...


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

So I wanted to short a stock tonight when an error comes up saying my account isn't allowed to. Firstly I need a margin account and secondly its not offered to aussie residents. That's good to know...


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Your also under your trading minimum I think.
$10,000


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I think the minimum for under 25 years of age is $3000. However im going to add another $1000 this thursday and 500$ onwards every week after.

The last thing I want to do is go against the trend, which could be at a cross roads IMO.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

So I bouggt twitter last night @ 40.20$. Why? Im not to sure. My brain is abit messed up as my friends been losr in blue mountains for 11 days but I thiught it was a giod R/R


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

ATM the markets arent confiring the reversalyet so I sti think it could see a potentail rise.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Goal is to aim for 46-55$


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Sorry for the lack of info. Lots of stuff going on trying to help friend. I will make a proper post as soon as I am focused.


----------



## VSntchr

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> So I bouggt twitter last night @ 40.20$. Why? Im not to sure. My brain is abit messed up as my friends been losr in blue mountains for 11 days but I thiught it was a giod R/R




Earlier on you assured the forum that emotion would not be a factor for you.
This is not supportive of that statement!!!!


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I guess its more a lack of emotion, but I havent had as much time to get a good idea of whats going on due to a lack of time.

Imo the overall balance of supply and demand hasnt shifted or hasnt indicated some sort of ****. Theearnings report pushed some supply out but I believe the situation was exacberated.  Its at a good pivot point however 36$ would be better but I hopped on board now at a 2% risk hoping for a jump.

Subconsciously I have looked at that particular chart so many times so I still believe I know what its doing. To whatever degree that is possible in trading.

I cant focus on my friends situatiin as I have done all I can and hence im trying to re focus on my personal tasks.

Am I emotional. I cant really say.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

The opinion of some traders on this forum have swayed me in the sense that I realise I cant short and im shifting my strategy abit to a more agressive short term trade style on rallies. But as foe twitter im up 3% and im going to let it run. I might move stop to Break even once it hits 46$ and confirms support.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Another factor ive been up 3 nights in a row waiting for twtr and fb to report earnings. I got knocked out both times haha. I wanted to break my trading virginity (emotions at its finest). But I still was disciplned enough to admitt it was a setup id have odds in or not.


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Its at a good pivot point however 36$ would be better but I hopped on board now at a 2% risk hoping for a jump.




How did you position size that?


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I set a risk of 1$. So I bought 160 shares with a total risk of 160$. At first I was going to set the risk at 50c which since I am undercapitilzed would mean I only risk 1% but I decided to risk a dollar as I wanted to be well under 40$ for two reasons.

Firstly pshycologically we all know round numbers are stronger support lvls ( I think) and previous support lvl was at 39$ with a standard devation of a dollar I guess.

So to minimize me getting stopped out as I was going to go to sleep I set the risk abit bigger to take into consideration price swings but I didnt set it to big to get me burnt.

Ive come to the realisation that my communication skills are horrible and I give the impression that im arrogant etc but im working on it.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

4 days ago it dropped $8

Do you seriously think the earnings report is going to be a signal for a long play!
This has doom written all over it!


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> I set a risk of 1$. So I bought 160 shares with a total risk of 160$. At first I was going to set the risk at 50c which since I am undercapitilzed would mean I only risk 1% but I decided to risk a dollar as I wanted to be well under 40$ for two reasons.
> 
> Firstly pshycologically we all know round numbers are stronger support lvls ( I think) and previous support lvl was at 39$ with a standard devation of a dollar I guess.
> 
> So to minimize me getting stopped out as I was going to go to sleep I set the risk abit bigger to take into consideration price swings but I didnt set it to big to get me burnt.
> 
> Ive come to the realisation that my communication skills are horrible and I give the impression that im arrogant etc but im working on it.




Are you holding longer than 1 day?


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

And you punched in 71% of your capital in your first trade? 





pinkboy


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> The opinion of some traders on this forum have swayed me in the sense that I realise I cant short and im shifting my strategy abit to a more agressive short term trade style on rallies. But as foe twitter im up 3% and im going to let it run. I might move stop to Break even once it hits 46$ and confirms support.





Hi Dark,

I preface my opinion with "do what's right for you", but just an observation

You took an initial position with 2% risk .... all good

You are up 3%  ..... all good

You are going to wait til it hits $46 till you move your stop to break even ...

You are not sleeping 3 nights running  .........

Why not move your stop to break even now and sleep at night?  

Bearing in mind stocks can gap overnight pretty severely so even a tight stop may not help

3% in a day or two is pretty good shooting from my experience, and as pointed out, if it dropped $8 in a day, I'd be concerned about a 2% stop holding for any period of time.

Not advice, just observation and I could be totally on tilt.  I hope it continues up for ya


----------



## skyQuake

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



pinkboy said:


> And you punched in 71% of your capital in your first trade?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> pinkboy




This. 

Taking an extreme example, look at GTAT US (GTATQ now), -90% gap down in a day out of the blue. 

These things will happen... Even to a $1.5bil company. Your portfolio has to be robust enough to be able to recover from a hit like that


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

tech, the earnings report from what I read met expectations. However that being said I don't even take it into consideration. I usually wouldn't go long after a bad earnings report as it's stupid but from my analysis of the volume I came to the conclusion that supply had been absorbed and I cant think of any where that there maybe overhanging supply. So I took that into consideration that most holders were not going to be shaken easily. Except for the 80mill trades done on that night regarding earnings

TH, I wouldn't mind taking profits quickly in less than a day but im going to hang on to this. My mobile phone app has live data feed for TWTR. Obviously it has a second delay but yesterday I watched the tape and when it got close to 40, the bids kept holding so I jumped on board. On tonight's open I might watch the overall markets and twtr reaction. If they show weakness ill cash in.

Haha pinkboy, from what I've read I should have bought a lot or two and then added on if it went in my position. My capital is only $8000 AUD, convert it to US and its like 7.5K or so. So its not really a big position size but ill learn my lessons if the market thinks its deserved haha.

Thanks for the feedback barney. Usually if the trade starts well, there you have taken one good step forward but from experience, I usually do well on entries but mess up on exits and during the actual play. So I have to work on managing a trade.

I just don't want to move my stop to break even yet as I believe the price could come back down to 40$ and I don't want to be stopped out and miss a possible upmove. Im not very familiar with IB system and its abit confusing so im abit weary. 

You are right about the 8$ drop and the 2% stop but the second day the volume had dried up significantly compared to the initial big drop. Im taking that as a sign that the players are calming down. My hope is that people realise that a sell was a bad move and they hop back on board pushing up the price. Ill be ready to sell out on any sign of weakness.

Thanks for the feedback guys


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Haha pinkboy, from what I've read I should have bought a lot or two and then added on if it went in my position. My capital is only $8000 AUD, convert it to US and its like 7.5K or so. So its not really a big position size but ill learn my lessons if the market thinks its deserved haha.
> 
> My *hope* is..................




So its more like 85%? 

'Hope' is not a strategy!


pinkboy


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



> Then I guess I have to find as many 'SELECTIVE' trades as I can




Followed by



> So I bouggt twitter last night @ 40.20$. Why? Im not to sure.




Then



> My brain is abit messed up as my friends been losr in blue mountains for 11 days but I thiught it was a giod R/R




Don't trade.



> Subconsciously I have looked at that particular chart so many times so I still believe I know what its doing. To whatever degree that is possible in trading.




Your belief is that its a long trade and over more than a day?




We are looking at the same chart??




My take.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*




From the chart as I can see 43$ and 40 and 36$ range are all supports. 43$ could still be a support level which was violated but rebounded and is close to again. The problem is  that you don't want to predict a reversal, only hop on board when its confirmed. Unfortunately I tried to predict it but the results will be clear soon.

The good thing is the brokerage fee is so minimal I can get out very quickly with near no damage if its doesn't gap down.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

But pinkyboy, its all about hope. If you have a working strategy, you still have a chance of being wiped out as long as your capital is finite I presume. So luck still plays a role but im just being loose with word choices.

But tech that was all before the markets violated some major trend lines. Now Im trying to adapt to new rules.
When I said why, its more so that its hard for me  to explain as I'm a bit of an emotional wreck but subconsciously I might still know why but harder for me to explain. 

I shouldn't trade but what can I say, I'm a fool.

I can just say that its just a correction after a decent run up. Its come back down to a major pivot point.
What suggests that the trend is broken?


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Also, it looks as though the gap is just being filled in. There are a couple of factor s in my favour and a couple out of my favour. If the markets keep going up though I believe I  will have the upper hand.


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Scatter chart of the gaps down for Twitter and this dude's stop in RED. Nothing wrong here,


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

TH, im assuming that the chart signifies that the probability of me getting stopped out in the 1$ range and more probable than the more extreme spectrum? By the way that's a neat tool. I have to look into that.


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> TH, im assuming




Ok I've tried hints (they are not gonna work here)

You may do better to *stop *reading what you want to believe and hear what is reality.

You haven't got enough capital to be going anywhere near a stock like twitter. You have a 14% chance of taking a 4-20 R loss on this trade.

F'in nuts!!!!!!!!!!!!!


----------



## Julia

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



Trembling Hand said:


> Ok I've tried hints (they are not gonna work here)
> 
> You may do better to *stop *reading what you want to believe and hear what is reality.
> 
> You haven't got enough capital to be going anywhere near a stock like twitter. You have a 14% chance of taking a 4-20 R loss on this trade.
> 
> F'in nuts!!!!!!!!!!!!!



Plus, when you concede yourself that you're an 'emotional wreck', this is no time to be experimenting.
You're all over the place, dh.   Understandable when you're worrying about your friend, but consider just accepting that, get out and rethink your whole strategy.
e.g. given your emotional lability, what about putting your very limited capital into a couple of Australian stocks which are stable enough to allow you to take more of a long position which is probably less stressful than trying to manage a situation which experienced traders have probably taken years to perfect.


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



Julia said:


> Plus, when you concede yourself that you're an 'emotional wreck', this is no time to be experimenting.
> You're all over the place, dh.   Understandable when you're worrying about your friend, but consider just accepting that, get out and rethink your whole strategy.
> e.g. given your emotional lability, what about putting your very limited capital into a couple of Australian stocks which are stable enough to allow you to take more of a long position which is probably less stressful than trying to manage a situation which experienced traders have probably taken years to perfect.




I have to strongly agree here.  You would have made circa 10% in the last 2 weeks of (sh)October by just putting some funds into some ASX Top 50 stocks.  WES, IAG, SUN, Big 4 banks, WOW, BEN, BOQ, ARG etc.  Then you have the dividends coming from NAB/ANZ/WBC before Xmas.

I too feel you have some emotional attachment to Twitter, perhaps a Social Media account addiction?


pinkboy


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



Julia said:


> Understandable when you're worrying about your friend, but consider just accepting that, get out and rethink your whole strategy.
> e.g. given your emotional lability, what about putting your very limited capital into a couple of Australian stocks which are stable enough to allow you to take more of a long position which is probably less stressful than trying to manage a situation which experienced traders have probably taken years to perfect.




Good advice I think Julia.

Dark, firstly on your mate who is missing, that is a very distressing situation. I hope it works out ok.

Mate, there is a possibility you may have picked the short term bottom in your trade. If so, that's great, but heavy gaps to the downside after a long grinding (slightly upward) consolidation often don't end well. (TH gave you the Gap stats ... have a good hard look at those results)

If you get fortunate and do ok with this trade (which I hope you do), bear in mind the odds were against that happening.

Listen the words of the wise here (that's not me by the way)  Tech suggested this may end badly ...  I know its only one trade, but you need to listen to advice from people who have been trading successfully for a long time so you can hang on to your Capital long enough to be in the game when you finally become a gun trader!!

Good luck with it, and good on you for being man enough to put your trades up for scrutiny, and also having a reasons why you took the trade etc.  At least you made an objective assessment of the situation which is more than I do at times


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Skyquake, missed your post. Thats nuts.

TH, ive got a 14% chance of it gapping down 4-20% you say but your putting the 20 and the 4% in the same probability. As the potential risk increases the probability will decrease. Im not saying you are wrong but you cant expect me to know all this info. Even if the best trader in the world told me, some stuff I have to experience to understand.

I dont understand what stocks im meant to trade then. Dont get me wrong I appreciate the advice and all but I dont understand it hence I cant see the threat. It probably took a lomg time for you to understand the things you possibly know and its hard to dish it out in a few lines.

Julia I dont know if im an emotional wreck. My anxiety has been stemming up from this disaster but I feel trading calms me. As if I have a task and I can hone in and focus. Maybe its good for me.

Thanks barney. I hope he is ok to. Me and him basically did everything together from picking up hitch hikers in barrington tops, to camping, to feeding homeless guys to kfc, to having a crush on the same chicks and having very similar views on life. He is/was a very good/unique character which can never be replaced.

I understand that this trade was the lesser of my good setups but as tech once said there are no perfect set ups. I looked at some odds and the risk /reward and the current potential short rally and said ill trade it. Other than the trade gapping on yhe low side I dont see in any other way why its risky or bad. 

By the way the stocks up 2.5% pre market so if I feel any resistance ill cash out and be happy with some gains. Maybe take a break for a week or two.

Thanks for ghe feedbacks. I do appreciate them and I question them so I can get a better understanding of them. I dont disregard them what so ever.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Tech regarding the revsal of the trend line I never drew one as I thoughts its to early for a longer term veiw to do as such. But ube seen many more charts then me sp I will be cautious and defensive. THanks


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Thanks barney. I hope he is ok to. Me and him basically did everything together from picking up hitch hikers in barrington tops, to camping, to feeding homeless guys to kfc, to having a crush on the same chicks and having very similar views on life. He is/was a very good/unique character which can never be replaced.




Mate that is devastating  ..... I truly hope they find him!



darkhorse70 said:


> By the way the stocks up 2.5% pre market so if I feel any resistance ill cash out and be happy with some gains. Maybe take a break for a week or two.




Not advice again, but if it goes higher on open, I would be running todays stop so far up its proverbial that you can't see the light of day   ..... 5.5 + % in a couple of days on a Stock which has just gapped ferociously to the downside ........ Take the money and run 

Seriously, I hope they find your mate!!


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Barney I might just do that. Its more like 1.6% right now.

I dont know man, ill watch the tape and see how it reacts. Maybe get out amd wait for some confirmation for a long position.

By the way pinkboy I know im bias tpwards twitter because ive just enjoyed watching its chart progress. I got to snap out of it.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I think ill let it get close to 44$ then bail.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

So I sold out as soon as the markets opened. I think some where between 42.60/80. I thought id take every ones advice and re evaluate my mental state and for other reasons mentioned above. On a positive note I am up 440$ or 5.5% of a total 8000$. Not that, that proves anything.

Im also frustrated at the fact that IB takes 3 business days to settle trades before I can re convert back to AUD. I basically cant even day trade on that note since it takes 3 days before the balance is settled which is so stupid imo.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Overall judging my trade, id rate it as a very bad trade. Not only did I have no reason to sell, but I shouldn't have entered that trade as I should be focusing on hopping onto trends not anticipating rallies. Not my style. If only I could short. If I do choose to jump on some rallies, I should atleast do it on very low risk set ups and as you guys said this was not the case where it has gapped very severely.

Emotionally I was not very relaxed but I think that day trading has more emotional pressure as you are watching the tape very closely and are not able to pull back from the trade and let it run while you are not present.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

By the way some profit was directly because of the currency moving in my favour but most likely only a very minute amount.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> On a positive note I am up 440$ or 5.5% of a total 8000$.




Good result.  There were a lot of worse scenarios possible


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Haha barney, all my tradong experiences have started on a good  note and ended badly. Lets hopd ive learnt a thing or two.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Haha barney, all my tradong experiences have started on a good  note and ended badly. Lets hopd ive learnt a thing or two.




Actually there were some positives to take out of the trade irrespective of whether it was good or bad trade.

Your Entry for a start was well thought out and well executed.  There's not too many who could have nailed that any better right near the bottom of that short term drop.  You assessed the momentum had shifted by watching the price action.  If you can hone that skill it will serve you well.

Just keep listening to the people here who can help you. You know who they are

Good luck with the next 5000 trades


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks barney, will do. Thanks for the feedback mate, reqlly helps.


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



barney said:


> Actually there were some positives to take out of the trade irrespective of whether it was good or bad trade.




No actually there was not. Its a trade, or position sizing, that is setting up for a quick hit at some stage.

I just ran a simple back test to see what is the likely actual average stop when you set it at $1.00. I was surprised that it only came out a bit bigger at -$1.14 but that hides the possible disaster around the corner by the sample period. Just by luck it missed a few of the big overnight drops. Still it managed to catch a nasty 5R loss.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



Trembling Hand said:


> No actually there was not. Its a trade, or position sizing, that is setting up for a quick hit at some stage.





Yep, fair call TH.

My encouragement of "Dark's" trade should have been clearer.

"Dark", to clarify .......... As TH is pointing out, even the best Entries in the world won't save you if you get the important stuff wrong  .... ie. Position size/Risk relative to your account size etc. 

Your entry was about as good as it could have been under the circumstances, but juggling blades and over position sizing simultaneously is a recipe for ruin ..... 

Apologies if there was any confusion over that


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Ok thanks for the feedback TH, barney.
Are you guys trying to say that im not defining my risk correctly?

If so I admitt I dont statistically do it how you are TH. I should be. Maybe I should look into how you came up with those charts.

Thanks again. I want to fix any mistakes asap.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Ok thanks for the feedback TH, barney.
> Are you guys trying to say that im not defining my risk correctly?
> 
> If so I admitt I dont statistically do it how you are TH. I should be. Maybe I should look into how you came up with those charts.
> 
> Thanks again. I want to fix any mistakes asap.




Well that's not going to happen.

Your trading a leveraged instrument while under capitalized.
Fix that issue first.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Tech, what do you mean leveraged? Its an equity. (Serious question).

Also what is the minimum to fix my capital issue?

Thanks


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Im assuming its all relative to the stock price and risk of each stock?


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Im assuming its all relative to the stock price and risk of each stock?




Sorry seniors moment---thought we were talking Forex. 

Ill go back to sleep.
Even though your undercapitalized.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Im assuming its all relative to the stock price and risk of each stock?




"Dh",  I'm not the one to tell you where you are going wrong, but what the guys here (who you need to listen to) are pinpointing for you is, when you take a trade, you *Have* to look at the worst possible case scenario.

You have a small Bank of around $7K
You put capital of around $6.4K on your trade
The problem is not the $6.4K  .... its the $7K !!  In reality, you are way undercapitalised.

Worst case scenario ... Twitter had recently once gapped what? ... $14 or something?  Then more recently another $8 gap.

Ok so it was unlikely you would get hit with one of those, but what if you did?  Your proposed $160 risk immediately becomes a 14X or 8X your "planned" amount

14X $160=$2240  which is about 1 third of your Bank.   You may get lucky and never hit a Black Swan, but the longer you trade, the more likely it is ..... and what if you hit a couple in a row!!

The above is the reason why TH originally asked you if you were holding for more than a day.  A soon as you hold any stock overnight, you open yourself up to more risk  .... that risk needs to be factored in.

Ask Tech and TH more questions

Cheers.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Loll Tech.

Barney, that makes complete sense. I should have been more carefull. That was wreckless put in that perspective.

Current liquidity net worth $8500AUD. By next thursday it should be bumped up to $9500 from my working salary.

My question is this. Nearly all stocks have gapped one time or another. Atleast the ones im looking at. Obviously the percentage is low but  id it does happen it would be devastating. 

 So how do you manage that? 

Not to be fully invested in it? To avoid them? 

I thought by being selective in regards to e try timing you could really minimze it. Obviously TWTR was a bad idea in that perspective.


----------



## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> * So how do you manage that? *
> 
> Not to be fully invested in it? To avoid them?
> 
> I thought by being selective in regards to e try timing you could really minimze it. Obviously TWTR was a bad idea in that perspective.




Take a smaller position. There is no other way.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> So how do you manage that?
> 
> Not to be fully invested in it? To avoid them?




Its a tough gig in reality .....

If you had a $200K Bank and you risked the $6.4K you did on twitter and it gapped down $12, you have still only lost roughly 1% of your account which is not ideal, but manageable.

It becomes a personal call as to what you feel comfortable trading and how much risk you are prepared to take on, but a small Bank makes life pretty difficult trading Stocks.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks barney. Since my beokerage fee is only like $1 , I guess I can still diversify between 2/3 different shares or trade in lots of 3000$ to minimize any unexpected risk.

Thanks mate. Ill definately be more aware next time.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks SKC. Will this time. Thanks again


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

If it was me!

Best bang for buck is going to be stock at $10 or less
$5 or less even better.
Risk 2% or less on every trade.
Pick trades where your logical buy and logical stop
(Where you can *CLEARLY* see your wrong) is around 6-12% of 
the current share price.

Let me explain this.

My years of testing 100s of systems found the "Sweet Spot"
for stop placement was 6-12% of the share price.
So if a LOGICAL stop on a $5 stock is 50c away from your buy
point then its a goer. If $1 or 20c its not.

If you think about it a bit this automatically keeps your risk in check.

My findings were that if less than 6% you have a far greater chance of being prematurely stopped on a pullback.
(I choose to trade with even smaller stops but that's another story and topic---)
If more than 12% then you find yourself with a great deal of Opportunity Cost" as a lot of trades will languish between your buy price and your stop---basically going no where.

I also found that a time stop also had merit. IE If your trade doesn't move by X in N time then sell and move on.
However I haven't defined an optimum N---stopped with this research--lack of time---and I knew what I needed to know!

I think this should be helpful in your quest for a trading universe and your liquidity problems.
You'll probably get 2-5 stocks going with your 9 K.

I have the NYSE stock lists which I update daily so can run a few searches for you if you want.

If you want to be ultra conservative while your learning then trade a *WEEKLY* method.
Same thing but weekly bars.---Cuts out Noise.
I also experimented with 2 and 3 day charts!---My theory was that pretty well no one else would be doing that!
The reality was that it was in conclusive and I stopped that investigation as well.


Anyway there you go.
Where's my Zimmer Frame!


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks John, ill adopt that method for now. If I place my stop at 6-12% of the share price than im assuming the amount of shares which I can purchase will be drastically reduced and also my reward will have to be around 30-60% of the stock price?

But thank you. Ill adopt it and let you know how it goes. 

Yes id appreciate it alot of you gave me a list of some pote tial candidates.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Thanks John, ill adopt that method for now. If I place my stop at 6-12% of the share price than im assuming the amount of shares which I can purchase will be drastically reduced and also my reward will have to be around 30-60% of the stock price?
> 
> But thank you. Ill adopt it and let you know how it goes.
> 
> Yes id appreciate it alot of you gave me a list of some pote tial candidates.




The stop should be a technical stop.
Not just an arbitrary amount.

I think we need to work through some exercises.
But lets say you have a $5 stock and a 50c Stop placement so that's
a 10% risk
You have $9k and your risk is say 2% or $180 so you can buy 360 Stocks.
@ $5.
The math is $180/50c=360 stocks

You can of course alter this by risking 3 or more % and stop level maybe less or more.
But ideally the sweet spot is as I have said.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks tech. I knew how to find x amount of stocks purchasable. I use to just get confused when you mentioned the 6-12% share price stop. 

Now I understand what you mean.

But im assuimg I should only use 30% of my total capital per trade or do you have some statistical fugure which youve discovered is the sweet spot? 
Thanks


----------



## pinkboy

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



tech/a said:


> The stop should be a technical stop.
> Not just an arbitrary amount.
> 
> I think we need to work through some exercises.
> But lets say you have a $5 stock and a 50c Stop placement so that's
> a 10% risk
> You have $9k and *your risk is say 2%* or $180 so you can buy 360 Stocks.
> @ $5.
> The math is $180/50c=360 stocks
> 
> You can of course *alter this by risking 3 or more %* and stop level maybe less or more.
> But ideally the sweet spot is as I have said.






darkhorse70 said:


> Thanks tech. I knew how to find x amount of stocks purchasable. I use to just get confused when you mentioned the 6-12% share price stop.
> 
> Now I understand what you mean.
> 
> But im assuimg I should only use 30% of my total capital per trade or do you have some statistical fugure which youve discovered is the sweet spot?
> Thanks




Its in black and white in his post.  2-3% of capital per trade.  30% is going to be a buzzkill if your stock gaps.


pinkboy


----------



## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Thanks tech. I knew how to find x amount of stocks purchasable. I use to just get confused when you mentioned the 6-12% share price stop.
> 
> Now I understand what you mean.
> 
> But im assuimg I should only use 30% of my total capital per trade or do you have some statistical fugure which youve discovered is the sweet spot?
> Thanks




If you risk 2% and you have stop at 6-12% of the current price, your position size would be around 16.67-33.33% of your total capital... which is a sensible size range to guard against the risk of adverse gaps.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



pinkboy said:


> Its in black and white in his post.  2-3% of capital per trade.  30% is going to be a buzzkill if your stock gaps.
> 
> 
> pinkboy




That's why we need some examples.
D/H doesn't get it (Unfortunate initials!)

The light will turn on.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks SKC. 

Pinkboy you're the one getting confused (no offence intended). 

Tech meant risk 2% per trade. That has no relation to the total capital invested.

But SKC answered the question.

Dont get me wrong, Id ask for a million different examples if you would be willing lol.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Ok so I scanned through a bunch of stocks manually yesterday. After scrolling through a bunch of random stockd with proces of 10$ and below most of them dont have anywhere close to the liquidity I want.

Thats not to say there arnt any, I just got to find them. I also stumbled upon microsoft. It looks like its in a good upward trend. All time high was set @ 60$. Currently at 48$. It violated it upward trend but not severly and recovered.

A low risk set up would be to enter @ 50$ if bids held etc and aim for $60 over weeks/months. At a stop loss set at 1$ which is 2%. Total shares bought 60 and 3000$ allocated. However im not fully through assessing the stock. More so an observation.

Tech im not disregarding your advice. With the 6-12% share price I basically cant make any significant amount of money unless the potential return is 50% or more etc.

However microsoft has a beta of near 1 and looks pretty stable in terms of volatility. If I did buy 60 shares @ 50$ it would be exactly $3000. However as I said this is just a brief overview of a potential candidate. Ill update later on.

It also really depends on the overall market conditions.

Im still looking for candidates which meet the criteria you set out John but when you say 6-12% share price it greatly reduces your purchase size I share amounts which must be made up for in large amounts of gains I assume?

All feedback welcomed. The more I can question and expose my flaws the better I will become.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Ok so I scanned through a bunch of stocks manually yesterday. After scrolling through a bunch of random stockd with proces of 10$ and below most of them dont have anywhere close to the liquidity I want.
> 
> Thats not to say there arnt any, I just got to find them. I also stumbled upon microsoft. It looks like its in a good upward trend. All time high was set @ 60$. Currently at 48$. It violated it upward trend but not severly and recovered.
> 
> A low risk set up would be to enter @ 50$ if bids held etc and aim for $60 over weeks/months. At a stop loss set at 1$ which is 2%. Total shares bought 60 and 3000$ allocated. However im not fully through assessing the stock. More so an observation.
> 
> Tech im not disregarding your advice. With the 6-12% share price I basically cant make any significant amount of money unless the potential return is 50% or more etc.
> 
> However microsoft has a beta of near 1 and looks pretty stable in terms of volatility. If I did buy 60 shares @ 50$ it would be exactly $3000. However as I said this is just a brief overview of a potential candidate. Ill update later on.
> 
> It also really depends on the overall market conditions.
> 
> Im still looking for candidates which meet the criteria you set out John but when you say 6-12% share price it greatly reduces your purchase size I share amounts which must be made up for in large amounts of gains I assume?
> 
> All feedback welcomed. The more I can question and expose my flaws the better I will become.




My OH my

*You STILL don't get it!!!*

Go back and read everything posted.
The 2% has NOTHING TO DO WITH THE STOP!
The 2% is the amount risked of your Capital.


----------



## CanOz

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Darkhorse, Google Fixed Fractional Positioning


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Haha tech I do. I chose 1$ as the stop loss. I could have chosen your 6-12% rule which would have been some where between 3-6$ or so.

Then I would time 3000 by 0.02 which would give me 60$. Then I would divide 60$ by 3-6$ which would give me the amount of shares which I could by.

How are we miscommunicating loll.

Thanks can. Tech already recommended that. I learnt tgat in nick radges book or am I missing something???


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

But as I said I came up with the 1$ relevant to share price as that would be 2% in terns of share price which yes could stop me out prematurely but microsoft is pretty conservative from a quick look at it.


It would then allow me to buy more shares which would increase my reward to make it worth while. Make sense???


----------



## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> Tech im not disregarding your advice. With the 6-12% share price I basically cant make any significant amount of money unless the potential return is 50% or more etc.




Yup. You got it. That's exactly how it is. 

You can't make any significant amount of money because you don't have a significant amount of money. Yes you can trade larger than methodologies like "2% rule" suggests, but you cannot escape the corresponding increase in risk. 

Every now and then you will hear how someone turned $X into $20X in a year.... and in most instances* it involved stretching or violating risk management rules (be it risk per trade, or total position size). They might be able to make a lot of money over the short term, operating under a "no bad luck" condition. But the longer one trades, the more likely bad luck will come knocking. And when it does, they give everything back.

That's exactly how it is.

* It is possible to do this while managing risks appropriately, but it'd probably involve much higher frequency, much shorter term tradings over an leveraged instrument. Oh, it also requires elite level of skill.


----------



## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> It would then allow me to buy more shares which would increase my reward to make it worth while. Make sense???




But it also increases your chance of being stopped out. So the expected outcome may not be better.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks SKC. I get everything you just said.
I don't want to sound arrogant but if I could highlight one area ive had the most consistancy in all my trading/simulating exp, it would be my entries.

Thats why I feel comfortable having tighter stops relevant to share price, hence being able to have a larger position size. However I have a problem exiting trades/locking in profits etc.

Since im going to only allocate 30% of my capital per trade, and for some reason my brokerage account doesnt allow me to trade once a trade is sold for 3 business days means I cant really day trade but I can do  a few short term trades as well as some trades which hold for a couple of days.

As far as everything you are saying SKC, I guess im going to have to keep trading and saving till I have enough capital to start to make some decent money. But at the moment im enjoying the whole experience and im learning something new all the time. 

If I have to increase my frequency in trading by adopting a shorterm time frame then thats what ill do. So far my mindset has changed. I wont be as fazed if a trade doesnt go my way. My ego has no place in trading anymore (some times I have to remind myself that lol).


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Dark. How many sim trades did you do?


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

3 asx games. I did heaps of trades though. I was up a few thousand at times but my brokerage fee ate into alot of profits and out of 2 times there wss no stop loss so I didnt really have risk control.

Id always end up negative after a few weeks and I would just give up. But since then I believe ive learnt enough about risk control to minimize that. It was more so my ubrealistic goals and then when id lose my ego would make me try to get it back as I believed thst to be right was more important than making money in the long run.

Since my fees would be 25 times less I could be way more competitive.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Plus after each simulator season, id have a few months to reflect on why I lost.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Bought microsoft @ 48.70$.

Reasons?

Will post up diary journal photos soon.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*








Some of the ways I go through my trade. Obviously I scan through charts which catch my eye and also go with the flow of the markets. Ill probably get bashed for it but feedback is always good.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Your trading a $48 stock with a few K??

Seriously.
When are you going to get serious?
You posted up expecting some help.
Its been given and ignored.

'---Sorry Ill start again.
Well done.
Looks average but at least its a trade.
You've actually DONE SOMETHING.


----------



## skc

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



tech/a said:


> Your trading a $48 stock with a few K??




What's wrong with that?


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I took your advice into consideration. I searched for stock under 10$ and 5$.
Most of them are no where liquid enough. I don't have the experience to know what is liquid enough but I was hoping for at least 1Mill turnover in volume daily. Or maybe you recommended them because you believe they are easier to double in price etc.

Most of them are a few hundred k with spikes above 1mill on occasion.

I understand its due to undercapitalization hence why you recommended that but if I am selective enough in my entry then my stop can be tight and allow me to still capture the run in more pricey stocks. More so if they are not as volatile. 

I'm not disregarding your advice. I'm just a noobie and until I fully understand the full implications and reasons of your advice, then I cant fully appreciate it. For example I just recently realized what you meant about undercapitalisation.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



skc said:


> What's wrong with that?




Nothing.


----------



## burglar

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



tech/a said:


> Nothing.




It's a hard game ... isn't it?


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> but if I am selective enough in my entry then my stop can be tight and allow me to still capture the run in more pricey stocks. More so if they are not as volatile.
> 
> I'm not disregarding your advice. I'm just a noobie and until I fully understand the full implications and reasons of your advice, then I cant fully appreciate it. For example I just recently realized what you meant about undercapitalisation.




*What you are still refusing to listen to is that your stop is Utter BS.*

Just because you say its at 50 cents or 80 cents or whatever has no actual link to what it will be in reality after 100 trades. If you had gone through a proper testing period and kept stats on the stocks you planned to trade and traded in the same method you would understand. But like most you have wasted a year or more playing the ASX game and do not know what works and why. Not keeping stats, not using the same approach, not using the same stocks and even more bizarrely admitting you were never profitable!!

As far as going through a proper development process to start heading in the direction of a competent trader you are doing the opposite. After 10 trades you will most probably be nowhere except lost and another 6 months down the track.

If you were at all half serious you would be setting up something like Ninja Trader with free Kinetick EOD data and trading a sim portfolio of $100,000 on the Russell2000 for example. That way you could have 10 trades open at a time and have to eyeball 100s of charts a day and actually manage risk and get feedback to what actually happens because you seem to have a best case view of the world. You cannot see  where risk is because you have never experienced it.


----------



## tech/a

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



Trembling Hand said:


> *What you are still refusing to listen to is that your stop is Utter BS.*
> 
> Just because you say its at 50 cents or 80 cents or whatever has no actual link to what it will be in reality after 100 trades. If you had gone through a proper testing period and kept stats on the stocks you planned to trade and traded in the same method you would understand. But like most you have wasted a year or more playing the ASX game and do not know what works and why. Not keeping stats, not using the same approach, not using the same stocks and even more bizarrely admitting you were never profitable!!
> 
> As far as going through a proper development process to start heading in the direction of a competent trader you are doing the opposite. After 10 trades you will most probably be nowhere except lost and another 6 months down the track.
> 
> If you were at all half serious you would be setting up something like Ninja Trader with free Kinetick EOD data and trading a sim portfolio of $100,000 on the Russell2000 for example. That way you could have 10 trades open at a time and have to eyeball 100s of charts a day and actually manage risk and get feedback to what actually happens because you seem to have a best case view of the world. You cannot see  where risk is because you have never experienced it.




Darkhorse and any other noob out there.

*DO THIS!*


The DUCK is over and out for this thread.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

TH, your speaking as if an aspiring newb trader knows exactly what steps to take as soon as he set foot in this industry. I wish I saw your first year stats.

I have been keeping eye on stocks. But they are forever changing and some become unsuitable. 48 $ was a significant point in microsoft where it propelled for a few weeks before topping. Yes my stop doesnt have any real significance statistically. Fair enough.

Ive made enough mistakes to know what not do, SON. Hahaha.

Either way you are right. I need to find statistically proven methods. Ive got another 40 years to develop it.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> TH, your speaking as if an aspiring newb trader knows exactly what steps to take as soon as he set foot in this industry. I wish I saw your first year stats.




Dark,  If any trader had very ordinary stats when they first started, and now they are a gun trader, would you think their advice regarding how to trade might be valuable





darkhorse70 said:


> Either way you are right. I need to find statistically proven methods. Ive got another 40 years to develop it.




That is correct  .. you have time on your side.  

Should you be risking your current 7-8K when in the mean time you could be honing your skills with NO risk, plus saving for the future when your you beaut tested system will turn your 50K into a million in no time flat

Bear in mind people here are not trying to put you down, and often the best advice will be in the form of tough love

Just for the record, have a look at the two similar charts below  ... One is Microsoft, the other the Dow Jones Index  ..... What do you see with regard to potential Risk on Stocks Vs the Index?


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks Barney. I understand where you're coming from. Im personally a bad teacher. I abuse my brother verbally when I try to teach him and I try to twach him through highlighting all his downfalls in an attempt to wake him up.

But we all need some positive feedback. The way im recieving the feedback is basically " your strategy sucks" or this specific ruke makes no sense. I understand imnot going to be spoon fed and most if the feedback is taken which im given and reflected on. Just because I dont change it doesnt mean ive disregarded it.

For example just because tech said the share price should be under x amount and I didnt adapt my strategy below that doesnt mean I dont acknowledge his wisdom etc.

Im trying to find my own style and although the fundamentals of all good traders are similar there strategies vary.


I know we speak about statistics and historical evidence but im being arrogant in the sense that I realize that back testing is a MASSIVE task and im hoping that following the basic principles of a good trader can mean I can bypass some sort of computer programmed testing.

Why? Because I have no idea how to do that. Ive also bought nick radges bool which tech advised and I still have to read it. So hopefully that opens my eye a little more.

Barney, the correlation between msft and the dow looks very positive. I wasnt going to go long if the dow wasnt up but im hoping the recent short term support at the previous all time high holds enough to give msft a little run.


----------



## barney

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> But we all need some positive feedback. The way im recieving the feedback is basically " your strategy sucks" or this specific ruke makes no sense. I understand imnot going to be spoon fed and most if the feedback is taken which im given and reflected on. Just because I dont change it doesnt mean ive disregarded it.





No, your strategy doesn't suck.  What everyone is trying to reinforce here is basically caution in regard to your account size vs how much you could lose if things go pear shaped a few times in a row (Gaps are one example)

The fact that you are putting a lot of thought into what you are doing is commendable; your problem is your Bank size; Why risk it at this stage?

Go back and read each of TH and Tech's last posts ..... TH told you what to do to improve your trading; Tech reinforced that emphatically (in BOLD) ..... I'm simply encouraging you to listen to them!!


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Barney I took the advice which you guys gave and only allocated 30% of my total capital to MSFT. Even if it gapped down 10% which would be 300$ ive minimozed the damage by 66%. 

Also most of those gaps are because of earnings reports I assume?

What TH is advising is create a technically sound strategy proven by historicall back testing. For all aspects including stop loss setting etc. I agree it has to be done.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

I thought im managing risk by only participating when there are as many factors in my favour as possible or as little factors as possible going against me.


----------



## Trembling Hand

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*



darkhorse70 said:


> TH, your speaking as if an aspiring newb trader knows exactly what steps to take as soon as he set foot in this industry. I wish I saw your first year stats.




Err..... I have mine but you haven't got yours!!!! My point is dude you have been through your first year and you don't know your stats on your ideas. First year has now been wasted!!  What do you think about that???



darkhorse70 said:


> I know we speak about statistics and historical evidence but im being *arrogant* in the sense that I realize that back testing is a MASSIVE task and im *hoping* that following the basic principles of a good trader can mean I can *bypass* some sort of computer programmed testing.




What like winning the Tour de France without training or performing brain surgery without doing a medical degree or flying a plain without pilot lessons.

 And that is me going the way of the duck,



tech/a said:


> The DUCK is over and out for this thread.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

How was it wasted. How can I even start to collect stats or run them through a sim if I dont even understand the basic principles of trading/position sizing/ risk control. Im only getting a grip of them and you can only start to run tests when you understand why is it your testing them.

Anyways im out.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Quick update. As a few of you kindly suggested, im going to go back to basics. ATM I am weeding out potential candidates which meet mh strategy to test on ninja trader.

As some of you also suggested, in order for me to truly understand my edge, my strategy should be robust enough to signal many trades (more sample size =  clearer picture). Also the fact that I need to find a strategy which will work on most market conditions is a must.

So far I have found one stock out of a few, symbol ALSN. Just waiting for it to rebound of its support level then enter  the posituon on the sim trading. My biggest challenge is scanning through enough charts to find enough trading signals. I dont want my results to be skewed. As for live trading, im currently atill in MSFT, however once I exit this I will probably pass up on trading live for a while. I might only participate in a few select scenarios.

Now that I have some direction I can be abit in peace and do what must be done. 

Thanks


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

My main goal is to find a strategy with minimal draw downs, consistancy, a positive expectancy and robustness. Im sure there is more to it than that but ill figure that soon enough. Ill use the stats from ninja trader to measure my performance.


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Got stopped out of MSFT. Will re avaluate situation but my priority is sim trading for now.


----------



## CanOz

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

ES and CL mate....


----------



## darkhorse70

*Re: Darkhorse's "REAL MONEY" trading diary (noob friendly haha)*

Thanks man


----------

