Week 16 - Not Yet Profitable

The start of March was madness. Since the PSEi broke down MA100, my trades began to follow through.

PSEi Daily Chart as of April 20, 2018

iZS happened start of March 2018

Welcome to the bear market! 

I was in denial from the bullrun of Jan to Feb. My strategy was still in 'bullish mode' even if the market is going down.

I was doing a lot of errors. I encountered series of losses, revenge-trading my way to get back what I've lost. 

I was overtrading PLUS my trading pysche was fucked up.

There were trades that I put TOO MUCH allocation, ending up LOSING A LOT.

To make my journey more transparent, I'm sharing my mid-March realized loss:

March 16, 2018
Total Loss: PHP -47,509.50

I started 2018 with PHP 108,000.

I ended week 8 of 2018 with PHP 170,344.65.

My realized loss on week 11 (March 16) was PHP -47,509.50.

From +57% gain end of Feb, it went down to only +13% by March.

I gave back my gains to the market. Superman syndrome happened after Feb, then makabawi syndrome on March. 

A perfect recipe for disaster.

REALIZATIONS:

• When the market is bearish, trade setups only for downtrend plays. Do not go against the trend.
  There's no sense using uptrend plays in bearish market (except for outliers).
• Be defensive all the time.
• When there are no tradeable setups, it's much better not to trade.
  Capital preservation should be top priority. Staying in cash is still a position. 
• Manage risk the right way. Do not put heavy allocation especially when the setup is not good.
  Allocate only acceptable volume so when the stock goes otherwise, the risk is bearable.
• Trade when ready and available. Since I'm still employed, I find it challenging to manage my trades.
  There were a lot of impulse trades and some were executed via mobile.
• When experiencing a losing streak, manage negative emotions. Break the habit loop of overthinking and do something that will make me happy. Life is still good outside the stock market.
• Patiently wait for a 'bread and butter' setup. 

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The battle must continue. I need to at least survive during this bear market. If I can make some profits for the whole duration of the bear season, that will be an achievement. By then I can easily decide whether I can transition into fulltime trading. Let's see until end of 2018.

Sharing some of my significant trades lately:

$VUL bounce / momentum play

$NOW bounce play

$NOW momentum on 3rd day of bounce  

$VITA Round 1 & Round 2 

Multiyr-high / breakout play

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Do I consider myself as profitable?

I don't think so. A consistent and profitable trader is the one who losses small but can get winning trades consistently. No rushing to get results. No jackpots. Patiently waiting for the quality trades.

I'm not yet profitable.

I'm still learning. 

But soon enough, I will get there.

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More to follow.

Practice Trade - $NOW, Bounce!

While waiting for my COL funds to be withdrawn and be transferred to my new MakeTrade account, I decided to paper trade this morning.

$NOW Daily Chart
Allocation: ALL IN 

Holding period: less than an hour.

Week 8 - Market's Uncertainty

After last week's emotional experience (See Week7 Blogpost), this week was a little different. 

A quick recap for Week 8:

Bought $MAC on Monday, sold it on Wed for $HVN and $PXP. 
Trade result: +1.09% trade gain, 55.6% allocation, +0.60% gain overall.

Bought $NOW on Tuesday's breakout at EOD and sold it on Wed.
Trade result: +12.53% trade gain, 24.8% allocation, +3.11% gain overall.

Day-traded $NOW and sold it w/n the day.
Trade result: -2.68% trade loss, 33.8% allocation, -0.91% loss overall.

Sold all $TUGS and switched to $HVN and $PXP.
Trade result: +4.69% trade gain, 53.3% allocation, +2.50% gain overall.
Holding period: 14 trading days

Bought breakout of $HVN and sold it on Thurs.
Trade result: +41.67% trade gain, 63.8% allocation, +26.58% gain overall.

Bought breakout of $PXP and sold it on Thurs.
Trade result: +4.57% trade gain, 74.9% allocation, +3.43% gain overall.

Feb 22, 2018 was really something, I didn't expect the market's uncertainty to be this rewarding. This is my first time to experience that amount of day change, w/c is more than my monthly salary:

Feb 22, 2018
Lunchtime Portsnap
(Of course, wasn't able to sell at these levels)

Actual day change on Feb 22:

This 16k daychange is again, my first time.

After selling all positions on Thurs, I decided not to trade on Fri and purge myself. This is to neutralize my state of mind and control the euphoric feeling. I want to eliminate the excitement, greed and superman syndrome. These were the emotions that affected my trading psych lately.

While on purge, I am pursuing my decision to switch brokers.

Goodbye, COL! 😞

Hello, MakeTrade! 😉

Total trades for this week: 6 trades

Trading Lessons:

• Embrace market's uncertainty, be prepared on whatever the market will give and just react based on established trading system and intuition. (When I say trading system: the technicals, methodology, emotions and thought-process). Last week I encountered an error but this week gave me good winning trades. I wasn't expecting this to happen. My overall REACTION will really justify my trading result.
• Learn to troubleshoot emotions. We can't control the price movement of the market. What we can control is how we handle each situation. Find a quick remedy whenever there's #FeelingExcited, #FeelingGreedy, #FeelingSuperman and especially when negative emotions arise: Fear, Hope, makabawi-syndrome, feeling sad, etc.
• Learn to switch losers/laggards to potential winners. I've been holding to TF trades lately and just watched some high-flyers: 
• $HVN on Jan
• $ECP on Jan
• $NOW on Jan / Feb
• It's okay to miss these moves but when that opportunity comes again, I want to make sure I am READY to RIDE that move.

Port snap end of week:

Current account equity value is Php 170,344.65.

Port is now up +57% from initial port of Php 108,000.

The pressure is ON. 

It's only week 8 of 2018, 

9 weeks 'till April 30, the end of #Uptrend2018 challenge. 

There's still 44 weeks to finish 2018. 

I am writing this to be aware. I don't want to be complacent and do something stupid. I am writing this to challenge myself ahead. There's still more to happen.

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EDIT:
Here's my trade stats as of current:
I don't have the ZFT excalibur, I only have RAVEcalibur (hehe)

Overall Stats as of Feb 24, 2018

Trade Journal as of Feb 24, 2018

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More to follow.

Week 7 - Emotional Week

What an emotional week indeed. Here’s what happened to my Week 7:

• On Monday, I'd let go of strong stocks for a greedy play: $POPI. Sold partially on $WLCON and sold all $PIZZA for $POPI trade. On Tuesday, I entered $POPI again, anticipating for another run. But of course did not happen. No wins for $POPI.
• Traded $NOW on Tuesday, good entry at EOD, but the exit was a bit early. Sold it in the morning of Wed and sold it at strength. Overall $NOW trade gave me +10% port increase.
• Lesson for $NOW: 
• The best decision to sell positions is in the afternoon. Particularly 2pm / 2:30pm/ 3pm onwards. Be contented with the gain and overcome the feeling of being left out. There are a lot of things to be thankful for.
• Error trade on $PXP. Perhaps this trade was due to mixed emotions: got FOMO with $NOW since I sold too early, plus I put too much volume on this trade. I even sold my remaining $WLCON position thinking that this stock will go fast. Probably my biggest port allocation this 2018 at Php65.2k. Expecting a strong close, at the ceiling, but did not. Ended up cutting near the close. Total port damage is -4.39%. This is the biggest port loss next to my $ATN trade (-4.00%). 
• Lesson for $PXP: 
• Since the setup and parameters are acceptable, it's okay to buy as long as the allocation is controlled. Do not put too much allocation right away. Do not buy big chunks too early. The best decision again to buy is near the closing. Overcome the FOMO and do not be Superman.

Emotions for this week:

• Too much greed.
• Too much excitement.
• Superman syndrome. 

Total trades bought: 5 trades

Total trades sold: 6 trades

Open position: 1 stock

$NOW Buy/Sell Transactions:

$PXP Buy/Sell Transactions:

Feb 15 Day Change:

-5,294.61 Day Change
Due to $PXP error trade

End of week 7 port snap:

Still holding to 1 stock bought since Feb 1. 

More to follow.

Week 6 - EOW Trade Summary

Here's what happened for my Week 6:

No trades made on Mon and Tues. 

I sold one of my positions this Wed and Thurs. This was bought since Jan 15, 2018. 
The stock is $SMC. I posted it in my previous blogpost: What's in a GAP?

$SMC Weekly Chart
GAP has been filled

$SMC portsnap end of week 5
(Not the selling price, of course.)

$SMC buy and sell transactions:

$SMC port allocation: 50.5%
%Gain for the trade: +9.71%
Overall port gain: +4.91%

Holding Period: 18 trading days

Reason for selling $SMC:
- Gap has been filled
- Target of 150.00 was reached

Bought 2 new positions for Week 7.

Time to grab some $SMC beer this weekend.

Cheers.

More to follow.

Week 5 - EOW Trade Summary

Summary of what happened for my Week 5:

Monday 
No trading activity. 

Tuesday 
I was outside and have no access to PC / Laptop to view the market and charts. I was at work and attending a whole-day activity. Despite of it, I was able to execute $TBGI and bought the breakout before the ceiling of EOD.

On Tuesday night, here's my plan for $TBGI:

$TBGI trade plan for Jan 31 (Wed): 

• If it gaps up tomorrow, wait for further movement within the day. Any significant drop or weakness should be considered a warning signal. Sell anytime when price plummets.

• Wait for a decision around 2:25pm to 3:30pm. Big moves happen during those times. 

• If it gaps down tomorrow, wait for the first 15mins to 28mins of the market open. Should the stock trades below 0.60 (closing of today) AND continues to go down with a MASSIVE SELLING PRESSURE, DON'T HESITATE TO SELL.

$TBGI Daily Chart
Bought Tuesday, sold Wednesday

$TBGI port allocation: 27.0%
%Gain for the trade: +31.02%

Overall port gain: +8.38%

Holding Period: 1 trading day

I also made an error. I traded $TUGS Tuesday morning but sold it the next day:

$TUGS Daily Chart
Bought Tuesday, sold Wednesday

$TUGS port allocation: 15.2%
%Loss for the trade: -9.80%
Overall port loss: -1.48%

Holding Period: 1 trading day

Lesson/s for $TUGS: 

Never enter half-baked setups and never buy in the morning. In the case of $TUGS, I was triggered since MA50 trail is respected and it broke out of immediate resistance. I anticipated a continuation or a favorable move towards the darvas high, which I admit is wrong. Anticipating is not helpful in any system. Especially if the setup still needs further confirmation.

Wednesday 

Error trade: $ATN. 

After cutting $TUGS and selling profits of $TBGI, superman syndrome strikes. I saw $ATN breaking out of the 52wk high.

I entered after recess while I'm in a meeting and got too greedy. I thought it'll close at the ceiling, but did not. I have to adjust accordingly and sell at the close.

$ATN Daily Chart
SUPERMAN SYNDROME

$ATN port allocation: 45.5%
%Loss for the trade: -8.79%
Overall port loss: -4.00%

Holding Period: SAME DAY

Lesson/s for $ATN: 

DO NOT BE GREEDY. Do not put too much allocation for these kinds of plays. The closing was a selldown and the ceiling play did not materialized.

Thursday
I entered the ATH of $HVN on this day. Sold the next day, Friday.

$HVN Daily Chart

$HVN port allocation: 27.9%
%Gain for the trade: +27.65%
Overall port gain: +7.71%
Holding Period: 1 trading day

Friday
Sold all $HVN this day. 
I'm still holding on to the stock I bought since Jan 15. Took some profits since my initial target has been hit. 

Feb 2, 2018 Day Change

To tell you honestly, it's my first time to experience a 10k day change. 
I never expected this to happen. With just the right preparation, right mindset with the right time, things like these can really happen.

Market's been such a Blessing this week.

It's my Father's Birthday and I treated my family for a yummy dinner on Fri night:

H-Cuisine's Most Awesome Angus Beef Belly
(Bon Appétit)

BTW. Got myself a new position for week 6.

End of week 5 port snapshot

Total trades this week: 5 trades 

I exceeded my max number of trades in a week which is supposedly 3 trades only. But I guess there's an exemption this week. There are setups that are too good to be missed out.

More to follow.

Week 4 - EOW Trade Summary

Here's a summary of what happened for my Week 4:

Monday 
I entered $NOW, it was a losing trade and this was an error. See blog entry here.

Tuesday 
As a punishment for my error, I did not traded this day. This was also the time I saw $EMP and $HVN as a missed trade. See blog entry here.

Wednesday 
I entered $NOW (momentum play) and $STR (ceiling play).

Thursday
Sold $STR in the morning. Sold $NOW in the afternoon. Max number of trades reached this day. I must limit myself to max of 3 trades in a week.

Here's my trade log in my journal:

Sold STR this morning. I was at work and I'm in a meeting when I executed my sell order. Around 9am, I already opened my account through my mobile phone and checked the projected open of $STR (and $NOW). 

At around 9:20-9:29am, the projected open of $STR was at its ceiling price of 29.25. At the market open, I was checking the bid/ask table through my phone while talking to my colleagues. I saw there's a huge amount of bid volume at 29.25 I am ready to sell $STR at the ceiling price, but I'm in a meeting. 

At 9:31am, I refreshed my port and here's what it looked like:

9:31AM of Thurs, Jan 25

Right after, I excused myself from the meeting and went to the CR just to execute. 

Time check: 9:35am. 

$STR already dropped to 23.00 plus the bid/ask table looks weird. The bid price is higher than the ask price.

So I waited for a few minutes, price is trading around 23.00 to 27.00. I didn't bother if my gains from 29.25 melted quickly. I just have to execute my sell order. So I decided sold half at 24.50 and the other half at 23.50. The portsnap was yummy, but I wasn't able to sell it at its peak. But still, good trade for a 1 day hold.

$STR Daily Chart

$STR port allocation: 19.5%

%Gain for the trade: +21.62%

Overall port gain: +4.22%

Holding Period: 1 trading day

$NOW Daily Chart

$NOW port allocation: 26%

%Gain for the trade: +10.36%
Overall port gain: +2.70%
Holding Period: 1 trading day

Friday 

No trading activity for Fri. I was busy at work since we have a whole-day activity (town hall department meeting).

I was checking the market through mobile, I got a little bit of FOMO with $HVN. It made +354.13% move week-to-date. From 21.00 level on Monday to 100.00 on Fri. CRAZY indeed. It was a missed trade. But i shrugged it off that night. I went for a long walk and grabbed some beer.

Left with one one stock, still holding since Jan 15:

More to follow.

Week 4 - Missed Trades

I have no trades today. 

Since I encountered a trading error yesterday, I banned myself from trading for a day or two (or for the whole week).

I missed these 2 stocks below.

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1. $HVN

This stock wasn't even on my watchlist for week 4. But yesterday and today was just HAVEN. Both candles closed at ceiling price.

$HVN Daily Chart
Jan 23, 2018 - Tues

The setup is too simple: Just buy on ATH breakout.

Buying from 26.00 to 32.50 yesterday can give you +25.08% opportunity.
Buying from 26.00 to 48.75 yesterday can give you +87.62% opportunity.

Anyway.

Will let this pass. Will watch it and document it for future references.

Trade lesson:

- Keep a thorough watchlist over the weekend. Since I have no plan for this stock, It's okay.

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2. $EMP

This is included in my week 4 watchlist.

My area of buying is simple, just the breakout at the 2 circled areas below:

$EMP Daily Chart
Jan 23, 2018 - Tues

But since I have work today and I was on a meeting, I missed this stock.

Didn't bother to chase since the price is high already (for me). Will watch it consolidate and wait for a good entry instead.

End of entry.