Chopped up

Took PNRA twice and SPWR with very little to be happy about today. Hope we get back to normal tomorrow.

Not much

Profitwise, that is. In fact, breakeven (not including commissions). AMR, CF and DAL. Chopped around a bit... low volume... blah, blah, blah. Just feels like I'm cracking my knuckles and practicing until the real trades show up.

JRJC - Long

A very, very short watchlist today for some reason. However, JRJC presented a nice opportunity off the 5-min chart. Entered off a break of the 10:10 bar high which was a hammer-like NR7. Price action was all over the place once I entered which really made me nervous. My price target was R2 and with the crazy price action I decided to sell all my shares just below R2. Nice, quick trade.
 

Another active day

Took 5 trades today: MSFT, SWN, NTGR, ARBA, RVBD
 
I ended up profitable in 4 of them with NTGR being the little b#$%& of the clan. SWN was actually a mistake entry (8/10) as I hadn't drawn my fib. lines before entry. Once I drew them in I realized price had already hit the fib. ext. Fortunately for me, priced moved in my favor... I exited immediately and made a small profit.
 
None of my trades were huge as I was pretty aggressive with managing my exits and price action was very slow. The only one that was quick and fairly satisfying was RVBD. My first trade today, I entered RVBD off the 5-min chart (9th bar) and price quickly rose to just below the fib. ext. which is where I exited. I timed my exit on this pretty well.
 

HOT - Long

HOT was one of those on-the-fence entries that I wasn't sure about taking because there wasn't a whole lot of room between entry and the fib. ext. I entered anyway and was happy to bank the coin it was willing to give me.
 
Entered long off the 11:45 candle high and exited right below the fib. ext. Quick, orderly and profitable... just like I like 'em. I liked the build up to the ORH, the rest during the 11:30 candle and then the decisive move by the entry candle (I wish it was more narrow). Hope you all did well.
 

FXI - Long

One trade can make for a satisfying day and week. I was actually late pulling my scans this morning and by the time I backfilled all my candidates and started flipping through the charts... my entry bar for FXI had literally just finished forming. Entered off the 5-min chart, break of 10:10 candle high which was an NR7 that formed right above the ORH after the previous bar found support off the 5ema. Partialed after 1R (haven't properly credited TraderAM for this as I used to partial at 2R) and sold the rest after a $2 gain.
 
Going back to the partialing part for a moment... I really like taking some cash at 1R and moving my stop to breakeven. This has been working well for my style of trading plus it ensures I'm in the money. Another thing I've been doing well lately is analyzing the post-entry action of my trades and partialing out if the trade's taking long to develop or not going my way. While this sometimes leads to regret... lately it's been saving me cash. As an example, entered PM today as well (off the :15) but it wasn't moving much and I decided I would move my stop to breakeven and take my chances. Worked out well as I most certainly would've taken a full loss on that one. Despite FXI, I have still been finding it tough to trade this week. FXI is a classic example of how persistence and patience can pay off.
 

FCX, PH - Long

I'll give a nickel to any other gap trader that can produce a good looking chart today that reached the fib. ext on the long side. Entered FCX off a break of the 5th bar high (15) and exited at the ORH. Fairly happy about that one.

Entered PH off the 11am bar (10-min chart) and after a nice initial move, price moved against me. Fortunately, I exited half my shares at breakeven. Up and down day with not a lot of options. Here's to Wednesday.

Blah

Very sluggish out there. Most candidates in my watchlist were long setups and I took DGX (7/15). Made a little move up but then came back down again. Ended up taking a small loss and calling it a day. Big contrast to the past few day's action.

CMI, CATY - Long

Kinda tired so not much detail except that CMI and CATY performed really well on very nice entries. I didn't want to get greedy with CMI as I was up nice on the day and ended up exiting earlier that what I should have (54.65), but it was still a $1 gain. I exited CATY just below the fib. ext.
 
Have a good weekend.

No trades

Entered orders in EBAY and PFE but they were never triggered. Action is pretty slow out there. Best to leave it alone for now.

Done early

Entered 3 trades (2 winners) and passed on two others (FMCN, FISV) which would've been winners. I'm happy with my gain and the day's still early over here so I may just kick the soccer ball around with my son.
 
Trades: STX, ASML, FTE (small loss)
 

 

Very active

Haven't seen this kind of action from me in a while. But... the setups were there and I took them. Entered 5 trades and all were profitable except for SCHW. Overall, I'm pleased with the results even being as conservative as I was today.
 
Trades: INFY, MTW, BHP, ARW, SCHW
 
More info on the charts below:
 
EDIT: Once again... Internet Explorer is not displaying the 4 charts correctly. I don't have time to edit for 2 browser types. Just switch to Firefox already, will ya?
 

Not much

Went long POT and short BAC. Neither one worked for me. However, I did manage my exits well to limit my losses.

Lost Generation

Great, clever writing.
 

HLF - Short

I have an event this evening so couldn't really trade too late. I found a nice short entry in HLF off the 10-min chart (10:30 bar low). This was a prototype 'retrace and reversal' trade with a two bar move to the ORL followed by a nice down bar on my entry. My exit was a bit hurried (again, the event tonight) so I decided to bail just above $45 (11:10 bar) which was a good decision at the time as price bounced at that point.
 
Anyway... have a good weekend.
 

ENDP - Long

ENDP just made it on my watchlist today gapping up 1.57% with an open just above yesterday's high and a little gap between the low of the first bar and yesterday's close. I wrapped up my watchlist fairly quickly by 9:55 or so... went through my first scan of stocks and saw the 2nd bar forming a nice inside hammer right above intraday R2 with the low hugging the upward sloping 5ema. Price stalled for a minute or so before taking off. I was in and out in less than :15 minutes as I exited just short of the fib. ext. Price continued to rise and I certainly left money on the table, but I'll always be happy exiting all my shares at the fib. ext.
 

Other than that it was another lackluster day. I gave ADI a hard look on the 5-min chart (6th bar) but that second bar scared me out of entering. However, I looked at the daily chart afterwards and saw that yesterday carved out a nice hammer. Should've seen that.

More of the same

While UPS and GTI messed me up... BA saved the day. BA was another 'yummy goodness' trade. I may just have to give my best trades this nickname from now on.
 
-Strong first bar
-Shallow retrace
-Entry bar closes strong and right above the ORH
-Quick rise to fib. ext (still amazed sometimes at the accuracy of the fib. ext.)
-Exited just short of fib. ext.
 
Look at the upper tails as price approaches the fib. ext. (lots of weakness/indecision). This culminated with a narrow range, inside bar (12:15) at the top with the lowest volume of the day before turning south. All the signs were there to make a 'cojones' trade but I didn't.
 
 

Frustrating day

I timed my GRMN short entry perfect on the 5-min chart (12:05 bar). Price then moved down and I was up a nice chunk of change... partialed out a bit then looked at the daily chart. QT now offers pivot points on historical charts but they apparently vary from month to month. Anyway, I saw the S2 from March at 48.29 and figured I would exit there. Well, I didn't and price moved back up to my breakeven point. A lot of profit down the drain.

SMH was just as frustrating. I happened to do well with NUAN long (but I felt I got luck with that as my entry was after price and spiked very close to the fib. ext.).

KLAC - Long

KLAC was all sorts of yummy goodness. I entered off a break of the 11:20 bar high (10-min) which was an inside NR7/inverted hammer closing above the ORH. It was also the second inside bar in a row and looked like a bullish flag. Exited all shares just below the fib. ext.

Comment moderation

I've decided to enable comment moderation since it seems a couple of anon posters like to take advantage of the fact that I don't moderate. They really don't say anything horrible but it's really annoying more than anything else. And I hate annoying people.

MOS - Long

Another strange day as a lot of my candidates started setting up nice patterns at one point but then presented reasons for me to stay out of the trade. I ended up entering MOS long on a break of the 8th bar high despite the previous bar's bearish look. My entry bar was an inside NR7 that closed strong above the intraday R2 level. My initial target was the ORH and I ended partialing out when price reached that level. Exited all my shares on a break of the hanging man low (12:30) that appeared after the long run up to the ORH.

Other than that I was keeping an eye on ACI and looking for a good opportunity. But I never found one that I was completely comfortable with (even though the stock made a nice move).

LFC - Long

Step right up folks... don't be afraid. What you're about to see is a bonafide trading chart. That's right. You haven't seen one of those around here in a while but this is your lucky day. Don't feed the candlesticks!!!

Tried to enter off the 11:10 bar but price never went that high. Fortunately a nice inside hammer formed during the 11:30 bar (10-min) on what I thought looked like a nice bull flag pattern right above the ORH. Exited at the fib. ext. Also shorted HOT which was a nice looking chart on the 10-min view. After going my way initially price then turned against me. I was still able to pocket some dinero.

Excel question

Here's what I'm trying to do in Excel and maybe one of the readers knows how to do it. So, I want want to import my first scan list of the day at 9:35 or so. Then, at around 10am, I'd like to import a second scan list. However, I want to only see the new or different stocks from the second list.
I could manually do it by deleting all the duplicate pairs but I'm hoping there's a much faster and easier way.

Any ideas? Suggestions?

No trades

Very short watchlist for me and the only stock that caught my eye was TSL (11:15 hammer-like bar on the 15-min chart) but high/low range of the entry bar was a bit too wide in relation to the closing price.

C and AIG

Went long on both of these stocks and while I'm happy with the money I made... there was a lot of chop between my entry and exit.