Here$14U's Account

[JTH]

Good to see you check in. I'll have to re-examine the metals this weekend to see where we stand in relation to my last review. Are you using stops, if so, how do you set them up?

[XL-entLady]

Good to see you check in. I'll have to re-examine the metals this weekend to see where we stand in relation to my last review. Are you using stops, if so, how do you set them up?

Good question, JTH! I usually set my stops at the next highest low on the daily. When I get them set correctly.

It will be interesting to see what 14U says because he's so good at this.

Lady

[Here$14U]

To be quite honest I set mental stops, usually 8% or so below purchase price. I find that whenever I set sell stops for real, less than 8% from purchase price or average cost per share, I usually get stopped out and the following day the issue heads back up, leaving me behind very perturbed. As long as the daily stochastics can continue climbing, and the risng 20 day moving average continues to act as support I stay long until my objectives are hit. I like to watch the daily CCI7 for an exit point, and try not to get greedy. At 8% profit I sell 2/3rds of my position, at 11% profit I sell the final 1/3 for about a 10% gain. I then take the cash and look for another daily stochastic buying opportunity also checking to see what the weekly stochastic is doing. Does it work all the time, no, and I'd be a liar to say that it does. There are times that the final 1/3 of the position does not get sold off at my 11% profit sell limit price. That's okay, because if the daily stochastic has topped then I sell it anyway at market and move on to the next opportunity. If a stock moves against me 3-6% (shortly after I buy it) and the daily stochastic is still oversold I don't hesitate to buy more 1/3 positions, (one at -3% and one -6%) as I'm only playing with 5-10% of my funds, but if I see more than 8% loss from purchase price or average price paid per share, then I'm wrong and out of the trade. I think sell stops are necessary when trading futures as your dealing with margin and leveraged trades. With stocks or ETF's stops are good if you are not in front of the computer all the time. If you can't keep mental stops than may I suggest using parabolic sars at stockcharts.com. They can be adjusted to the volatility of the issue you are interested in. The upper Bollinger band as well as the CCI7 are tools I also use on daily charts to try to pin point exit points. Hope this helps. Trade well!

[Here$14U]

Ended up buying some shares today (buy limit orders) as the gold & silver stocks were down some. I had orders in to buy 3% lower than my purchase price for HL and TRE which were triggered today. I still own USO, SLV, AZK, and NSU as well. Gold and Silver better be up tomorrow!! Will the S&P continue falling tomorrow? Could be it for the four day rally. Good Luck trading!

[Here$14U]

Today some of my limit sell orders got hit in TRE, HL, AZK and NSU. I still have 1/3 positions in them. I have adjusted buy limit orders for 1/3 positions at 3% lower than today's closes. I also own SLV and USO showing a small profit in USO and a small loss so far in SLV. I do have a buy limit order in for SLV @ 12.47 and a sell limit order for 2/3rds of my position in USO @ 30.41. Each day after the market close I update a spreadsheet that calculates my buy and sell limit orders depending upon what has transpired during the day. The system is basically this;
Buy 1/3 positions below 1st purchase price @ -3%, and -6%. Sell 2/3 of the position 8% higher than purchase price (or average price paid) then the last 1/3 of the position 11% higher than purchase price (or average price paid) for roughly a 10% gain. Today the gold stocks triggered their sell limit orders 8% above average price paid, but because I didnt enter my sells at 11% higher for the final 1/3 sells I still own shares in them. So in my spreadsheet I entered today's closing price instead of my average price paid and the spreadsheet gave me new prices to buy and sell at using 1/3 position buys, and 2/3, and 1/3 position sells. I know its hard to follow but so far it seems to be working quite well.

[alevin]

thanks for sharing your strategy, I need to zero in and study it, see if it will work for me, I'm trying to minimize trading costs since don't have a lot of capital to work with-no margin either at this point, tho I'm considering modifying account to allow it.

I thought I could short stocks at an intermediate trade permission level between just buying/selling stocks and buying/selling options, but apparently I have to have margin to be able to short, I thought that only applied to options but I guess not. still cogitatin on that chess move. I allow myself more than 3 minutes on the clock to make my move sometimes too.

[Bullitt]

Sounds like you have a well thought out plan 14. How often do you play the Juniors?

[Here$14U]

Alevin, yes you need a margin account to short stocks.
Bullitt, I just started playing the juniors on the last dip they experienced, so only about 2 weeks now. I'll mention the way I select them. I go to Clearstation.com and type in HL for example and the chart shows up. Then click on Gold & Silver in the Sector line. I concentrate on the RS (Relative Strength) of each stock. Also price comes into play because I like to buy the cheap ones with RS of at least 80. There are quite a few to choose from above RS80. The ones I first chose a few weeks ago were, NSU, JAG, TRE, and AZK. Fundamentals are good to know but I think everything known is already factored into price. The main thing is to pick the highest RS stocks you can afford. Hope this helps. Trade Well!!

[Here$14U]

Have a position in FAZ now, which I believe will do well starting tomorrow. Still own some USO, SLV. Junior miners too, TRE, AZK, NSU and HL. I think USO may come down a little which would be a good opportunity to buy more. We'll see how it goes. Also watching TZA, SDS, SDD, EFU should we pull back. Trade well!

[Here$14U]

Bought some shares of the junior minors early this morning, and sold some late in the day. Sold 2/3rds of my FAZ, and 1/3 of SLV. USO almost made it to my 1st target for a 1/3 sell but not quite. I'm expecting a market pullback so will be looking to buy some TZA, SDS, SDD, EFU, FAZ on any rally Monday. Not all of them but probably the least expensive one which I believe is FAZ or TZA. Also QID might be a possibility. Maybe we'll get a pop Monday morning which will provide an opportunity to get some bear shares. Trade well!