The posted CMC trades, just one of the stocks that I am tracking and trading, has produced a decent return on investment since September.
Five trades posted, 4 winners and 1 loser.
Using the typical "$1,000 invested could have been..." method of reference seems a little unrealistic as the price varies and percentages can be deceptive if spun the right way. Assume that a trade size of 100 shares (the typical lot size) the first trade (a short at $14.50) would have tied up $1450... so I will use that as the starting capital. All trades thereafter remain 100 shares and, but as it turns out, $50 would have had to have been added to keep this size as the price does rise into the last trade.
Total profit was $400 for a 27.6% return based on the first trade of $1450 (26.7% if you count in the extra $50 added at the end)
Not bad.
Doing the compounding thing based on the share prices for each trade turns this out to $406. Interesting as I thought that it might have been a bit higher. The loss early on and the larger share price at the end reduced the effectiveness of the compounding.... but an extra $6 is still $6.
I'll post my total record next time around. I have the data but just have not run it through the ringer yet, some I traded and some I did not so it's a little all over the place right now.
Jeff.
Questrade, My direct access discount broker.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
CMC and not so live trade blogging
I've been somewhat tied up in other projects (personal and work related and I have not taken the time to keep my blog updated. Some of the trades that I have been tracking I have not actually managed to get into, and some I have. I can only do so many things. So, I am updating my favourite stock following today.
My CMC trade posted active on November 23rd, 2010 didn't get entered. The way the price hovered around $15 then broke up just did not instil much confidence in a followup drop in price, basically the setup looked far more bullish than bearish. As a result I just decided to let it settle into the next groove. In the interest of not looking like I am fitting the trades to the hindsight circumstances I will keep it in the mix as if it were made anyway.
Book one loss of $1.50
As such the setup came for a long trade, a little more aggressive based on older support / resistance rather than new trend establishment, enter long at $15.50 following the mid-December high of $17.46. February 17th saw the $18.00 break which made the setup a little less aggressive but still active.
Mid-March saw the price spending most of it's time in the $15's so there was lots of time to get a decent price for this trade. Target exit at $17.00 met on March 29th.
Book one profit of $1.50
Of course a short is in order next, target entry was for $17.50 to allow a little space to wind up and make this a lower risk setup. Trade filled on April 1st and closed on April 18th at the target of $16.00.
Book another profit of $1.50.
All in all not a bad producer.
Jeff.
My CMC trade posted active on November 23rd, 2010 didn't get entered. The way the price hovered around $15 then broke up just did not instil much confidence in a followup drop in price, basically the setup looked far more bullish than bearish. As a result I just decided to let it settle into the next groove. In the interest of not looking like I am fitting the trades to the hindsight circumstances I will keep it in the mix as if it were made anyway.
Book one loss of $1.50
As such the setup came for a long trade, a little more aggressive based on older support / resistance rather than new trend establishment, enter long at $15.50 following the mid-December high of $17.46. February 17th saw the $18.00 break which made the setup a little less aggressive but still active.
Mid-March saw the price spending most of it's time in the $15's so there was lots of time to get a decent price for this trade. Target exit at $17.00 met on March 29th.
Book one profit of $1.50
Of course a short is in order next, target entry was for $17.50 to allow a little space to wind up and make this a lower risk setup. Trade filled on April 1st and closed on April 18th at the target of $16.00.
Book another profit of $1.50.
All in all not a bad producer.
Jeff.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Broker hiccup? (NOT!)
I tried to close my IAU position this morning but I keep getting a "More shares requested than in current position" message. I even tried reducing the order, setting a stop order, limit order.... no avail.
As much as this is frustrating I am not terribly concerned about it... yet. Gold jumped a bit between my attempt and now, almost $8, and the fund jumped from $13.71 to 13.79.... about 8 cents. Yes, there is a reasonably close correlation in short term moves on this one.
I would like to set a stop and just trail it manually, I'll have to wait for the broker to get back to me... or I can call the order desk if I feel a strong desire to have this dealt with quicker.
UPDATE:
I called the trade desk and had it pointed out to me that I had an outstanding stop order in place and therefore could not add another order on the same shares (DUHHH!). I have been trading with and without stops for a while no so I just forgot that I had one in place. Once I had placed a couple of failed attempts and had them rejected then looked at the order status I failed to notice the original order nested in the bottom. Classic newbie mistake.
Anyhow, the price climbed back up near it's high for the week at $13.85, I closed it out at $13.77 so I don't need to sit on it for the weekend. With the Middle East shenanigans it may very well gap one way or the other by Monday and I would rather not deal with that... so an overall 3.11% gain on a short term gold rally trade.
I look at the entry and exit based on the gold futures contracts and drool... a little. $6,000 in profits. Now I am not trading those so the point in moot but what is interesting is that there was a bit of a disconnect between the percentage increase between the ETF and the futures. Prior to this week they were tracking with the ETF a little ahead but this week the ETF has been a full 1% lagging. A shame as I was likely to be closing the trade this week it would have been nice to have been able to post an extra point on the return.
Jeff.
As much as this is frustrating I am not terribly concerned about it... yet. Gold jumped a bit between my attempt and now, almost $8, and the fund jumped from $13.71 to 13.79.... about 8 cents. Yes, there is a reasonably close correlation in short term moves on this one.
I would like to set a stop and just trail it manually, I'll have to wait for the broker to get back to me... or I can call the order desk if I feel a strong desire to have this dealt with quicker.
UPDATE:
I called the trade desk and had it pointed out to me that I had an outstanding stop order in place and therefore could not add another order on the same shares (DUHHH!). I have been trading with and without stops for a while no so I just forgot that I had one in place. Once I had placed a couple of failed attempts and had them rejected then looked at the order status I failed to notice the original order nested in the bottom. Classic newbie mistake.
Anyhow, the price climbed back up near it's high for the week at $13.85, I closed it out at $13.77 so I don't need to sit on it for the weekend. With the Middle East shenanigans it may very well gap one way or the other by Monday and I would rather not deal with that... so an overall 3.11% gain on a short term gold rally trade.
I look at the entry and exit based on the gold futures contracts and drool... a little. $6,000 in profits. Now I am not trading those so the point in moot but what is interesting is that there was a bit of a disconnect between the percentage increase between the ETF and the futures. Prior to this week they were tracking with the ETF a little ahead but this week the ETF has been a full 1% lagging. A shame as I was likely to be closing the trade this week it would have been nice to have been able to post an extra point on the return.
Jeff.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Resisting the urge...
I keep having to pull myself back from overtrading. I have considered selling and buying this gold trade a few times and I may have come out ahead based on my timing BUT I am resisting and sticking to the plan.
Today I moved the stops up on my first trade and entered a second position, double basically, and set the same stop. This has me at breakeven for trade one and 33 cents down on trade two.
Today's entry was close to not getting filled due to the shallow pullback off the start, but I stuck to my entry price. Had I started earlier I would have got my price pre-market, just busy with other stuff.
I am starting to go over my previous trades, as I mentioned I was going to. It looks a little monotonous as I will have to print out and manually annotate my charts as there are no studies that cover what I am looking for. Most indicators are available (Aroon, On Balance Volume, moving averages and perhaps I'll use the Bollinger bands) but cross referencing time scale charts with non-time scale charts... either nobody does it or they have and not found it useful.
Actually, over the years I have found that all of the non-useful stuff is readily available and all the really good stuff is near to impossible to get without having to pay a fair price to get, so I am now wondering if what I am doing is just one of those things that may happen to work very well. If nothing else I can prove or disprove that theory this weekend. The trouble with any study is trying not to let the known future affect the trade ideas that are to be based on the past data.
Jeff.
Today I moved the stops up on my first trade and entered a second position, double basically, and set the same stop. This has me at breakeven for trade one and 33 cents down on trade two.
Today's entry was close to not getting filled due to the shallow pullback off the start, but I stuck to my entry price. Had I started earlier I would have got my price pre-market, just busy with other stuff.
I am starting to go over my previous trades, as I mentioned I was going to. It looks a little monotonous as I will have to print out and manually annotate my charts as there are no studies that cover what I am looking for. Most indicators are available (Aroon, On Balance Volume, moving averages and perhaps I'll use the Bollinger bands) but cross referencing time scale charts with non-time scale charts... either nobody does it or they have and not found it useful.
Actually, over the years I have found that all of the non-useful stuff is readily available and all the really good stuff is near to impossible to get without having to pay a fair price to get, so I am now wondering if what I am doing is just one of those things that may happen to work very well. If nothing else I can prove or disprove that theory this weekend. The trouble with any study is trying not to let the known future affect the trade ideas that are to be based on the past data.
Jeff.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Gold continued....
It's nice to be in a trade that is actually doing something.
EOD today has my gold trade up 1.82% as gold sits in the mid 1370's. Target is somewhere over 1400.
I have closed all of my other trades as of yesterday. While my win rate is just under 50% (too many shorts as the shorts did me in with this grinding rally overall) I have more data to play with while I wait for the setups to setup and trigger. I decided to apply an On Balance Volume (OBV) indicator to my trades to see how it reacts to the various price moves. I haven't been using volume as a factor in my trade decisions lately and I think that it may have been a factor that could have made me take, or close trades at a different point.
Sometimes simplifying things too much can be just that... simplified too much.
Jeff.
EOD today has my gold trade up 1.82% as gold sits in the mid 1370's. Target is somewhere over 1400.
I have closed all of my other trades as of yesterday. While my win rate is just under 50% (too many shorts as the shorts did me in with this grinding rally overall) I have more data to play with while I wait for the setups to setup and trigger. I decided to apply an On Balance Volume (OBV) indicator to my trades to see how it reacts to the various price moves. I haven't been using volume as a factor in my trade decisions lately and I think that it may have been a factor that could have made me take, or close trades at a different point.
Sometimes simplifying things too much can be just that... simplified too much.
Jeff.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Gold ETF and equivalency tracking.
One of the factors that affects how appropriate an ETF is to replace an underlying index is how well it tracks relative to the underlying index moves. Right now I am in a gold trade that I am using IAU as a proxy for gold futures contracts.
I have both the futures and the ETF prices tracking from my entry point as if I had bought both. So far my real position in IAU is beating the futures by a slim margin.
For example, last night's close for gold was 1362.7 and IAU was at $13.32. Now futures trade after hours so there is no continuous price changes to compare so EOD is as of 1600h yesterday. The increase from the position opening is 0.87% for gold (11.7 points) and 0.98% for IAU (13 cents per share).
While this is worth noting the real difference is mostly negligible as futures contracts can vary based on factors other than just the traded price for gold. If the contracts are skewed high due to demand or expectations then later on the futures increase in value may be less than the corresponding ETF as this initial disparity shrinks.
Basically, if the tracking is this close I consider it acceptable to base the gold trades off of the futures contracts for triggers at entry and exit. The only exception might be that virtually closing the futures trade due to proximity to the expiration date may not apply to the ETF trade. It depends on the trend.
Jeff.
I have both the futures and the ETF prices tracking from my entry point as if I had bought both. So far my real position in IAU is beating the futures by a slim margin.
For example, last night's close for gold was 1362.7 and IAU was at $13.32. Now futures trade after hours so there is no continuous price changes to compare so EOD is as of 1600h yesterday. The increase from the position opening is 0.87% for gold (11.7 points) and 0.98% for IAU (13 cents per share).
While this is worth noting the real difference is mostly negligible as futures contracts can vary based on factors other than just the traded price for gold. If the contracts are skewed high due to demand or expectations then later on the futures increase in value may be less than the corresponding ETF as this initial disparity shrinks.
Basically, if the tracking is this close I consider it acceptable to base the gold trades off of the futures contracts for triggers at entry and exit. The only exception might be that virtually closing the futures trade due to proximity to the expiration date may not apply to the ETF trade. It depends on the trend.
Jeff.
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