29 turning 30. 11 years of trading. First profiting year Journal 1

[wabu27]

What's up guys. I'm going to start a new journal just posting all of my daily results.

Hopefully it will give me an incentive to trade safer each day.

I've been trading since 2010 and this is the first year where I'm actually making a profit.

I've been having a good streak and thought it might be a good chance to start another journal that can actually last a couple months.

Trading is a lonely journey and hope some people can get some excitement from my results as I do.

I daytrade futures - mostly natural gas. Commission has been a killer so I'm thinking of going to commission free stock trading. Last Friday I switched my IB Pro account to IB Lite, which gives me those commission free stock trade.

If anyone has any questions I'll do my best to get back to you.

Wish me luck

 

[wabu27]

7/30/2021 +$669
Was waiting for NG's fall for over a week and yesterday I was scared it may not move as I expected so I decided to exit my positions and just go in again during market open hours. NG started the day much lower and I couldn't capitalize on the massive overnight drop. Sigh.. I guess I should be happy I didn't have a losing day but it is very disappointing.

 

[wabu27]

8/2/2021 +$2137
Started a little late in the day because i had night shift and i gave into sleep. NG had a good downrun going so i made my money shorting that.

Something that hit me really hard just moments ago was I am making a significant amount of money.. but for what? I didn't do anything special and yet it's telling me I'm up over a thousand dollars. I'm doing the same thing I did before and when I traded 1 contract, my daily goal was make $200 or 20 points a day. It felt doable with a little effort. When I was up $200 or even more, it was a feeling of whatever. Same old same old. If I was down $200 or more, it was also a feeling of whatever.
Now I'm doing the same thing, just scaled up. When it starts going over $1000 so easily, I'm thinking "What the hell... is this legal?". In this world, I believe there is always a cost for the money you gain. So why am I making so much money when I'm doing work that I don't think should reward me with so much? After getting this uneasy thought, my heart started pounding really fast and I decided to exit most of my positions and just let 2 contracts run. Based on what I'm seeing on KOLD/BOIL charts, I could have let my positions run even more. I should have run it more - it was showing a pattern that I'm comfortable with. Yet, I didn't have the stomach to run with it because the money was getting too big. Amateur hour, I guess. After 25 more point gains with 2 contracts, I covered all.
Hopefully I can keep this up long enough to get used to this kind of money movements. Hopefully, in the near future, going up (please not down) $2,000 will also be just a 'whatever' moment.

 

[wabu27]

8/3/2021 -$2778
Didnt trade in the morning. In the afternoon after the NG sudden rise, I thought it was a fake and it would go down so I shorted. Made $1000. Didn't exit because I thought it would go down a lot more so doubled my position. NG went the other way. I guess I only feel uneasy when I make money because I'm so used to losing money, I'm down 3K, which is a big deal, but I don't feel that bad. I'm tainted..

I just couldn't exit or didn't exit when my trade was going the other way because it looked like such a fake rise. I believe the downward trend is starting, or has started already. We'll see tomorrow and NG report on thursday which would give a clearer picture. Decided to hold my position overnight because I believe this is going down. Also told my friend to buy KOLD so she is in for a couple thousand.

 

[wabu27]

8/4 -$7098

Dang. I saw NG could start higher but i was expecting it to start higher and go steadily down. Thought overnight if I should cut my position in half but I was like whatever, let's just go with it. Well that small thought ruined me today.. this is why you never go all in all the time. Sigh.. Well I still think it's starting a downhill trend. If it shoots up again tomorrow after the NG report, that's when I'll call GG. Not too worried for now, but after tomorrow I might be.

 

[wabu27]

8/5 -$721
It is so painful to post when I have a losing day.
It is tiring to see the chart when it goes sideways instead of up or down.
After today's chart, now it looks like it can go higher. Or (NG) drop tomorrow. Thought about exiting but shit I lost so much I'll just keep on going until maybe like 5K more and than I'll call it quits. This is exactly why I shoulda went to stocks instead of futures... if I'm wrong, futures market owns me when in stocks, it's not as big of a loss, moneywise.

 

[wabu27]

8/6 -$811
for the week -$9271

Well that was hell of a start to a journal. I dont know whats more surprising. Losing almost 10K in a week or still up 1.5K for the past 4 weeks.
Exited all my positions. Balance was $24799 so added 3K so I can daytrade stocks next week. Going to go back to 1 contracts if i trade futures. That will probably mean 2 or 3 but it will not be all in like how i was all this week. I think I can make 10K again in about 3-5 weeks if i just play it safe. dang this was a bad week.

 

[wabu27]

8/9 +$702
Always this way. I exit and the trade goes the way I wanted. Sheesh!
Did some scalping today with NG futures. Feeling okay going forward. I think I can get my winning streak back. I was super laid back over the weekend because of the big loss last week. Lived on 2 days of pizza from dominos.
Tried to trade stocks today but it says im under PDT rule when my acct is over 25K. Why is this? I did have 2 positions in NG so available funds for stocks were 20K. Is this why? I feel like total amount is over 25K so it shouldnt matter. Iono.. if I see a good entry tomorrow Ill try trading stocks again and see if it works.

If anyone have recommendations on stocks I should follow, please let me know! I'm looking for something that has lots of volume, frequent volatility average of 2-3% each day, stock price above $20 preferable and prices not too high. I lost my old watch list.

Also what's a good brokerage watchlist tool? For example, I used to use Scottrade before for my watchlist and it gave me realtime quotes and the template just worked for me. I don't like Interactive Brokers watchlist setup, I tried Etrade today and it seemed trash (needed $1000 balance for realtime quotes), I tried logging into TDAmeritrade but I couldn't verify my info...they said try again after 72 hours.

 

[wabu27]

8/10 +$1147
Tried stocks. So it was because my capital was less than $20K that I couldn't daytrade even though my total capital was over 25K. When I did just stocks, the orders went in just fine. Shorted MRNA for a quick gain. Played around with NG with 2 contracts for the rest of the gain.

Made a new stock watchlist and it brought back nostalgia seeing all the percentages move right when the market opened and throughout the way. Trading just excites me.

 

[wabu27]

8/11 -$979
Man I shoulda concentrated on MRNA yesterday and ride it until today. Woke up late and missed the big drop.. waited for the bounce and scalped. Started with a profit. Than noticed I could buy more and decided to buy until I couldn't buy anymore so I can see where my limits are at. Went from doing 50 positions to 225.
I still have half of that position in.. I think it's due for a bounce this week. If it goes down tomorrow I'll try to limit my loss.. hopefully it wont start too deep in the red. Hoping for a higher start tomorrow for MRNA.

Stocks is definitely my thing compared to futures. I love stocks. I am definitely trading too big right now. After tomorrow I'll limit my buying power in stocks as well.

 

[wabu27]

8/12 +$5068
Thankfully MRNA started higher. I called itttttttt saw the drop so i sold right way. it drops. called its bounce so i bought and it bounced. Just played around with MRNA all day. Didn't even go all in. At one point I had 150 contracts I think but most of the day it was 50, 100, 82 contracts at a time.
Stocks is definitely my thing. Screw futures. NG moved exactly the way I predicted but the probability is not high enough that I can bank it. It plays around the resistance points too much to fake people out. I just can't bank on NG's big movement days but I take all the losses when it moves big the other way.
Stocks on the other hand, because commission is zero I go in and out like back in the days in 2010 when I practiced with virtual trading. I trade like it's a game and I have no pressure to deter me from going in and out since commission is zero. The way I traded stocks today, when I do the same thing with NG futures, my commission easily goes up to $300-400/day. Often higher. So I was feeling like I was earning $300-400 today just by not trading futures. Feels just fantastic.
Because I was earning small bits at a time and not trying to ride it out, my money went up little by little to what I earned today, and I wasn't even paying attention. I was just having fun, going in when I saw an opportunity and going out when I felt a movement other way was about to come out. There are time I would earn like 0.2% and just go out because I'm like "nevermind" and I'm okay with just exiting with a tiny gain because there's zero commissions. And everything just added up. I don't think I had any losing trades today. Traded total of ~950 buys and same number of sells today and commission was $2.06. Not sure why there's that commission since commission should be free, but hey I'm not complaining. You can charge me $2 any day compared to what I used to pay to IB.

 

[wabu27]

8/13 +$784
For the week: +$6722

Stocks on my watchlist didn't move much today. Played around with MRNA little by little throughout the day. Made $40, $50, $60 per trades and it just added up. Also shorted AMD because it was going up so high from the start. Waited until it looked like it was running out of gas and shorted it with a small position. Overall, a bunch of small trades. Also had zero losing trades today. All the small gains added up to make up today's profits. Going to end the day early and end it on a positive note. Can't wait till Monday!!!!!

This week has been good. Solid trading. Realized again my love for stocks and I don't think I'm going to go back to futures. The mental relief of having zero commission per trade is really something.

 

[wabu27]

8/16 +$247
All the stocks in my watchlist moved weird today. No clear sense of direction. MRNA started a lot lower and I believe it would bounce to $440 so I thought this would be a big payday. Saw the initial drop, the rise, and I thought it would drop once more before working its way up to becoming positive. So I was waiting for the second drop but it never came; it just slowly creeped up and I missed the 5% rise altogether. Made my money in the second half of the day shorting AMC and MRNA. For some reason, I can only short a smaller amount in AMC compared to MRNA. I can short 300 shares in AMC but can short 225 in MRNA, which in dollar terms is a big difference. I wonder why this is so.

 

[wabu27]

8/17 -$101
Well that pissed me off. Woke up late. Missed the morning rapid rise. Waited for an opportunity. Made money with Tesla. $800. Thought about calling it a day but I thought I saw another opportunity. Trade just did not go my way. But it seemed like someone was not letting Tesla fall at the end and just forced it to steadily go up. Lost all of my gains and some more.

AHARHARARFKAOPRGKAPORKG
Tomorrow I'll wake up early and make sure omfg Tesla dropping a little now. That was bad of me. Man I really got to watch myself going all in. Especially later in the day since I feel like I'm 50/50 in the second half of the day.

 

[wabu27]

8/18 +$1,665
Played around with MRNA. Did a lot of scalping throughout the day. Going to end it early since I'm not sure if it's going to go up to positive or drop further down. I feel like right now it could go either way. Also I have somewhere I need to be in 40 mins. YEAAAAA

 

[wabu27]

8/19 +$1,343
Balance: $37,675

Made money with MRNA and AMC today. AMC started a lot lower so waited until it looked like it wouldn't go any lower and tried to play the bounce. Same with MRNA. Almost lost half of my gains because I went big on MRNA and it didn't bounce the way I'd hoped and instead went even lower. It did bounce back a little so I made most of my money back but ... tired. It was a long day. Going to call it a day and go back to sleep.

Including a picture of when I entered/exited. I figure this would be more entertaining than my post, which made sense to me when I was writing it but once I re-read it after posting, it's not good writing.

 

[wabu27]

8/20 -$1,177
For the week: +$1,977
Balance: $36,498

Was running on 2 hours of sleep. When I realized I should really pay more attention, I was down $1,300. MRNA all day. Today was a big disaster. I wouldn't have been surprised if I was down a lot more because nothing worked for me today. I called the directions correct but got the level of movements completely wrong. I would go to a big negative, swing it to break even and if I stayed in I woulda won big but I thought it would reverse again so I switch my positions, and go back into a bigger negative, than try to breakeven and on and on.
MRNA's volume was really low compared to other days and I really feel like it was trying to fall yet someone was propping it up. I really felt like this was forced. Of course I could have traded better and go easier on my positions, yet man MRNA just moved weird today.

Very disappointing finish to the week and also to my trading self. A problem I need to really fix if I want to become rich from daytrading.

 

[Smith2525]

Happy birthday!

 

[wabu27]

8/23 +$2,822
Balance: $39,320

I have a weird sleeping schedule. I woke up late at night and just stayed awake until the market opens. I was checking out Natural Gas and it looked like an opportunity. Now I try not to trade anything overnight because 1. it is super hard to predict 2. I have a history of losing big. Yet it just seemed like a good opportunity so I went in. Made money. Went in and out multiple times and made money on all of them. I shoulda went big but i didn't because I was scared .. but the trades went so well both ways that I made almost $1600 before the markets even opened. This may seem a lot but if I went big, I think I could have made like $6000 because the trades were just going the way I expected. So compared to what I could have made, I don't think I made a lot.
During the day, played around with MRNA. Scalping. I feel like it won't have any significant movement rest of today so just going to call it a day. Have some errands to do so will take care of those right now, eat some lunch, and get some sleep.

3 weeks in and finally making profit from the start of my journal. The $10K loss on the first week really hit me hard but I recovered from it and now I'm up $2,919. Yay!

 

[wabu27]

Happy birthday!

It's my birthday?