Bought MTL.to @ 13.27
Bought POU.to @ 27.40
Partially sold some TXG.to, VGCX.to and ARE.to (to replenish CAD cash reserves)
Portfolio = 82% stocks, 18% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.01%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period of time (^SP500TR) = 14.37%
Buy orders currently set for NA.to and OCFC (top-up)
Bought POU.to @ 27.40
Partially sold some TXG.to, VGCX.to and ARE.to (to replenish CAD cash reserves)
Portfolio = 82% stocks, 18% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.01%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period of time (^SP500TR) = 14.37%
Buy orders currently set for NA.to and OCFC (top-up)
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Sold ARE.to @ 11.55 (reduced target, mainly because of the further sell-off that happened after purchasing it)
+12.19% gain (incl. 1 dividend and zero top-ups), held for 125 days = 40% annualized gain
Bought POU.to @ 26.70 (top-up)
Portfolio = 84% stocks, 16% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.05%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 14.46%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.95 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to
VNDA, GM, OCFC, NEE, NFBK, SSRM, UDR, HRL
Buy orders currently set for MTL.to (top-up) and BANC
+12.19% gain (incl. 1 dividend and zero top-ups), held for 125 days = 40% annualized gain
Bought POU.to @ 26.70 (top-up)
Portfolio = 84% stocks, 16% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.05%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 14.46%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.95 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to
VNDA, GM, OCFC, NEE, NFBK, SSRM, UDR, HRL
Buy orders currently set for MTL.to (top-up) and BANC
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Sold NFBK @ 10.45
+18.37% gain (incl. exch. rates, 1 dividend and 0 top-ups), held for 42 days = 333% annualized gain
Portfolio = 80% stocks, 20% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.49%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 14.44%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.96 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to
VNDA, GM, OCFC, NEE, SSRM, UDR, HRL
Buy orders currently set for MTL.to (top-up) and EVRG
+18.37% gain (incl. exch. rates, 1 dividend and 0 top-ups), held for 42 days = 333% annualized gain
Portfolio = 80% stocks, 20% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.49%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 14.44%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.96 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to
VNDA, GM, OCFC, NEE, SSRM, UDR, HRL
Buy orders currently set for MTL.to (top-up) and EVRG
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"Laurentian Bank is where investor money goes to die." LOL. Funny quote I seen on BNNBloomberg.ca today. Just checked it out right now and, yup, sure enough it's where I want to be. They had a good enough quarter to put back on my watchlist again (after having had a 3 month "time-out" that is).
Bought LB.to @ 25.86
Portfolio = 84% stocks, 16% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.36%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period of time (^SP500TR) = 14.50%
Buy orders currently set for HWX.to and HP
Bought LB.to @ 25.86
Portfolio = 84% stocks, 16% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.36%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period of time (^SP500TR) = 14.50%
Buy orders currently set for HWX.to and HP
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Hello, I'm pretty new and clueless, after a few months of ineffective day trading.
I watch a PropSHop evert day, but can't keep up with them, so am thinking of swing trading. I've done a bit, successfully, just on the basis of waves which repeat every 2-4 weeks or so
But,
the thing is,
there's this:
Which you probably recognise, it's QQQ5.
That's about 68% in the last year.
Obviously the things which hurt it are the long red periods. A simple rule, like a moving average or "switch to the SHORT version of the ETP after 2-3 red days", or a %age pullback, should yield more. Switch back as soon as there's a decent blue, or positive %age.. Even if you just closed and held, it would be 100% plus.
You'd see things coming to a point, so could use 1x and -1x as well. I've "back tested" for a year on paper - it appears to work.
I can think of strategies which would take more attention, but this would only be about daily. Jan to June, nothing to do.
A slightly intelligent bot doing it for you should be spectacularly successful. I'm really surprised there aren't commercial bodies offering a service using something like that. Or are there?
I watch a PropSHop evert day, but can't keep up with them, so am thinking of swing trading. I've done a bit, successfully, just on the basis of waves which repeat every 2-4 weeks or so
But,
the thing is,
there's this:
Which you probably recognise, it's QQQ5.
That's about 68% in the last year.
Obviously the things which hurt it are the long red periods. A simple rule, like a moving average or "switch to the SHORT version of the ETP after 2-3 red days", or a %age pullback, should yield more. Switch back as soon as there's a decent blue, or positive %age.. Even if you just closed and held, it would be 100% plus.
You'd see things coming to a point, so could use 1x and -1x as well. I've "back tested" for a year on paper - it appears to work.
I can think of strategies which would take more attention, but this would only be about daily. Jan to June, nothing to do.
A slightly intelligent bot doing it for you should be spectacularly successful. I'm really surprised there aren't commercial bodies offering a service using something like that. Or are there?
Sorry cara, I'm afraid I won't be of much help there... I gave up on trying to succeed with any of those kinds of Technical Analysis systems years ago. I'm strictly a bargain shopper now, to put it simply. I only look for *fundamental* reasons for a stock to rise. In my case, those would be that it is; 1) a dependably *profitable* business; 2) it is currently *cheaper* than the average profitable company out there right now; and 3) people had *recently* liked this company enough to have paid pay a much higher price for it. All 3 of those conditions must be present for me to consider a potential trade to have enough of a positive bias or *edge* to make it worth my while. And any fine-tuning that I do make to my mechanical trading system is always based on adherence to those 3 conditions.
Truth be known, I personally don't believe anyone who says they are long-term successful at TA trading. There are just too many delusional gamblers - or worse - outright frauds out there who, in reality, just make their living from book sales/course sales/mentoring fees/youtube ad revenue/blog post ad revenue/signal service revenue/fund management fees/etc. to find anyone bona fide, IMO. Good luck though.
Truth be known, I personally don't believe anyone who says they are long-term successful at TA trading. There are just too many delusional gamblers - or worse - outright frauds out there who, in reality, just make their living from book sales/course sales/mentoring fees/youtube ad revenue/blog post ad revenue/signal service revenue/fund management fees/etc. to find anyone bona fide, IMO. Good luck though.
You missed the point a bit. What I meant was, is it worth going to the bother of selecting stocks for swing trading when you can do pretty darned well with something like the QQQ5, expecially if you stop using it when it's against you.
Day traders can certainly do well - have a look at tradertv live on youtube. They can pick and use stocks. Affirm went up about 11% each day for three days, then COinbase/MARA went up about 8% the next day, and yesterday google went up a few percent out of the open then AMD took over. Well over 10% total
That's 11 + 11 + 11 + 8 + 10.
62% in 4 days.
I'm just too slow to keep up and they have a bespoke platform. And I keep closing when there's a retracement.
My swinging efforts were usng regular several-percent rises, followed by drops, on things like GE before it "stopped", and MKS.
Fun while it lasted: buy the dips, wait for the humps. GE. Each hump is 5 - 6 %. I day candles. Almost a copy of Apple.
Day traders can certainly do well - have a look at tradertv live on youtube. They can pick and use stocks. Affirm went up about 11% each day for three days, then COinbase/MARA went up about 8% the next day, and yesterday google went up a few percent out of the open then AMD took over. Well over 10% total
That's 11 + 11 + 11 + 8 + 10.
62% in 4 days.
I'm just too slow to keep up and they have a bespoke platform. And I keep closing when there's a retracement.
My swinging efforts were usng regular several-percent rises, followed by drops, on things like GE before it "stopped", and MKS.
Fun while it lasted: buy the dips, wait for the humps. GE. Each hump is 5 - 6 %. I day candles. Almost a copy of Apple.
Well, I for one can't make trading a single index fund work because I would never know how to gauge when it is cheap enough to buy it or not. Whereas, using relative value for stock selection (comparison shopping) is child's play. This is because exactly one-half of a watchlist of quality stocks is going to be under-valued at any given time and only ONE of those under-valued candidates will have been sold-off the most from a recent high. Every new buy order can now be set to match that same sell-off percent of your worse one. Now the best part is that, even though I'm technically swing-trading individual stocks, I'm also simultaneously (mostly) fully invested all year long as well - so as to avoid that dreaded "market-timing" under-performance phenomenon so many people are afflicted with.
This methodology of mine might work for a basket of index funds though, I suppose. Maybe... The hard part, again, would be trying to determine if the one that sold-off the most is actually under-valued or not. Perhaps, it could have been a well deserved sell-off from a bubble??? That would be my problem trying to trade those.
Again, I have to emphasize that I don't follow (or believe in) any TA signals or patterns. Nor, do I use any Stop-Losses or discretionary trading decisions for that matter. So that style of trading you're researching would be completely unsuitable for me and yes selecting stocks is definitely worth the bother - just as long as I can continue to *beat the market* that is. Surprisingly, so few can... I suppose the jury is still out on that though. You'd be surprised at how many people require a 20 year track record for proof of that statement.
This methodology of mine might work for a basket of index funds though, I suppose. Maybe... The hard part, again, would be trying to determine if the one that sold-off the most is actually under-valued or not. Perhaps, it could have been a well deserved sell-off from a bubble??? That would be my problem trying to trade those.
Again, I have to emphasize that I don't follow (or believe in) any TA signals or patterns. Nor, do I use any Stop-Losses or discretionary trading decisions for that matter. So that style of trading you're researching would be completely unsuitable for me and yes selecting stocks is definitely worth the bother - just as long as I can continue to *beat the market* that is. Surprisingly, so few can... I suppose the jury is still out on that though. You'd be surprised at how many people require a 20 year track record for proof of that statement.
So how do you decide which of your stocks is "undervalued" if you're only comparing it with others? Do you just sell off the one which has done least well in the last period?
I am also suspicious of many of the proponents of wonderful Indicators. There's so much Confirmation Bias involved. "Look it fits exactly, here ".
Current relative "value" on that GE line above is clear enough even for me. A couple of straightish lines is all it takes to outline the channel. No I wouldn't suggest that only one stock should be used, except perhaps that QQQ5.
Which market are you beating at 28%? Clearly not the 5x Q's at 28 vs 68%, and more if you sold/went short when it dropped.
I suppose what I'm saying is, if the fund is ok, find a multiplier. I guess you aren't using leverage. The standard 5x would have turned your 28 to 140.
5 of those little humps above is 28%. Sure, you can use a few stocks so the humps don't coincide, but they often will. (Of course if you open Short when the price turns down, your money is very much In the Market, because you have to retain it in your margin account.)
I still believe, perhaps naively, that if I can pummel my brain into doing the bleedin' obvious, I should be able to take the free advice that's available, and achieve several percent per day, most of the time. Again, normal leveraging turns that to a dozen or twenty percent. The 62% I quoted from today's previous 4 days is not leveraged, so that would be 310%. In those names there were catalysts, but I closed and got distracted when they retraced a bit. Paper hands!
I think we all have a love/hate relationship with stop-losses. I have just picked up TradingView, which is one front-end where the "current price" can be worked out using the average of the previous few candles, so it ignores "wicks". Dunno where you are, but I'm told Ameritrade does that too.
I am also suspicious of many of the proponents of wonderful Indicators. There's so much Confirmation Bias involved. "Look it fits exactly, here ".
Current relative "value" on that GE line above is clear enough even for me. A couple of straightish lines is all it takes to outline the channel. No I wouldn't suggest that only one stock should be used, except perhaps that QQQ5.
Which market are you beating at 28%? Clearly not the 5x Q's at 28 vs 68%, and more if you sold/went short when it dropped.
I suppose what I'm saying is, if the fund is ok, find a multiplier. I guess you aren't using leverage. The standard 5x would have turned your 28 to 140.
5 of those little humps above is 28%. Sure, you can use a few stocks so the humps don't coincide, but they often will. (Of course if you open Short when the price turns down, your money is very much In the Market, because you have to retain it in your margin account.)
I still believe, perhaps naively, that if I can pummel my brain into doing the bleedin' obvious, I should be able to take the free advice that's available, and achieve several percent per day, most of the time. Again, normal leveraging turns that to a dozen or twenty percent. The 62% I quoted from today's previous 4 days is not leveraged, so that would be 310%. In those names there were catalysts, but I closed and got distracted when they retraced a bit. Paper hands!
I think we all have a love/hate relationship with stop-losses. I have just picked up TradingView, which is one front-end where the "current price" can be worked out using the average of the previous few candles, so it ignores "wicks". Dunno where you are, but I'm told Ameritrade does that too.
I have an admittedly simplistic view to value determination (that I tried to explain in my opening intro post). Like a boots-on-the-ground "What's in it for me?" approach. I.e. What? Your company will pay me an 8% dividend but everyone else only pays around 3% or so (or considerably less for the popular ones)? Is it sustainable though? - Well, the net worth of our company keeps steadily increasing every year *despite* having paid out all those juicy dividends - so yes! We should definitely be able manage those payments going forward.
As to my "beating the market" claim, I use the S&P 500 Total Return Index for my benchmark. (This "total return" version includes a hypothetical dividend reinvestment for all those 500 companies it tracks, thereby giving you a more realistic number to use instead of just ignoring any dividend payment like the standard S&P500 index does. Yahoo reports this index as the symbol ^SP500TR and currently for the last 5 years its avg annual compounded return has been just over 14%)
As to leverage, *sigh* my wife won't let use any (she HATES any kind of debt). Otherwise, I would in a heartbeat. Not brokerage margin, mind you, that's beyond asinine. But rather I would take out a mortgage on the house and/or a HELOC. You know, something that isn't tied to the value of your stocks which would force you to sell them at the worst possible time (thereby blowing the account in the process - margin calls wipe people out and that's a fact).
As to my "beating the market" claim, I use the S&P 500 Total Return Index for my benchmark. (This "total return" version includes a hypothetical dividend reinvestment for all those 500 companies it tracks, thereby giving you a more realistic number to use instead of just ignoring any dividend payment like the standard S&P500 index does. Yahoo reports this index as the symbol ^SP500TR and currently for the last 5 years its avg annual compounded return has been just over 14%)
As to leverage, *sigh* my wife won't let use any (she HATES any kind of debt). Otherwise, I would in a heartbeat. Not brokerage margin, mind you, that's beyond asinine. But rather I would take out a mortgage on the house and/or a HELOC. You know, something that isn't tied to the value of your stocks which would force you to sell them at the worst possible time (thereby blowing the account in the process - margin calls wipe people out and that's a fact).
Sold GM @ 33.70 (failed trade, break-even exit)
+0.53% gain (incl. exchg rates, 2 dividends and 0 top-ups), held for 119 days = 1.62% annualized gain
Sold OCFC @ 15.75 (reduced target due to increased sell-off after purchase)
+10.82% gain (incl. exchg. rates, 1 dividend and 1 top-up), held for 69 days = 72% annualized gain
Bought VNDA @ 3.96 (this top-up was required because of too much cash on hand at the moment)
Portfolio = 73% stocks, 27% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.27%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 14.58%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.97 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to, LB.to
VNDA, NEE, SSRM, UDR, HRL
Buy orders currently set for PXT.to and HRL (top-up)
+0.53% gain (incl. exchg rates, 2 dividends and 0 top-ups), held for 119 days = 1.62% annualized gain
Sold OCFC @ 15.75 (reduced target due to increased sell-off after purchase)
+10.82% gain (incl. exchg. rates, 1 dividend and 1 top-up), held for 69 days = 72% annualized gain
Bought VNDA @ 3.96 (this top-up was required because of too much cash on hand at the moment)
Portfolio = 73% stocks, 27% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.27%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 14.58%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.97 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to, LB.to
VNDA, NEE, SSRM, UDR, HRL
Buy orders currently set for PXT.to and HRL (top-up)
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No, nothing I invested in has ever imploded. The worst losses I have to take from time-to-time are in the 30% range *I think* (and usually those were the ones that required an immediate exit due to a poor earnings report). Most of those losses get mitigated by my smallish position sizes though. Like that FM.to you refer to. I'll admit, that it was a bit irritating that a quick stock price recovery depended on the outcome of a coin-flip decision in the Panamanian Supreme Court. Now that that went against them we're stuck facing a longer recovery instead, that's all. Whatever. It happens. Anyway, on the day that my order filled for that one, it only amounted to 5.74% of my entire portfolio size due to my adaptive diversification strategy. Hardly worth fretting over. Still a good company, still undervalued, still profitable until proven otherwise in the next E.R. and they still have avenues to recoup that copper mine in one way or another.
The beauty of a mechanical trading system (especially one that you believe in) is that emotions are almost entirely removed from it. No dithering over what to buy or sell or at what price. It just gets done. Cold and calculated. Mild dithering only required for general system refinements if you find markets have change markedly from what you were used to.
The stocks with the largest potential rewards are quite often the ones deemed the scariest by the general trading crowd at the time. After a while, you just kind of become numb to it.
Actually, diversification is probably what helped me the most. You can likely see from my PnL chart the point at which I began to take that more seriously. Oh man! Those days prior to that adjustment got pretty wild. There may have been a bit of luck involved back then...
The beauty of a mechanical trading system (especially one that you believe in) is that emotions are almost entirely removed from it. No dithering over what to buy or sell or at what price. It just gets done. Cold and calculated. Mild dithering only required for general system refinements if you find markets have change markedly from what you were used to.
The stocks with the largest potential rewards are quite often the ones deemed the scariest by the general trading crowd at the time. After a while, you just kind of become numb to it.
Actually, diversification is probably what helped me the most. You can likely see from my PnL chart the point at which I began to take that more seriously. Oh man! Those days prior to that adjustment got pretty wild. There may have been a bit of luck involved back then...
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Bought HP @ 34.93
Sold NEE @ 62.32 (slightly reduced target)
+22.01% (incl exchg rates, 1 dividend and 0 top-ups), held for 71 days = +178% annualized gain
Portfolio = 82% stocks, 18% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.70%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 15.05%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.99 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to, LB.to
VNDA, SSRM, UDR, HRL, HP
Buy orders now set for TCW.to and XOM
Sold NEE @ 62.32 (slightly reduced target)
+22.01% (incl exchg rates, 1 dividend and 0 top-ups), held for 71 days = +178% annualized gain
Portfolio = 82% stocks, 18% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.70%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 15.05%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.99 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to, LB.to
VNDA, SSRM, UDR, HRL, HP
Buy orders now set for TCW.to and XOM
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Sold UDR @ 37.91
+13.55% (incl. exchg. rates, 0 dividends and 1 top-up), held for 40 days = +219% annualized gain
Bought VNDA @ 3.89 (top-up)
Portfolio = 72% stocks, 28% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.62%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 15.11%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.99 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to, LB.to
VNDA, SSRM, HRL, HP
Buy orders now set for TCW.to and HRL (top-up)
+13.55% (incl. exchg. rates, 0 dividends and 1 top-up), held for 40 days = +219% annualized gain
Bought VNDA @ 3.89 (top-up)
Portfolio = 72% stocks, 28% cash
Portfolio Annual Gains (XIRR) = 28.62%
Stock Market Annual Gains over same period (^SP500TR) = 15.11%
Updated Cumulative PnL chart (4.99 years, zero leverage):
Open Swing Trade Positions:
TXG.to, VGCX.to, CPX.to, WCP.to, FM.to, MTL.to, POU.to, LB.to
VNDA, SSRM, HRL, HP
Buy orders now set for TCW.to and HRL (top-up)
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So I made another strategy adjustment today for my Dividend paying stocks value assessment. Instead of using the Average yield of all the companies on my watchlist, I will now be using the Median yield - to mitigate the effect of some significant outliers skewing the result. By me willing to accept a slightly lower yielding stock as an undervalued one now, this *should* decrease my exposure risk per trade (increased diversification) - a worthwhile trade-off, IMO. This change has only resulted in about a half-a-percent or so of my benchmark dividend yield (probably negligible in the market's eyes). I believe recent price-action holds a little more weight than dividend yield does in a typical investor's perspective. We'll see...
Buy orders currently set for TCW.to and PII
Buy orders currently set for TCW.to and PII
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