james_gsx

At first today looked like it would be a doji which worried me, but price moved higher and closed above the ambush zone. So that looks bullish to me and I'm leaving my other options open until $110. Still might see a pullback before then, but that's my target for these remaining calls. One thing I do need to learn though is better risk management with options. I don't like buying naked calls all the time, and I would like to expand on that aspect of my business. Does anyone have any recommendations? I have read far too many options websites and they all say the same thing over and over, I guess I need more experience?

Trader273 - I was looking at HO and NG as well before making the trade, and they did confirm for me. As with the CL trade, I'm exiting a small portion right now and the rest I will exit when price hits $110. I think CL is going to $125, but that's for another trade This was just a simple S/R trade with my entry based on candles. As I said, my stop would be to CLOSE below $100. I have noticed that CL will dip through lows etc during trading hours to blow out stops, just to retrace back above/below support/resistance. We did it several times before an actual close above $100. Once the close above $100 came, it all took off. Edit: I got out of the April call, and now I'm just holding onto some longer term calls. I don't think price will scream to $110, and it looks like today is producing a spinning top, so we might pull back again. The reason for selling the April call was to lock in a small profit, and let the rest of the trade mature.

I agree, when they first came out I wasn't a big fan. But, as with any BMW, they grow on me. And the Z4 is the ultimate chick car

The bulls have had plenty of chances to rally, and can't seem to do it. Overall it looks very bearish to me, which is why I exited my position flat today at break even. Yesterday we had a doji after a rally, followed by confirmation today with the move lower. I think we'll test the 1325 area soon, and if that holds we could move to 1375. If not, back to the lows we go.

Frankly I don't care what the signal was, it's making me money. If we want to get bitchy about the candle and when I should have taken it, then we will simply look at price action alone. The fact stands, price hit support and found buyers thus moving price higher.

I finished all my options trading and a few futures trades this morning so I decided to head into Denver to run a few errands. While I was down there I was near the big BMW dealership and decided to stop by. I had never drove a BMW before, so this was a good experience. After looking at several cars for about an hour I asked to drive the 128i Convertible simply because I had never drove a convertible. It was okay, nothing to write home about unless maybe I was a girl or not into driving as much as I am. But I wasn't getting out of the car wanting to dump my Mercedes. The second car I drove was a blue metallic 335xi coupe. It has the twin turbocharged I6, awd, and 300hp. That car was FAST and had a ton of grip. I basically drove like a dick and explored the limits of grip on the car. I was sold immediately. Normally I would go with RWD, but since I live in Colorado the AWD is ideal for our snowy winters. I also go up to the mountains a lot, and sometimes that AWD can save you. What I really liked was the free maintenance. Especially since I just paid $635 last week for my service, $60 for the stupid wipers :doh: They also have a cool loyalty program for those who lease and get a new car every three years, which is what I would opt for since I seem to have ADD with cars. I'm barely 20 and I'm on my third car, I would have more if I wasn't into expensive ones. I didn't get the car today because I want to get a little more established with my trading. My options business is starting to become very profitable, but the futures isn't quite yet. I want to get more experience under my belt and I want to trade full time for a few more months before I reward myself. I live cheap except for my cars, so I can afford things like this. I am also waiting later this year for the diesels. Rumor has it they are averaging over 40mpg with plenty of power and torque, and that makes a huge difference. The price of diesel is more, but if that gets me an extra 10 round trips to work then I'm all for it. So if any of you traders have some extra cash laying around, I urge you to go drive one :o

I agree, I could have gotten in at a better price. I guess that's one thing I need to work on, I'm always afraid of missing the move. At least this time I acknowledged the move and bought at $100 again. I wouldn't be surprised to see a small pullback tomorrow, but over the long term I believe CL is going to 125.

I will admit, I got in a little early. I bought a little more on the pullback to $100 and the trade is starting to work out. The smaller bodies indicate a lack of selling to push through support, which was bullish. This goes to show that sometimes you get the candle and the trade doesn't happen immediately, you have to be patient and stick to your plan.

That's 30minutes after the close? That works for me, see you all there.

Well with a successful break this morning of the resistance, along with a very strong tick sentiment I bought 1 April call @ 1370 today. The reason I got in early was due to the ticks, which showed very strong buying and confirms that this rally is legit. If we close back within the range then I will exit the trade, otherwise my target is the next 1375 resistance area.

Looks like another exciting week is ahead of us. Everything is pretty much rangebound at this point, and I don't think we will see any major breakthroughs. ES: Like Brownsfan said, there is a nice range. I don't know if this current resistance will hold, but if prices moves to the upper range resistance at 1375 I will fade the move. If price hits support at 1250, I will fade that move too. The reason I am not doing anything now is because I don't like the R/R, since it's basically in the middle of the larger ranges. If I fade the other levels I can setup tight stops and bigger targets. NQ: On the weekly QQQQ calls look attractive, but at a closer look 1750 is in the middle of the range between 1700 and 1800. Therefore it's not a very attractive risk/reward for my money. The daily chart doesn't look as good as the weekly, so that's another factor. If price charges down to 1700 then I will buy calls, but if we get a slow grind that moves with the trendline then I will not do anything. I am talking to my broker about setting up an options account to trade the options around futures. I don't like the swing trade the futures as the $ loss and reward is too big for me to stomach on a daily basis. But I can handle the options, and that will allow me to trade other markets such as oil and gold without looking for ETFs. So if that happens, then I won't use SPX or QQQQ options but the options underlying the futures instead. Good trading this week.

Once we got everything going the chat was very successful I would say. We started around 12pm my time, got things rolling around 1. I was still talking to other traders when I finally left at 8pm, all very informative for me and hopefully everyone else. Next time I think it would be very beneficial if we have a list of topics to discuss, that way we are a little more prepared. I look forward to our next chat.

Here you go JBW - we created a new room. http://www.traderslaboratory.com/tlchat2/info.php?hmmwhy=link

Well HLM said we could create a private room, but I'm not sure how to do that. Just go ahead and join the TL chat. Up on the top menu on the site, click on Chat Room and we will use that. We can upload charts and such there, might be easier for now.

Cool, I'll see everyone there in an hour. Edit: If for some reason we can't meet in the Paltalk room, just join the TL chat. Thanks.

http://bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=au.befYjYaHk&dlbk Not going to lie, looks like something I would enjoy doing He's looking to start in June with around $1b in capital. Scary to think that in the mid 90s $100mil meant you were a big fund.

Looks pretty bullish to me. This dragonfly doji, or hammer (whatever) looks like some buyers came in around the $100 area which should now be support. I bought a few more calls this morning and I still think oil will retest the $110 area and eventually move higher. The lows of this hammer could still be tested, and it may not spring up next week - but I still think it's a bullish setup. Thoughts?

Well let's get things rolling. How does 2pm EST Friday, March 21 work for everyone?

Well theres a few things we can take away from this. It doesn't really matter who is selling or who is buying or why, but we saw in advance that there was a higher probability for SOMEONE to sell...

Heres what you have to remember, you have to charge as much as the customer is willing to pay. This is intellectual information we are talking about, which is a very valuable commodity. I have had a few people tell me I could charge for the face-to-face meetings I have with them and teach them things I know. But in reality, I'm not as great as I want to be nor am I nearly as good as those I learn from. But to them, I am almost like a God. But heres the other problem, in reality your trading style should theoretically only work with you. It's designed to fit your personality, and no two personalities are the same. So you could charge someone $20,000 to teach them for 6 months and they could walk away confused as hell - simply because your style doesn't work with their personality. Yet I could charge them $5 and teach them more, because my system works with their personality better. Even though you are the better trader at the end of the day. I would never pay a veteran trader to teach me his system or anything like that. I would pay to have someone watch over my shoulder and point out things that I don't pick up on myself during the day. Things such as emotions, impulse trades, failure to see the opportunities present, etc. That is something that would be valuable to me, but not to others. Just my two cents.

Yeah! Gold got hammered today, finally. So did oil, and I had a few calls on that but oh well. If you look at my video I did last night I was actually talking about gold. It pulled back close to exactly where I wanted it to initially. I will take a look at it tonight when I get home and see what I can come up with. What is everyone elses thoughts?

That's good to know Stanly, in the future we will have to look for an alternative to Paltalk. I think that will be a goal after we get things moving and we have proof that people are interested in this idea. James - I can run this weeks chat in a private Paltalk room. All I will need is for everyone who wants to participate to add me so I can send them an invite. Any updates on what time we want to do this?

Alright I got a new computer and it came with Vista premium. Here are the specs before I go into my review. AMD 9500 Quad Core Processor 3gb of ram 500gb hard drive So far... I like it. I couldn't stand it on the laptop because it was too slow, but on this machine I do like it. I like the layout better, and aesthetically everything looks better IMO. So far I haven't had any issues with it, but if I do I will post them in here. Like Brownsfan, I won't go out switching everything to Vista but I will get Vista with any machines if they are fast enough to handle it.

Well... Unfortunately I didn't build the computer. A lot of things came up at once and I didn't have time. I also had a change of heart and decided I wanted all my trading expenses to start coming from trading gains and not a bottomless pocketbook. But... I was at Best Buy yesterday getting a feel for what was out there. I was planning on buying a new laptop and using my current computer strictly for trading. But instead I found a Gateway with an AMD 9500 quad core processor (not sure if AMD is a good thing right now, but I've had great success in the past), 3bg of ram, 500gb hard drive, and the video card was able to support 2 monitors (all I use) straight out of the box. I got it for $700, which I thought was a pretty good deal. So I went ahead and bought it, and it came with Vista Premium. So far, I like it.

Nice find Brownsfan! I actually had that noted on the whiteboard next to my desk. But like you, I don't feel safe holding any futures trades overnight. Monday morning I made a few trading mistakes because I wanted the market to fall, and it was going up. Had I actually looked at the daily chart during the day I would have seen that big support level and would have faired fading it, instead of trying to go for the miracle breakout that rarely comes. Lesson learned. And let's get this thread going again!