Stocks

[Baker 10]

swing trading stocks for the first time. started 2 weeks ago originally with $1100, now im down to $1050 from two trades due to impatience, stupidity, greed, and inexperience.

 

first trade i bought 100 shares of EBR and it rose $.32 in two days and reached the price i planned on taking profit at (extremely heavy resistance). instead i held it blindly, hoping that it would break the resistance level and id make hundreds of dollars :crap:.

 

most recently i bought 125 shares of VELT, prematurely anticipating the confirmation of my indicators, and i was down $.25 before i knew what happened.

 

i learned from these very stupid mistakes, thought they easily could have been avoided. ive been trading incredibly sloppy and i havent been respecting my money. as of now, that wont happen. i expect to make mistakes along the road, but these hiccups are completely inexcusable.

 

from now on im sticking to my plan and doing my research.

 

a little background on me, im a sophmore in college and im majoring in economics. this is more for learning than actually making a large amount of money. i would like to trade full time, but thats not happening anytime soon.

Edited August 30, 2012 by Baker

[Baker 10]

also im starting to meditate 10min in the morning and 10min at night. ive been reading about it a lot as of late and the benefits of mediating seem very beneficial to trading.

[Baker 10]

havent updated this lately as i havent been on the site much. i also keep a more intricate journal that i use while just watching random stocks on the market. also got a speeding ticket and had to withdraw half of my account, leaving my buying power at $620 :crap: this sucks, but whatever.

 

i bought 100 shares of BSX on 9/18 @ 5.64 just incase it broke through the downtrend (which it didn't). i sold the next day (9/19) after i decided it wasnt breaking that line, so i got out with a total profit of a whopping $7.

[Baker 10]

it also appears that when i did my first trade, i had massive surge of emotions. excitement, fear, curiosity, anxiety, etc etc. it was mostly just due to trading for the first time. seems as though this feeling has dimmed down a bit. i worried excessively over my first trade; i checked the hourly and the 15m charts even though i planned to be in the position for a couple of days. now a good amount of these emotions have left and i feel a lot more confident when i trade. not saying that im 100% confident with every trade, but it seems a lot easier to manage my emotions after my first trade.

[Colonel B 10]

That is hard bro. I mean the econ major. LOL All that econ is going to kill you in trading if you are not careful. I went finance and I wish I would of went accounting. No, wait, no I don't. Accounting would of been better for the trading but I don't think I would of made it through if you know what I mean. Most traders don't care about LRAS (Long Run Aggregate Supply) or comparative advantage. But that doesn't mean its not useful. I have a really good friend that got his econ masters and works at KPMG. He is some senior guy now and just yesterday he went to a local university and did a bunch of interviews. So who knows you could end up at a prop shop or hedge fund watching TV/Bloomberg/news all day and translating the important stuff.

 

But about your trading. Sound like you are a bit underfunded. If you are not going to get any more funds till January and you insist on trading then I have a few ideas for you. Get a subscription to the Wall Street Journal. The business school at the university you go to should have some paper you can sign up through so you can get the student discount. Start asking other students in your classes if they trade or not. Find the ones that trade or at least are attempting to trade. Talk with them and learn what they are using and what they have tried and where they learned it. Talk to the faculty and find the ones that trade or have traded in the past. Talk with them and figure out what works and where to go to learn it. Don't wait to do any of this stuff till your senior year. Start now. Read your WSJ so you can keep up with current events. If you do this then who knows when the time comes you can maybe land a job on the worlds largest trading floor. Getting into a prop shop is your main priority if you want to trade. Oh and of course get good grades. 3.5 or better.

[Baker 10]

Idk dude hah econ is the only class i like for some reason. Im also starting to look for an internship at an ibank over summer to gain some experience. Ive been looking for other traders but cant really find any. The people interested dont take it as seriously as i either.