Reading Level 2 to help with entries

Reading Level 2 to help with entries

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I have been having people sending me requests to write about Level 2. I definitely rely on Level 2 as well as Bollinger Bands to help determine my entry and exit with a stock. For me when I see the price action or the sales going through at the price on the Ask side there are more demand for the stock and they buyers don’t want to always wait for the bid price so they go in at market or Ask. That would be a strong indication to me that the momentum is in the long direction. Once I see the price action change and the sales are going through at the Bid price consecutively there is less demand for the stock so the price is dropping and people don’t want to wait for the Ask price so they are willing to sell at the Bid.
Sometimes there can be large buyers or large sellers that show a support or resistance level, but if the momentum is moving fast enough those sellers or buyers orders are eaten up and the movement continues.
As with JWN, ENDP and CLRB on Friday I could tell from the price action that all those shares were exchanging hands with high volume and the price was fairly flat for the second half of the day, so the stocks would have covers happening on Monday morning. These shorts covering and the investing buyers would cause the people that shorted on Friday to cover creating more demand and driving the price up. My understanding allowed me to profit almost $5,000 in the first 15 min of the trading week. I learned from 1 week ago and I walked away happy with meeting my weekly goal in 15 minutes.
My 4 stocks that I have long right now are INSY 14.37 , ENDP 15.36 , LE 17.21 and ZAGG 5.19
INSY from Finviz.com is showing 24% short float interest. It has had 9 days of upward momentum. Today at 651 from Briefing.com They have passed their phase 1/2 for their new cannabidiol drug.
6:51 am Insys Therapeutics announces ‘successful’ completion of phase 1/phase 2 safety & pharmacokinetic study in pediatric subjects with treatment-resistant epilepsy being treated with cannabidiol oral solution (INSY) :
“We are excited that our synthetic pharmaceutical CBD in a non-alcoholic, medium chain triglyceride-based formulation was studied up to a daily dose of 40 mg/kg in subjects with pediatric epilepsy. The data is currently under analysis, and the CBD appears to have been generally well tolerated,” said Dr. John N. Kapoor, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Insys Therapeutics
“We anticipate meeting with the FDA to discuss the subsequent steps for this program, as well as the development program for the treatment of Dravet syndrome and Lennox-Gastaut syndrome, two rare forms of pediatric epilepsy for which Insys’ pharmaceutical CBD formulation received orphan drug designation. Additionally, we have an ongoing trial evaluating CBD in infantile spasms, a catastrophic form of childhood epilepsy. These efforts underscore our commitment to advancing our pharmaceutical CBD program in pediatric epilepsy and we look forward to updating you on our progress in due course,” added Dr. Kapoor
I have been holding INSY as a swing trade because the stock was so beaten down hanging around the 52 week lows. The high short float interested me knowing that as soon as there is volume behind upward price action it should drive the price up fairly quickly. Also the CEO bought 50K shares back on 5/11 and the CFO just exercised his options 5/23 for 10,000 shares. When the two insiders are going long it is a pretty good indication that positive supporting news is coming out.
For ENDP I have had this one on watch and trading it almost each week as it seemed to keep hitting a new 52 week low. Until last week. Then we saw Billionaire John Paulson invest 30% of his initial holdings and the stock has had nice upward momentum to recover some of the loss in value over the past year from a stock price of $90. It actually looks like the shorts have wised up and the float has decreased down to 2.73%. That would also lead me to believe the shorts think this stock is going to continue growing.
LE is another retailer that has been beaten down and with the news of the marketing director stepping down it lost some additional value. This week it is setting new 52 week lows, but has been holding 17 support fairly well. The short float on LE is 18% and the RSI on daily chart is 18.75. The volume has been light just 150K shares traded today. Once there is movement on this stock it should surge upward nicely. Earnings are due to be reported 6/1.
My last long position is ZAGG with the two days of new 52 week lows. They just announced their earnings 5/10. My main reason for going long besides the 18% short float and the new 52 week lows is that the CFO just bought 10K shares of the company. To me the CFO knows the financial health of the company and knows a good point to invest in the company.
As always I hope that my blog posts help you in your trading adventure. Remember to study hard and if you are just starting be kind to yourself. Position small in the beginning to limit your losses and gain confidence with profits. Once you see you are profiting more often than losing slowly add to those position sizes.
If you have any questions or comments you can always reach me here on my blog with comments,Twitter, Profitly , Instagram, Facebook  or LinkedIn.
I love hearing your success stories so feel free to share. They also inspire others.
This blog is for information purposes I am not a registered securities broker-dealer or an investment advisor. The information here is not intended as securities brokerage, investment or as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund.
 
 
 

$ENDP, $JWN and $CLRB

It was another stellar week locking in roughly $5,000 in profits up to $15,000 for the month. Don’t get me wrong I had a bad start to the week self sabotaging my winning trades of $980 in the first 45 min. I am learning a lot from Mandi Pour Rafsendjani about the psychology of trading. I definitely had wonder women syndrome where I could do no wrong. I positioned large and gave back my gains and then some.
Tuesday I started fresh as each trade is a new possibility. I made roughly $1700 for the day. Trading is definitely a reflection of your mindset for the day. So I am working on myself to get better with my trades. Let me ego go and set hard stops to protect myself from myself.
I find that the entries in going long are the riskiest time in it going against me. I am trying to get better at adding hard stops right off the start to minimize my risk. If I enter at the wrong time I would rather take a small loss than be a bag holder all day and waste my time. If I entered at the wrong time the hard stop will help me defeat my ego and protect myself.
I used hard stops all week and I feel less stressed in my trading. I move the stops up as the profit is climbing so I don’t let those profits tank away on me. We are our worst critic and I have seen my weaknesses of not cutting losers. This week I had 4 green days and 1 red.
Onto the the stocks above. I wish I had more capital to hold $JWN over the weekend as well. All 3 of these stocks I believe will have a spike up at open on Monday.
$JWN has been oversold with earnings and then just announced their dividend. In the past two days it has gone up $2 and it was continuing to rise over the weekend. In my opinion value brokers are going to push this value stock to the baby boomers who are interested in looking for residual income on stocks that are fairly safe. It is due to grow and give them income in the next week. Monday I think will provide a nice spike at open and slow growth through Wednesday a great swing trade to sell just before dividends, since the next day the stock usually tanks.
$ENDP is down to $15.44 from the $80’s last year. This stock is oversold and just had a Billionaire John Paulson increased his position by 30% in this stock. I executed my trade awfully today getting out too soon. I made $500 and if I had left my limits it would have been $4950. I did not see the news or else I would have held until it hit all my limits. Seeing the fact that the stock did not tank down and consolidated all day. In my opinion the shorts tried to sell off the stock all day, however the investors saw that it is a bargain after a Billionaire Investor jumps on board. My anticipation is that the news will spread over the weekend and the stock will have buyer and shorts getting squeezed.
$CLRB was a huge penny stock winner of the day with a patent issued by FDA. The same thought process led me to hold this over the weekend as a couple months ago this stock was at 10 dollars. It is a lower float stock, so that usually means faster runs in price action. The stock held its value all day with dip down to 3 and then a high by end of day of 3.89. The shorts were trying to find borrows and trying to knock down the price.  It did not happen and I believe the strength of today and the news will excite more buying on Monday and a pull back on Tuesday. Could be a bit squeeze, but more upside before tanking in my opinion.
As always I love hearing feedback from you. It makes my trading more personal and I like to hear how I can help you. I’m working on a training site with Mandi which will be coming soon. I have had people ask me for personal training and I am willing but it comes at a cost. The idea of having the training site will be more affordable for more people.
If you have questions or comments you can contact me here or on Profitly, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook.
As always take time this weekend to spend time with friends and family as that time is priceless. If you are in Canada have a wonderful Victoria Day Weekend.
This blog is for information purposes I am not a registered securities broker-dealer or an investment advisor. The information here is not intended as securities brokerage, investment or as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund.

Still learning not to give back profits.

Today was a great day with over $1700 in profits which made up for my red day yesterday when I was down $700. My biggest lesson I have learned in the past week is to use hard stops to try to protect myself.
Monday morning was going great I was up $980 in profits in the first 45 min. I said I was going to walk away and……
I did not of course. I saw more opportunities because I wanted to hit my $1000 goal. I scalped a couple profits of JWN and BITA and MGT. Then I decided I wanted to get back into MGT because it kept spiking.
Here is where I went wrong. I was being emotional with my trades. I wanted it to go higher instead of letting the chart let me know when to enter. I am not a great break out trader and I was trying to do something that doesn’t do well for me. For some reason I kept trying and kept trying.
To make it worse I was revenge trading and positioning fairly large because it was a penny stock. I was long 6000 shares and my worst loss of the day was just before close when the stock went down to 2.89 and hit my stop. If I had let it ride overnight I would have been up roughly $12,000 today. It could have also taken an after hour tank.
I think I self sabotaged myself in my brain thinking its ok because I made $980 already I can be more aggressive when in fact. I need to do just the opposite to protect those profits.
Trading is definitely all about yourself and the market. Don’t get distracted with necessarily what the masses are doing if that doesn’t match your strategy. In life do you feel best when you are being yourself or when you are trying to impress people and doing things you think they will like?
The same is true with trading. There are some traders that are absolutely amazing at breakouts and penny stocks. I know for me that is not my expertise. I am doing well with my strategy that I have developed. Yes there is some quick money in it, but I don’t execute those trades well.
I find when I deviate from what works for me I end up losing. Why try to do what others are doing? Why not do what works for me. If it works why break it?
Trading for me is enjoyable when I am confident in my entries and feel my risk is truly minimized. Like today with FRAN. It was oversold down 30% on news of the CEO voluntarily leaving and estimated poor earnings. The market reacted and it dropped the stock. These are the ones I love.  I went long at 10.474 with the analysis looking at the chart that it is setting up for a double bottom a great bearish indicator on the macro scale looking back at the year. So I thought I will put in my limit order to sell at 10.68 which looked like a resistance point for the day and if it spiked it should execute there. I did 10.68 because there was a big order to sell at .69 and I wanted my order to execute.
Trusting my trade and my decision, I left my desk and went for a run. I took a small walk break as my cardio has been suffering since I sit trading a lot more. During that break, I checked the price for fun. It was a .63 and I was going to change my order to lock the gain and in that time the stock broke through .70 to .73. I knew I had just made $1000 while out for a run.
Depending on your trading strategy and your risk tolerance it is possible to trade being away from your desk.
This week has been a great week. I spoke with two amazing female traders from Australia and I was interviewed by Jacob Whitish, a writer for TheStreet.com. I will definitely post the link to the interview once Jacob has it ready. You will be able to access it for free on the Digital Stock Summit page as well. The other Summit videos have a fee, but mine will be free for everyone.
As always I hope the blog is helping you in your trading journey. No matter what happens don’t beat yourself up. You are human and imperfect. Learn from your mistakes.
If you have any questions or comments leave them here or reach out to me on Twitter, Profitly, Instagram, Facebook or LinkedIn.
Carpe Profits and stay green.
This blog is for information purposes I am not a registered securities broker-dealer or an investment advisor. The information here is not intended as securities brokerage, investment or as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund.

I'm Truly Living the Dream

I'm Truly Living the Dream

I remember when I was thinking about what am I going to do in order to be at home to be present should my daughter need me. And my real estate career was smashed with the silly language laws in Quebec. It’s not enough that I pass the equivalent of law boards for real estate in Quebec I had to pass a language proficiency test for French. Well that I bombed and I was shattered.
I thought I need to figure something out to be available for my daughter and still make money. I started studying and now after studying and learning every day since Feb of 2015 I’m making my average goal of $1,000 a day.
Of course I still have bad days as you can see from my calendar below. 20160514_223948.jpg
I honestly don’t let those down days get to me. Each day, each trade is a fresh beginning and a new opportunity. When I have a bad trade I don’t beat myself up because it won’t get me anywhere. I try to analyze why it went wrong.
For my two down days. I had bad entries. I know better. I was anticipating the move on the stocks and not letting the trade set up and enter at the right time. As hard as it can be sometimes to take a loss it is better to cut the losses early and use the capital to make money with a better trade.
I also implemented hard stop limit orders to protect my profits as they go up to ensure I don’t give back. On Friday I had an amazing day with JWN. It was on fire. However I still had one trade that I was emotional and entered at the top of a spike and in turn lost .34 a share.  It tanked so quickly I didn’t get a chance to put in my stop.
In working on my project to try to help inspire female traders I spent a good hour speak with Mandi Pour Rafsendjani a specialist on trading and psychology. She gave me great perspective about trading. Trading is a reflection of who we are as a person and how we process our thoughts. If you are beating yourself up about what went wrong then you will probably find losses. If you have thoughts that you can improve and look for the positive in a loss like a lesson to be learned it will help you become a better trader.
It is true that our trades are a reflection of who we are as a person and that is why different strategies work for different people. We all have different risk tolerances and enjoy different rates of return. Some people are amazing at swing trades while others are great at breakouts and some are top notch at shorting.
From my perspective it is important to figure out what works for you. What limitations do you have with your broker. Work with them and figure out how to be successful. When you have a negative trade was it trying a new strategy? Bad timing? Where is the lesson in it?
We are all human and not computers so there will always be an emotional side to your trades. For me I know this week I had bad entries. Friday was much better and when I did have a loser my stops protected me.
Each day I trade I learn more about myself. Being transparent and sharing my experience as well helps me to see the sometimes brutal truths about my actions in trading. When you trade it is you and the market. Do you want the market to run your thoughts and be tense or enter trades that have the probability to go in your favor? Studying the market and yourself will teach you what works. Stick with that and be profitable, successful and happy.
As always I hope my posts are helping you. If you have any questions feel free to share them here as comments or on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn. I love hearing how it has helped you to become a better stronger trader.
With hard work we can all succeed. Enjoy your time this weekend with your friends and family as that time is priceless.
This blog is for information purposes I am not a registered securities broker-dealer or an investment advisor. The information here is not intended as securities brokerage, investment or as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund.

$LXU and $ENDP

$LXU and $ENDP

I had a request to write about the setups I look for and how I tackle them. I am in a timeframe when I am more long biased. I like the fact that when you go long the loss is limited to the investment you put into the market. The short squeezes that drove KBIO into the sky could easily cause anyone to lose the shirt on their back if they hold short overnight. That being said I stick to more of the long side unless it is a stock that I see moving within the ranges of the days.
For $LXU and $ENDP I found them in the same way. I found them by looking at the stocks with the biggest move down in the market for the day and looking at the chart. I typically try to play them for the initial morning reversal.
For $LXU I was in at 9.06 for initial reversal and then out at 9.25. It sold off a little and had held 9 fairly well so I added more when it dropped back down to the whole number. If you don’t see it already the round dollar and fifty cent marks tend to act as resistance and support as most people are looking to enter or exit around those numbers in their brain. So I went just below 9 as it was holding well. Then at lunch it started to sell off and continued down until close. I added again just before close for an average of 8.74 with the idea that this stock has come down $6 from $14 a 40% drop in 3 days and the shorts should close before end of day on Friday.
Most people that short stocks want to close out the short position before the end of trading day on Fridays. They want to close out the position because in shorting you borrow the stock from the brokerage house and have to usually pay a borrow fee each day you have the stock short. On Saturday and Sunday there isn’t really a benefit to borrowing the stock because there is not trading sessions. So typically on Friday’s you will see a stock that has been beaten down over the week to have a bounce up on Fridays before lunch.
That was exactly the case on $LXU today. I sold part of my position at 8.99 this morning thinking the 9.00 mark would pose resistance to the price movement. Well the next minute it spiked to 9.81. In that minute I went ahead and executed a market order to get out of the position in case it tanked down the rest of the day. In holding overnight for the gap up I have learned take the profit early. It could continue up, but it can also tank away all day again so as I say…..Carpe Profit!. Seize that moment in price action. All gains are never a reason to be upset. It’s a gain. Yes if I had held my full position to the high of day on LXU I would have been up $17,000 but I’m happy with my $4600 profit on the stock.
Another indicator I look at for the stock is looking at the RSI for the stock in both a daily chart with 1 min time frame or year chart with daily time frame. With the year chart with the stock below 30 it is a good indicator oversold for the macro vision of the year. Then I look more micro into the minute time frame to see the price action for below 30 or a dip below the Bollinger bands.
With $ENDP I have been in and out of this stock a couple times so far this year. This FORBES article from April 11 resonated with me about the stock and now when I see the RSI below 30 I usually capitalize on it. Screen Shot 2016-05-06 at 9.28.53 PM
As you can see by the chart above ENDP definitely looks oversold with an $RSI of 23.55 on the 1 year chart. The stock was down more than 40% of Thursday’s closing price all day. The low of the day was 15.50 and it opened at 17.40 from a closing price of 26.59. To me this is the rubber band effect. It has been overextended downward and shorts have tried to pummel it down as well as people selling their value investment. The shorts in my opinion will cover. The stock lost 40% of the value based on forward looking statements. For the past quarter they produced better than expected earnings per share however a negative forward looking statemen
I guess my rubber band reversal strategy comes from looking at a value stock seeing it on deep discount it makes me think of this quote from the Forbes Article….Legendary investor Warren Buffett advises to be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful.
I like to look at the oversold stocks as opportunities. I am still working on perfecting my strategy and not going in emotionally. My entry on $ENDP is 16.15 average so going into the weekend I’m up .02 Yes!
Ending the week Green. Carpe Profits!! Now that the markets are closed on the weekend please take the time to study and research and enjoy time with friends and family. Don’t forget your mother on Sunday. It’s Mother’s Day!
I love to hear back from you. If you have a question a comment or concern please send it my way here as a comment or on Twitter (Jane_YUL),  Instagram (MissAirplaneJane) Facebook (Jane Gallina) or LinkedIN (JaneGallina)
I have begun work on my special project to help inspire more women to trade. I never would have thought I would be here today with all these profits, but it is all possible with hard work and study.
This blog is for information purposes I am not a registered securities broker-dealer or an investment advisor. The information here is not intended as securities brokerage, investment or as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund.

Earnings Season is here!

There are lots of stocks in play right now because all sorts of companies are announcing their earnings. There are many locations to find the calendar of which companies are due to release earnings here is one through Yahoo Finance.   It is definitely risky holding a stock through earnings because the market does not always react rationally. When it is a winner it can tank and when it is a loser it can spike. So remember to trade the price action not what you think it is going to do.
Monday was a tough day trading for me as I broke rules and my trades suffered from it. I try not to enter a trade before 950-10 am when there tends to be a clear trend in price action. I made the mistake of entering too early and ended up down for the day. I also entered at the top of a run at 1030 which I know my past trades is not a profitable entry point for me on the longside.  By 11 am I was down more than $500.
When that happens don’t become emotional and revenge trade to try to make it back. I simply stopped. Listened in on the Trade Ideas Trading Room and stopped to watch. I was rushed in the morning on Monday not of a clear head when I sat down and my personal day affected my trading day. Trades are better without emotions. Great to celebrate afterwards, but trading without emotions as much as possible and just the numbers will give you the best profits.
I waited until my head was clear and then entered two good trades to end up down but roughly $21 instead of over $500. I did not force the trades and I was patient for good entries.
Today was an amazing day until 3pm. I jumped back into SRPT for power hour looking for an amazing finish to the day with the downtrend on price action from 230. In retrospect I was trading without my full screen from the kitchen table and I probably would have done better not just jumping in but looking at the press to see it was getting beaten down with downgrades. After I read those articles I made sure not to hold it overnight as I believe it will be a gap down scenario. Not too bad closed down .10 from my entry.
Right now there are great plays even when the SPY is downtrending. Finding your niche and being able to profit when the market is tanking is always good. I’m looking forward to learning more about options to use puts to short because the risk is limited into the contract investment instead of unlimited with shorting a stock.
My losing trades in the past two days were all about entries where my risk was not minimized. It is extremely important to understand about the risk of your entry. I got lucky on my trade after lunch with SRPT today when I jumped in over the half dollar at 18.57. It dropped back down to 18 before it went up to 18.80 again and I bailed. That was a gamble trade. RSI was high so it was showing overbought and I think I might have bought and the high of that runup. It was luck that the trade went for me.
Being continuously successful in day trading is all about a good entry. Learn what makes your entries good. When you have a good entry it is easy to be confident in the trade and not feel stressed in front of your computer. You can breath easy and when it is going in your favor surf the net some, try not to let the profit growing cause you to sell off too soon.( the emotion of profiting can take over) Two days in a row I sold SRPT way too conservatively leaving a bunch of profit on the table. I still profited but I can definitely get better in letting my winners grow.
I have moved up my goal of 100K in profits to my birthday August 15th. I would love to be able to say I made 100K before then and with my goal of $1K a day now it is possible. If I have a loss I don’t beat myself up. I analyze and learn from my errors. Those red days are becoming fewer and fewer. I’m not a computer so I know they will happen I just need to learn from them.
As always I hope these blogs are helping you learn and grow as a trader yourself. I try to post watch lists, however I find I’m actually doing better with my trading when I analyze the market in the morning. Time as a mom is always precious and if my head is not clouded with what I think will happen to a stock and trading the price I find I do much better.
Learn from your mistakes, Carpe Profit and Stay Green.
This blog is for information purposes I am not a registered securities broker-dealer or an investment advisor. The information here is not intended as securities brokerage, investment or as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund.