Pic: Getty
Confessions of a Day Trader: Swings and roundabouts – children must be supervised
News
share
Each Monday, Stockhead’s resident day trader gives us a peek at the highs and lows of his trading diary and hints at what might be coming this week.
Platform used: Marketech
Round Trip: A round trip is $10 up to $25,000 and then above $25,000, commission is at 0.02% in and at 0.02% out.
Rules of engagement: Never hold any positions overnight (unless forced) and try to avoid any suspensions (if possible). No shorting.
Monday January 24
Today was stepping through an unmarked minefield. CBA was a surprise but everything else was as expected.
Managed to stay safe as only really observing.
FMG found a bottom and I rode that for a bit and anything I had lined up in CBA, never got a look in.
Made a very cautious $190 but nervous for the rest of the week, especially as we have a holiday here on Wednesday and that’s when I would expect a bounce but we are not open.
Recap:
Bought 1,000 FMG @ 20.59
Bought 2,000 FMG @ 20.48
Sold 3,000 FMG @ 20.58 ($190.00 profit)
Tuesday January 25
Blood on the street overnight, with tech stocks particularly taking a hammering.
CBA has the biggest swing in a day I have ever witnessed and moves from a high of $97.15 and a low of $93.87 or a $3.28 movement over the day.
Got in early when they fell below $96 and then amazingly when they fell below $95 and had to watch them fall below $94 to $93.87 before they recovered.
It took them ages to reach my limit but eventually they did and then shot past it by another 20c or so.
Plus $857.50 today, having been down over $1500 at one point. My conviction that things were a bit overdone and that most news was built in and also, it may sound strange, but Bitcoin managing to hold and rise gave me some confidence that we are finding a bottom.
Market closed tomorrow, so Thursday will be interesting.
Recap
Bought 1,250 CBA @ 95.55
Sold 1,250 CBA @ 95.98($537.50 profit)
Bought 2,000 CBA @ 94.89
Sold 2,000 CBA @ 95.05 ($320.00 profit)
Thursday January 27
Lost $380 today and mainly because of CBA. Man, it swung around by $4.81 today and I got caught out big time; however FMG and RIO saved my bacon (mostly)
What a nightmare of a day. Between CBA and RIO, it was wild. An early mark in FMG was destroyed by CBA, though RIOs came good towards the end of the day.
Was down over $6000 at one point and just had to ride the wild swings through, as best I could.
Who knows about tomorrow!
Recap
Bought 1,000 FMG @ 19.48
Sold 1,000 FMG @ 19.98 ($500 profit)
Bought 1,000 CBA @ 95.73
Bought 1,000 RIO @ 110.11
Bought 2,000 CBA @ 93.98
Bought 2,000 RIO @ 108.76
Sold 3,000 RIO @ 109.70 ($1,470.00 profit)
Sold 3,000 CBA @ 93.78 (-$2,350.00 loss)
Friday January 28
Today turned out to be a cruisy day, which makes a pleasant change from all the other days this week.
It seems the fun and games which were being played in CBA came to an end at 11.45am, when the stock jumped from $92.58 to $94.00 in the 15 mins to midday.
I had dipped in my toes for 1000 at $92.95 on a limit order below $93.00. Got filled and watched them go lower and then bang, off they went and out they went. That one trade pulled back half of my losses from them yesterday.
See chart on CBA and the other one I have added – BHP.
They had an amazing amount of volume go through today, on fund re-weightings ahead of them being removed from their London listings.
153m went through in the 4.10pm round at $46.92, giving them their volume for the day of 327.4m, or $15.4bn worth.
So, this week’s wash up is $1717.50 gross and $1296.50 net. Let’s hope CBA will go back to a more normal $2.00 a day movement and not at $4.00 plus.
Recap
Bought 1,000 CBA @ 92.95
Sold 1,000 CBA @ 94.00 ($1,050.00 profit)
