The market is digesting a lot and a REAL correction may finally be in the process.  We have seen small pullbacks, but this one definitely feels real.  With the Greece News, whatever happened Wednesday with  the mini-crash and the original mess with GS it has pushed the market to finally correct.  This is not a bad thing, it just takes time for the market to fully take direction.

It has been an extremely quiet week in my trades due to the market and my confidence.  Hopefully next week the market takes a direction with conviction and I can get back to trading.  I’ll begin posting my trades in real time next week!

In my last post and in my tweets I mentioned shorting MOS yesterday.  It did not collapse like I had hoped, it being more of a swing trade anyway, but I was able to book a nice $830 profit.  I really needed that win as my trading hasn’t been very well lately.  After I booked that win I didn’t do any more trading for the day.  I believe once you make a big leap towards a goal you should either play really cautious or quit – I chose to quit.

I am not trading today due to work, but WOW what a crash!  The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1000 points in minutes.  There are rumors going around that it was an error by one of the big institutions, but we’ll have to wait and see what happens next to really know.  I am going to continue taking it easy this week, probably not even trading tomorrow.  Starting next week I am going to start tracking my trades in real time on the “Real-Time Trades” page of the site on the top menu.  This is a system that I had created which will store all of my trades from here on out.  You’ll be able to see trades as soon as I enter, exit and all historical data will remain so you can see my progress over time.

Lastly, I will begin writing educational posts soon and hoping to get the first one done this weekend.  My goal is to start small and basic and keep writing through the stages of a trader.  Essentially I want this blog to be like a big book for new traders and anyone else looking to learn.

The market continues to become uncertain.  There is no clear direction, but this dip in the market definitely feels like it could be the correction many have been waiting months to experience.  I apologize for the lack of updates, but honestly there isn’t much going on as far as trading in this market.  Once a clear direction is taken I will pick back up my trading.  I am going to begin writing different posts, not just daily recaps and watch lists so stay tuned as you may see them this week.

Today I took two trades in one stock.  I shorted MOS earlier in the day for a quick $50 profit.  I re-shorted it later in the day as it came back down and penetrated support.  I am holding overnight and will see how it plays out tomorrow.  I’ll keep you updated in my next recap.  Be careful trading in this market!  It’s best to not make as much money than lose a ton.

Daily Profit: $50 – before commissions

No trading today.  Another very, VERY volatile day in the market.  It has been a tough week and I am just glad that it is over.  I am willing to bet a lot of traders lost money this week or are sitting around break even.  One minute the market was rallying, the next it was sharply falling off a cliff.  One day the market was down, the next it was up on weak volume, but some how continued to go higher.  In times like these I am going to try and stay in cash.  There is no sense in trying to trade these sharp swings because the potential reward is smaller and the risk is a lot higher.  Unless you like to take risk, just sit tight or take small positions.  I will be back Monday with an update if I trade or decide against it.

I had a sales meeting at work today from 8 AM (when I get to work) and it ran over time until 10:30 AM.  By the time I got out of the meeting I was so lost in the market so I didn’t really jump into anything.  Surprisingly the market rallied up today after a couple of really nasty days.  I quickly checked in on my twitter stream and some websites to see what other traders thought of the action today and the consensus was that it was suspect.  So again, I was very cautious to jump into anything.  In my opinion if something messed up your schedule for the trading day you should step away and refocus or maybe skip trading today.  The meeting definitely messed me up and I didn’t feel like I could jump into anything.

A little after 1 PM I entered VECO that was bouncing after being crushed pretty hard.  I got into the trade at $47.21 with a 300 share position.  It worked immediately which I love to see and held for a little bit.  The market then started selling off hard, it dropped, held up well and kind of chattered around for a while.  I didn’t really like the up and down action it was doing and I had another meeting at 1:30 so I sold out of my position at $47.23 for a meaningless $3 profit.  As of this writing VECO is bouncing around the $47.40 and $47.50 area so i could have had a little more profit if I had stayed into it, but I’m not too upset about 20-30 cents on a small position.  Maybe if I could hold overnight I would have stayed in it, but I don’t feel comfortable holding positions with a prop firm when I am already in the red.

This week has been a tough week for most traders with the suspect rallies and sharp sell offs so needless to say I am not going to meet my goal of being at the break even point by the end of the month.  That’s okay, but tomorrow has to be a big day for me so I don’t fall further into the hole.  Tomorrow may determine if I stay with the prop firm or go to a small account trading my own money.  I’ll keep you posted.

Daily Profit: $3 – before commissions