Post by brosin on Oct 26, 2010 22:57:23 GMT -5
Not good - after a few supremely good months of probably lucky trading, I finally got what was coming to me after avoiding so many big moves in both directions...
I remember that early Dec wiped out quite a few of my big time gains. I would stay out of the market until late Dec when I started putting on bigger short positions.
In email to my bear of a friend/professor:
(He had told me relatively recently to beware of going all in or out for fear of the whipsaw]
"I heard you, I just wasn't listening. I guess we all need to really learn things for ourselves. I learned the hard way how the whipsaw feels. I was bullish (from a trading perspective only) into Friday mainly because of volume, and knew I should probably take some gains that shortened trading day. But I got greedy, thinking that "well, if we're up on Monday, alot of people would start to jump on as the volume picked up after the holiday week." Plus my exit point was 9000 on the Dow (stupid, in hindsight, to have one of those). Well, we know what happened Monday. Yesterday got to me more than probably any other day - I really got scared when we dropped off from 200 to even in about 30 minutes. At that point I was down big on the week and my thinking was, I'm going to live and see another day. Got out of most positions, and even took one decent short position. Market rallies big. You had said, never go all in or all out. I heard, but...
I'm really uncertain right now, and I'm going to take a wait and see attitude. Thanks. "
The takeaway for me was that I never plan to go all in or all out of a position all at once...
I remember that early Dec wiped out quite a few of my big time gains. I would stay out of the market until late Dec when I started putting on bigger short positions.
In email to my bear of a friend/professor:
(He had told me relatively recently to beware of going all in or out for fear of the whipsaw]
"I heard you, I just wasn't listening. I guess we all need to really learn things for ourselves. I learned the hard way how the whipsaw feels. I was bullish (from a trading perspective only) into Friday mainly because of volume, and knew I should probably take some gains that shortened trading day. But I got greedy, thinking that "well, if we're up on Monday, alot of people would start to jump on as the volume picked up after the holiday week." Plus my exit point was 9000 on the Dow (stupid, in hindsight, to have one of those). Well, we know what happened Monday. Yesterday got to me more than probably any other day - I really got scared when we dropped off from 200 to even in about 30 minutes. At that point I was down big on the week and my thinking was, I'm going to live and see another day. Got out of most positions, and even took one decent short position. Market rallies big. You had said, never go all in or all out. I heard, but...
I'm really uncertain right now, and I'm going to take a wait and see attitude. Thanks. "
The takeaway for me was that I never plan to go all in or all out of a position all at once...