Jim, I was curious about QCOM today, whether it would hold its Nov 30 low I believe that was 75 1/4, well it didn't intraday. I asked about that in "da room" and next support was 68, I believe.
I screwed up several times this last 10 days, and it was the same kind of mistakes I made earlier this fall. Teresa came into "da room" and talked for a while as we were grinding slowly nowhere this afternoon. She noted that you must always know why you entered a trade when you did, and already know where you're going to exit if it turns against you. And mental stops are no good as you'll revise them. Or you'll get blown away by some afterhours warning when you're not watching. In addition, her clients used to set "mental stops" and then refuse to lose until they "puked at the low." They were called "weak handed longs"--they tried to pick bottoms that weren't really bottoms. I don't feel a bottom is in place myself either simply because we've ground down and ground down and in spite of various "pukes" there hasn't been a big one. I really did think it was in the other day when intc warned and we held steady but I was wrong.
She says as for stops, don't begrudge the mm their pennies and dollars, you're preserving capital. For instance who knows when an afterhours warning in your stock or its sector might just crash it (as in extr, ugh). She is 1000% right about all this and what amazes me is when I follow, learn from her, watch the setups as she does (w/ her neutral bias)--the supports and resistances she marks always do show up...and I trade okay...even well...and I make $ every day. But when my evil twin, the one who can't forget the qcom days of calls that went up 10,000%, gets restless, she calls in orders on the road, or refuses to get out at a few point loss, and boom...
I wonder how many lessons I'll have to learn? I mean, the same lesson again and again.
Anyway, things do not look too rosy here. I'll read her market wrap later tonight (she's in Vancouver so posts around 9 or 10 our time) but I recall last night she said that either we will consolidate today or if we don't, lookout below. So I can understand why you want to short, but one thing to think is just short the QQQ, which moves fairly slowly, and you don't have to wait for an uptick. In "da room" Jerry says people get their feet wet shorting that first.
I still haven't tried even paper shorting....maybe in the New Year. |
