DAYTRADING: The Highs and the Woes
I was in the basement of a church, standing in front of a dozen people who were sitting around a large table. I was
pretty nervous. Most of them were drinking coffee, many were smoking.
"Hi" I began, "My name is Lee and I'm a...I'm a...I'M A DAYTRADER." There, I'd said it.
“Hi Lee” they said.
"I'm here" I continued "because nothing else has worked, not even seeing my shrink Doc Kronkite every Saturday. I think I hit rock bottom yesterday. This is my first time here and I'm kinda nervous." I saw lots of sympathetic, nodding faces.
Encouraged, I continued. "I've been a day-trader for several years. I kept telling myself that I didn't have a problem, that I could handle it, stop anytime. I thought my wife and kids didn't know. But of course they did." More knowing nods from around the table.
“Actually, I did handle it pretty well at first. One trade a day, maybe two. Then it was three and four and pretty soon I really got a taste for it. I'd sneak away from my grandson's Little League game in the third inning, run home, make a few trades and get back in time to catch the last inning.
“I’d tell Suzy while we were eating breakfast that I wasn’t really hungry, that I had some work to finish up. Then I’d run to my upstairs office, lock the door and pull out my laptop that I hid in a desk draw. I’d boot up, logon and start trading. With the click of a few buttons I could be in and out of a stock in minutes, seconds. I needed it, couldn’t get through the day without it. And weekends! Weekends when the markets were closed were torture!” Heads were bobbing up and down around the table. They knew.
“Heck, just yesterday I bought 200 shares of COHR at 34 ½ and kicked ‘em out at 36 a few minutes later. Bought ‘em back at 36, sold ‘em at 39. I bought the ICGE gap opening, 400 shares, and took a point and a half. CYMI was making a nice bull-flag on the 5-minute candlestick chart and I had to buy a couple hundred. I blew it out at 25 1/4 for a nice gain. Crazy huh?
“Then I’d go downstairs for a cup of coffee with Suzy. “Got an awful lot of work done” I’d say. We’d talk about the kids, the grandchildren, the dogs, the upcoming weekend (ugh!). I couldn’t wait to get back to “work.”
“Gotta go” I told Suzy, gotta finish up my column.
“Don’t work too hard” she said.
“I’ve heard that the first step toward recovery is admitting that you have a problem. Well, I guess I have a problem.”
Every head nodded solemnly, except for one fellow who was smoking a pipe. “I’m pretty good with numbers” he said. “And without being too precise it sounds like you made a good deal of money yesterday.”
“I did?”
“Yes, you did. Twenty four houndred and thirty seven dollars. Heck, when I was trading I never had a $2,000 day.”
I flashed back to the first meeting I had with my shrink, the never pedantic and former Barney Fife stand-in, Doc Kronkite. Doc Kronkite eventually helped me become a good day-trader. ‘Course, he never thought I’d run amok and end up in the basement of a church.
Suzy and I had a hell of a fight the night before my first appointment with Kronkite. “I don’t wanna see a shrink” I hollered.
“Oh?” she said softly, “and why is that?”
“’Cause there’s no way a shrink can turn me into a good day-trader, that’s why. I’m not going, and that’s final!”
“If you want to make nick nick with me tonight you’ll go see Doc Kronkite. He’s a specialist you know.”
Damn, she was good.
I got to Doc Kronkite’s office the next morning at 7:00 a.m. sharp and was met by a whiskey-voiced, long-legged, red-headed receptionist named Thelma Tushbumper. As I walked in I saw Doc Kronkite standing behind his desk, gesticulating wildly and talking to no one. He looked an awful lot like Mel Brooks.
He pointed to a couch. “On the couch boobeleh, on the couch lie down already” he said.
I wondered what a boobeleh was as I eased onto his lumpy couch.
“So” he said, “It’s good you’ve come to me with your problems. I’ll fix you right up. A phobia you got maybe? I do phobias. I’m a specialist you know. Maybe we’ll do some free association. Won’t cost much.”
“No doc, no phobias. See, the problem is I can’t sleep at night because of my addiction to day-trading. I think I might be a day-tradeaholic doc” I said.
“An expert in insomnia is what I am. I cured that Albert Epstein fellow when he went years without sleep while he was trying to invent regularity.”
“Your mean relativity, don’t you doc?”
“Exactly, that’s what I said, regularity.”
Mmm. Seems the doc was a major-league malapropist.
“I cured Dick Nixon, Jean Dixon, Raymond Massey, Shirlie Bassie, Larry King, Marty Pring, Jimmy Ling, the percussion section of the New York Milharphonic and four-fifths of the Jackson Five. Michael kept walking backward on me. A real challenge that one. I did an entire chapter on insomnia in my best seller, ‘The Truss: Friend or Foe’, a bargain at only $49.95. You read it of course.”
“Gee doc, I was meaning to, really.”
“Anyway, the cure for insomnia is simple” he said. “Whenever I suffer from insomnia I turn on the TV until I find Alan Greenspan, Bob Dole, Connie Chung, Dennis Fung or Charlton Heston trying to sell me an AK-47. If this doesn’t work I plop in a tape of Mary Matilin, an all-pro sleep inducer that one. Have you ever seen her lips move? A great ventriquilist she’d make.”
“But Doc, my problem is that I’m a DAYTRADER. Do you know what people think about daytraders? We’re laughed at, scorned, treated like lepers. It’s not easy being a daytrader doc. Can you cure me doc?”
“Of course I can cure you. I’m a specialist you know. How much money did you lose last year daytrading?” he asked.
“Actually doc, I didn’t lose. I made.”
“How much?” he asked.
I told him.
“Mmmm. One of my patients, Mendelbaun the Fund Manager handles my portfolio. He’s a specialist you know. Loaded me up with internet stocks when they were flying. When they started to drop he bought more for me, said something about dollar-cost averaging. I’m getting killed in those stocks.”
“Gee doc, that’s too bad. But do you think we could talk about my problem. Can you cure my of my daytrading tendencies?”
“Of course boobeleh. Make a bunch of appointments on your way out with Miss Tushbumper. Lots work we have to do with you. Have you ever been hyptonized?” he asked.
“You mean hypnotized don’t you doc?”
“Exactly. Next week we start you on hyptonization. Always works. Don’t worry, we’ll cure your terrible daytrading problem. A classic case is what you are. A whole chapter I might devote to you in my next book, ‘Growing Tin in Your Back Yard.’ You really made that much money daytrading?”
“Yes doc” I said.
“No matter. I’ll fix you up good. Next week, 7:00 a.m. sharp.”
“Thanks doc.”
Lee Kramer |
