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John, my discount brokerage, which shall remain unnamed, provides me with additional discounted commissions and a real time system which indicates everything that you would expect including how many buy and sell orders are in the system at any time for Intel or any other stock/option, etc.. This provides a huge advantage for me to read the supply/demand factors immediately at any one time. No, I'm not into selling the options. For me, you either buy the calls or you buy the puts and then sell them outright. When the option takes off, whether up or down, I want to get all of it - not just that part plus what I may have to give up to cover any selling of the option. Selling options limits your profit potential to only what you get for those sales. Whereas, again, just buying outright gives you access to the full profits. My day starts well ahead of the market openings where I'm reviewing the overseas markets as well as what's happening here in instinet trading, economic news, etc. It proceeds throughout the actual trading hours of our markets. If things are slow or I'm in positions where I have everything going my way and no worries about it going against me shortly, I'll take a few minutes to 15 minute break to eat or sometimes to even scan for things on this computer. I keep an eye on CNBC at all times also as it runs on TV. I tape CNBC and will rerun tape on fast speed to places that I want to again hear certain information or to review certain places on their tape tickers to study later certain tech stocks trading again and that certainly includes Intel. Then, I do my readings, both church related and trading related; get on and off this computer to review many BBs for market psychology, information, etc. - sometimes being on here until as late as 4AM the next morning. Until this morning, this past week I've averaged about 4 hours sleep. So, you see - if you want to be successful and the best you can be, you have to spend lots of time. And, just think of it - I've been semi retired for some time now - which just means that I now get the 4 hours average sleep per night (ggg). My 36 plus years in the business speaks for itself - although for a good many years I was employed in other things (but able to conduct my daily trading without as much attention) before going full time. I don't really need to do this now but it gets into your blood. I think that my saying that I am now semi retired relates more to the amount of money that I trade - I don't trade the amounts that I used to trade. Of course, a lot of that is related to the age of this bull market. After 36 years, one has to learn that markets go down as well as up; that things are never going to be different - we will always have our bear markets. The younger generation hasn't appeared to learn that lesson yet - since many that are in the markets have not seen a true bear market that lasts for years and grinds away relentlessly. The bear markets of the 60s and 70s lasting a couple of years are points in case. Also, the period from 1966 to 1982 whereby the Dow that had touched 1,000 in 1966 couldn't significantly close above it until 1982. I don't care how young one is; I really doubt if they want to watch their money in stocks stand virtually still for 16 years - as investors. Traders, of course, during this and all periods do well - if their timing is correct. Finally, I like to trade the upside primarily, although I do trade the downside as well. That, in spite of one is able to make money faster on the downside with the quicker, bigger moves such as 1987 on even some of these short pullbacks. For instance, in 1987 I was totally into puts when the crash came. Just one of those was DEC which I had picked up the puts in it near its 200 high - and those of you who have been in the markets know what DEC did; just as IBM and a lot of others did. Finally, in conclusion, I want to tell all that my trading related activities are always put on hold when the church or my family calls me - no matter what time of day. As such, my schedule as previously related above still includes my attendance at Sunday school and church during the morning and church again at night and prayer meetings on Wed nights as well as other church activities as an ordained deacon. The church and my family remain numbers 1 and 2 in my priorities. Peace and Good trading. Jack |
