Ron: I shouldn't be included in that list. You and I had nearly the same loss for the year, since my open positions should be included. I agree that one or two trades usually make or break the year. This year my CSCO and ERICY holds cost me a decent gain for the year. Let the winners run isn't always true. The stocks that I sold last year are in most cases well below where I sold them. Cut the losses. Not sure if I agree with this entirely because I had a paper loss in some stocks that I eventually sold for a gain. In general you are probably right, however. The trick is at what point you throw in the towel on a trade, and I need to get back to more of my TA to make these decisions. For example, I should bail on a position when it breaks support, but I disagree with taking a fixed percentage loss on any trade.
Paul: You are right. The coveted longest hold period award goes to John S. Sorry! I thought that I posted the final 2000 statistics, but you are right, I never posted it. Message 15140257 It must have something to do with the arrival of my baby boy around that time. <grin> I still have the spreadsheet and don't mind putting together a summary next weekend.
Sue: Interesting that you noted that people tend to trade the same stocks over and over again. I commented about this before. I think it has to do with stocks, companies, industries, etc., that we are comfortable with, and think that we know better than others. I generally try to stay away from trading stocks that have burned me in the past and stick with ones that I have made money in.
Along those lines, here are some more statistics for closed trades.
Bill traded 3 stocks, 7 trades, 43%.
Chartseer traded 1 stock, 1 trade, 100%.
Dan traded 7 stocks, 14 trades, 50%.
Ed traded 4 stocks, 4 trades, 100%.
Hui traded 10 stocks, 10 trades, 100%.
John traded 3 stocks, 5 trades, 60%.
Kelvin traded 26 stocks, 60 trades, 43%.
Larry traded 32 stocks, 44 trades, 73%.
Paul M traded 26 stocks, 78 trades, 33%.
Ron traded 23 stocks, 94 trades, 24%.
Sue traded 19 stocks, 40 trades, 48%.
The lower the percentage, the more times a single equity was traded as a percentage of the total number of trades. The higher the percentage, the fewer times the same equity was traded as a percentage of the total number of trades. For example, Chartseer, Ed, and Hui scored 100%, meaning they didn't trade the same stock more than once. Ron's 24% is the lowest, meaning that he traded the same equity more times as a percentage of his total trades than any of us. Not sure if it means anything, but then again, maybe it does. Larry's percentage is on the high end considering how many trades he did. I'm certainly not here to tell anyone how to trade, but Larry might consider focusing on fewer stocks this year to see if his return improves. Diversification is good in a hold account, but there is probably a point where one person can't effectively trade more than a certain number of issues in a short term account. This seems to make sense due to the time it takes to analyze a stock for a short term trade and speed with which the market can move. There is probably something for all of us to learn in these statistics. After all, that is why we are doing this, I think. I personally need to get back to more TA, but didn't have the time or motivation to do much trading this year, and I let CSCO and ERICY get away from me even though they broke one support level after another.
Best to all for a profitable 2002!
Dan |
