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Strategies & Market Trends : Waiting for the big Kahuna -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dave Gore who wrote (16107)	4/11/1998 11:22:00 PM
From: James F. Hopkins	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 94695

Dave; We see the same thing.. biz.yahoo.com thats a big fly in the soup. Since Feb. 1st..(and I was late getting long ) I was up over 32% by April 1st on the part I had in stocks and options, and took most of it off the table..since then it's been a tough and I'v at one time had half of it back in..then back out for very small gains..but I can see that I need to sharpen back up my straddle strategy..as I could have done good this past week had I hedged the bets I made..playing both sides leveraged, and not using any more capital than I used. What I would be sitting on now would be some puts, that were already more than paid for by the profits on the calls, and still made about the same. ----------------------------- I use to make the dog track a lot..and learned in time how to handicap with the best. The thing you come to notice is the people who handicap every race..( they are the biggest losers ) as in time you can look at the program..and shake your head and say..this race is a crap shoot..( pass it )..or get some long odds..( which seldom they give you on thoes kind of races ) After you go regular you get to know the pros..you may see them show up for 1 maybe 2 races out of the 12..make a bet.. wait then win or lose, you see them leave the track. They know that half the races can't be called, and the other half are such a shoe in it's not much worth the risk because you won't get the odds you need. Being I had to drive 60mi I would stay..and maybe bet from 3 to 5 races out of the 12..( but that was more playing the odds board than the dogs themselves )and it was the odds the crowd left that was the final determination if I layed a bet on any of the races. It's called mugging the crowd..( you seldom can do much as if they leave odds when you bet you also tend to lower those odds.).and with a big bet you can kill your own odds, so it's not a get rich thing or I would be there instead of trying to scalp a few bucks with this computer. The track is more fun, and if I could get my wife to move up close to it I would quit this. :-) ------------------------- Being I'm talking about the track I have to tell about the dumbest thing some people do..there are sharks there that conn them into buying one system or the next, but the worst system is the one were they start off with the tip sheet, and bet $2 on the first dog..or the best box for that week.. or such thing as just pick a hot number and stick with it, then they double the bet each time they lose..the para-mutual queen will kill them..if they win one or two they really get hooked..before you know it they done lost the rent money and all. It's that same thing the more you bet the worst you make your odds. ------------------------------ With stocks that don't always apply..I've had some luck doubling down ..but it takes a lot of nerve. In my regular account if one goes aginst me..I pick my double down point and sell puts to put me in her at that level..can't do that in my IRA.. just sell covered calls is all..so I got to be more careful with it. I can only do straddels or buy puts or calls and such in my regular account too..that being taxable, I guess the Gov don't want you to gain to much in a non tax account. I'm also learning to avoid stocks that are not popular enough to have options, even if I don't want to play the option side..thoes stocks seldom gain or lose the popularity it takes for them to make good trades. There are exceptions and plenty of them but when sceening you have to set some sort of limits or you wind up looking through to much juck. So if no options I now dont even look any more..got two of them now that I wish I didn't. Jim