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Strategies & Market Trends : Trading For A Living -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tai Jin who wrote (1631)	4/20/1999 1:25:00 AM
From: David Wright	Respond to of 1729

I just happened on this thread, and really enjoyed reading the last 7 days. I wanted to offer a few comments on some things. First, someone asked about DATEK. When I was day trading in 1998 I was using them. I felt that they did an exceptional job for me. I had about 8 of their servers bookmarked, and I would put 4 up at a time. One for quotes, one for entry orders, and one for exit orders. The last one was to watch for fills. I always locked and loaded both sides of the trade on separate servers, and then watched my IQC.com real-time TA feed, and the DATEK Streamer for the right entry/exit point. I did about 500 trades with them, before I hung it up, and I cannot remember many times that I didn't get a fill with a market order at the price shown on their real-time streamer. I finally quit day trading because it began to feel too much like a real job. I also was short on capital to ride out the losses. Over 500 trades, I actually broke even, so it wasn't a bad initiation. I loved the game, and I am both an analytical engineer, and a good 7- card stud poker player, so I think that helped some. I agree with the observation that the traditional TA signals still work. The only difference now is that you have to interpret them differently than their founders tell you to. An example is MACD. A great indicator, but if you want to trade it these days using a real-time chart service, and 5-minute charts, you use the slope of the upswing, as it comes off the bottom, not when it crosses the signal line. If you wait for the signal line crossover to enter a trade, the stock will have blown past you. Same thing with oscilators like stochastics. Look for small signals, and jump early with very very tight stops if you are wrong. I have switched to covered call writing, only I approach it like a trader. I have found that using the trading TA and traditional daily entry and exit times are boosting my ROIs by 10 to 15% on every covered call play. I don't hesitate to leg into option plays either, once I have some else's money in my jeans from the covered call write. I also seem to have the fearlessness (numbness) that comes with putting every cent on the line 10 times a day as a day trader. This has made me able to react instantly to dead cat bounces with quick averaging down, and other option trades, to get healthy when a stock tanks. To those who feel bitterness about the MMs, and the beating you took as a trader, I can only say that it was one of the best experiences of my life. I learned more about myself, and about the limits of my own discipline in that short time, than in all of the rest of my 56 years! Overcoming fear, and maintaining 100% discipline is what puts you in the top 10%. My hat is off to those of you that can do it. I left the game before I found for sure if I could. But I did find out that I didn't want to do it. I like to think that there is a difference.