Weekend Weigh In (5/20/2012)

So, this week sucked.  The markets just kept dropping.  It’s hard seeing everything falling and not doing something.  Perhaps I should be doing something?  I have thought about dumping some but haven’t.  And there were moments this week, when I thought about dumping them all but just turned off the computer instead.  For the most part I like what I have and believe that all will recover in time.  Here’s what I have right now.

Alcoa (AA):  Underwater and still waiting.  Next earning date is beginning of July.  I flip back and forth between selling when it recovers enough for a small profit and sticking with it longer term.  If I stick with it longer term it may recover toward that $15+ level.  I just don’t know if I want to have money tied up in it for that long or even how long that might be.  Let’s see how long it takes just to get back to good.

Aflac (AFL):  Underwater and pissed.  Here’s a perfect example of what not to do.  I bought this just before earnings, it jumped up and I was slow to sell.  Since then I have watched it go from profit to loss this week.  Stupid!!  Need to be better if I am to transition to full time trading someday.

Hewlett-Packard Company (HPQ):  Underwater.  There’s talk this week that Meg is going to cut about 25,000 employees.  Looking back I should have passed on this one.  The company just has too much stuff going on.  And it seems that investors are just tired of hearing it all.  I am going to have to wait a couple of quarters for this one to get back to good, I feel.  I bought in that $25 range so it has some swimming to do.

Walgreen Co. (WAG): Underwater.  Walgreen dropped out of what I would call the channel of $32 - $35 range.  Have played this range before a few times and I may have pushed it one too many times.  I am really interested to see how it acts this week.

International Game Technology (IGT): Underwater.  This too I was looking for it to bounce back into that $17 range and it hasn’t done it yet.  So another one that goes on the wait list.

EXCO Resources Inc. (XCO): Underwater.  Still waiting for nat gas prices to go up.  They have been climbing some but I need them to keep climbing.  Still thinking about hanging on to this one and seeing if it might turn into a homerun down the road.

That’s it for this weekend.  I find it is always good to review where I’m at and the good and bad decisions that I have made.

Here’s to a better week than the last one and to keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.

Watching the markets sink and looking for things to buy

So today the stock market just started going down and took all the stocks I own with it.  Everything was in the red today.  It was a weird feeling watching things drop, thinking there goes some of my hard earned dollars and yet wanting the market to drop more so I could buy stuff.  Had some orders in but nothing got filled.  Was feeling margin good about some stocks but it wasn’t meant to be today.  Added some money to the account tonight so tomorrow if things drop a bit more I can buy without the margin. 

I have sell orders in for almost every stock I’m holding right now.  The hard part is just watching things go down days in a row with nothing to do but wait.  (And second guess myself.)  I’m happy with where I bought AFL, IGT, and AA.  Need all three to rise a little and I’ll cash out.  I see all three of these stocks as short term plays.  As for HPQ and XCO I was early by half and don’t really like my average price for either one.

It will take some time for either of them to get back to good.  Although XCO has come up a bit this past week, it still isn’t nearly enough.  I still think down the road nat gas prices rise and XCO becomes a big winner.  If it got back to its 52 week high then all would be forgiven. 

As far as HPQ, I don’t know what to think.  IF Meg can right the ship then the stock looks way undervalued right here.  I should be adding hand over fist, but I ain’t.  Even after all she’s done I don’t have that kind of faith in her or HP.  What I am willing to do right here is wait and see.  Not so long ago the stock was in the $40s.  I know a lot has happened in the past year, but still… $40s.   So I’ll wait and pick up a little dividend money along the way.

Here’s to buying stocks at prices that we still like days later and to keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.

The Craziness in France Should have Gotten Me Some Stock Cheap Today

So after the election this past weekend I was expecting stocks to fall some today.  And some did... sort of.  I had my eye on two different stocks and had my buy limit orders in but it was not to be today. 

One of them was my own fault.  It dropped some right out of the gate and I thought it would slide some more.  I couldn’t make up my mind on a price that would make me all smiles.  By the time I picked a number it was above and never came back to me.   I don’t want to jinx it for tomorrow so I’ll let you know which one it is and the number I was looking for in a couple of days or so.  I’ll start with the buy order in same area tomorrow, only this time before the opening bell and see what happens. 

The other stock I have been around and around with the past few months and have made money on it every round trip.  I was hoping that it would come to me today.  Nope!  Again I’ll let you know in a couple of days which stock it is, just don’t want to jinx it.  I’m feeling that this one might not get down to where I want it to be for a buy but who knows. 

I am not sure what to think about this whole Europe thing.  The French pick a guy that says “let’s start spending again.  Screw austerity.”  Ok maybe that’s not the exact quote I read this weekend, but it’s kind of close.  Then there is Merkel saying “To bad buddy.  Congrats on the election but the deal is done and we ain’t looking to renegotiate.”  You know, something to that effect.  Maybe I should be looking to get to cash right now.  Are we on the edge of a correction?  For now I’m still buying if I can find a price that catches my eye.

Here’s to the Euro not collapsing till I can make a little more money, then get to cash and to keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.

Bought International Game Technology (IGT) Today

Even with the market going up and up today IGT spent the first half of the day in the red, just where I needed it to be.  A little history first; International Game Technology first showed up in a screen back in early February.  I got in at $15.75 only to watch it sag for most of that month.  I got out late March at $16.60.  For the most part I consider that a good trade for a month and half.   Now here we are in May and it is back to a good buy point again.  Yesterday I had a limit order in for $15.50 and missed getting filled by eight cents.  So this morning changed the order to $15.45, thinking it might trade down a little more.  So now I am back in and looking to trade this range back to $17 ish.  I may do $16.60 again.  Ideally if IGT can stay in this range I can get a couple of more turns out of it in the next few months.  Will let you know how this all turns out.

Here’s to familiar stocks coming back to buy prices and to keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.

Watching Amazon run ahead

Let me start by saying that Amazon (AMZN) doesn’t fit my parameters so I don’t trade it. For the most part I don’t really keep track of it either, except on those days that it runs up like crazy and it is all over the headlines. It doesn’t pay a dividend and that is one of my rules. No dividend, no trade. That being said it is still hard to watch a stock run 15% plus today and not be a part of it. Amazon reported good numbers yesterday and was up big in after hours and up today on big volume. I had thought about taking a flyer on it yesterday before the close. I have a kindle touch and buy stuff from Amazon. And I had a “feeling” that it would do well yesterday with its numbers. If you don’t recall I am trying to get away, far away, from trading on feelings.


So, on the whole I am glad I didn’t chase those feelings yesterday with a buy of Amazon. As I watch it bounce up today I have been trying to remember that it is all about developing solid trading tactics, the kind that make me money year in and year out. Flyers won’t pay the bills consistently. It will be those skills that allow me to transition to full time trading. At least this is how I am rationalizing missing a 15% move in one day.

If you bought Amazon yesterday and caught that big wave today, congrats! Have you jumped out after the 15% + burst or are you holding out for more?

Here’s to trading guidelines, sticking to them, and keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.

The stupidity of adding to a losing stock position (XCO)

They say confession is good for the soul.  Well this one has been months in the making and perhaps overdue.
So the books I have been reading, for the past oh say… forever, say that adding to a losing stock position is a sucker’s bet.  It is the amateurs that try and average down into profits instead of cutting bait and moving on.  It sound easy enough but there are times I still have no mental discipline.  Such was the case with XCO.  On January 10^th  2012 I bought a little Exco Resources Inc. (XCO) for $9.30.  (There has to be a bottom somewhere for natural gas prices, right?)  It kept dropping throughout the day.  The next day I threw more money at it, buying again, this time at $8.80.  The games our mind plays when trying to trade stocks.  And I thought my mind played games when I was giving up smoking.  The short of it is that once again I was trying to catch a falling knife without the mental discipline to do it half way safely.

Nat gas prices can’t possibly keep falling

Famous last words as the past months have seen the price plunge, to what I think, is an all-time low.  Natural gas quotes are now routinely near $2.00 .  Sub two dollar trades have printed enough that it seems almost common place and people are no longer shocked.  As far as XCO, it would have to work really hard just to be able to see it’s way out.  A short while ago it was trading under $6.   This position is so far underwater of my $9.00 breakeven, that it might as well be my own personal submarine.  It has recovered a bit in the last two days, just enough to give me the tiniest of slivers of hope that one day, some day it will come back to the surface.  Then again maybe it won’t.  I once thought that about Orion Pictures (look it up).

Long term take away

My goal is to one day have a pile in the trading account big enough to allow me to dump the day job and trade for a living.  In order to do that this kind of mental lapse has to be learned from.  Don’t add to losers… ever!!  Even if this stock somehow gets back to good I may keep it as a reminder of what not to do.  Well that’s it for today. 

Here’s to learning from our mistakes and keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.

Games my mind plays when trying to trade stocks

For the last couple of days things have not been great on Wall Street. Good!! I was looking for some stocks to pull back so I can get back in. Yet none of the ones that I track have pulled back to the point that I am compelled to jump back in. As I watched the prices bounce up and down today my mind started to play its games.

Should I change my buy price?

Maybe I should be tracking different stocks.

What happens is this is as low as it goes and then reverses and I miss out… again?

Maybe this is just the beginning of a bigger pull back and my buy prices are way too high.

I am going to feel like an idiot if this keeps falling for the next couple of days and I jump in too soon.

And the games and thoughts swirled through my head all day. And to think this is what I want to do full time in the future. Quite the day job and just trade. It seems like the perfect idea until my mind starts spinning on days like these.
Make the right decisions and it rains money. Make the wrong decisions and you get pounded. Simplicity defined.

Here’s to making good decisions and keeping an eye on your Everyday Money.