leejo

Bought 100 shares KO @ 60.17

SmokingTarpan

I bought 200 shares of Sanderson Farms Inc (SAFM) @ 42.34.

New question: How do you do sell short in this tool? I get the concept of what shorting is, but I don't have a clue on what buttons to push, etc. So far I've got the following: enter stock ticker, action "sell short", ### quantity. I don't know what to do with the rest of the form, or what sort of advanced orders options to pick. I'd assume that you want "oto: stock" and then you put in a buy order stopped at a lower price, but I've a feeling I'm dreadfully wrong.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

SmokingTarpan

Well, I finished +453.35 for the week. I'm probably low man on the totem pole here, since I don't know what I'm doing and have not made really big trades like I'm thinking other people have. I suppose I should be either buying larger amounts of shares or more expensive stock, as I've still got $62.5k in unused cash at the moment. Just don't know what to buy yet, but I seem to be making "okay" decisions on the things I do buy.

While I feel I've not been doing as good as other people, I still finished on the plus side of things. I guess that's what counts when it comes down to it, eh? If I finish +1 I've still made money.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

Drizzid

Your doing better than I am if it makes you feel any better Smoking Tarpan. I have made $116.10 for the week after a rough day yesterday. I have bounced back today but thats the way the market goes. You have some good days and bad ones you just hope you have more good than bad. I think you are doing fine

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TG-Drizzid
Yifios
Phoenix (87:55)
Marble
colony
Danetia
Menzo (86:55)
Wine
ColonyII
Rayiatia
Paradise (87:54)
Sulfur

Damonte

Currently up about $6,000 for the week (down $2,000 from this morning).

It was a risky move, but Damonte was fortunate. He probably wouldn't have tried this with real money.

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....

Axis of Eeevil

Sounds fun, but I have two Investopedia simulator games going right now, don't think I want to make a switch and lose all that history. I have one that's over 400% from when I bought...Mostly tech stocks. Maybe I'll start something up...

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SmokingTarpan

Bought 100 shares of Hanes Brands Inc. (HBI) @ $33.00.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

leejo

Bought 100 GE @ 32.58

SmokingTarpan

Well, nix that HBI purchase. It already hit my stop price of $32 ($31.96 actual); so much for relying on news updates as a source of what to buy.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

leejo

First of all, I really wish HBI had something to do with beef.

I think you're learning two lessons I've learned the hard way. One is the way you set up your stop loss and the other is the timing such that you bought on release day.

Looking at HBI, I would have felt better about setting a stop around 25.20 - near the lows set on 3/11 and 3/17. A more aggressive stop would have been 27.40 - just below the low set on 3/28.

Googling "how to set a stop loss" has some advice around setting up an effective stop-loss. If you set a stop-loss too tight, you're practically guaranteeing that your stock will stop out and you will hand your money to your broker and another investor/trader. Set it too loose and it won't serve it's purpose - to manage your risk.

The other issue is regarding the nature of trades around earnings' release. When buying/selling around earnings' release (HBI released their earnings today), pay attention to how often a company will report good earnings and the stock will drop. You have to learn to buy on the rumor and sell on the news. If there's a company you like, say HBI, and you know it's about to announce earnings, start paying careful attention to the ticker about a week ahead of release. You're looking for signs of how the professionals are trading the stock. These are the people who monitor the garment industry, who know what the retailers' same store comps are, who live breath and eat the market and the industry with which your potential investment concerns itself. Underwear, in this case.

With HBI we see that on 4/14 it ticked up almost 4% on nearly triple normal volume. Why?

Not much movement on the 15th but again very high volume. On the 16th, up almost 5% on 2x normal volume. Then a decent sell-off on Friday.

It's certainly not 100%, but when a stock ticks up strongly before earnings, you can bet that industry professionals - who don't know confidential insider information but who are highly attuned to the industry - are expecting good earnings. It's not unusual to see some profit taking the day before earnings' release.

However, what's not unusual at all to see is a bunch of people who show up late to the party buying the stock AFTER earnings taking a bath as all the professionals sell off during the release day.

Google "how to trade earnings release", for example, for some insight and advice on what's going on in the market around these releases.

Don't be "dumb money"! I'd google "dumb money" and read up on the sorts of things "dumb money"...uh...do? does? are? Anyway, learn how the dumb money behaves, and you'll learn a lot about what to avoid, what to watch, and hopefully, what to do.

leejo

Bought 3 BRK/B @ 4288.00

leejo

Sold 50 AAPL @ 164.53

(locking in some profits and getting my cash back to where I want it)

SmokingTarpan

Bought 1000 shares of Ford (F) @ $7.63
Bought 100 shares of Williams Sonoma (WSM) @ $27.80

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo

xTYBALTx

OK, I'm in. To start things off with a bang, here are my opening moves:

Short 3500 shares of Ford (F) @ Market
Buy 2500 shares of SDS @ Market

F is Ford Motor Company.
SDS is bkelly's find, the fund which shorts the S&P500.

Edit -

It's pure coincidence that I shorted F one post after ST bought the same stock.

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Current Tybalt theme song: Mason v. Princess - Perfect

SmokingTarpan

It's a battle to the death! (good thing it's play money)

By the way, I'm still unsure of how to short a stock properly with the trading tool. A general walk-through would be appreciated, as I'm not keen on doing it wrong and losing thousands.

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[squadl]
"I am the prettiest african-american, vietnamese..cong..person." -SugarNCamo