An NYSE Scalper's Tale - A Trader's Diary

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

A Big List Converting To Hybrid Tomorrow...

Gross: +$546.60
Net: +$470.71
Loss From Top: 0
Trades: 50
Shares Traded: 62600

Stocks Traded Today (net profit/loss):
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD): +$337.56
Motorola (MOT): +$51.60

Home Depot (HD): +$42.80
Walmart (WMT): +$28.06
Exxon Mobil (XOM): +$18.17
Hewlett Packard (HPQ): +$0.72
EMC Corp (EMC): -$8.22

Another (half) day, another dollar.


This morning there were some big massive moves, but I was slow and missed quite a few of them. When Motorola (MOT) opened up for trading today, it was complete chaos! It announced earnings this morning and I really wanted to get in on some of the action, but I couldn't "see" what was going on as the Level II was just a complete mess.

I've noticed that Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) had been really a money machine for me lately. There seems to be more follow through on it's moves and since AMD is one of those stocks that really moves when it moves, there's been some great trading on it lately.

Unfortunately I cannot say the same for one of my favorites Walmart (WMT). Lately it has become a lot choppier and more difficult to trade. It's longer term chart shows that it's flattening out and not sure which way it should go.

I caught a nice move made by AMD in the morning and that was basically the highlight of my day. I just wished I was filled for all 4000 shares instead of being partially filled for 2800 shares.

Anyways, I just traded until lunch and called it a day just to put the money I made today in the bank. I'll do this a few more times so that I can get my shutdown higher (shutdown is the maximum I'm allowed to lose before the system automatically shuts me down - it's calculation is based on how well you've done the last few trading days...right now mine is abysmally small).

Once I get my shutdown higher, I can then use bigger share size more comfortably (without having to worry about getting shutdown if a position goes against me severely).

Now - on to another topic...

I must admit - I am a virgin when it comes to posting charts and pictures in my post. In fact, that diagram of the trading floor layout is the first time I ever posted an image in my post!

And so, I'm asking you readers out there - where can I find free charts that I can use after-hours to post up some of my charts. For now, I'll use BigCharts to post up a chart of stocks I traded today. Unfortunately the charts at BigCharts are not very good at displaying intraday stuff.

Of course, there won't be as much for me to tell you about the charts technically (unlike some of my fellow bloggers out there). But I think it may help some of you out there just to see what I saw and why I made some of my trading decisions. Check out my "Good Trades" section today for my *gasp!* first post with a chart!

Anyways - to the point of this post. Tomorrow there is going to be a whopping 50 stocks that will "Hybridize". There are some big names on this list and several stocks that many of the traders at the office trade. It will be interesting to see how well we all fare tomorrow.

The ones of interest to me will be AT&T (T) and Ford (F), simply because I trade both of these issue a great deal. And so, here is the list of stocks going Hybrid tomorrow (note: I left out different classes of stocks and I have also left out PFD's, which is why this list isn't quite 50 stocks).

Stocks going Hybrid tomorrow:


AIRCASTLE LIMITED (AYR)
EATON VANCE SENIOR FLOATING RATE (EFR)
EATON VANCE FLOATING-RATE INC TR (EFT)
EATON VANCE TAX ADVANTAGED GLOBAL DIVIDEND (ETG)
EATON VANCE TAX-ADVANTAGED GLOBAL DIVIDEND OPPOR. (ETO)
EATON VANCE TAX-ADVANTAGED DIVIDEND INCOME FUND (EVT)

FLAHERTY & CRUMRINE/CLAYMORE TOTAL RETURN FUND (FLC)
NATIONAL GRID PLC (NGG)
ALON USA ENERGY INC (ALJ)
ALPHA NATURAL RESOURCES (ANR)
BOYD GAMING CORP (BYD)

NABORS INDUSTRIES (NBR)
NORTHSTAR REALTY FINANCE CORP (NRF)
CELANESE CORP (CE)
HARMAN INTERNATIONAL IND. (HAR)
INGERSOLL-RAND CO LTD (IR)
MCMORAN EXPLORATION CO (MMR)
CORE LABORATORIES (CLB)
ITT CORP (ITT)
JABIL CIRCUIT INC (JBL)

ST JOE CO. (JOE)
OWENS & MINOR INC (OMI)
AGERE SYSTEMS (AGR)
COMPUTER SCIENCES (CSC)
JACOBS ENGINEERING GROUP (JEC)
RADIAN GROUP (RDN)
RYLAND GROUP (RYL)
SIERRA PACIFIC RESOURCES (SRP)

ALLIANT TECH SYSTEMS (ATK)
CORPORATE ASSET BACKED CORP (GYC)
LUCENT TECHNOLOGIES (LU)
LIVE NATION INC (LYV)
ROGERS CORP (ROG)
AT&T INC (T)
CBS CORP (CBS)
FAIR ISAAC INC (FIC)

MANPOWER (MAN)
WYNDHAM WORLDWIDE CORP (WYN)
YANKEE CANDLE (YCC)
BRISTOL MYERS SQUIBB (BMY)
FORD MOTOR (F)
TAIWAN SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING CO (TSM)
SOLECTRON (SLR)

The NYSE is now starting to rapidly move all stocks over to the Hybrid system - a lot quicker than I was expecting. I've really been trying hard to trade EMC Corp (EMC) (which is already Hybrid), but I've had only limited success.

I just hope my results on EMC doesn't reflect what my profits will be when all stocks are finally Hybridized...

Good Trades

10:20AM - Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) was downtrending while the Futures were moving down, but had bounced up briefly. AMD was approaching the $24.65 level, which had some relatively big size on the bid. Just then, the Futures started tanking really hard, so I tried to get short 4000 shares on AMD, but got partially filled for 2800 shares. I got some of my position out prematurely when AMD stalled for a bit, but got out the rest for a good winner. I got out as follows: 2-cent winner (1000 shares), 13-cent winner (1800 shares) ($254 profit before fees ; In: 10:20:56AM ; Short 2800 shares @ $24.65 ; Out: 10:25:53)


Bad Trades
None.

8 Comments:

  • Glad to see things are going smoother for you the last couple days! Plus you get to work half days. And full days aren't even as long as most people's full days! Isn't this the life? :-)

    If you can't find any acceptable intraday free charts, you could take srceenshots of your trading screen just after the trades you think are interesting. Even without special software, just hitting {printscreen} puts your entire screen into the clipboard, waiting to be pasted into MS Paint and saved as a .PNG.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at October 18, 2006 7:17 p.m.  

  • David,
    Heheh - that guy's a chart maniac! Yea - I should ask him and see exactly what he's using...ideally I'd like to use something that I can scale the chart down to just a few hours (i.e. just show the chart for a two-hour span). I'll keep looking.

    Richard,
    Yea - I'm kind of enjoying it actually - I've now got more time to do more of the stuff I've been putting off. I think the toughest part is actually trying to leave the trading floor...today I actually sat there for 20 minutes debating whether I should stay or not...I guess discipline won today...

    I guess I could do a printscreen of the charts at the office - the charts we use there are from in-house developed software. Otherwise I don't mind using BigCharts...we'll see how it goes from here on in (Blogger gave me trouble while I was trying to upload this chart...it took me about 15 minutes to finally get it up there....grrrrr...I guess I can't complain - I was the one who chose to use Blogger!).

    Good luck to you tomorrow - I too am having trouble with some of my longer-term trades (though for me, longer term means > than 10 minutes!!!). Hopefully we can both figure this out soon...

    By Blogger J.C., at October 18, 2006 8:57 p.m.  

  • StockCharts.com is an excellent source of charts you can post up.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at October 18, 2006 8:57 p.m.  

  • Hey JC,

    I was going to suggest Stockcharts.com also.

    You might have to subscribe to get intraday charts though....

    Nice trading today!

    Linda P.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at October 18, 2006 9:37 p.m.  

  • Try the new Yahoo Charts, they are excellent intraday. Make sure that they are the new interactive ones. (In beta currently) not the old static ones.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at October 18, 2006 9:40 p.m.  

  • Anon@8:57PM,
    Thanks for the suggestion...I'll check it out!

    Linda P,
    Thanks for the comments. Hrmmm...I'll check out StockCharts.com to see if they have intraday charts available.

    Anon@9:40PM,
    Yea - I kind of like the look and feel of the new Yahoo charts...maybe I'll try posting one of those up one day. I'm mainly looking for charts similar to what Ugly uses or even what Richard and MoveTheMarkets uses. I'll keep looking, otherwise I'll stick with BigCharts.

    Good luck to all and happy trading!

    By Blogger J.C., at October 18, 2006 10:29 p.m.  

  • You could use Java charts over at http://www.prophet.net/analyze/javacharts.jsp
    They're free, scalable and accurate. You could also use a very small screen capture programme called MWSnap which will reduce the file size down to few kilobits. http://www.download.com/MWSnap/3000-2347_4-10544482.html
    Cheers

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at October 19, 2006 6:05 a.m.  

  • J.C.,
    If you like Big Charts, use their java charts. It will give you very clear prints.

    Thanks for you interesting blog.

    By Blogger Sicilian, at October 19, 2006 5:07 p.m.  

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