Unusually Cautious

Gross: +$725.00
Net: +$712.16
Trades: 42
Shares Traded: 20800

Stocks Traded Today (net profit/loss):
Bausch & Lomb Inc. (BOL): +$505.03
Southern Copper Corporation (PCU): +$69.66
Monsanto Company (MON): +$57.95
Ryerson Inc. (RYI): +$54.80
GameStop Corp. (GME): +$51.94
AK Steel Holding Corporation (AKS): +$26.52
AGCO Corporation (AG): +$22.04
Dick's Sporting Goods, Inc. (DKS): +$7.81
Peabody Energy Corporation (BTU): +$3.86
Arch Coal, Inc. (ACI): -$41.92
Allegheny Energy, Inc. (AYE): -$51.02
Williams Companies, Inc. (WMB): -$62.79

Over the weekend, I signed up for one month to use Trade-Ideas and I spent some time trying to get more familiar with it's capabilities. I figured I'd give it a try for one month to see if I could use their alerts.

But when I came in this morning, I felt as though I was more hesitant than usual when it came to putting on trades.

I watched the open and kept an eye on some of the stocks I had set my sights on the night before, but I never really found any good opportunities to trade them.

I then started to keep an eye out for those Trade-Idea alerts and I can definitely tell you I was not disappointed!

Trade-Ideas pointed me from one opportunity after another, but what I really had to do was get in at the right time and not jump right into a stock just because it came up as an alert.

I can tell you, Trade-Ideas really saves me from having to switch from stock to stock, seeing if anything is trending or is near intra-day or yearly highs.

Unfortunately, I was feeling really cautious today and most of my positions were only for 200 or 300 shares....not sure why I felt the need to reduce my share size....maybe it was because I felt like I was trying something new and I wanted to err on the side of caution.

Well after trading several stocks that came up on my alerts, I started feeling a little more comfortable. I was taking 20+ cent winners, however since I kept my position sizes small, it didn't really account for much P&L-wise.

Then I got an alert for Bausch & Lomb (BOL) and that it was approaching it's intra-day high. Well thank goodness I had Trade-Ideas! Without it, I wouldn't have even known BOL was making a move.

It was at that moment I decided I needed to up my share size a little....I couldn't just keep taking 20+ cent winners on so few shares and expect to do anything spectacular on the day.

Well BOL came up to the $56 level and when it broke, I went long 1000 shares. BOL just exploded from there....

Unfortunately I started unloading my position when it started re-tracing rather hard and I was worried that it would reverse, considering it had already made quite a move and that the overall markets were stuck in neutral.

Well well, after I got out, BOL would just keep going up by several dollars! I didn't see anything that would have warranted the move at the time, but now I see that there were some buyout rumors out there.

Unfortunately I didn't know that and again, given that I came in today usually cautious, I was still happy with the $500+ gain on the trade.

Hopefully I can get used to trading those alerts that Trade-Ideas give me and hopefully I can get more comfortable so that I can trade them with more of a position (rather than the smallish positions I was putting on today).

One good trade and no bad ones.

I started feeling like I did on Friday after lunch, so I decided to leave for the day lest I repeat what happened on Friday.

Good Trades
(trades in which I make $200 or more)

• 11:34:59AM - Bausch & Lomb (BOL) started to move up and took out it's intra-day high when it came up to the $56.00 level. When it broke, I went long 1000 shares. As soon as BOL broke $56.00, it exploded to the upside. I held onto it, but then it made a hard move back to the downside, which spooked me a little, so I started dumping my position. Below is the 1-minute chart so that you can better see what I'm talking about. BOL would just keep going up after I got out. I've really got to get better at holding them winners. I got out as follows: 47-cent winner (500 shares), 49-cent winner (300 shares), 62-cent winner (200 shares) ($506 profit before fees; Long 1000 shares @ $56.00 ; Out: 11:38:24AM)
  

Bad Trades
(trades in which I lose $150 or more)

• None