It’s all gone a bit quiet on the trading front I’m afraid. With having various other commitments I’m just not managing to find the time to look for potential trades and I don’t want to rush into anything as this has gotten me into trouble in the past.

My position in paragon has rallied by around 4 points today. Not what I want considering I’m on the short side. The ADX is still just above 25. If it falls below this level or if the any of the MA turn upwards then I will exit the trade as the reason for the trade will have gone away. Shanks and premier foods have both gone up a bit today. Shanks will have been open for 8 weeks on Friday. IF it fails to move into 2R by then end of the tenth week then I will exit the trade and look for other opportunities. Ten weeks is the length of time set out in the momentum divergence strategy for the trade to come good. If it fails to come good then I shall look for another trade.

Premier foods is also a momentum divergence buy, it’s only in it’s second week so this has another eight weeks to come good. Luminar is the same although it has been open for four weeks.

At the moment I am quite happy to let my existing positions play out. How I said if the ADX on paragon moves below 25 I shall exit the trade and look for something else.

I have placed one new order for tomorrow. This is Dominos Pizza. The stock is clearly up trending and has just pulled back for three days. Therefore I have set a buy order for the high of today with a stop set at the low of today. There is every chance the order will not trigger but we’ll see what happens tomorrow.

That’s all from me for today.

Works been hell today and I have virtually no time to write anything meaningful today.

Pargon have gone up and Shanks have gone down, not what I wanted really but hey. I’m still in on both positions and they are both breakeven or better so I can’t complain too much. We’ll see how things pan out over the coming days/ weeks with them.

With having virtually no time to write I also have no time to look for mew trades. I don’t think this is that bad though as it stops me from over trading. I should have more time tomorrow to look for potential trades and also write a more meaning full update.

Sorry I couldn’t write more.

I made a bit of a mistake this week. I placed an order for BP last week to buy at 395 with a stop at 388. This was only meant to last until the end of the week. I forgot to cancel the order over the weekend and it executed this morning trading me in and out within about 10 minutes. Bit of a pain but it’s another lesson for me. I need to keep track of any open orders better and if I am not able to trade for a while I should close out any pending orders. It’s cost me £7 not a massive amount but a loss I could’ve done without all the same.

I currently have 4 open positions. Three longs and one short. The short (paragon) is currently my best performer, will it last? We’ll wait and see. I have spend some time on my trading plan but it is far from complete. I have decided to limit the number of my open positions to 5 for the time being. I want to double my portfolio value before I will add another 2 positions allowing myself 7 open positions. I think limiting myself to 5 open positions at once will help eliminate my over trading.

I would like to thank “I” for e-mailing me his trading plan. I have added it to a new page on my strategies site for now. I may look to re-arrange things at a later date. How I said I am still working on my own plan and will add it as well when it’s finished. If anyone else has a plan they wish to share feel free to e-mail me and I will add it to the site.

There isn’t much else to report today. I’ll try and update my open positions and do my weekly analysis if I get chance tonight or tomorrow.

“It’s oh so quiet, it’s oh so still.”

I’m not referring to the markets as these seem to be as volatile as ever with no sign of changing at the minute. I am referring to this blog. I am going away for a few days with work and I doubt I will get any chance to update. I may get some time when I am back on Sunday but that is unlikely as I’ll be spending time with the family. I most likely get chance to update on Monday but we’ll have to just wait and see.

My trading has certainly gone quiet compared to how it has been over the last few months. I think this is a good think. I was clearly over trading and it’s done me no good psychologically or financially .  I am putting some serious time and effort into my trading plan. All successful traders have a plan that they stick too and never deviate from. I think it’s something that takes time to develop initially and then requires constant maintenance as more knowledge and experience is gained. I aim to share my trading plan with you when my first attempt is complete. I say first attempt as I suspect it will need some tweaks over the coming months.

I would love to hear from anyone that has a trading plan that they stick too. Maybe others would like to share their trading plans with everyone. If you do have a trading plan and are willing to share it with everyone please e-mail me. I am thinking to make some changes to the site to accommodate my own plan and others. I know a trading plan is a very personal thing but I think it’s good to see what other traders have included in there plan to give a novice, such as myself, an idea of what is involved in writing a good detailed trading plan.

Other news.

Well there isn’t much really. I have placed no new trades mainly because of lack of time to look. I think It’s also good to take a few days off from trading. It will allow me to try and clear my head of all the confusion of late and come back to it next week and try and make some sense of things again.

Don’t get me wrong I’ll be keeping my eye on the market and any developments but I won’t be trading probably until Monday or Tuesday now, and only then If I get a good setup opportunity.

Thanks to Tony & Neil for leaving their comments. I appreciate them as always and it’s good to get an opinion from other people. Maybe I am over complicating things using ADX, MA etc. But then again if I start trying to change now will I just confuse myself even further. At the minute I don’t know. I think taking some time away from it all for a few days will do me some good. I can try and clear my mind a bit an come back to it with a fresh new outlook.

My positions in Home retail, logica & aegis all stopped out today. They were all short positions and lost me a total of £12 across the three trades. I decided to take a look at the charts again to try and shed some more light on where I went wrong. Interestingly enough the stocks would’ve been potential momentum divergence buys according to the momentum divergence strategy. I think when I am looking for future sells & buys I will take a look at the 6 week momentum indicator also. This will limit my potential trades but I’d rather place few high probability trades than loads of low probability trades.  The only question is does this actually increase my probability of a winning trade or will it only serve to confuse things further?

I decided to take a look at my one remaining sell position ,Paragon. This also has shown momentum divergence. I guess it’s hardly surprising since I spotted the FTSE all share had momentum divergence two weeks ago and a trade would’ve triggered last week as the price passed it’s high of the previous week. Should I have taken this as a sign that the price was about to reverse from the down trend indicated by the MAs & ADX? I don’t know. Just when I think I’m starting to make some progress with my analysis and not trading recklessly I stumble on something like this and I feel like I am back at square one. I guess I’m just going to have to chalk this one up to experience again.

I’m thinking to incorporate this in my trend spotting and not trade any that are showing momentum divergence according to my strategy. I wonder if this will help? I don’t know what to think. All I know is this is hard work. If you are looking for an easy way to make money then find something else. I think robbing a bank might be easier than this.

I have to say my long term goal of making £100+ a day consistently seems like such a long way off. I seem to be getting worse at trading rather than better. I think I would settle for a consistent £1 a day at the moment.

I’m going to spend some time now looking for new potential trades. I may just look though, I’m not sure if I will place any orders yet. Maybe I need to take a trading holiday and come back and try again. I’m not  sure what to do for the best. Anyway time will tell.