AAPL - break of the 20 day

I'm watching AAPL for a break of the 20 day moving average. If it breaks it could TANK. GOOG and BIDU already have failed.

MON - Great example of my favorite type of trade right now

Below is a trade that I unfortunately missed today. It's a great representation of my FAVORITE type of trade - shorting into resistance. These work great because there is big upside and little risk. Short it at 125 and use a mental stop above the HOD at 125.27. MON had struggled to get and stay over 125 this last week so there was a good chance it'd fail again. A little patience and a convenient market sell off and 3 points would have been made with about .30 of risk.

MBT #2

giddy up. I got out at 85.31 - great two days of action.

MBT Follow-up

MBT was up over 5% today as it broke through the declining tops line (in white) I referenced in a post a couple of days ago. I held a position for most of the day, sold it near 80 and then bought back a 1/2 position just a minute before the close. My main concern at this point is the yellow channel. I love how the stock is acting so clearing that channel solidly to the upside will have me back to a full position.

PKX - Follow Up

POSCO (PKX) has broken out as I thought it would. Unfortunately for me, it went without me as I was waiting on the volume to come in. In retrospect I should have picked up 1/2 a position or so when it broke through as there was a good likelihood that the volume would eventually come and when it did it'd ramp. The stock is in no man's land now so I have to wait for a bit of a base or a pullback before getting in at this point.

Trading Performance - Stepping Up the Accountability

Pasted below are charts of my trading account's equity curve. A year-to-date chart and a separate chart for each month are included. In posting these charts I'm looking to address one thing: Accountability.

There are two facets of accountability at work here. First, accountability to the reader. I'd love to see portfolio metrics on every trading blog I come across. I want to know if the person posting is full of it or not. So to you, my 9 faithful readers, I'll be offering up my equity curve. You'll be able to tell if I'm trading like crap and you are crazy to listen to me, or if I'm doing unbelievably well and everything I am touching is turning to gold.

The second facet of accountability is to myself. I'm an exceptionally competitive person and placing my results here for the world to see is very likely to cause me to have a much smoother equity curve than I have had in the past. 2007 was a year where I experienced massive gains, only to lose them towards the end of the year. I won't let that happen in 2008 and if placing my results on the internet for all to see plays a small part in that then I'm all for it.

Year-to-date Performance +17.44%:


January 2008 Performance +3.95% (+3.95% YTD):

February 2008 Performance -2.5% (+1.34% YTD):

March 2008 Performance +2.45% (+3.83% YTD):
April 2008 Performance +10.06% (+14.27% YTD):


May 2008 (May 1 - May 14) Performance +2.78% (+17.44% YTD):

MBT - Setting up for higher

MBT is starting to look nice - a move above 80 would have the stock above its 21, 50 and 200 day averages and it'd have just broken out of the declining tops.