Saturday, February 5, 2011

TideTraders Subscription

Hey guys,

For those that know me, you are aware that trading is a huge part of my life and my main source of income right now. You are also aware that I hang out in the Tidetraders chat rooms. I try to post most of my trades, or at least most of the option trades I take that do not cause Obligation. I try to limit my posts to options that give you rights and not obligations. The main reason I do this, believe it or not, is because there are many people out there who do not do their own research and may not be aware of the risks they are taking. With that being said, my conscious does not want me to hurt anyone financially. I do not want those who choose to take my trades to ever lose money. I do post both my winners and losers. And believe me guys, I have losers as well, sometimes more than I would like.

The key is money management. I always preach that there is not a book in existence that can teach you about yourself. Your fears, your greed, and monetary value, and what money means to you. You have to identify the type of personality that you have. When I say you have to identify your personality, I mean, your personality as a trader. Are you someone who has to be in and out quickly by scalping because you like that style better or you just do not want to have any money at risk over night and prefer to have a clean slate every morning? Are you someone who likes to day trade positions and give them time to work throughout the day and close all positions out prior to close so you can avoid any overnight swings and again start fresh every morning? Are you the type of trader that likes a slower pace of trading, more relaxed sit back and watch type trader? If so maybe you prefer to employ a swing type trading strategy. Maybe trading is not your main source of income and you have another job. These traders, should consider swing trading positions and maybe looking at types of equities that will allow them to set there stops and let them develop and work for them at a slower pace.

After identifying your personality, you must also ask and understand the risks that personality entails. If you are still not comfortable with those risks, you have not identified your trading personality correctly. Do not care what others think of you. Do not lie to yourself. It is very important that you identify your trading personality correctly otherwise you can not advance to the next level.

When you have identified your trading personality, you can step forward and move to setting up proper money management techniques. A 6 month to 1 year period is recommended to study and hone your trading skills. You do this by paper trading an account as if it were real money. There are some issues with that because emotions are difficult to identify when you do not have real skin in the game. However, you will sharpen your skills, learn the required information including patterns, correlations between multiple trading vehicles, and many other issues that affect the markets. You will learn and understand money management and trading techniques using different types of financial vehicles. You will develop rules based on hours of practice and identifying the indicators and parameters that work and do not work.

When you have completed this personal identification, training, and have built a confidence based on indicators and consistency you should have a solid foundation. Now you are a Rookie, a Newbie or any other name that you can use that describes you as being a new trader or green.

Please do not be in a rush to lose money. Remember, any profession you take on, to be a real professional you have to dedicate yourself and put in many hours of studying verbally, written and practically. I like to use the example of my personal life. For those of you who do not know, I am an airline Captain. I invested years of my life and thousands of hours studying, taking hundreds of written exams, oral examinations, and practical tests including simulators and real airplanes under strict rules and a strict examiners eye. I had to perform under all these rules that are dictated by the FAA and be able to perform and execute within very strict limitations. I did all of this to become a professional, to be one of the best at what I do, to be able to compete with other professionals that may have many more years of experience than me. I did this because I love flying. I did this because I had to in order to fly people around and visit all the countries that I studied as a child.

OK, enough about me, the point that I am getting at is, there are many professionals out there that have been trading the markets for many years and are ready to take your money at any given time. So before you get into a business with experienced seasoned professionals who have been properly taught and trained to take your money you better get your act together and be prepared to put in hundreds if not thousands of hours to be able to compete in this great business we call the Stock Market.


Now for those who hang out in the TideTraders chat rooms, you are aware of the promotion they have going. They have free chat rooms and other chat rooms that include Equities and Forex. In these rooms J-P, Rickster, and the Witch Doctor post their trades live. These guys have greater than 40 years of trading experienced combined and are some of the best at what they do. They are not only traders they are also fantastic educators. You will have weekend updates on the stocks they are going to trade with entries, targets, and stops. During the week they post their entries and exits as they take them. They give you extremely detailed commentaries including the use of charts and videos. The price for this information currently is $24.95. Today at midnight the price will increase to 29.95. In the free rooms you can watch over Rickster's shoulder everyday and watch him trades the S&P E-mini futures and ask all the questions you want throughout the day. In 2009 Rick made over 1,000 points trading the /ES and in 2010 he came in just shy of 1,000 points I believe the final was 937 on the /ES. For those of you who do not know what that equals. Each /ES point is worth $50.00 per contract. So 1,000 points is equivalent to $50,000 if you were just trading 1 contract, $100,000 for 2 contracts and so on. Oh yeah, let me also tell you. He showed all of this live, as he pulls the trigger you can see his monitor and the trades triggering with both the stop and limit orders in place and the contracts he is trading. This information is all live, real and best of all it is FREE!!!

I am a chartered member and am extremely blessed to be considered their friend. Outside of being a chartered member I have no affiliation what so ever with Tidetraders. It is just the best chat room by far to spend some of your time in and get educated and profitable throughout the day.

For those of you who sign up before the price increases tonight from $24.95 to $29.95 a month you will also be entered into a contest to have 5 hours of personal coaching on Options via Skype with me.

I am doing this because I choose to. There is nothing in it for me. I am just thankful for what I have and want to give back.

The entry rules to qualify for the 5 hours of 1 on 1 personal options coaching with me are as follows.

1. You must sign up with TideTraders before midnight tonight Saturday February 5, 2011.

2. Your membership must be for a minimum of 6 months.

3. You must submit a stock of your choice, no options by Sunday night February 6, 2011 no later than 11:59 pm est .

4. Please submit your stock in the comments section below or at petevoptions@gmail.com

5. At the end of the 2 week period and market close on February 18th 2011 the stock the performs the best, percentage wise, will dictate the winner.

6. If there are multiple people who have chosen the same stock I will ask you to choose a second stock and we will go off that percentage.

7. If the second choice stock is the same the procedure will continue until there is a different stock choice.


Please visit www.tidetraders.com for any questions or further details, most importantly you will love the environment, and maybe you might learn a thing or two, and more than likely become more profitable.

Good luck and have a great weekend,

Pete

Monday, January 10, 2011

A Few More Stocks to Stalk this week

I will be keeping a close eye on the following stocks this week for trading opportunities.

AXTI
ATML
AREX
CY
LLTC
LVS
FFIV
MIPS
TMO
TZOO

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Taking a look at the Transports and a focus on Railroads

I mentioned on the Sector review video that we need Transportation to be healthy if the markets are going to continue their bullish treck. A pull back is expected and would be welcomed. In this video I am taking a look at the Rail Roads. I have traded them throughout the year and am currently in a CSX jan 62.50/60 put credit spread which will expire in 12 days and I will likely get to keep the full premium collected as long as the stock remains above 62.50 by expiry.

Ok moving right along. I am really liking,

NSC
UNP
CP
KSU

They are all very attractive on the monthly and weekly charts. KSU is a bit extended on the daily, therefore I will be looking to enter positions long on NSC, UNP, and CP, I will likely take 2 of these and look out to March and May expiration. Please watch the video link below for a better understanding of what I am thinking.

http://www.screencast.com/t/3hj4aTrt

Bullish Look on RRC

I am going to position myself long in RRC using Call Options. I am considering the Feb $45 call for $2.60. I also like the Mar $45 or $46 Calls, which give me a little more time. I do think this chart is set up technically and has a good possibility of attaining $50 in the next 60 to 90 days.

There was a ton of call activity that crossed the tape on Friday January 7th. They were going after the jan and feb strikes. The feb 52.50 saw 5435 contracts traded with a previous Open Interest of 0. So it is evident these were being bought to open. Now keep in mind they can be a hedge if attached with shares sold short.

RRC is in the Natural Gas sector and was downgraded on 1/6/11. Natural Gas prices have been depressed for quite a while now. We have seen a recent push up in Natural Gas prices but keep in mind that there is still an abundance of Natural Gas Supplies.

Aubrey McClendon, is (CHK) Chesapeake Energy's CEO. I consider him to be a sharp individual and a great leader. He invested a ton of his own cash into his company and because of the economic recession, Hedge fund, and Shorts pressuring the stock down, he was forced to sell his common shares because of margin call requirements, taking a large loss I presume. OK, the point I am getting at is, this CEO is confident in his company and its future. He invested a ton of his own cash in his company, which is one of the reasons I like CHK in the Natural Gas sector. Along with it being the largest U.S producer of Natural Gas, it has great management!!

CHK has also hedged about 96% of their Natural Gas production for 2011, Here is an interesting article.http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2011/01/07/chesapeake-finally-takes-its-foot-off-the-pedal.aspx

With that being said, lets get back to RRC. I mention CHK because I much rather own them or APA for that matter, but I am first and foremost a trader and RRC in my opinion offers a better technical setup at this time. I have enclosed a a video with some technical analysis and my thoughts on RRC.

Here is the link to the Video

http://www.screencast.com/t/iuNK9k0pagRz

Sector Review

Here is a video link to a discussion on Sector review

http://www.screencast.com/t/zPU3duMs

SPY, QQQQ, IWM, DIA

here is a link to a video on the major indexes.

http://www.screencast.com/t/ciEh2xKrt

Saturday, January 8, 2011

January Effects Results

Here are the results of the January Effects trades.

The Results may vary depending on the dates entered and exited as well as execution price. The results listed here are based on an entry of the closing price on Monday December 27,2010 and exiting the trade on Friday January 7, 2011's closing price. I also took 5 of these trades using call options and entered them after December 21,2010. Please feel free to look at the archives under January Effects posted on December 21, 2010


Security - Entry Price - Exit Price - P/L

AONE _ $9.71 _ $9.63 -0.83% Jan 10 Call in @.20 out @ .20

BYD _ $9.98 _ $11.92 +16.27% jan 10 Calls in @.45 out @.90 & 1.80

BPZ _ $4.62 _ $4.95 +6.67% Common Shares

BZ _ $8.15 _ $8.15 Unch Common Shares

FTK _ $4.35 _ $5.14 +15.36% Jan 5 Calls in @.70 out @.80 &.75

GMXR _ $5.56 _ $6.00 +7.33% Common Shares

HOV _ $4.01 _ $4.45 +9.89% Common Shares

LNET _ $4.00 _ $4.47 +10.51% Common Shares

MNKD _ $7.97 _ $8.20 +2.80% Common Shares

PMI _ $3.50 _ $3.74 +6.41% Common Shares

SOMX _ $3.15 _ $3.30 +4.55% Common Shares

SQNM _ $8.13 _ $7.70 -5.58% Jan 5 Calls in @.42 out @.84

SPF _ $4.44 _ $4.78 +7.11% Common Shares

SVU _ $9.26 _ $8.66 -8.08% Jan 9 Calls in @.50 out @1.00 &.80

STP _ $8.16 _ $8.28 +1.45% Common Shares

UTA _ $6.29 _ $6.37 +1.25% Common Shares

YRCW _ $3.71 _ $3.41 -8.80% Jan 4 Calls in @.24 & .14 out @.07



Largest % winner not including Call Options BYD + 16.27%

Largest % loser not including Call Options YRCW -8.80%

Total P/L not including Call Options +7.49%




6 total Call options



4 Winners

BYD
FTK
SQNM
SVU




1 Loser

YRCW



1 Break Even

AONE