SPN

MTH:  I opened a  position in Meritage on the NYSE last tuesday for System B.  I haven’t done many trades on the US stock market, but I can see that changing at least a little.  Running my searches across the SU markets is showing me some good looking trends, which I will try to capture over time.  It would make sense to determine a portfolio mix across markets – I just need to find the time to get to that!

MMS:  I opened a  position in Macmillan Shakespeare today at 11.10 for System B.  It showed up in the weekend scan for the system and looked a bit promising, and the order was placed last night (Sunday night).  As you can guess I didn’t really look at the market close across the world last friday – and things closed poorly.  Germany down ~3.5%.  Doesn’t bode well for the week…  Overall this share is just peeking into a long term high – normally a good sign but will have to keep a close eye to see if the greater market sentiment drags it down.

AGO:  I had my position closed on me in Atlas Iron today as it hit a profit target.  The short trade was closed at $2.00 for a 7% gain.  In this case I set $2.00 as a profit target as the price was rejected from that support level 2 weeks ago, and has given the impression that the support will hold at that point – it’s a solid round number.  Either way, nice profit off a quick trade.

Let’s see what the rest of the week has to show for itself!

BTR

SXY:  I closed my position in Senex Energy today on System B at $0.84 for an overall 15% loss.  (This is a blend of the initial and pyramid positions).  Not a good trade at all.

This trade is a great example of ‘doubling down’ on a losing trade.  Enough of the trading books I have read say not to do this – and there’s a reason:  It’s a BAD idea.   Writing this is my attempt to program this into my brain… I haven’t done it in a while, and its to be avoided.

Only pyramid into winning trades!

BRG

Anyway, taking into account the original entry, and the pyramid entry, this is a very nice trade!  Note that the 6% profit does not include the original entry, as that was taken before I returned to my blog – so that would be cheating.

CMJ:  I closed my position today in Consolidated Media Holdings at $3.20 for an 8% profit under System B.   If you look closely at the few bars prior to the close the share appears to be forming a broadening triangle, so I suspect there might be a significant move here shortly.  I might keep this on the radar, and see what comes next for this one.

Again, as for the BRG transaction above, this is a very nice trade, taking into account the original breakout followed by the pyramid entry.  I’m very happy with this one also

As for the one above, the 8% profit does not include the original entry.

The exit is unfortunately well off the peak about 3 weeks ago (these are weekly charts for System B), giving up a nice bit of the profit – remember it’s not about picking tops and bottoms though.

BHP:  I have opened a short position in Broken Hill Pty Ltd today based on a System B entry.  I have entered this position when BHP was at a price of $32.17 using a short option position for leverage.  Similar to my warrant positions, it’s quite small in order to manage the risk.

The option expires in about a month so if should track closely to the actual value of the trade.  The value is in the money, but only just.  Lets see how we go.

GNC

As I look at the european market tonight, its again taking a hit.  This might again be a fairly short trade.

AGO:  I opened a short position in Atlas Iron on friday at $2.14 using a short CFD position.  The trade came from System B.  I’ve held off short trades for a bit, based on a couple of factors.

In Australia at the moment it can be tricky to put on short trades.  The options for short trades come down to option positions, warrants, and shares that are shortable via a CFD – the usual short market seems to still be fenced from retail traders.

When my system comes up with a short trade, I then need to try to locate a mechanism to take the trade, and that is combined with my past history of some unsuccessful short trades.  That said, when I did do short trades in the past, they weren’t based on a system.  Let’s see how this one goes.

SXY:  I opened a further position in Senex Enegy on friday at $0.75 on System B.  This is actually pyramiding into a losing position, and generally not a good idea.

The entry was based on a decline of 61.8% from the recent high in SXY, so a bounce at this point is a reasonable expectation – it looks like it has taken quite a hit in the current market, so this is taken with the view that SXY has over-corrected.  Will watch for a bit and see how this plays out.

WHCKOB:  During the week I was stopped out of the Whitehaven Coal position, as this trade was done with a warrant that had an inbuilt stop loss.

Lets watch those stop losses this week.

update 5/6/12 – corrected my AGO entry price.  Unfortunately the correct value is a smaller gain

GNC:  I closed a position today in Graincorp at $8.85 for a 4% loss as a System B trade.  This looks to be another trade cut unnecessarily short due to the currently falling overall market.  This is a case of a well found candidate, and I followed the system to a T.

PRG:  I closed my position in Graincorp Limited today at $2.28 for a 10% loss.  Again a System B trade.

Again I stuck to the plan, and have only taken a small loss.

For tomorrow it’ll be something I don’t do too often anymore.  I’ll take a short trade that System B has signalled today.  On my tests System B seems ok on the short side, however my statistics on real short trades do not reflect the expectations of the system.  I’ll have to sit down and analyse that in detail at some stage.

BPTKMB:  I had my position closed yesterday in my warrant position Beach Energy at $1.20 for a 50% loss under System B.  The stop was the exit price on the barrier warrant, which returns the intrinsic value to me in a week or so.  As I bought in at a low price, and the warrant exit price aligned with my stop loss on a System A trade.

You can see how the price fell after exit day in the picture to the right so that stop loss worked well for me – noting that my position size was quite small so a 50% loss is not a significant cause for concern.

MMS:  I closed a position recently in Macmillan Shakespeare at $10.51 for a 1% loss.  This was a good trade in regards to a good clear entry, and the exit was clearly defined.  MMS has been a good share in relation to strong moves, so I may be back in it shortly – let’s see how it pans out.

MVP:  I opened a position in Medical Developments at $0.75 using System A.  This is a risky position due to the greater market moves – although this share has been growing consistently and strongly for some time.  You can see todays movement in the share price  and the dip was fairly strong – however the price seems to have stalled at a resistance level.

WAA:  I closed my position today in WAM Active at $1.07 for a 7% loss under SystemB. The share fell rapidly following my entry, however I didn’t release immediately as it’s a weekly trading system. The exit was triggered at the end of last week, but under the rules I can exit anytime this week – I waited until friday to see if the market would increase at all.  Funnily enough, the share recovered friday so my loss was slightly lower than expected.

BRU:  I closed a position today in Buru Enegy at $2.69 for a 14% loss under SystemB.  This was my second entry, looking for a bounce at the point of entry.  The position didn’t play out as expected, so I exited quickly.  Given the loss, not quickly enough – but within plan nonetheless.  I really did miss a good move in Buru, which seems to have occurred slap-bang between my two trades.

NWH:  I closed my position today in NRW Holdings at $3.58 for a 13% loss under SystemB.  I seem to have picked a top again by buying into it!

This entry has actually disappointed me – looking at the entry point, there is no clear breakout – I really just bought in on a high volume and dominant candle.  This is what I am supposed to be avoiding in System B, so I actually have to call this a poor trade – even though I executed my exit strategy correctly.

SAI:  I closed part of my position today in SAI Global at $4.68 for a 10% loss under SystemB .

I was definitely more happy with this entry than the previous one (NWH above) as it was a breach of a longer term resistance line.  A nice clean entry, but it looks like rejection of the higher prices was fairly sudden and strong.  I snuck a look at market depth late friday, and I noticed almost all sellers leave the market, leaving lots of buyers, and almost no sellers – I was expecting the price to suddenly jump, so I moved the remainder of my position to a higher sell price.  Just prior to close a lot of sellers re-entered, keeping the price down on close.  Will look to exit the balance of the position shortly.

All up – a week of losses, and general erosion of the portfolio.

LSA:  I closed my position today in Lachlan Star under SystemB . The share touched my stop loss on the share and so I was exited.  Looking at the remaining open positions this one may have been worth keeping, as some of the others are not looking at all healthy.  Oh well – drop the losers, ride the winners.  Today this one isn’t a winner.

TEL:  I opened a position today in Telecom NZ today under System A, the longer term trending following system.  I actually missed my entry yesterday and chased price overnight to enter.  I haven’t logged in during the day for a bit and this can delay the transactions.

This share really has a nice slow steady increase – and I just hope it keeps on going the same.

The last couple of days have been a bit unusual – the US and UK markets are not showing strength, but today the ASX made some new mid term highs – a good sign for the next short period of time.  Also maybe even a divergence with these other western markets.

SXY:  I opened a position today in Senex Energy under SystemB . This is an entry on the weekly momentum system.  The entry price was $1.145.

You can see the earlier trade I had in Senex which was recently closed out, and very profitable.  The entry today would imply that the trend may continue.  Looking at the graph updated with todays price it looks like a tweezer top / double top may be forming – so I’ll keep a close eye on this one.

GNC:  I opened a position today in Graincorp under SystemB in what appears to be a continuing uptrend.   The entry price was $9.26.

I did notice there was a warrant for this trade, however I have stuck to the main equity in this case.

BPTKMB:  I opened a position today in Beach Energy under SystemA.  I actually opened the position in another warrant against BPT, as I am looking for the leverage on this one.  The entry price was 0.435.

In this case BPT again showed up in my trend following system and looks to have turned up from the recent low.  This trade is taken on a small investment as the share is developing into a down trend (lower lows and lower highs).  The recent dip seems to have come up as a result of the company running a capital raising.  The capital raising seems to have knocked the price a tad.

MIX:  I opened a position today in Mirvac Industrial under SystemA after a strong close at the end of last week.  The entry price was $0.105.

I’ve never traded MIX before so I will have to get a feeling for its personality

Time for a sleep – I’ll update the portfolio page tomorrow.