My positions management business

First my english is not very good, i know. It's not because i am not well educated, it's because english is not my first language.

I have always said that i will never start a public journal on a forum. Here i am today, i am starting one. I think i am doing it because of boredom. Trading is a solitary business and nobody in my entourage is involve in trading so nobody can understand what i am doing day after day. I could write my own journal outside of public forum but if someone learn something from my writings so why not make it public. I plan to use this journal to talk about my trades, my feelings, my frustrations etc... Not to sell something or to teach other peoples. I am not here to disclose a big secret. Just sit and watch and if you can learn something in the meantime then good for you.

My backgroung:
I am a health care professionnal by formation. I trade since 6 years, scalping most of the time. It went good for me, i made money (and still making), enough to quit my daily job 3 years ago. At some point in my life i became sick and tired of the scalping lifestyle and all thoses hours infront of the screen. So from scalping i gradually made the transition to swing and position trading during the last year. I still daytrade XAUUSD but i can say now 80% of my total trades are swing or position trades. I trade less and do more money than when i was scalping. I am very happy with my decision.

I am a self-made man, i forged my own understanding of the markets myself after so many hours infront of charts. I learned very few things from other people and basically nothing from public forum. For thoses who haven't make it yet, seriously it's not the way to go. Stop asking others for help, jut sit and watch your charts, use your own head to solve the puzzle. There is more than one way to trade profitably and you have to find your own way.

Now about my style, like i said i swing and position trade most of the time.
A lot of the things i am doing may seems counterintuitive for most people here. For exemple:

-I scale in/scale out of my positons
-I don't use SL
-I add to my losing positions sometimes (mostly with stock)
-I don't focus on my entries (management and exit are the important part)
-I barely use leverage (i seriously think the excess use of leverage is the main reason why most retail traders can't make it)
-I take my time and never rush into a position
-I take my profits, i don't try to catch a homerun each time i make a trade
-My main concern is always risk management over profit making

That's some key elements of my style.

It may seems cliché but i really treat my trading like i would treat any other more tangible business.

I am also trading other markets:
-bonds (government and corporate cad and us bond)
-Gold and silver
-european stocks
-US stocks
-CAD stocks (that's where i have most of my money invest, much more than in my fx portfolio)

Even if all thoses things are differents from fx, my general approach to trade them is always the same. I plan to talk about the trades i made in thoses markets too.

So let's start this journal and see where it goes.

I made only 1 trade today. A short term trade on XAUUSD. I still made some of thoses trades from time to time but not really often. I only make them on XAUUSD near NY open.

I close my UJ short i opened last week and still have some ucad short open.

I also bought a couple of CPG shares on the tsx. Otherwise, nothing special to report today.

I bought some shares of CMG this morning. It's a nice compagny who paid 4% dividend. It have potential to grow. It depend how it's gonna develop but i may have a first profit target around 11$.

I also bought some G shares. May be a low risk cheap aquisition, will see.

I made some forex trades too, i will talk about them later today.

I take a nice trade on UJ last nigh. It developped well during the london session. I close it soon this morning aroung NY open with a quick 60 pips gain. I could have wait more, it seems it's gonna break up again but that was so easy and quick money i took it.

I also took a short GU, it was a nice and clean setup but it didn't goes as expected. Price refuse to break down again, it became pretty obvious during NY session today that i was on the worng side. I close it for a small profit, barely BE.

I also took a long EU. I am still riding it, expecting another move up. Maybe an exit around 1.1825.

I added to my short UCAD position today. It now give me an average price that make the global position BE. I am expecting another move down and want to exit with that move.

Then finally i also make a quick trade on XAUUSD around NY open this morning. It was fast, gives me an easy 50 points. I exited on the 3th move up, right on top, got lucky on that .

Hi Vince,

This is a nice average down on your case, under leveraged i guess and with a good reasoning.

However, can you explain the first entry, why was there a short? thx

Hey Buddy nice to see you around!

That first position on Ucad was taken many days ago. For differents reason (on a daily perspective), i was thinking the downtrend could resume around 1.24 and make another break down under 1.20, it was a long shot... It didn't developped like i plan and i was not quick enough to kill the position, so i "save" it another way instead. Yeah you are right, I am under leverage.

I didn't have a lot of time to trade this week, we renovate our house, it was a busy week. I made some longer term stock trades but for my shorter term trades i almost only trade XAUUSD. I will begin with thoses trade and i will make and update on my stock trade later during the weekend.

My gold trades of the day and my thoughts.

For my stock trades, i sell some shares today. I took profit on my CPG trade i made 2 weeks ago. I also added some new stock to my important watchlist to be buy soon (CIX, CNQ, ECA, FNV, SNC).

You know I would have been interested in seeing what you got but when you said I add to losing position no thanks and good luck

Why a comment like that? You don't like how i trade, just don't follow my journal.

There is no need to write that, i am not gonna change the way i trade because you don't like what i am doing.

By the way adding to some losers from time to time doesn't mean keeping them or continue adding to them until the account blow.

My gold trades of the day. It was not the kind of day i like to trade, no direction, a spike up, a spike down then a range. Tough day for me. I wasn't able to pick my spot and capture my part of the range. I also made a stock trade, i will maybe talk about later tonight if i have time.

I add a new compagny to my long term stock portfolio, i bought some RUS shares. I was looking to make an acquisiton in the basic material field since a couple of weeks. I choose them because it's a good compagny. They make money, the PE ratio is not too high and they pay a nice 5,6% dividend. The weekly and the daily are in my buy zone so it was time to take a first shot.

I almost always scale into my long term stock trades. Usually i split the total amount of money i want to invest into 4 equal parts. That means i am gonna buy some shares of that compagny 3 times again during the next months.

The total of the 4 parts never goes over 10% of my total portfolio. That's means even if the compagny make bankruptcy and the price goes to 0, my total loss is not gonna be more than 10% of my total money. That's why i am very patient with thoses kind of trades, i am ready to hold them until i die, lol!(moreover they are paying me to hold with the dividend). It's also why i am not afraid to add to those kind of trades when they are in losing territory, it gives me a better average price while they pay me to hold.

This is investing, not trading. That's my main business.

Gold trade to be update later today.

Gold was a nice classic BO trade this morning.

Not an easy ride today but i finally catched my chunk of the daily range with 4 attempts. Tomorrow it's a bank holiday in the US so i will not trade. The week is over for me.

Hey Vincelev,

Great trading journal! I like to read your gold daily trade, keep it up! Other than your analysis of the higher timeframe, would you say that you base your trade mainly on MA and Pivots?

Have a nice weekend!

Malouin

I use MA to quickly spot where we are in a move according to a TF.

I use pivots almost exclusively as target.

I base my trades on the general directional idea i have after all my analysis.

I am not sure of what you're asking exactly? I guess you want me to talk about entries?

That's my analysis right now. If i was going to trade now i would look for sell gold on a PB. I am gonna do the same tomorrow morning before i begin my session.

Maybe i am totally wrong, maybe gold is gonna skyrocket, i never know for sure. Sometimes i have to change my mind and do the opposite of my initial analysis according to how the session progress.

That's basic, that's how i technically see the market. A lot of time i am wrong but i think most of my hedge is recognizing momentum and what is happening with the PA live while i am in a session then acting on that.

I apologize, english is not my first language either. What I meant to know was what were the "pointers" you were looking for before taking a trade, so yes the entries. You perfectly explained me how you are doing it, so thanks a lot for your analysis, that help a lot.

I'm not much in bonds or stocks, but I would definitely consider myself more of a daytrader than a swing trader. However, I like to see how you trade so keep it up! Wish you luck!

Malouin