Momentum Trader Report: 03/11/10

11 Mar

Posted by Momentum-Trader as Momentum-Trader Report

The S&P 500 hit its January high. A level a lot of traders are watching, wondering if this will be a double-top.

But the NASDAQ, which is leading this market higher, surged through it January highs. This is a bullish market, but looking parabolic. It could literally turn at any moment.

And I had some sweet breakouts today. The best being JOEZ.

The other was PVTB.

And still nice continuation in recent triggers. Here are some that did well today:

They didn’t all move higher. I was stopped out of this one today.

CLNE reported earnings today. It was a recent trigger that I sold this week since I don hold into earnings. It made a nice move today.

Trade Ideas for 03/12/10:

Very nervous at these levels, but still finding charts setting. Probably looking to day trade these.

Good luck and good trading!

2 Responses

HS

March 11th, 2010 at 10:55 pm
1

Hi Mometum trader,
was recommended your website by a friend and now am eagerly hooked onto it that i wait for your posts each night. I am learning a lot from your posts. Thanks for taking the time to patiently explain your moves.

Can you tell me:
1) when you set a trailing stop , do you go for a $ amount or % amount and how you determine what that figure is?

2)Similarly on the upside do you cash out when you reach a particular target $ profit or % ? do you also set up triggers to automatically close the trade on the upside or do you manually close the trades?

I have a regular day time job and i usually only get 30 mins to monitor the markets.
Momentum-Trader

March 14th, 2010 at 8:41 pm
2

HS

Good to hear from you, thanks for the comment. I dont have hard answers to these questions because it’s an area I have been developing.

I set my initial stops below the 15 day SMA. Since I look for breakouts from this area, they are usually pretty tight. In swing trades, I will trail my stop below the 10-Day SMA once it takes off. I try to sell 1/2 - 2/3 as it moves higher, and get stopped out of the remaining shares.

In swing trades, I am trying to hold on and not sell. In a confirmed rally like this one, I don’t want to sell too early, so I hold and wait to get stopped out. But I am only holding a portion of the original position. In the case of PODD on Friday, it didn’t hit my stop, but I closed the position anyway, as the action was ugly.

In day trades, I will take profits earlier. Hope thsi helps.