Our playoffs have begun- earnings season. This is the time where we as prop traders make most of our money because there is so much price action. Interestingly, there has been tremendous price action in the financials and energy sector recently before these playoffs. Hence a dilimena. What to trade? Do we stick with the energy and finacials stocks that … Read More
Small Tier Size Can Equal Large Profits
I meet with a ton of potential future SMB prop traders. Obviously there is a great deal of interest in those who wish to trade with us. Hey that’s part of my job. Luckily for me I get to screen everyone who walks in our doors. So I enjoy most of the interviews. There have been a few two minute interviews. … Read More
Rally Monkey Come Out and Play
Today we saw good strength on the financials with our money maker WFC leading the market. It was definitely a good stock to watch today on the open. It was a bit sketchy into the close and it made it easy to churn away profits in the middle of the day. But overall if you stuck to buying and selling … Read More
XLE Levels
The past two trading days there has been tremendous price action in XLE, crude, and related equities. I am not an expert on energy but I do know that 80 and now 77 are very important levels for XLE. Below 80 and 77 and you should look for weakness in the energy stocks. Above 80 and 77 and you should look for strength. Below … Read More
Profiting From Patterns
During our AM meeting our Desk gathers in our conference room to discuss the stocks that will be “In Play” for the day. I usually also throw in some tidbits about recent market patterns that may help our traders make some “easy” money. Easy money is usually found in one of our core trading plays that our trainees learn during … Read More
Hey, Just Relax and Trade
During the past few days we have seen noticeably increased volatility and movement in our markets. Days like this are what a day trader salivates for, because the money making opportunities are vast as money is pulled in and out of the market and stocks act somewhat erratically. During these times it is easy to get overly worked up because … Read More
Trading Slumps: Don’t Stop Believing
Recently one of our guys was struggling. His Luger’s fund (money donated by our desk for a celebratory meal at Peter Luger steakhouse http://www.peterluger.com/) jokingly(?) turned into Mike’s Survival fund as you can see from the picture. Trading slumps as they are usually known, happen to the best of us. To me it is just a psychological barrier that slowly … Read More
Picking Your Spots
We had a long discussion about picking your spots today with our desk. How many of you who are professional day traders feel as if you over-traded today? Today was a day where that was easy to do. But let’s take a look at the last 3 hours of the trading day and particularly with LEH and FNM and discuss … Read More