Trading Notes -- 20190130 Wednesday

Added on January 30, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

Broad tone poz... short headwind ... Fed Day, 2PM normal shenanigans ... Naz +2.5% EOD

CODX stock du jour, no borrow, FIDO 10, 5.9K, 37.5K, 94.8K

Tried a rare long TSX style in CODX (see chart below), trial size but coulda been smaller still, super tight stop, instantly stopped, kind of dumb, certainly not my style, sort of regret doing it but I have to get better about getting long from time to time ... if I had a borrow there were some great spots

TRVN -- offering PO, down 16% ... amazing they had millions of shares avail on Monday, none on Tuesday, and the offering comes Wednesday PO? Coincidence? 2.76K, 6.11K, 19.5K

EYEN active PO, no borrow, 1.64K, 7.48K, 14.2K

EKSO yes borrow, missed lovely OM B entry, chased C half size, hit all targets almost immediately, 1.18K, 6.87K, 12.7K

MLNX yes borrow, weird one $100+ PO on Intel thing, avoid,

CANF yes borrow went dead, no play

ZYNE surprise borrow, shorted YB, super thin, 1.74K at 10:15, shouldn't waste time with it, just dead money Day Two waste of energy, carrying it, looking to scratch, will be tiny loss if stopped using today OR stop, 142, 1.44K, 6.18K

OCX shockingly 100K+ PO but all borrowed mighty quick, zero during RH, classic Day Two dead dog, hero to zero, 809, 5.93K, 16.2K

VYGR exited rest at Typ3

SXTC latecomer no borrow

Trading Notes -- 20190129 Tuesday

Added on January 29, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

Broad tone neg … short tailwind … OCX the stock du jour (6.38K, 37.2K, 139K) but no borrow … locked out of broker with a borrow cuz I only have a few K there and did three trades yday (maxing PDT thing, sheesh), can’t play again till next Monday which means I have to act this week to get some cash over there. I did have a borrow in CRON (2.93K, 36.0K, 130K) and VYGR (849, 6.78K, 20.1K) so played both… OSTK (23, 936, 12.5K) no borrow today, TRVN (1.28K, 10.3K, 35.3K) no borrow (and they had millions of shares yday), ZYNE (216, 3.61K, 20.9K) some borrow PO but quickly pre-borrowed, AVCO (418, 3.58K, 7.55K) no borrow (.144 at TZ, ~$300 for 2,000 shares, ha!) but it tanked beautifully for a Day Two, that squeeze they did yday was shameless, but of course they got me out personally, which was their goal. :)

Woulda stayed out of trouble in OCX, even with borrow, thank god … TRVN I’d have a couple legs on despite SSR ... had to chase VYGR, went half size and instantly hit minC, waiting on rest for Typ3 … covered rest of CLRO at updated target which was wise because it is so dead I was totally StuckAtaProfit, turned out to be a nice trade.

CRON was the big winner, it’s at all-time highs, shorted B & A & A+! so a rare large position, had to take LLP to Ladies’ meeting, came home to find it had hit all targets and I was out, an incredibly pleasant surprise. Totally by the book and I needed a big winner given recent SLM jam-out, and IQ/GME stop-pulling debacle from earlier this month.

OSTK tanked which was nice, I was hoping for A+ but it never happened, but I’m content with the size and took off part at minC, waiting on rest at Typ3, will be nice win if I exit it all at targets.

Until the Poets Run Out of Rhyme

Added on January 28, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

The great Barbara Lewis surrounded by a weirdly unmoved (until cued), mostly white, studio audience:

Uploaded by Rob Lloydy Jones on 2014-10-23.

Trading Notes -- 20190128 Monday

Added on January 28, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

Broad tone neg ... short tailwind... jammed out pre-open on remainder BIOC (bastards), woulda been shaken out same spot in reg hours but still, dirty, small loss in the end, will have to look for precise number but very small; CLRO covered some at minC looking for Typ3, maybe too greedy, reevaluated, prolly 185 more realistic than 175, it's so completely dead impossible to exit any size, StuckAtaProfit Day Two dog; BBBY finally went to B/E level to take me out, instantly dropped back 50 cents, comical, should have been out of that days ago; OSTK came in with a plan, they tested the prev day high during OR clever devils, reversed, filled B & A hoping for A+ no joy; SLM got lucky opened weak, got out of all at modest targets, dodged a bullet cuz that was definitely a revenge trade with revenge size and I got away with it, needed the money :)

AVCO (2.74K, 14.1K, 63.9K) and BIOC (1.46K, 11.1K, 21.7K) the stocks du jour, AVCO FIDO 15, no borrow in either at IB/ToS, shorted (0.065) AVCO at B coulda gotten A but it was tricky during OR, covered some at minC, it came back in afternoon stopped me out on balance at A, re-shorted it at B which had become perfect support lol, instantly jammed out at 1R loss but I didn't add A A+ which was good, once difangs shot on the afternoon short squeeze, I'm sort of at a loss (ha!) but think it best to leave alone, avoid revenge trading, it was a good solid player, tons of activity and volatility, really enjoyed it. Pretty quick to figure out new order entry system, slippage not proving to be horrible, but it shows you how good IB's TWS really is. Liked the 3PM failed breakout in AVCO so took another stab at it, broke hard to VWAP and held, very hard to piece out a position using limit orders since there are no OCOs, it's all hot key stuff, too quick for an old man. Took it all off at A level in pieces, clock was ticking but B level woulda also worked. Got back a little. OK to lose a couple hundred bucks monkeying around with new order entry platform.

BIOC there was an opp during OR but required anticipation and I was afraid of revenging it so focused on much more active AVCO instead, which was good.

Need to get the ~$4K out of ToS since it's useless for trading more or less and everyone tells me they keep their account open with $100, so I'll do that this week.

AVCO was a perfect long of course (look at the chart below) but I'm always looking short... I know how to get long, I have good, nay near-perfect, entries, etc., but I'm just opposed to it for some bizarre psychological reason.

TRVN sub $1 stock that came over a dollar and showed up on scanner, no borrow IB, oops they found 150K shares just for me, above magic level no play.

Movies Watched -- Black Coal, Thin Ice (2014)

Added on January 27, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

In Chinese. 106 minutes, but felt at least 15 minutes too long. Weird one from China. The Chinese title is 白日焰火, which means daytime fireworks, which makes sense at the end of the movie (it’s also the name of a night club within). Sort of a crime / mystery / thriller, but it was none of those things really — more a low-budget art house movie than anything. The only thing that interested me about it was that it was set in Harbin, a city I have some familiarity with, having spent my fall semester of my junior year abroad (in 1990!) at the Harbin Institute of Technology … and of course I know China well.

Structure of the movie wasn’t very good, fairly disjointed, lot of leaps of logic, femme fatale angle didn’t really work, just strange — how did the detective (who was later killed) track down the killer? Did the other detective love the girl? Why? And why screw her and not save her? Yellow rating for those who think about China, and especially Harbin, with some nostalgia, red rating for everyone else.

Luke Buckmaster correctly writes, “It's hard to imagine it traveling much wider than the festival circuit.“

Movies Watched -- Darkest Hour (2017)

Added on January 26, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

125 minute running time so at least 25 minutes too long, but I liked this one. Gary Oldman plays Churchill … it’s a sort of a companion movie to 2004’s Der Untergang. I don’t know how historically accurate it is, but the movie was very entertaining. I also like Lily James’s look (see below) … I first saw her in Baby Driver (she played the waitress).

A rare green rating from the Chairman.

This is another movie from 2017 that I can recommend along with:

Trading Notes -- 20190125 Friday

Added on January 25, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

Broad tone poz, shorts no tailwind. Ear infection, saw doc at 11AM, spent afternoon in bed… CLRO the stock du jour (1.13K, 14.5K, 34.2K), the only game in town, I shorted C&B and came close to getting an A entry but no cigar, holding for targets well below; took a loss in SLM, once again forgot I had open orders in there and filled a bunch pre-open which was a mistake and increased the loss about 25%, but nothing crazy, just annoying, also noticed I missized one of the original legs, bah, this is what happens you change your bet sizing during experiments; able to cover a leg of BIOC; VIPS rallied and stopped me out on last so a scratch, I hate that stock, it acts like a Usual Suspect, very difficult; re-shorted SLM in afternoon off of ORR, maybe a revenge trade, lotta size, but it felt ok, we’ll see.

Trading Notes -- 20190124 Thursday

Added on January 24, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

Broad tone poz … yesterday’s heroes become today’s zeros, look at BOXL and SPI (though BOXL did a cynical run in the afternoon, straight into yday’s closing level), monkeyed with ToS order entry, no way to put on multiple legs out with a single order, pretty lame, but customer service wasn’t terrible, I had to call them after multiple chats with semi-competent reps (unlike IB where everyone seems sharp), I don’t think I’ll leave much money with ToS with the crummy order entry and $7 a ticket :-), power outage before the open and another right before 10 AM, not cool but all my stops were in.

PCG -- 230, 4.56K, 188K, halted near 15:30 then gapped up to $15ish on limited liability news, glad I wasn't involved in that one, knew halt risk was high

SLM — 30, 15.2K, 75.6K, yes borrow, poz earnings, strong morning, shorted in both ToS account (experiment) and IB, C & B entries

VIPS — 198, 8.84K, 40.2K, yes borrow, short C covered minC, waiting for Typ3

BLNK -- 565, 16.1K, 25.4K, stock du jour looked like, no borrow, went dead though, note 10/16 TC dichotomy

VTVT -- n/a, 4.48K, 22.3K, back from the dead, no borrow, gave beautiful spots, coulda had full amazing position but no borrow means no joy

MBOT — 540, 7.1K, 18.3K, full red restricted from short sale, came alive in afternoon, super cynical drive, slimy stock

BIOC -- 25, 2.57K, 12.6K, yes borrow (surprise!), so even though very thin, shorted B & A (new sizing experiment, not a great idea, go back to original amounts — no risk, no reward), they filled me on 100x cover, but didn’t fill me a single share short there, bastards, another reason not to cover any there, ever

CLDC — 1.43K, 8.55K, 12.0K, active PO then went dead, no borrow

BOXL -- 140, 1.47K, 4.66K, completely dead, H2Z, 10TC1.53K, no borrow

SPI -- 110, 1.22K, 3.27K, completely dead, H2Z, 10TC1.23K, no borrow

TLGT — 131, 653, 1.53K, yes borrow, semi-active PO and a good example of something that is thin and dead, note 10/16 TC (see chart below)

Trading Notes -- 20190123 Wednesday

Added on January 23, 2019 by C. Maoxian.

Broad tone mixed to neg... I left at 10:30 for a massage and then dealt with M for the Mars poster framing, didn't get back till around 14:30 ... took a bunch of stuff off in afternoon, will be nice to get it off the watchlists, clean things up. PO actives went dead quick, see TC below. Stocks du jour were all latecomers.

BOXL -- n/a, 10.7K, 74.3K, FIDO 16, stock du jour, no borrow, strong OR, shifted shortly thereafter, no borrow so no joy but coulda filled BA

PCG -- 224, 7.18K, 58.4K, pulled plug, though liquid, out of patience, took it off, decent gain

VIPS -- n/a, 14.7K, 54.2K, yes borrow, active on upgrade / new PT, something of a Usual Suspect, tricky in past, I'll keep a lazy eye on it

MBOT -- 42, 329, 42.7K, FIDO 15, no borrow full red, came back to life, rallied right into a 15:30 offering, the dirty devils, they would have driven me out had I had a borrow

CRON -- 279, 7.54K, 36.5K, FIDO 17, filled during OR, nice gain, will be good to take it off list since it’s a Usual Suspect

SPI -- n/a, n/a, 15.4K, no borrow, latecomer, don't know if on early scanner, will check, burst was 11:50ish (I was away)

ATHX -- 1.25K, 2.83K, 9.41K, yes borrow, poz drug news, active PO, no fill, just too weak and went super thin

SNGX -- 1.25K, 5.6K, 8.32K, yes borrow, patent news, active PO, C fill only, out minC and Typ3 in absentia, nice gain

FNMA -- 8, 2.03K, 5.84K, got a fill finally during OR and they dropped it much lower of course (the only way you can get a fill on OTC/BB nightmare), nice gain

RCON -- 120, 3.31K, 5.41K, yes borrow, filled CB, out minC, touched Typ3 but no fill, felt me out and took it back up, ridiculously thin

BBBY -- came close to Typ3 but no fill, big bounce, patience running out

AVCO -- no borrow, active at open, super weak, maybe C fill possible with borrow but no joy

AUPH -- pulled plug, no liquidity, no patience, out with decent gain

FTK -- pulled plug, super illiquid, just so dead, sick of it on monitor, decent gain