Posts Tagged ‘Dax’

I decided to go short against the DAX. But here is my mistake. I did it not because any of my indicators sent me a short signal but because I felt it has already jump to much and correction should come.

So yesterday evening I opened a short position on the DAX at 4941 with stop loss at 5001. By 7:30am I was 35 points in profit so I moved my stop loss to 4940 and went to eat breakfast and drink coffee. By the time I was in front of the screen again I was out. The DAX jumped to 4961 triggered my stop loss and through me out. Then it went down again to 4920.

Here is my my second mistake. I was upset that maybe I am going to miss a big down trend only because I moved my stop loss. So just from pure emotions I placed an order to sell the DAX again this time at 4960 with stop loss at 5021. Needless to say that by 11:00am the order was executed when the DAX jumped to 5000. So now I was -40 points… but it went down again and by the time the Dow opened I was break even. Around 16:00 the DAX was still around 4960 and I felt confidence that it will go to my direction. It closed at 4957 so I even had little profit.

But then the Dow moved up strongly and took the DAX up to 5023. I was out by 20:30 and this time really upset. Then of course it went down and while I am writing these lines it is around 5000. And tomorrow it can still go down, but I am already out.

And here is my mistakes:
1) Because my decision to open the short position wasn’t based on indicators I was nervous
2) Because I was nervous I opened a position after the first one has been closed. This was a mistake.

Good thing that I did:
1) Moved the stop loss to a profit zone on the first trade. If you can do it, then your money is protected.
2) At 21:00 told to myself that it wasn’t my day and my timing was really bad. I learn from it and move on.

It is! and this is what my friend has just did. And this is how he did it with 3 trade only:

Bought a PUT option 4700 on the DAX for at 7, £10 a point. A day after the Dax lost 3% and the option was 40. 33 points = £330.

Last Friday he open a short position (£4 a point) on the Dow with 100 points stop loss and 50 points profit target. The Dow almost touched his stop but changed direction and he got the 50 points or £200 profit.

Yesterday again on the Dow he went short with £5 per point and got 120 points or £600 profit.

All together £1030 profit and with the £70 the balance is £1100.1471% profit in 10 days. Amazing but…

I don’t think this is the right way to trade. In fact I think my friend did all the mistake he could… but he has a lot of luck. The way he trade is more like gambling when you may have a good strike but in the end the Casino most of the time wins.

Mistake number 1:

Trade on all the money in the account. It is ok when you have only £70 in your account to trade on all. But when you account is more than £1000 it is not wise. One bad trade and you are out.

Mistake number 2:

Thinking that only the £70 is his money. He always says I don’t mind losing – it is only £70. What I try to explain him is that was £70. Now it is £1100 and it is belong to him. He can take it and put it in his bank account.

Mistake number 3:

No strategy. He opens positions according to guts feelings. He follow the market quite long and he has the experience, but he is not using technical analysis to back up his instincts.

Today he opened a new position on the Dow. This time it is £15 a point with 75 stop loss and 100 points profit target. Again this is a mistake because the ratio between potential loss and profit is to low. You should always aim for 2:1 at least.

I do hope for him that it will go well for him but I don’t recommend you to follow this method. Although with 1471% profit some will be tempted

Hi all,

I am not a big fan of stop loss. I think they make you lose money. So I don’t use them. But today I had sometime and I decided to use Worldspread offer of £250 cash back.

I saw the Dax up strongly today and I know that the 4950-4975 is the upper resistance at the moment. So I opened a position to sell the Dax on 4946 with 25 points stop loss – £10 a point.

At one point I was £150 up, but my target was £1000 or 100 points. But an hour later the Dax was strong again and peaked 4978. I was out. 2 hours later it was 4900… and the again it was up to 4975 and down again.

25 points stop loss is a joke. If you really serious about trading and you still want to use stop loss then use 200 points on Index like the Dax. Otherwise you will be out before you know it.

Stupid Newham council has took my car because according to them I parked in foot path. Needless to say it is bull$hit but it cost me £250 and half a day which I wasn’t happy with it at all. I can dedicate a whole blog about Newham and their annoying mayor, but this blog is about money and not politics.

So I promised my wife that I will cover the lost with spread betting and I had a plan. Worldspread has offered me £250 cash back if I open an account with them. So my plan was to take this offer and cover up the (stupid) Newham loss.

But I am so busy lately that I haven’t had the time to deal. But on Thursday morning I saw the Dax at 4815 and I thought this is my chance. That day was my birthday as well so I thought it must be my luck day.

My target was to make £1000. So I’ve made a £2000 deposit into my new account and I was looking to open a short position on the Dax, £10 a point, with 25 points stop loss so my £250 cash back will be the limit, meaning no lost what so ever.

Good plan but Worldspread doesn’t offer the option to add a stop loss to an order! so I couldn’t just order and forget. I had to open a position manually and then put a stop loss. But I didn’t have the time to follow the market. I had a meeting with a client on Friday and nothing was ready yet. And it was my birthday so many phone calls.,. so my plan to open an order at 4830 with 25 point stop loss was all gone.

And what happened in the end? The Dax went down to 4730… my £1000 profit if I could stay focus follow the Dax and choose the right place to enter. Instead I had nice birthday, finish the project for my client at Friday (early) morning and still have £2000 in my Worldspread account waiting to be invested. After all I need to cover this parking ticket.

The Dow is 8185 after it has already touched 8250 today. The FTSE 100 is 4189 and the Dax is 4704. Is it the time to sell? I think we are getting near the point when the direction is going to change south. I think that the economies are still in dire situation and there is no real substance for the latest rally.

But the question is when to enter the market and sell? it is a good question which I don’t have the answer but I feel that by somewhere next week the direction will change. It is only guts feeling which you don’t really want to count on but I am quite sure that we will see the FTSE & the Dow below 4000 and 8000 respectably.

What I am going to do is wait and see. Once I see that on both side the atlantic the indexes are down by more than 1% I am in. Selling.

On the last article Simon Grifin from Share magazine has recommended to sell the FTSE 100 at 3950. He called the latest rally as typical bear rally or in other words false rally. By the time I was reading his article the FTSE 100 was around 4100 and the Dax was 4650. Then came Friday and markets continue to move up around 0.5%

All of these put my Dax 4000 Put for May call value on the lowest you can imagine (6 points when I bought it for 36). This wasn’t good. I was speaking with my friend that holds the same positions and both of us agreed that the market is almost on its peak and the only way is down.

So we checked to buy the Dax 4400 Put for May. The price was 66 around 17:00. I though that if the Dow will finish on high note then the option will be worth 60 or less and I will buy it. But I forgot to check. You know Friday evening is not the best time to deal.

Anyway it touched 62 and the weekend has started. A new week and the markets again see red. The Dax lost 190 points in one day. This means two things:

1) My 4000 Put worth 34 now (300% in one day)

2) 4400 put that I didn’t buy worth around 125 (100% in one day)

All I can do is blame myself. I knew that the market will go down but combination of tiredness and fear of losing more prevented me to take a huge profit. Another painful lesson has been learned.

Hello all,

I have bought today a put option on the Dax. Why the Dax? The FTSE 100 didn’t jump as high as the German one or the Dow. While the Dow jumped from 6500 to 8000, and the Dax from 3600 to 4500, the FTSE was much more solid and jumped from 3500 to 4000.

So if I am right and the market will change direction, my logic says that the FTSE will slide slower than the other two. So I left with 2 options. The Dow options seem to me expensive so I’ve decided to choose the German index.

Bought it for 36.3. The lowest price today was 30 but I missed the bottom. I guess you can’t catch the bottom. So I have 4.5 weeks and my target is to double the money. I will keep you updated.

Hi all,

On Friday I bought shares of Barclays at 48p. Today it turned out to be one of the best buy I ever did. They announced in the morning that they made a profit and they don’t need more money and the share went all the way to 88.70 a 73% gain in one day. Did I took profits? No. No? No. Why? because I think the share has more to gain. I target the 120 price but I know some people who look for the 150-160p.

Again I missed the GBP/USD my order level is still 13520 and it went down all the way to 13550 and then a huge jump to 13967… I don’t have luck with the GBP…

Another thing that I’ve made today was to go short on the Dax at 4332. This was a mistake. First I never followed the German market and I don’t know a thing about it. Second I didn’t have the right frame of mind to follow the trade. And third I didn’t set targets. So why I opened the position? because Paddypower has this nice tool on their homepage where you can see the balance between short and long that people are taking. So around 15:00 98% went long on the Dax. I thought 98% can’t be wrong and the RSI was at 82 level. I opened a position. 10 minutes after I was 40 points down. Now if you bet one or two pounds per point it is not that bad. But I was more than that and my profit from Barclays was at risk.

I’ve almost lost my temper and closed the position at lost. But I hold my nerves left the computer for 10 minutes and by the time I came back I was in the money. I closed the bet because I knew I didn’t have the time to monitor it. 10 points gain. Now I checked the Dax and I could made another 35 points… but lesson learned. Never opened a position on a market that you don’t know. And never use a stop loss on Index. It will cost you a lot!

By the way Paddypower spread on the Dax is just 1 point!