Back with another green day recap. Today was an eventful day, but I limited my play selection to 2 names since I’m not able to work trades all day.
I’ve run into a reoccurring theme over the last couple of retro’s that I’m noticing that I want to address. I see that I am missing some very nice setups that I’m calling, and sometimes VERY close to what actually pans out. For instance yesterday I wanted to see $ATHE go into the 3.56 area for a short (I botched the entry) and today I missed a very NICE setup on $PLUG off the open where I was wanting to see a push into the 22.98 level for a pull back to low 22’s and it did just that without me…..sheesh. This lets me know that I need to set alerts and keep my ideas in front of me as I’ve kind of been on it lately in the ideas, but missed on the execution. The fact that I’m having these nice insights into possible price action is encouraging because it means that things are really starting to click. There’s a quite a bit going on in these markets and for newbies like myself it can be a little daunting to take it all in, but as time goes it’s like things just start to click.
Alright, well onto today’s trades.
FCEL
Man what a trip this one was. I had an eye on it from last night and was wanting to see some strength to get involved, but I jumped the gun. Albeit I had super TINY size on my premarket trades,I should have been paying a bit more attention to the volume and key levels, which would have had me hold of until at least the 4.30 zone. I also could’ve stood to wait for some confirmation for a level vs just jumping in because it hit. Now with that being said I took little paper cuts on the size down in premarket (like truly tiny little scrapes because my size was very small), so I definitely wasn’t pre-exhausted on the trade, but for whatever reason I just found myself on the wrong side, so I backed off until open. No off the open I had a fat finger moment and somehow I ended up going Long and cut that for a pack of gum (literally..lol) and then waited for that 4.43 level to confirm. It did and I got in, but where I goofed was that I didn’t cover into the key level of 4.13. I was looking at it thinking that I should and I guess greed got me, so I left some on the table there, but got back in for the next confirmation of fail and took it off when I felt a shift in the tape. That cover ended up being a good one.
LXRX
Nice trade here. My only grip is that I wish i put much more of my size on in the 2.30 range. I started to get involved with the key intraday level of 2.20 was proving to be a point of resistance, then we got the free look of some artificial volume that got stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey, so I added in there and started to scale after the open. Again I wish that I sized up sooner, but I think that with time this will sort level out. I’m happy with my adds overall in the trend and felt like I had a good read of the action. Now where I’m a bit disappointed in myself on this trade is that I didn’t wait for it to hit my target for a 1.79 cover. I covered most around 1.88, so I’m talking about .10 here, but I want to maximize these opportunities as I get them.
Jacob, a trading buddy of mine, had an awesome recomendation that I wanted to highlight.
Have you ever thought about just holding like 100 shares for your 1.8 target (or any target in future plays) ? That's what really helped me hold to targets
— Jacob (@jmbjake97) November 17, 2020
Now the interseting thing here is that my first cover, which was about 75% of my position, was at the 1.88 level and I had full intentions of letting the rest ride, but I think I have something called “cover-itis”, which is basically when I start to cover I have a hard time stopping.
I’m pretty sure that this onslaught of covering that I’m doing is a direct response to the many times that I’ve been up on a position only to watch it swipe me out and me to go red ( *Shakes fist at WIMI * ). This is definitely something that I have to work on, so I’m going absolutely make sure that I’m making sure some of my spotioin is down to those target zones.
Key Takeaways
I honestly didn’t even think about until I started writing this retrospective (these things really do help me with my process), which is being able to discern the difference between heavy tape, where you have a bit more headroom to be patient, vs a hectic tape (like what was going on in $FCEL), where you need to cover into the washes.
There is a very distinct look and feel to heavy tape like that of $LXRX vs that of $FCEL and that is something that I need to do a better job of identifying and understanding when I have more room to be patient. This is something that I will be actively looking to improve on as It will let those plays that really do warrant patience play out, and it will keep me from being overly ambitious on tape where there’s jut no room for that.
I’m officially excited about what this new revelation will bring!