Trade Log - May 5, 2023

Well, I said I would share my winners and my losers, so today is already that day to share the losers for transparency. I believe I have said it before, but I'll say it again just in case, I won't share R's or dollars, because I want to work through the process and the things I need to work on. Most importantly, the psychology of trading, which I did terribly with today.

$NVDA

I started out good, sticking to my plan. My plan was to try the short at $280. I did that and got stopped out. Since the 5min appeared to wick me out, I tried again, then got stopped out again. I was already in other trades and was trying to stick to my plan, so I didn't flip my position here. Hindsight is 20/20 and everyone can try to say they would have flipped long here, but I didn't, and that is okay, because I was sticking to my plan.

I then stepped outside of my plan, because I knew $285 was a strong level for $NVDA. It struggled and I kept on adding for some reason. Eventually it broke out and I stopped out, but all of the adds added up to a big loss. Then I got emotional and FOMO, so I immediately flipped long. I partialed, then added early, then started taking partials as I got scared of it tanking to the downside and eventually got the rest out at my next level.

$AMZN

This one crushed me and I have no idea why I thought this was a good. I got in looking for the break of my level just under $104 and set a tight stop. Well, I went ahead and added telling myself I'll maintain a tight stop. Then, I added again. At that point, my position was way too big and I decided to hold on for the ride. Eventually it broke $105, so I got out and immediately flipped long. I sat through the consolidation and eventually got out at near break even.

$MSFT

This was another one that wasn't on my watchlist and, just like $AMZN, looking for that breakdown below a level that was just below PDC. I got stopped out and then it ripped. Good thing is that I at least stuck to my stop and walked away.

$TSLA

Another one that crushed me. I took a small position at $164 just in case, then added at $165. For some reason, I didn't set my stop and just let it go against me. They had a catalyst premarket that should have told me that I needed to certainly stick to my stop. Either way, I chose to keep adding believing that $TSLA was going to stay in that $160 - $165 range. Well, I need to remember that it's okay to be wrong, because trading is about making money, not about being right. You certainly can't make money if cut your winners early and let your losers run. The saying is quite the opposite of that. As you can see, I tried a long, which did end up working, but was really just gambling. Then I tried to short it, and eventually gave up on it.

Overall, this was a very bad day, and not just on my PnL. It was terrible for my risk management and what a terrible way to go into the weekend. But let's not worry about that, let's take the weekend to relax, then come back strong on Monday. Regardless of my PnL today, I lived to trade another day, so let's trade another day and stick to the rules then. I may already be 50% sticking to my rules on these trade logs, but let's get some discipline and make that percentage go in the right direction and quickly.