Sunday, 27 December 2015

Tuesday, 15 December 2015

Tuesday, 8 December 2015

Did you trade WPX (NYSE) with me for a $2236 profit in 19 days?



Wrote a post about a shorting opportunity for WPX a few weeks back and yesterday I decided to take profit as it was near the support. Congratulations on those who followed the call. The entire trade a little bit of a roller coaster as you can see after I entered short, I was actually making a unrealised loss for quite a number of days.

This reminds me of a book i read about how being discipline and sticking to your trading plan is essential if you want to succeed in this.



As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Monday, 16 November 2015

[Bullish Setup] - Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (SGX: BS6)


I have been watching this ticker for quite some time after I exited my position. There seems to be a long opportunity and I will be watching it closely today.

Entry: $1.165
Stop Loss: $1.12
Take Profit: $1.23

RRR: 1.55

Always remember to give the market some time to adjust itself and not to jump in right as the market opens because there is a potential that your entry might be triggered not by actual shift in momentum, but by marginal investors adjusting their position.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Thursday, 12 November 2015

[Bearish Setup] - WPX Energy (NYSE: WPX)


Entered a short position for WPX Energy yesterday.

Entry: $8.47
Stop Loss: $9.37
Take Profit: $6.68

RRR: 2

I entered this trade because of the indecision of the market the the past couple of days and judging from the volume, it shows the loss of momentum of the uptrend. My profit taking level is based on the prior resistance level.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Thursday, 15 October 2015

A New Singapore Stock Screener?

I have always found most screeners online failing to include one important set of data, which is the SGX data. Of course, I am not saying all of them don't include it, it just doesn't come free.

So while randomly searching around a week ago, I found this relatively new screener and to my surprise, it not only includes stocks from Hong Kong, Australia and India, but also Singapore stocks.

The visuals don't look very impressive, but hey, I'm not going to complain because the service that they offer are great for people who want to screen Singapore stocks technically.



The screener is called Top Stock Research and this is the link.

You basically create an account, which won't take very long and you're good to go. You can screen them based on price, candlesticks, volume and a whole bunch of other technical indicators.

I hope it helps my fellow Singaporeans and of course to my readers from overseas as well.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Wednesday, 14 October 2015

[Bearish Setup] - Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (SGX: BS6)


A few days ago I mentioned a bullish setup for Yangzijiang. The long trade has now been realised and it the prices seem to be consolidating.

I am looking out for a short opportunity and trading plan will be as follows:

Entry price: $1.225
Take Profit: $1.14
Stop Loss: $1.28

This trade gives a nice RRR of 1.55

Whether or not I go short on this trade depends heavily on tomorrow's first hour after market open. It it opens and hits the price of 1.28 or above, this trade in invalidated.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Tuesday, 13 October 2015

Why Starhub Ltd is a BUY

I recently finished an equity report with my group mates and the target company is Starhub Ltd.

The current price of Starhub Ltd as of the time the report was done was $3.61, Our target price is $3.90 which equates to an upside of about 8.3%

Below is a snippet from our equity report, feel free to take a look at the whole report that can be downloaded here.

P.S. "Cerebral" is just our group's name and not an actual company or firm.


Investment Summary 

 Emerging 4th Telco likely to meet operational challenge 

 The push for a 4th mobile network operator (MNO) in the local market has managed to attract two bidders, MyRepublic and OMGTel. Upon announcement of the news, Starhub’s share price declined to reflect this information. However, under IDA’s requirements, the successful bidder will have to fully develop the mobile network infrastructure by September 2018. We believe this poses a challenge for the current bidders, since neither of them has direct expertise in building a full network. While the two bidders have promised low prices to gain market share, this notion is likely to be discouraged by the high initial investment outlay to rollout the network nationwide, at least in the early periods. Therefore, we see that there will be little or no threat to Starhub’s revenue at least in the 4th telecom’s early stages.

 Starhub is Mispriced Due to China’s Devaluation 

On August 10, 2015, China devalued their currency that caused a large selloff in the equity markets including the Straits Times Index. Starhub’s share plummeted 13% following the announcement of the devaluation as investors sentiments shifted. However, the fundamentals of Starhub has not changed which leads to the conclusion that the stock is currently undervalued and should correct itself in the short-term.

 Hubbing Strategy Shifts Focus to Enterprises 

 Starhub’s hubbing strategy focuses largely on home consumers in the past. The recent shift to concentrate more on leveraging its growing enterprise customers to gain consumer sales indicates a lower acquisition cost and higher retention rate. We foresee that this strategy of integrating their various revenue streams will positively impact the company’s performance because there will now be lower volatility when it comes to profit.

View the full report here.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Monday, 12 October 2015

Thursday, 1 October 2015

Did you trade HCP (NYSE) with me for a $1162 profit in 2 days?


Entered a short position for HCP as the candlesticks indicated that the selling pressure was getting stronger. Profit was taken using a trailing stop strategy.

On a side note, this was the only trade I made in September as there were not stocks that matched my trading strategy. Note that not trading is also an alternative, you don't always have to be in the market to make a profit. Most money is made by waiting, not trading.

As always, happy trading

Cheers.





Wednesday, 30 September 2015

[Bullish Setup] - Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (SGX)


A bullish setup for Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (BS6) with an engulfing candlestick. The high volume is also a good indicator of the price momentum.

Entry: $1.135
Take Profit: $1.23
Stop Loss: $1.08

RRR: 1.7

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

P.S. I have not been updating much ever since school started. I am currently specialising in Banking & Finance and I am now learning new methods of investing which I will discuss in the future. This new method is more towards value investing and modern portfolio management. Thank you for being patient and following this blog. Do drop me an email or comment if you have any questions.

Monday, 3 August 2015

Did you trade PSEC (NASDAQ) with me for a $2060 profit in 13 days?


By far my highest profit made in a trade. I have been revising my risk management rules which I will discuss again in a future post.

If you have any questions regarding my methods or in general, feel free to post a comment or send me an email at sgtrader92@gmail.com.

Together, we can all learn from one another.

P.S. I will be starting school really soon, in a couple of weeks times and I am excited to learn stuff that might actually benefit what I am doing right now. I do feel a little overwhelmed because I didn't really do well for the last semester. It took me a while to get over that fact, but I know that I can't let that prevent me from working hard.

I will post more when I find more trade setups and more things to discuss.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

[Bullish Setup] - TRIP (NASDAQ)


This is the trade that I will be looking at tonight. There seems to be a bullish setup with the hammer candlestick. I have places to take profit slightly below the huge market gap that formed a few days back. Stop loss as usual as been adjusted using ATR.

Entry: $79.43
Stop Loss: $75.89
Take Profit: $84.88

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Wednesday, 15 July 2015

Wednesday, 8 July 2015

[Bullish Setup] - FSLR (NASDAQ)


Potential reversal point for tonight's trading day.

Entry: $45.15
Stop Loss: $42.70
Take Profit: $48.95

RRR: 1.55

I am currently exploring ways to increase my winning percentages and I am currently looking at considering volume as one of the factors I use when screening stocks. I am still pretty uncertain in this area. I would love to hear from my viewers what their perspective on volume is, I'd really appreciate it.


On a side note, I have successfully entered NTU Business Banking & Finance specialisation. It was my goal when I was still in Singapore Polytechnic and it's been quite a journey. I look forward to learning as much as possible and sharing whatever I know with my viewers.

As always, happy trading.
Cheers.

Tuesday, 30 June 2015

Did you trade CPB (NYSE) with me for a $733 profit in 6 days?


I identified a shorting opportunity at the blue oval due to the candlestick patterns and my entry was set $48.28 with a target price of $47.

For this particular trade, I decided to buy back half of my position and secure $289 first as I was unsure if the price would bounce back at the gap. I will discuss more about the significance about this gap in future post. However, the other half of my position did hit my target price by the end of the trading day and a total profit of $733 was secured. Stay tuned for more post!



As always, happy trading.

Cheers.


Thursday, 25 June 2015

Friday, 19 June 2015

Did you trade KMB (NYSE) with me for a $720 profit in 8 days?


I entered a long position for KMB (NYSE) at the entry price of $105.76. I secured a profit of $720 at the price of 107.95 as that was identified as the previous resistance level.


Stay tuned for more trades and updates! Do join my mailing list to receive up to date information or follow my twitter account at www.twitter.com/sgtrader92

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Thursday, 18 June 2015

Did you trade ADM (NYSE) with me for a $1560 profit in 21 days?


Entered a short position for ADM (NYSE) at $52.40 and it hit my take profit level of $50.42. Secured $1560 profit in 3 weeks!


This particular trade was really a "roller coaster". You will have to get used to the whole idea of "emotionless trading".

I will go into detail what I mean by this in the next blog post so stay tuned!

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Saturday, 6 June 2015

Did you trade AINV (NYSE) with me for a SGD$410 profit in 2 weeks?


Entered a long position 2 weeks ago for AINV (NYSE) at $7.71 and it got stopped out at $7.86. My stop loss was $ 7.51. Total profit of SGD$410 secured!



If you want to learn more about my trading system, do follow this blog or even better, share it with your friends and join my mailing list.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Friday, 5 June 2015

How much money should I risk per trade?

Today, I want to discuss how to go about determining the amount of money you should risk per trade.

There are numerous ways to determine this amount but I have developed my own technique which is still being tested as I continue to learn and trade. But I will be sharing this technique with you and it could help you get started.

The first thing you need to consider is the amount of money you are willing to risk. And this could be an arbitrary number that you are comfortable losing per trade. aka, something that you can lose and you can still sleep peacefully at night.

This figure could also be a percentage of your total capital. Perhaps no more than 5% for a start. This means that if you start trading with $5000, you should not risk more than $250 per trade.

Personally, I do not risk the same amount for every trade. It depends on 3 factors that I have incorporated in order to minimise my risk and maximise my earnings.

The 3 factors are:

Direction of the trade (Long or Short?)
Trend of the stock (Up or Down?)
Sector Performance (Up or Down?)

By answering these 3 questions, it helps me to determine exactly how much I should be risking per trade.

Lets use an example of a stock that I recently identified as a potential trading opportunity.


A bullish setup for MWV (NYSE) has presented itself.

So, going back to the 3 questions,

Direction of the trade (Long or Short?) - I want to enter long

Trend of the stock (Up or Down?) - I will consider this stock to be on the uptrend because of the higher highs and higher lows

Sector Performance (Up or Down?) - The sector here is Packaging & Containers which is down the previous day. I check the performance using Yahoo Industry Index.



Having answered all 3 questions, here is how I determine my risk amount. I have 3 risk amounts, $400, $600, $800 for high risk, medium risk, low risk respectively.

Low risk is when the trend and sector are in the same direction of the trade.
Medium risk is when either the trend or sector are in the same direction of the trade.
High risk is when neither the trend nor the sector are in the same direction of the trade.

So using the example above, only the trend is in the same direction as the trade. (Long & Uptrend)

Therefore, I will risk $600 if I were to enter this trade.

I hope you have gained the simple concept of risk management by reading this post.


As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Thursday, 4 June 2015

Did you trade GIS (NYSE) with me for a $1250 profit in 10 days?


I entered a short position based on the hammer candle stick and the RRR of 1.56

This indicated a potential trade and when the market opened the following day, it hit the entry price of $57.6.

If you are interested in my trading style, do follow this blog as I share my experience and tweaks that I make with my trading plan.


As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Friday, 22 May 2015

What is Time Stop?

I've mentioned the term "Stop Loss" in previous post. It is a predefined price level at which you will cut your losses and move on to the next trade. It is an important concept that every trader should follow and be discipline about it.

But there is also another stop loss strategy that I use in my plan but have yet to have a chance to actually exercise it. The concept is known as "Time Stop".

You do not necessarily need to wait for the price to hit your stop loss price to get stopped out. Time stop is with regards to the duration of the trade. There will be some trades that hit your take profit level really quickly, like in a matter of days. But there will be some that will take like what seems forever.

If the trade is ranging around a certain price and not really doing anything, I will exit my position whether or not it is at a profit or loss. The opportunity cost of holding on to that position which is going nowhere exceeds the cost of exiting the position.

I usually give my trade a maximum of about 7 to 8 weeks for it to work itself, if it doesn't, then it is time to get out.

I personally have not had a chance to use to stop because my trades have never taken that long before. I will update you when it does so that I'll have a good example to show you.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Wednesday, 20 May 2015

Monday, 18 May 2015

Sunday, 10 May 2015

Saturday, 9 May 2015

3 Invaluable Tips For Trading


Today I will be discussing 3 tips that I think would really change your trading success rate. I started out trading without utilising them and often entered bad trades, but after these minor tweaks, I was in a whole different world.

Tip #1: Don't Trade Immediately

I always trade 1 hour after the market has opened. For example, the NYSE opens at 9.30pm GMT+8 (Singapore Time) and the prices of the stocks will be fluctuating like crazy because of the big players such as investment banks are adjusting their positions.

So... why don't I trade these volatile periods? I always set an entry price for a trade. These volatility in the stock's price can cause me to enter a trade that isn't necessarily the true consensus of the market. Therefore, I always enter my order about 1 hour after the market has opened.

Tip #2: Don't Over Trade

When I first started out trading, I always felt like I had to take a position; I either had to be long or short. This made me enter a lot of trades that did not work out and that meant losing money. You have to realise that not trading is also taking a position. If you feel like the market is ranging or it is against your strategy, you can always choose to not trade and wait for a better opportunity to present itself. Choose to focus on a few good trades instead of having the need to enter every time an opportunity presents itself.

Not earning money beats losing money every time. 

Tip #3 Always Check Your Order

I don't really want to admit it, but a mistake as careless as this can cost you a lot of money. Always double check your order quantity (how many stocks you are going to buy) as well as the order price. Not only that, the other figures that are crucial is the stop-loss and the take-profit price and quantity. 

If for some reason you entered the wrong quantity, there is no one else to blame except yourself. The market isn't going to give you a chance because it was a careless mistake. You will have to bear that loss. I remember making that mistake once, and it was once too many. 

Say for example, you enter a trade at $11 for 1000 shares. You want to place a stop-loss price of $10 for 1000 shares. You enter $10 as the stop-loss price but you made the mistake of entering 100 shares due to carelessness. This means that if the market moves against you, you are supposed to lose a maximum of $1000. 

But since you entered 100 shares only, you lose $100 and the remaining loss will still be in your unrealised profit. If the market continues to move against you, your loss will be significantly more than $1000 dollars. 

Not only that, you incur more commission cost because each trade you take (buy/sell), you have to pay a certain amount of money. Lets say each transaction cost a minimum of $10. The trade above should cost you $20 in total (Buy and Sell). But because you entered the wrong quantity and have to sell it again, you will incur a total of $30 (Buy, Partial Sell, Partial Sell).

So you incur not only more loss, but more commission cost. Remember to ALWAYS check your order.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Tuesday, 28 April 2015

Did You Trade AGO With Me?


Update: I have sold the other half of my position and I have a total profit of $694.60, hope you traded with me!

In one of my previous post, I mentioned a trading setup for AGO and yesterday night during the NYSE session, it finally hit my take profit of $26.63

It was an unrealised profit of $878. I have sold half my position to secure in about $440. I will be using the trailing-stop for the other half of my position.

This will be the first time I am implementing the trailing stop for equities and you can see that the most recent candle showed quite a bit of momentum. I will update you as this trade takes its place.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Wednesday, 22 April 2015

Friday, 17 April 2015

Tuesday, 14 April 2015

Why Do 90% of Traders Lose Money?

You've probably heard this phrase and because of that, you felt that the stock market is against you. There are so many books out there about investing, why is it that so many people still make losses in the long run?

In my opinion, the books out there can only teach you the technical part of trading and investing. Just like the stuff I am studying in school. Everything I learn is considered knowledge and information. But what sets you apart is how you use this knowledge and apply it to the real world situation.

Secondly, people let their emotions get the better of them. Trading has a very psychological effect on humans. Greed and fear of losses affect how we trade, but in order to make money in the stock market. We have to ignore those human instincts and stick to our individual trading plan.

Now I am not saying that if you are a emotionless trader, that guarantees profit. The market will against you and it will do it often. What you have to do is to limit those losses and in the long run, you should make a profit. Even if you don't make money in the first month, you have to keep trading according to your plan!

I say this over and over again because I feel that it is the single most important advice I have ever received.


Some people get emotionally attached to their trades. They feel that they have a need to be right and they cannot accept the fact that the market has not moved in their favour. I am guilty of this at times. Sometimes the trade setup is perfect but yet, when I enter, the market decides to go in the opposite direction leaving me stranded in disbelief. (That's why stop losses are important!)

The last reason why traders lose money is due to the fact that they believe trading is simply gambling. Making money is as simple as pressing buy and sell and hopefully they are right. If this is the mindset you adopt, I suggest you stop trading and start gambling instead, you can save the brokerage fee. 

Do not let the title affect you when you trade. Ignore this statistic and just remember to.. you guessed it. STICK TO YOUR PLAN.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Saturday, 11 April 2015

What Is My Trading Strategy?

I have received many question as to what is my trading strategy. Today, I will go through it while making sure that it is as simple to follow as possible. So without wasting any more time, here is my trading strategy.

First of all, I am looking for a reversal candle stick. More specifically, I am looking for a hammer, inverted hammer, shooting star or hanging man in the candlestick daily chart. I trade these as they seem to have the highest rate of success in my experience.

Here are some examples of how they look like.



I use screeners to look for them daily. Click here to see which screeners I recommend using. After identifying a chart with a hammer, I order 1 cent above/below the high/low of the candle (depending on whether it is a short or long trade) for the next trading day.

My stop loss will be 1 cent above/below the high/low of the candle as well.


Here's an example. The neckline will be where I enter the trade.

My take profit will be the previous high or the support/resistance.

After identifying, my entry, stop loss and take profit, I will also check the RRR ratio and see if it qualifies. Currently, I am looking for trades that are at least more than 1. If it does, I will enter the position.

This is the basic strategy I am currently using. I will post a more detailed entry about my strategy where I will discuss ATR and position sizing so stay tuned!

What are your trading strategies? I would love to hear from you!

As always, happy trading.

Cheers. 

Thursday, 9 April 2015

Losing Trade - M (NYSE)

Yesterday I highlighted a shorting opportunity for Macys (NYSE).

The markets opened and it did hit my entry price. But the market went complete opposite of what I was expecting as seen below.


Making losing trades is part of trading. There will be no magic formula to guarantee 100% winning trades. Never allow your losses to affect how you trade. Sure, I might have lost some money, but there will always be another opportunity around the corner. But I am going to stick to my trading strategy regardless; and you should too.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.

Wednesday, 8 April 2015

Which Technical Indicators To Use?

I will be straight up honest with you. I don't use much technical indicators when I am deciding on which trade to take.

When I started out, I tried to develop the ultimate strategy that would have a high success rate. I went about studying different indicators, their purpose and limitations, and which one had the most success in determining the direction of the price.

But I found myself having a chart that was ineffective in telling me any useful information. Odd isn't it? One would expect more indicators to give more information, but instead, it seems to have diminishing returns after a certain point.

Let me show you an example.


Singtel (Z74) Daily Chart 

I've included some of the more commonly used indicators such as RSI, MAC, ATR, Moving Averages, Bollinger Bands and Ichimoku Kinko Hyo. Okay, maybe the last one isn't that commonly used. I was just trying to prove a point!

I used to look at charts like the one above and the problem was that I kept getting mixed signals. I kept changing my strategy to try to fit certain indicators into my plan only to be conflicted with another indicator that was telling me otherwise. 



This is what my charts currently look like. I use 2 indicators, mainly ATR (Average True Range) and Volume. The chart is cleaner, it is easier for me to focus on the price action rather than having a whole load of information which doesn't allow me to make a decision. 

Of course, these indicators are suited for my strategy and can differ from person to person. The point here is not to use the indicators that I use, but to stick to a few and be disciplined about it.

I will write another post as to why I use specifically ATR and Volume in another post.

As always, happy trading.

Cheers.