watchlist 12/28

AKAO----I’m liking this one for a r/g type move. I don’t think I’ll take it any other way. Not too used to this look right here.

CNAT---Looking for a few scenarios here. Could see a r/g here but I’m not looking forward to that. If I didn’t take the long already I should not get into it this high. I am actually looking for a further extension for a lower high short. Curious also to perhaps see an overextended gap down move to green and then a fade back down. Could go higher and keep on going but I wont be interested for the long at this stage

CRC---This one has room till well over 21. I would love to see a r/g but we may also see a push out of the open for a long (as long as it is not too close to resistance) Or we may see a gap up pull back for the entry long.

GPOR---If we break below this base I will look to get short.

X--- still waiting for the breakout

UA---I think this one still has room to go lower. Has been slowly grinding down. Could have one more strong short day

YELP---Would like to see a r/g here.

Trade of the day HIIQ

Ok so those who saw my watch list from last night saw that HIIQ was one of the stocks on the list. My idea for this was purely a short set up. If you read my blog you will see that i had a feeling it could have gone up more but I would not try to short it until it showed me a lower high. And that is exactly what it did today. Here is an annotated chart of what happened intraday

Watchlist 12/27

Hope everyone had an awesome christmas and ready for an incredible pnl positive 2017! Here is my watchlist for tomorrow Tuesday the 27th of December

X---I like this one as it has been holding support. I would like to see this have a nice push at the open and a pullback for an entry. As long as we hold this 35.50 area.

TWTR---Perhaps a day 2 push here. Either on a r/g or a straight out push at the open and pullback. Remember this is in a downtrend so it could just as well be weak at the open and go right back to its original downtrend. Just watch which way the strength is at the open.

SHLD---Call me crazy but I think we have a day 3 short here. If we gap down or show any signs of strength to the longside i will trade it long. It has got to prove me wrong though. Any G/R and we could go lower.

WSM---Notice how we are at a nice support level now after two strong days down. I am not looking for a short here at all. I am looking either for strength at the open and a push higher or a fake breakdown and higher low set up or any long set up for that matter for the long. 

PGNX---We could go higher here. Either r/g or a push at the open with a controlled pullabck for the entry. Could see a new move higher

ACAD---Tricky one here but I want to see what happens. Strong move on Friday but we have the ma200 right above. I don't want to buy into it but if we see a red move at the open I would like to see a r/g type play here

HIIQ---Last pick for tomorrow 3 days up already so I am not longing this anymore however it could very well go higher but after so many days up we need some sort of a pullback soon. Looking for a push higher and short on the lower highs. If you want to be safer wait for the break of the trend and get in on the new downtrend. 

Watchlist 12/22

Here is my watch list and plans for tomorrow 12/22

GME---This one has been slowly inching up and is at its third attempt to break out. Even though we have had a few days up already I believe there is a chance we break out tomorrow. If not tomorrow then perhaps on Friday. R/G scenario is good here. We may also see some sort of a push out of the open and pullback. Just be careful getting in too close to the resistance area. Just my two cents

X---This is one that along with other steel companies has been having some nice moves lately. We have been seeing a nice base forming from the intraday chart. I believe we can see a r/g type move respecting the support levels. Maybe a push out of the open followed by an opportunity to get in. Be patient if the move doesnt happen right away. We may also see a base formed and a move sideways for a while until the later afternoon move.

CXW---I believe we see a nice short here. Its got that nice rounding down look. It has the potential to go quite a bit lower. Looking for a g/r type play. Slight gap down and pullback is also  a possibility

RLGY---Could have another breakout day here of this mini flat top. Over 27.30, pretty straight forward move here

TWLO---Looking for a r/g play here. Just be careful with the ma50 above. If this gaps up too much I may look for a short off a lower high 

LABD---Some resistance above to be careful not to get in too close to that level. However , if a r/g is seen the play may be a nice one. If not wait for a break of the resistance area. We may also gap up slightly and pullback for a long set up later on

Upper wick into resistance or overextended set up

So It's been a while since I have spoken about set ups in particular. That is because i am still developing as a trader and learning set ups as the days go on. My job as a trader is to be an expert at pattern recognition. It is of extreme importance if you are a discretionary trader such as myself, to be able to stare at as many charts as possible and ask yourself what happens if so and so happens. If you see a pattern repeated over and over you've got it! Add it to your file and whenever that same set up happens again you now have a plan. That is what it takes to be a successful trader. Most traders fail in my opinion because they simply don't have the desire or passion to look at the amount of charts it requires to actually ingrain those patterns into your mind. I personally could not envision as better way to spend my weekends :)

Today I am going to talk about the move into resistance after various up days. This could also be an extended move. The key here is that the stock has had many green days and the last day ended with a big upper wick. Meaning there was selling into the close. The examples I will show today are WTI and SGY. Here is a look at the dailies for the two as of today 1:30pm

So notice how yesterday WTI closed with a high upper wick. It started off the day strong but after the lower highs the short signal was given,.If you didnt get in yesterday based on my watch list you had the chance to get in today and I will tell you how. SGY on the other hand was also overextended but it ran into an area of resistance as you can clearly see on the chart.  I will also show you how to trade this chart , which happens to be exactly the same set up as WTI. 

Lets say its the night before so in this case, 12/20/16 you are scanning and you see two great stocks with big upper wick closes which look to be overextended. What do you say to yourself? How do you plan your trade for the next day. First off you know the next day is going to be a short play. Of course nothing is guaranteed but why would you plan for a long. The goal here is to get into the short play as close as you can to the resistance area, So lets say SGY had gapped up this morning over 12 and showed weakness right away. You;d be in RIGHT away because it was close to resistance. Unfortunately that did not happen. What you saw was a flat open and a push higher. Remember the overall set up is NOT a long so that means even if you see a long set up you do not get in. Another important point to mention here is do not simply short at a pop too far away from the resistance area. Wait for the obvious short set up ( if it doesnt reach the resistance zone ). In this case we never reached the resistance zone but when you begin to see lower highs and a crack of a base you know its time to hit that short. If you didnt quite get it there you had another chance once a bear flag formed and cracked. Here is a look at the intraday chart with some annotations.

What about WTI? Well as you can see it was very similar. The only difference here is that there was no big time resistance. What you had here was an obvious overextended chart with a top formed yesterday which would be used as the resistance.  This one didnt even come close to its resistance but as we did on SGY the lower highs could be used as an entry short signal since probability was on your side. No reason to short too quickly out of the gate but once that lower high started to fade off that was your sign of weakness. It worked all day! 

Watchlist Review 12/20

So let's chat about the action of last nights watchlist. As always I will talk about how I could have written my watch list better because this is a big part of how I learn. Hope you guys are enjoying these posts.

MOMO---I had a few scenarios for this stock. The green to red scenario came to play here but wasnt quite the strong move of the day. The ma200 is what I will focus on more next time. Not simply the ma200 itself but levels of potential strong support. What we saw here today was somewhat of a fake breakdown on the g/r move followed by a powerful push higher that signaled we were in for a reversal. You could very well have waited for this reversal and gotten in long at the pullback before the continuation move in the direction of the new trend. So what could I have done better? Account for the fact that the ma200 was sitting right there and that it could be used as a support. Many times reversals will occur after a fake breakdown of a support level , this was the case here. Take a look at the intraday chart.

TRIP--- this was one that I had for a short but as you can see the gap up and extreme push out of the gate was enough to show I was wrong and that this was going to be a reversal day. A long entry was given at the flag on the 1min.

WTI--- now here was the big one today. As I said in my watch list blog last night this one could keep on going out of the gate, wait for the lower high situation for the short. And this is EXACTLY what happened. That is why it is so important to have your plan written out. 

TSEM---Not much happening here today. In the long run just a consolidation play here. Not much bias to either side. 

PIR---Another good trader today from the list last night. If you had a buy stop in you couldve gotten in pretty early but there were a few other entry options to get in. Not the best flags to get in but still worth the risk 

ATW---This was one more great pick from yesterdays list. Strong push here in the morning and an opportunity to get in on the sideways consolidation we saw right after 10am

GME---This one was a little tricky to trade because it pushed up at the open but then pulled back. This pullback could have been used to enter some more long as it never pulled back below the low of today. After that we made some higher lows and grinded up for the rest of the day. Not really a great trader

Watch list 12/20

Here are the new names I am watching for tomorrow

MOMO---I believe that with this one we see another down day. My scenarios here are as follows. If we see a slight gap down we can set up an orb play. If we gap down slightly we may also pullback some and cover the gap before the move lower. A g/r scenario is also possible. I will not prepare myself for any long scenarios today unless I see a ton of strength at the open which I doubt

TRIP---Support is seen at around 46. I would like to see a G/R move here. If we push down past 46 that may also be a good short set up. I will not go short in this heading into 46 though. Maybe a tad risky. As always , watch for the price action at 46.

WTI---This is one that is getting quite extended now. I’m not sure its ready to be a short just yet, may have one more push to short on a lower high. I just know  I will not long is at this point! So just wait for the short set up.

TSEM---This is one that could have some more upside potential here. R/G could be the set up here.

PIR---r/g look here or a push higher through 9.14 for the long set up.

ATW---We have a clear area of support here. Flagging looking to push higher through 14. Either on a r/g set up or push out of the open and flag for the long

GME---liking this one for a long on a r/g set up, we could also see a gap up and pullback for the long. I am not looking to short anything here. Too soon  

Watchlist review 12/19

Good evening everyone! This is my second watchlist review. This review will be done on the stocks I had on my list for today Monday the 19th of December 

MOMO---I had a couple different scenarios for this stock. I had mentioned that the ma200 was not too far down below and that we needed to watch it carefully. My main idea was for a second day continuation long if we showed some strength in the morning. However as you can see intraday right away weakness is strong. There is no entry opportunity since the move is fast and down to support near the ma200. From this spot you could even take a long trade if you so wished. However remember the strong downtrend the stock was originally in. As you can see it eventually tops out at prior support from Friday , now resistance and a great short ( farther away from the ma200) can be taken. OUt of my plan I do like that I incorporated both a long and short situation. I just think I should have put some extra weight on the short play since the long candle on Friday was not extremely bullish. I may have been too focused on longing at the ma200 over the bigger play with trend once the long got faded. Here is a look at the intraday action 

AKAO---Ok this one was tricky. I had placed more weight on a short play since it seemed to be a pump and dump on its way down. And there was a short play in there, eventually , but not in the way I expected. AKAO was sitting at support and for a short play to occur I would have liked to see either a break of this support or a g/r style move that began away from support. My idea for a long was if we held support and set up long which is exactly what happened. On this one as the last name I liked that I had both scenarios accounted for short and long. I also wish I had placed a bit more emphasis on a potential long scenario since we were at a strong support. Here is an intraday snap shot of the action 

M---Here is one I got wrong.My idea here was for a long set up. I had no plans whatsoever for a short play since I saw we were at support levels. We saw an attempted weak move at the open to go higher that was getting faded over and over until eventually a crack to lower lows was seen. I liked being disciplined on this one and not getting in simply because it looked weak but maybe next time I should account for a potential g/r type move since even though it had a big candle on Friday it was not extremely over extended and it was a day 1 type move. All in all though a good and safe move not to get in. 

FSLR---Actually quite similar to M but in reverse. There was a strong resistance above the ma50 , If the move had been r/g but red from farther away ( more space to the ma50) it could have been a good long. However this open was too close for comfort to me. It was not a short in my eyes because it wasnt extended, it just happened to be sandwiched between not being too extended and the ma50 so better not to take a trade here at all. As you can see though if you took a long once it was further away from the ma50 and had made higher lows you could have had some nice gains ( going with the trend) I do not have any comments here as I liked my discipline not to do anything here. Although a long trade farther way from the open would have been nice!

PAY---Here is one that did not amount to much. If I were the flash I could have hit it right at the open once it broke the consolidation range but I wasnt fast enough.. It did begin to flag after the initial run but that flag was too far away from any support and was not big enough to make me feel safe entering for a long. Faded for the rest of the day , so no trade here for me. 

WUBA---Here was a tricky one that ended up doing what I wanted it to do but without me in it. My idea here was for a short once it went under the support area it had formed under 30.15 or so I believe. It moved nicely down to that zone but then shot up looking like a long set up was now in play. ONly to turn around and fade away for the rest of the day. In a situation like this it is very important to know where the levels are and what has to be broken to set up a short play. In WUBA  the true break of the support was around 30.14. So after the break you wait for a pullback and then you get in. Even if the pullback happens to be bigger than usual as it was in this case. Just little things to notice. 

Watchlist 12/18

Here is my watch list for tomorrow Monday the 18th

MOMO---On Friday the idea was a test of around the ma200 area and a push higher from there. Tomorrow I believe we see a continued push higher perhaps one more day of a flag. I am looking for a r/g type play or even a slight gap up and push. If weakness is shown right at open area we may have to scrap this long as it may go back with the bigger short trend.

AKAO---This is one that is behaving exactly how I would like it too. For tomorrow we have a couple potential scenarios most involving shorts. First scenario is a gap down and hold below 13 for the short and eventual death of this stock. A green to red scenario is also a possibility ( if it is too close to support at 13 wait for the break down of 13 before getting in. Only long scenario I have is if 13 area holds and strength is shown .

M---This is one that could be ready to bounce. It is sitting at the ma200 right now after a big move lower. I would like to see a show of strength at the open. The idea for me here is NOT to short. If we get a g/r type look I will not get in until a long set up shows up. 

FSLR---Looking for a r/g type look here. Just be careful with the ma50 right above. 

PAY---This is one of my favs for tomorrow if market shows strength. A move over 18.50 either on a r/g or a push right at the open. A gap up if not too large is also acceptable.

WUBA---A lot of things can happen here but I do expect a short below the base that has formed here. Weakness if clearly in the air and I believe this is the day we break either on a g/r move or a push lower at the open under 30