Clear Trades

Bought 270 shares of the FAS (FINANCIAL BULL 3X) at 4.90 per share.

Buy, FAS

I sold my full position in the Financial Select Sector ETF (XLF) . I realized this ETF moves almost exactly like the UYG, which I have a much larger position in. I still think we are reaching a bottom in the Financials, so I thought I could benefit more from that rebound by moving this money to the FAS (FINANCIAL BULL 3X) ETF.

Realized a loss of -$392.02, for a return of -20.56%.

Sell, XLF

I bought 500 shares of Citigroup (C) this morning, purely as a speculation of course. I didn’t read the news as being quite so bad as the stock seemed to show with its reaction, but I’ll be keeping a tight stop on this as I certainly can’t say I have much hope in a company like Citigroup.

Buy, C

As I wrote in my previous post (Bought 300 Shares of BAC at 5.60), I set a stop loss order on my BAC shares at 5.32.

Unfortunately, this trade didn’t work out for me and I was stopped out around 2:55, at 5.32 per share (see the red arrow on the chart). This stop saved me from the low of the day (5.11), and also happened to be the price that BAC closed at.

Perhaps my stop was a bit too tight, though I didn’t really think it was at the time I set it.

One problem I have to figure out how to deal with is the small size of my account and the difficulty of making trades that don’t risk more than 2% of my total capital. I’m probably going to have to trade even smaller numbers of shares in order to allow for a little more downside risk. Of course, BAC has been highly volatile so it may not be the right stock for me to learn how to trade anyway. I’ll review some charts tonight and see if I find anything I’m interested in buying tomorrow. If not, I’m happy to let my UYG position ride for a little while longer. I still think that is due for a nice recovery.

Realized a loss of $98.02, for a return of -5.81%.

BAC, Losses, Sell

I bought 300 shares of Bank of America (BAC) at 5.60 per share this morning.

I set a stop loss order at 5.32. The reason for this stop loss is to limit my potential loss to 2% of my trading capital.

I don’t have a clear plan for when to sell, which is a problem, but I’ll probably begin looking to sell at 5.80 and/or simply continue to raise my stop order if the chart continues to look positive today.

Below is today’s chart up to the point that I entered my trade (the green arrow at 11:44 AM). You can see this doesn’t look like a very positive time to buy, but I expected some support around 5.60.

Below is a 5 day, 15 minute chart of BAC. Again, note the green arrow as the point I entered this trade. I was looking for the pullback to the moving average and expecting the trend to continue up. Obviously, I’m not a technical analyst, but I’m learning and these are my basic thoughts as of now. Of course, I also have in mind the general positive trend for financials this week and even more so today.

BAC, Buy

I got scared and got out of my BAC trade much too quickly.

I actually got a margin maintenance call after I bought this. Apparently I wasn’t paying close enough attention to my ‘buying power’ and over extended myself. I could have held on for more gains of course, but I really just wanted to get out with a small profit while I could and avoid having to add more cash to my account to cover the margin.

Realized a gain of $27.59, for a return of 1.69%.

BAC, Gains, Sell

This was a quick buy that I made while watching the Bernanke hearing on CNBC. The bank stress test sounded a lot less ominous than I believe was previously thought. That made me think BAC would be good for a quick trade.

BAC, Buy

My Weekly Realized Returns Report is a way for me to check my progress and see how I’m doing in terms of real dollars. After all, those are the ones that count!

For the week of Feb 16 – 20 I had a total realized loss of -$1,103.56. This loss was a result of me cutting my losers and moving my money to what I think will provide me a better chance to earn this money back.

This brings my all-time (since January 28, 2009) realized return to -$850.92.

For purposes of this report, realized means the actual net dollars of closed positions, after commissions have been subtracted

Weekly Report

After realizing lots of losses, this is my hope for salvation. At 2.01 per share this just looks too cheap too me and I think we are closer to getting good news in the Financial sector than we are more bad news.

This purchase gives me a total of 2,350 shares of UYG at an average price per share of 2.30.

Buy, UYG

Cutting more losers…I was completely wrong when I bought this one. I paid 6.57 per share.

Realized a loss of -$177.51, for a return of -17.89%.

BCS, Losses, Sell