Where Have I Been? #2

Baby boy number 2 is here. Beau Valens Klingsick.

He did come 2 months early 2/27/24, and with complications. It is currently April 13th and I am sitting here in the NICU typing this out. He is doing well and we are expecting to be out of here to bring him home by May. 

This has obviously compliacted my trading life drastically. 

I cant stop trading. Just not going to happen. So I find a way. Swing trading has still been wokring very well for me as I slowly continue working on my spreadsheets and trying to get faster, more efficient with less time spent at the desk. 

My main goal right now needs to be eliminating parts of my data recording process. 

I have a lot of things I am tracking. It takes hours. Daily. Weekends take a few hours before I can even get to the charts.

I do not have time to Day trade right now.

I barely have enough time to swing trade. And I know if I was able to put more into it, I could be better.

Main thing is tracking. Trends, industries, setups etc. I cant trade as effectively as I would like. 

I have created a Weather spreadsheet. The goal of this sheet is to get everything I need to see on to 1 page. That I can click, see what trends are happening, and know what to trade from there.

Bottom line I need to figure out, is what needs to stay, and what needs to go. What is helpful to me, what is a waste of time. 

To do this I need to go over my morning/weekly routine and type out every sheet I open, why I have it, what I record, why thats important, and why it needs to stay. If I dont have good reasons or not good enough, Its out of the process.

This way I can reduce the number of times I update these sheets, so I only have to open my Weather sheet for the quick look. I wont have to update several sheets everyday, I can reduce that to updating them once or twice a week. The Weather sheet would tell me the most important pieces to track.

Sentiment Tracker

    -Obvioulsy need to keep this. But does everything I record in it need to stay.

    -I have this to identify trends in the breadth of the market for stocks 2B mkt cap +

    -I track over 50 variables in this. Half of which I type out, other half just formulas to fill

    -I got the idea from Stockbee, he only tracks 15 variables.

    -I cant find any of mine to eliminate. They are each important. They also matter in regards to my Queries sheet which I will get to later. The point is to reduce time take to fill out and review so I need to consolidate it somehow. 

Sector/FANG Trends

    -I use this to identify when FANG is breaking trends, when the biggest 20 companies, and biggest 20 tech companies break trends

    -I do the same for the SPYders and each sector by tracking the largest 15 stocks in each.

    -The trends I am tracking are 1D 5D 10D 20D Average gains/loss %. And then W% M% Q% change. Standard Dev %Chg and Vol %Chg. The main Focus is the 1st 2 sections. 

    -This has been reduced to a copy and pasting of 1 line, I can finish this data in a minute, no adjustments needed, Clearly a keep.

Trend Tracker

    -This is where I get more detailed on what is trending.

    -For each tab in my Sentiment sheet, I track which variable is trending or not, 10days in a row I start tracking it.

    -I have been counting the days the trend has been in effect. 156 days is currently my largest. 

    -156 days or 20 days shouldnt make much of a difference to me and my trading. That is something I can eliminate is the count aspect. I can simply label if the variable is trending or not. 

    -I have a fairly good memory of being able to match these trends with how long they have been going on as well. So I have a memory in the back of my head that knows Semis have been leading trends for a long time but recently broken. 

    -I have also been keeping a log of which trends have broken and when. I dont think this is necessary. It hasnt come up in the past 5 months ive been doing this I had to go back and look. The chart of SPY or Q or the Sectors or leaders tells me enough. Just a simple yes or no does the trick here.

    - I can redesign this sheet in a more '1-line' type manner so that I can import it to my Weather sheet for an easy read.

    -I have updated this to tell me if the variable is S for short term, M and L. S for a week, M for more than a couple weeks, L for more than a month.

Queries

    -This sheet created to run backtests on SPY when certain critera are met on market breadth (90% down days, days where stocks above 20sma dropped 30%, days where ADDQ lo was 20 etc)

    -This has shown me dozens of occasions when the market is hitting extremes, we can expect continuation or pullback

    -So far I have seen when I get a lot of 70% closes green in the next D/W/M then it has led to more upside. Now that I write this mid April, I have not been getting many 70%s to log, that plus the trend tracker breaks we are now seeing that pullback.

    -This is important to keep track of but I can save myself more time by knowing where those extremes are and having a 'cheat sheet' to know that if 75% of stocks are up on the year vs 25% down that leads to thy SPY closing higher a month later. Things like that. 

    -Keeping a log doesnt need to stay. I dont see myself going back to this to review it. 

    -Keeping an eye on how many studies come true, and how many studies I have in total is what matters. The goal is to eliminate and get a snapshot of what it is showing me on my Weather sheet. 

    -My issue with this sheet is I am too zoomed out. Sure its nice to know I have several studies telling me the SPY in past history has an 85% chance to close higher in a month, it does not help me wanting to go long ENPH for a swing trade. The sheet is important but only for a quick yes/no look.

    -This sheet has shown me that 80% of the time these predictions come true. That is edge. That is edge in trading the SPY, but not much help for stocks. 

    -What matters most here

        -How many studies are open for the month ahead

        -Average %

    -Create a section that displays counts of 70%+ across all tabs

    -Import that seciton to Weather sheet

    -Import section that counts how many studies are open for the month and Whether R or G closes

    -Can also play with idea that lays out % gain, not just chances its green. 

    -Individual studies/tabs/variables do not matter as much as the whole picture. That is the point of the Weather sheet. 

Swing Trade Notes

State of the Market

Even after these reductions, It still doesnt change my selection for a trade. The above is all for gauging the weather. While it is nice to know the backtest closing percentages along side the number of trends we have in tact, that is only going to tell me its a good time for longs, no need to conern myself with hedges. Im still going to trade the individual stock.

If real estate is sucking performance wise, but I see an A+ technical setup, im going to take that trade. I will not size up on it, nor will I hold out for more profit, but that setup is still worth taking. My weather sheet will tell me if a setup in a certain industry is worth sizing up more. 

What are the most important elements in my swing trades?

The environment has changed. My B setups do not work well now. I cant get away with taking lesser breakout trades expecting them to blow up when the market is no longer performing the same way it used to. I have to restrict myself to A grade trades only for now until the maret/setup is clearly working in my favor again.

Industry performance is huge. If the stock I want to trade is an A grade but the industry sucks and isent performing well, then chances are its not going to be a great trade. On the other hand if I have a B grade setup, but its in Semis, or another strong outperforming industry, then I can get away with it. 

Tracking leaders in the industry is also important. Knowing when leaders are breaking out can be a trigger for more adds, more trades, more attention to that industry. If leaders are dumping but my stock is hanging on, yes it means rel strength but overall I should expect failure.

The grade. B setups have different tolerances than A setups. They require different leashes. One longer one shorter. An A+ grade setup deserves a pullback to breakeven. To add more. A B grade setup needs to be cut to keep a win. After all my recent loses show me I gave back too much holidng and hoping the past market trends would continue.

Goals

-Review losers

    -Where is optimal place to cut wins to keep them wins.

    -Treat B and A setups differently. Keep the win when needed. 

-New Stop System

    -Prev Day Lo as stop?