You can spend hours maybe even days preparing a watchlist and sometimes maybe those same hours or days waiting for one of them to give up your signal for entry. It's tough when you see other people commenting in the chat room about something that is moving and it's not on your list. You chart that ticker and try to determine what is going on before that run is over and you jump in because the volume is pouring in. You end up buying near the morning spike top and end up taking a loss because price is correcting quick. 10 minutes later or so that ticker that you found puts in a great move and you don't take it because your too put off about that losing trade that you know you should not have taken. What's worse is that 'your' ticker trends all day and ends up being the most chatted ticker of the day.

It's a bitter pill to swallow because that was 'your' ticker and everyone else is making bank from it, but not you. I have found that when I look at the daily chart to look for those stocks that are trending well, or even better, look like they are beginning to trend and make a note of them, more often than not either the next day or the next few days that stock will put in a large percentage move during the day but I rarely see it happen because there is always that one ticker or two that rules the week and your data-mining homework has taken a back seat to the hot mover. 

So, is it a question of adapt or die or wait patiently for your homework to pay off? This is a tough question to answer because if you want to do this for a living you really would like to get paid every day. It can be a lot of pressure to wait a day or two before you make a trade when you have bills to pay. And, a bankable trade at that. I don't trade for a living but my guess is that if you do the pressure can be pretty intense because of this. Now, if you have a 7 figure trading account and you know how to live within your means and actually have a financial budget the pressure may not be as intense but it is there nonetheless because again, you trade to get paid.

I usually have 6 small charts for the tickers that I think might move during the day along with a few more in a watchlist and one large chart for the one that I think will actually do something. I pick these up from pre-market scans or runners from the day(s) before. Usually a few of them spike but it's not a matter of just jumping in right there. You have to determine if you think the spike will continue enough for you to take a position or wait for a pullback then a dip buy later. When I first started trading penny stocks here about a year and a half ago I thought that I had to buy a morning spike somewhere because I am going to miss that big move. After learning the hard way that this is not the correct way to go about doing things it's now a matter of waiting and watching. It feels good to say that sometimes that first trade is 20 or 30 minutes after the open because I simply did not like what I saw at the open. Yes, missed a few big moves and still will but it doesn't bother me any more because I know there will be another opportunity soon.

That morning open can be very chaotic, that's what the DVD's are for; to recognize the pattern or reasonings for the move and why you should or should not get in. I'd rather wait for my signal outside of that morning spike because it is more of a controlled or recognizeable area for me to trade. I'll still trade the spike if I like what I see but I don't mind sitting on my hands either if I'm not sure about things.

So how do you deal with the waiting? Well, if you have ever noticed in some of Tim's videos sometimes you will see a little yellow icon at the bottom of the screen that says Alerts in the ETrade Pro platform. I noticed that it had the number 300 also. Yes, 300. That tells me that he has, now I might be totally off on this, 300 alerts set for most likely support and resistance areas for the stocks in his watchlist(s). Some of these are probably a mix of short and long term plays but the point is..300 alerts. Maybe not 300 stocks but a hell of a lot of them either way.

It's so important to be prepared for an opportunity and to do the due diligence to build that list and note the charts. 300 stocks...if you think about it, more than one of those will present an opportunity during the trading day. I think of a trade as an opportunity. I still trade too often, when I have the time and I actually do just as well when I'm too busy and have limited screen time...still working on finding that balance...that trading zen.

Anyway, I don't think we really need to adapt or die when trading. If we are prepared and have done our homework we should do just fine. It's hard to not trade every day, and you really don't have to but it's hard to pass on an opportunity. I'm still only going to look at a handful of charts towards the open but I do plan on expanding my watchlist and setting those alerts so I can be prepared for the next opportunity.

Have a safe weekend.

Palmer

The Penny Stock Quest