In this blog post, I'm going to talk about a few recent trades, why I took them, how they turned out, and some reflections as a result.

Before I start, I want to reiterate a few key points about myself as a trader as I currently understand (applies to my July+ trades, as that's when I started to develop):
- I am quick to get out of a trade as soon as I see something I don't like.
- I am content with small gains, and not looking for home runs or nice sized wins at my stage.
- I am not trading for the sake of making money, but rather to become a better trade, and learn how to take better trades.
- I am currently uncomfortable shorting, touching dumpster Greek shipping stocks, and anything that trades on the OTC, so that reduces my surface space a bit in relation to Tim's material, so that's why I look to expand my views on the long side of things.

For better or for worse, that's me currently. Now on to my trades.

[AMD]

AMD earnings were 7/25, after hours. The reaction was great, and the stock jumped almost $2 in premarket. The next day, 7/26, was filled with a lot of hype, shorts getting squeezed, and some profit taking. I did not like the stock in the $15 range; I want to be selling it at the $15 range. The next day, 7/27, there was quite a sell off back down under $14, touching around $13.70, before recovering in the low $14s. I did not like the stock in the $14 range; I want to be selling it at the $14 range. 7/28 was a Friday, and there was another morning dip to around the $13.70 area, but the stock bounced back up over $14, and headed into the weekend with mediocre performance.

At this point, I was thinking the performance was related to profit taking, perhaps some new shorts trying to get lost money back, and just reality setting in that the stock moved up way too fast, and was correcting. My first trade on $AMD was Monday, 7/31. $AMD usually has morning dips, so I would never buy the open. I decided instead to wait and see, expecting some weakness and end of month selling.

I set my risk level at $13.70, which I felt was a key level. I would want to buy close to it, but only on strength away from it if it got near it, so that's what happened and how I executed my first trade. I don't expect large caps to behave any specific way with all the algo trading and stuff going on, so I was willing to have some patience. I saw another small dip and bounce off the area where I bought, which I thought was still fine, because it's like a big ship, and needs a bit of momentum to really get moving. Then, i saw the same thing happen again, so I added, feeling confident since my risk level was still not being touched, this channel action was 'ok'.

About 45m after I added, the stock seemed to be trending back up as expected, it got closer to the area where I had bought, but I was not going to add again. I've added on two places where I thought I would be in a good position if it broke out and moved towards $14, so I felt it's best to make sure things are going to go as I expect.

There was another rejection $13.84, and while you can't see level 2 action based on candlestick charts, it was pretty scary. I had been watching this stock for over an hour, and it seemed like people were trying to keep it down the entire time. I would see a massive 1.1K ask pop up on Level 2 and stay in place and not fill based on time and sales, then the price would push back down and it went away.

Upon seeing the trading action taking place, and how essentially 4 tops were at the level I bought now, I got out right away for a small loss, most of which came from commissions. Here's a chart I posted in my trade comments.

I got out because I knew my expectations were wrong, I had given it enough time to prove to me I was on the right track, and I was not going to take a larger than necessary loss holding out hope that I would be right.

As it turned out, it was a wise decision. Here is what happened shortly after and then for the rest of the day.

I was right about $13.70 being a key level to pay attention to, but my bias was wrong. Things could have gone the other way of course, and the stock went back towards $14 rather than breaking down, and I would have been more happy I was right, but that's not what happened.

Once that broke down happened, then $13.70 was the new resistance, which meant I have to formulate a new long plan. As I've blogged about before, I will wait for the entirety of downside until it looks clearly over to me, even if I do end up missing a bounce. So, that's what I did. The dip down towards $13.46 was particularly worrying, because if that went, next stop is most likely $13.

However, I did not take a trade using that as my risk, and buying the strength off it. Main reason was I just had 2 failed trades earlier that day with the same pattern, why would I think it would work now when the stock is down so much more? I decided no trades until towards the close, and that was that.

Near the market end, I got in 500 shares at $13.62, with the intent to be more willing to risk down 10c, towards that $13.46 line. I want some padding between my entry and my escape, so if I really mess up, I don't set myself up for a major loss, even though there's no much worry of that on a large cap like $AMD with my share size.

I took the trade overnight, with larger size, because I just felt I wasn't wrong with my line of thinking in that the stock is selling off a bit more than perhaps it should after earnings. The market will do whatever it wants, but I thought there would be some recovery today and perhaps a slow grind back up towards $14.

I woke up for near the end of premarket action this morning. I missed the dip back down to where I bought at 8am est. That's what kept me from selling into that, although I most likely would have given it a chance since it is premarket after all. Hard to say, but it didn't happen so not going to think about it too hard.

Near the market open, the stock started to get back into that $13.70 level. I decided I'd give it a chance to breakout and show some strength, as otherwise I'm not holding for the morning dip this stock usually has. As soon as it started looking like it wasn't going to breakout, and the ASK was stacking, I sold.

I wanted to get back in today to continue my thesis, but there was no solid opportunities I saw. Here's my chart

Now, I liked the stock at $13.60. I liked the stock at $13.80. However, $13.70 needed to establish itself as support again if I were to execute my original plan, so I watched and waited. There was a nice spike off my $13.46 line at the open, but I'm not buying that because if it doesn't hold, and panic sets in, its off to the races towards $13.

As the stock was moving back up to where I bought it yesterday, I was not going to buy into a rejection of $13.70 again, so I had no plays. Even though the $13.85 area was hit again, that's heavy resistance, and the chart clearly shows what was going on.

I wasn't looking to buy at $13.65 because I just didn't know if it'd hold, and if $13.70 would reverse. It was a highly undecided line for the entire day. Because of this, no trades on $AMD and I was not going to hold overnight, because of the $AAPL earnings, and the potential risk of a negative reaction.

It seems the $AAPL earnings reaction was awesome, and as a result $AMD is up nicely after hours, but that was a gamble, and I'm not looking to gamble. I don't think I'll take any trades now on it, but more because I tried my experiment, was wrong, didn't cost much, but I just don't see myself becoming successful with large cap trading. Pennystocks feel so much more predictable now, and I don't know how much I'll benefit trying to study large caps, even though there's a lot of overlap.

That's not to say I'd not want to hold $AMD from the 13s and sell into the 14s or 15s, but not from a pure trading perspective.

[MTBC]

I've been watching MTBC since early May. I was a super noobie then, so I passed up on a lot of trading opportunities because I didn't understand at the time that you have to treat theses stocks as simply the means to extract money from the market, and that's it. I had done a ton of research into the company at the time, had an idea of how things would play out, and they did play out exactly as I thought, but, I didn't take advantage of that.

With earnings a day away now, I wanted to focus on correcting some past mistakes, and decided to take an experimental trade on $MTBC today in anticipation of an pre-earnings runup. I wasn't expecting much, maybe 10c-20c upside, but I was willing to take a 2k share position because I felt confident in my line of thinking, as with $WKHS, and even if I was wrong, I should have limited downside risk, and still profit if the trade failed.

So, here's my trade chart of what happened.

Now the biggest question is, how did I mess this up? I was not looking to sell so soon, for such little profits. The profits don't matter, it's the trade setup that I feel I can justify taking that matters to me.

I was confident in my reasoning for taking the trade, but not confident enough to sit through some level 2 action that ultimately got me out of the trade when I had a chance. To be specific, this is what I saw.

Mind you, this is after I sold into $1.38, since there was a bid large enough to take my order. Checking the full book, there were a bit more orders stacked up above.

I felt with such an experimental trade based on missed opportunities of the past, specifically, this stock ran up a bit in anticipation of earnings, already had a PR pumping earnings, just like before, but this time around, there was no stock reaction when it was released. I was going to play a delayed reaction going into earnings, but due to the way my $AMD trade turned out, I lost sight of the risk I was really willing to take.

Instead, I protected myself from unnecessary losses, took the small gains since I felt I was a bit early and could possibly get back in later, and was content with the trade.

Shortly after, I realized I missed the move I wanted to hit, but I didn't jump back in. I felt like I would be chasing, and that I had my chance to nail a trade, got out safely with small profits, and I don't want to give them back. I really do not want to give back profits to the market on follow up trades that I don't have a solid plan for.

The plan I was wanting to execute changed as soon as the level 2 action seemed to go against me. Once it was over, I was worried about all the other sellers that were coming out of nowhere on the way up, but apparently the stock had enough buyers to keep pushing it higher and higher. Once it got over $1.40 and showed signs of congestion, I just sat out of it, feeling I missed my opportunity and any trades I take now would just be FOMO trades.

That's why I wrote I don't truly regret the trade, as I was sticking to my core, and protecting myself from unnecessary losses when something happened that I didn't like. Unfortunately, had I been more willing to accept my desired risk, or be willing to give back profits for my intended move after things settled down, I would have been on the right side of hitting a really nice trade.

So, that trade hurts, but I feel like I was on the right track with my line of thinking of when I bought, why I bought, and why I sold, even though it worked against me. In any case, I wanted to write what happened, and how I missed my opportunity, but with that said, it feels good to see these opportunities right in front of you sometimes, and with enough experience and studying, one day I think I'll be able to reach out and grab them.

I already know I've got a lot of work to do and a lot more studying, but I feel like I'm heading in the right direction at least.