Monday’s have never been my favorite trading day, really until this year. Maybe it’s because John always told me he never traded on Mondays — I’m not sure. But, yesterday went swimmingly.
With a combo of my stacked trades, I’m currently up over 2k between my two options accounts, with BYND, MSFT, TWLO, ZTS making up most of those profits.
Here’s how I’m managing that, and how I want to present that opportunity to you…
I usually keep around 15-25k in these two accounts, depending on what expenses I have that month, vacations I want to go on, private school I have to pay for, etc. Then I keep the rest of my cash in my long term savings, stock accounts, and retirement.
The smaller account I’ll usually trade with about 5k cash total and the larger account’s a full cash account. Why 5k? I don’t know, I like the challenge. The larger account’s obviously for larger position size.
I suppose I could just use one account, but I tried this out this year so I could have larger positions in one, then smaller in the other.
Either way, I like to keep cash on hand in long-term accounts, so that I can feel free to stack ‘em up in my options accounts, while letting my Phoenix and Five Star strategies work for me on the long term in my stock accounts.
That also allows me to be a little more aggressive in my options accounts.
By funneling money out, and putting it into longer term savings, I have a higher amount of confidence in trading my options account in a more aggressive basis.
My next goal to start funneling money into real estate (like John has taught me, but more on that later).
Now here are my current positions…
As for the positions, you can see that the majority are working for me, and a few aren’t.
But, this is the glory in the risk/reward that we discussed in last week’s webinar. If you need a refresher, or missed it, you can watch the replay for that webinar here.
Yes, you will have losers.
I have them, that’s why we have risk control.
For me, ROKU, ZS, CSX, and PYPL are nominal, but they haven’t really gotten started — yet.
My gains are mainly coming from ZTS, ZS coming back yesterday, BYND, MSFT, and TWLO.
- MSFT was a smaller position size, since it was an earnings trade, but I already took off half for a double and I’m holding the second half.
- TWLO, I started to scale out, since I had 3 contracts, but I’m letting the rest ride.
- BYND is a short squeeze that I’m waiting for.
- So is ZS.
For these to REALLY come through, they need to breach through the previous high on the day.
A look into my two accounts I talked about above:
Account One:
Account Two:
Now don’t forget to be wary of the ‘High Five Trade’.
I try not to brag, as I don’t want the ‘High Five Trade,’ to get me. But I feel like it’s a good example of making your money work for you. Traders always ask about risk allocation, account size, losers vs winners, etc.
So I decided to include this today.
What’s the ‘High Five Trade’?
This is when you congratulate yourself on your profits, and the market immediately takes a turn for the worst.
This is why I pretty much always avoid sharing this type of information, but after my recent webinar, I’ve been getting a lot of questions so I wanted to share it with the Five Star Community!
Looking Forward: Upcoming Macro Events
When you look at the overall market condition, we have a situation in which the market’s going to be largely driven by earnings — and, the upcoming Fed meeting in 10 days. Now, traders are largely expecting a rate cut. Which, is bullish for the stock market. Of course, there’s always a possibility that won’t come through, and if it doesn’t… I expect volatility.
However, this isn’t for 10 more days. The most immediate catalyst we have is earnings season.
After Netflix’s surprise drop, it’s a dark, foreshadowing for the MAAFANG stocks (Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Adobe, Netflix, and Google), that certainly casts a shadow on the market. However, last Thursday, Microsoft again showed us who’s boss — and injected more faith back into the market.
Microsoft’s a leader — and, it’s continuing to lead — higher.
This week, we have many key names that’ll be in focus, including PYPL, FB, and AMZN. I’m looking for these companies to meet their EPS and revenue estimates, as well as post forward guidance. Guidance is always important, because it tells us if we can expect the current numbers to continue… or not.
P.S. if you missed my recent webinar, no worries — I’m having a second one tomorrow. Here’s the link to sign up!
