Swing and Position Trading

techst

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Hello fellow traders, I'm just on the look out for some fellow swing and position traders who use these boards. Hoping to start a lively thread where we can exchange ideas and views on US and UK stocks to swing trade. My trades normaly last a few weeks and i concentrate on just UK stocks at the moment. Im a big fan of Elders work on trading and have been following the market day by day for about 2 years now. After surviving my first year of trading, and by survive i mean i still have capital left to trade with! I'm looking to progress and one thing thats holding me back is probably timing as sometimes my losses are bigger than my winners. Prehaps i could post a chart of a stock up and we could all exchange views on it and then see how it pans out and hopefully we'll learn along the way. If anyones interested then just reply, thanks for your time.
 
Hi there techst@ - I also ''position'' trade but mainly stick to anything other than shares.

I am a very big fan of Alex Elder. Not so much his precise set-ups but the common sense way in which he approaches trading especially from a mind-set and money management pov.

Also Linda Bradford Raschke and her book Streetsmarts has been a big influence.

I bought Marc Rivallands book and thought it was very well written but for some reason I couldn't get on with his style of trading.

I agree that swing/position type trading gets far too little attention on these boards. Surely most of us aren't able to sit in front of a monitor day trading?? Not sure I'd want to really.

What sort of set-ups do you look for?

Cheers F
 
Hi techst@,

I would be interested in following a thread like this. I'm trading the DOW, capturing swings across a few time frames and it would be useful to broaden knowledge across individual stocks, US/UK or both. Looking forward to the discussion...do you have a favourite UK stock?
 
ChowClown - I'd be interested to know whether you have any opinion about cj12's Dow swing trading system published on another thread late last week? Did you see it? I'd attach a link but am not sure how.

Cheers
 
I'm interested too! Unlike fastnet I get on alright with a Rivalland type approach using UK stocks and ftse index.
 
I did, fastnet. I was interested because I've been trading "123 reversals" through FX (Cable and EUR/USD) for a while and cj12s' system looks similar and has useful entry/exit conditions. I tend to use macd divergence for exits, so it will be interesting to couple them up to see if this can improve exits.

If Fridays' low holds (daily chart) then I see a DOW 123 long with a target of 10329. But the 123 short (from the Sept 7th high) gives a target of 9885 :eek: I tend to use on-balance-volume as a filter, along with slow stoch (39,1,1), for longer term plays. OBV(30) broke through the signal line on friday for the first time since this latest leg down from the Sept highs. Slow stoch has now crossed below 50....this is usually a good indication of a southerly longer term move.

fastnet said:
ChowClown - I'd be interested to know whether you have any opinion about cj12's Dow swing trading system published on another thread late last week? Did you see it? I'd attach a link but am not sure how.

Cheers
 
Thanks guys! lets get started. Setup up wise i look for trending stocks check their weekly long term position and then daily, i dont really have definition of what im looking for but i know when i see an oppurtunity. Im just looking for value areas when i enter. I make sure theres enough room for me to trade so I'm normally attracted to stocks that have a 10% + swing in their price.
As for favorite stocks TSCO hasn't let me down yet, touch wood. And HG has a really nice tradeable trend (see attach.) What do you guys think of these two stocks BLND and HG?
 

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Classic Elder. . . . love it.

Removes a lot of the stress if you know exactly what you are looking for in order to trade. Good luck. I don't trade stocks simply because I have never found an efficient way of doing it and also found plenty of decent set-up on FX, metals, indexs etc with smaller spreads. These both look ripe for a safe entry.

ChowClown - a lot to think about there, thanks. I will and let you know.
 
techst

ok - first hg.

Trend changed to up after moving above the high of the earlier swing high bar. The first swing low was iffy because it was lower low so I ignored. The second swing low (continuation) looked ok so I entered long @ 270. The third swing low came a bit early for my taste and is now being tested (not yet closed below it) so things look doubtful. I have a b/e stop in which has not been triggered yet.
 

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HG isn't one that i would be looking to trade at the moment. But it's a great example of stock that's got good movement to trade. The swings are clearly visible and that's why its one of my favorites. The blue EMA on my chart shows the value areas i like to trade near. I'm not sure how long this trend will continue, but i'm sure there will be others that will turn up when this one regresses and takes a rest.
 
.....and then blnd

not in this one at the moment. It did well during its rise from around 400 level, although there were a few nervous moments and a few false stop outs on the way. It gave a repeat buy signal on Friday at 732 (my filter rules denied it) and if you got that today you'd be in the money by a few bob.

techst

do you have stable of likelies or do a full scan for set ups every week (or whatever)?

good trading

jon
 

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barjon

Some questions if I may

1 What is the black line on your chart ?

2 What is the significance of the dotted blue line ?

3 Are these daily charts ?

4 Did you go long at 690 in mid-August after it moved up from support ( hindsight on my part )

Regards

bracke
 
bracke

1. 15day sma (one of the filters - pinched from Rivalland)
2. dotted blue line not significant - just to prompt me that only one more lower low bar was needed for a
possible swing low - which didn't arise)
3. yes - daily chart
4. not in my stable at the time - the buy signal was a close above the high of the first swing low bar (the
reddish one that the blue line sprouts from) at around 701 you can see you might have got stopped out
intraday later on (the grey bar that dipped below the line) if you'd set your stop too close.

regards

jon
 
barjon

Thanks for the reply.

Another question...... How do you find you likely targets and do you stay with ftse 100 companies or look at ftse 250 companies. I know that mully used to consider that the ftse 250 offered better opportunities.

Regards

bracke
 
bracke

Use mainly ftse 100. No set method of selection just a visual scan each week paying particular attention to those near major support/resistance levels . I look for those who travel smoothly (not that they will do so in the future just because they have in the past) eg: avz was particular good both on the way up and on the way down before it got a bit volatile due to the fine it incurred. gsk has been good recently.

jon
 
barjon said:
bracke

Use mainly ftse 100. No set method of selection just a visual scan each week paying particular attention to those near major support/resistance levels . I look for those who travel smoothly (not that they will do so in the future just because they have in the past) eg: avz was particular good both on the way up and on the way down before it got a bit volatile due to the fine it incurred. gsk has been good recently.

jon

barjon

Thanks for the reply

Regards

bracke
 
techst@ said:
.... And HG has a really nice tradeable trend (see attach.) What do you guys think of these two stocks BLND and HG?

Hi techst,

I EOD trade FTSE 350 stocks mainly using Elliott Wave analysis (or at least some form of it). I went long today on HG because it seems that we're at the end of an abc correction of the uptrend. I've attached a chart. (well, I hope I have - it's the first time I've tried to post a chart !) :p

I'd be interested to hear any comments.

Regards,
 

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Hg

For me, i look to buy within that circle on my chart. 270 looks like strong support, but the move up could run out of steam soon. Its funny that times when i look back and find a stock with a great uptrend by the time its established a good trend, its time for it to head south. Theres some MACD Divergence on my settiings but that may not stop you from catching an upward move. But when that moves over then this one may see a good retracement
 

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Hi, I too am interested in Swing Trading, and am about to start trading with the Marc Rivalland approach on the DOW and perhaps the FTSE. One problem I have come across though is inconsistencies with some of the charts available on the Web. I was using www.bigcharts.com, but then I noticed that the highs and lows shown by their candlestickes were wider than the quoted highs and lows for those days!! Does anyone have an explanation, or a better source of charts!!
 
You cannot trade on charts of indices. You need to follow the futures charts as that is all you can trade in reality.

It should also be pointed out that volatility is less since Marc published his book. The FTSE has been virtually untradeable for over a year and the Dow might not be as easy now as the book suggests...

That said I do rate the book and see him as a genuine chap.

Bigcharts calculates the highs and lows based on the low price and high price of every stock during the day despite the fact they don't occur at the same time.

That is why the high is always higher than reality and visa versa.

The cleanest data is available from www.downloadquotes.com

JonnyT
 
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