Educate Me

[derekgreer]

Okay, I'm a complete novice to trading other than participating in my 401K. I recently came across this website called stock of the week and after looking at their recommendations decided to sign up for their news letter. They recommend penny stocks. I watched them for the past month and each one of the stocks they recommended would have made you a lot of money if you bought when the market opened for that day and sold within a few hours (and some after a day or so). So, I set up an etrade account with $500 just to get started thinking I'd jump on the next announcement which was this morning. Their pick for this week was MOJO. It said the last amount was 0.18, so I put in a limit order at 0.25 and started waiting. I waited and waited, but my purchase order was still open. After about 10 minutes I assumed that my order didn't go through because the price had already jumped above my limit. Okay, I thought, I'll cancel that one and put in another one at a slightly higher limit than what it's trading for now. Upon trying to buy the stock, I got the message:

"Opening orders for this security cannot be accepted online at this time. For assistance with placing this order, please contact Customer Service at 1-800-ETRADE-1 (1-800-387-2331)."

I googled around, but didn't find any info on what this meant, so I got on etrade's online chat. The person told me that this security couldn't be traded right now and said it can happen for a number of reasons.

The stock jumped to well over 1000% within 30 minutes of the open. I was set to put a limit sell after 100%. So overall, I missed out completely even though I was trying everything I knew.

Can someone please explain what happened here?

 

[tomorton]

People seem to say this is a volatility issue but you can phone in to buy. Of course, that might not mean you get the most economical deal compared to online.

More important though is the implication that selling the shares might also be difficult.

 

[derekgreer]

That occurred to me ... what if I got in, but then started getting that message when I tried to sell. So, you think this can happen if the stock is too volatile?

At this point, I'm just trying to use this as a learning opportunity. I'm expecting some email to go out from that news letter saying "Wow, this stock increased 1020%! We really know how to pick 'em!". Doesn't help me if I can't actually buy it. I'm wondering if this is what I could expect from all of their picks ... stocks that jump up for an hour, but can't be traded online because of volatility.

 

[Quantt]

Okay, I'm a complete novice to trading other than participating in my 401K. I recently came across this website called stock of the week and after looking at their recommendations decided to sign up for their news letter. They recommend penny stocks. I watched them for the past month and each one of the stocks they recommended would have made you a lot of money if you bought when the market opened for that day and sold within a few hours (and some after a day or so). So, I set up an etrade account with $500 just to get started thinking I'd jump on the next announcement which was this morning. Their pick for this week was MOJO. It said the last amount was 0.18, so I put in a limit order at 0.25 and started waiting. I waited and waited, but my purchase order was still open. After about 10 minutes I assumed that my order didn't go through because the price had already jumped above my limit. Okay, I thought, I'll cancel that one and put in another one at a slightly higher limit than what it's trading for now. Upon trying to buy the stock, I got the message:

"Opening orders for this security cannot be accepted online at this time. For assistance with placing this order, please contact Customer Service at 1-800-ETRADE-1 (1-800-387-2331)."

I googled around, but didn't find any info on what this meant, so I got on etrade's online chat. The person told me that this security couldn't be traded right now and said it can happen for a number of reasons.

The stock jumped to well over 1000% within 30 minutes of the open. I was set to put a limit sell after 100%. So overall, I missed out completely even though I was trying everything I knew.

Can someone please explain what happened here?

I would stay away from services like this, they are usually pump and dump operations, and as you can see you cannot get the fills due to the low volume and volatility (unless you trade on a simulator as they probably do)

As per their "disclaimer":

"StockoftheWeek.net reports/releases/profiles are commercial advertisements..."

This means they are not traders, but companies gives them free stock to advertise to the subs...

You will lose a lot of money fast, if you trade on their advice...

 

[derekgreer]

So, just to help me learn more fully what happened ...

My first order actually was accepted by etrade and went into an "Open" status. I guess that means waiting to get fulfilled. I placed an order around 9:30 where the stock had previously closed at 0.16. I put my order in with a limit price of 0.25. My thoughts on this was that my order was going to get fulfilled relatively quickly, but I needed to set a limit higher than where the stock would have been at the time of the order getting processed. I thought 50% higher than the previous closing price would have been enough margin. The order was never filled and I sat and watched it climb well above my limit price.

So, was the reason why my order didn't get filled that my limit was probably under what the current price was at whatever point it was getting considered? Sorry, I don't even know enough to answer the question sensibly. I'm wondering what I *should* have done had I wanted to place the order when the market opened to have ensured I could have bought some shares.

 

[tomorton]

If the buy price to your order is lower than the buy price of the share when the market opens, it will not get filled. Likewise if the firm don't have time to fulfil your order before price shoots past it. This is not an argument for entering a crazily high buy price, to get in literally "at any price".

But look, we're talking here about a missed opportunity, about entry prices and how to get in. How much worse would it be if you had bought the share, price had gone up and then you had the same difficulty getting out as you had on this one getting in. And then the next day price drops through the floor and you're broke.

I hope to high heaven you see the warning signals.

I obviously wasn't direct enough earlier, but for pity's sake steer clear of this entrapment.

 

[derekgreer]

If the buy price to your order is lower than the buy price of the share when the market opens, it will not get filled. Likewise if the firm don't have time to fulfil your order before price shoots past it. This is not an argument for entering a crazily high buy price, to get in literally "at any price".

But look, we're talking here about a missed opportunity, about entry prices and how to get in. How much worse would it be if you had bought the share, price had gone up and then you had the same difficulty getting out as you had on this one getting in. And then the next day price drops through the floor and you're broke.

I hope to high heaven you see the warning signals.

I obviously wasn't direct enough earlier, but for pity's sake steer clear of this entrapment.

I hear what your'e saying. I'm just trying to learn the ins and outs of all of this. I'm also playing around with very small amounts to learn.

 

[Penny Picks]

Okay, I'm a complete novice to trading other than participating in my 401K. I recently came across this website called stock of the week and after looking at their recommendations decided to sign up for their news letter. They recommend penny stocks. I watched them for the past month and each one of the stocks they recommended would have made you a lot of money if you bought when the market opened for that day and sold within a few hours (and some after a day or so). So, I set up an etrade account with $500 just to get started thinking I'd jump on the next announcement which was this morning. Their pick for this week was MOJO. It said the last amount was 0.18, so I put in a limit order at 0.25 and started waiting. I waited and waited, but my purchase order was still open. After about 10 minutes I assumed that my order didn't go through because the price had already jumped above my limit. Okay, I thought, I'll cancel that one and put in another one at a slightly higher limit than what it's trading for now. Upon trying to buy the stock, I got the message:

"Opening orders for this security cannot be accepted online at this time. For assistance with placing this order, please contact Customer Service at 1-800-ETRADE-1 (1-800-387-2331)."

I googled around, but didn't find any info on what this meant, so I got on etrade's online chat. The person told me that this security couldn't be traded right now and said it can happen for a number of reasons.

The stock jumped to well over 1000% within 30 minutes of the open. I was set to put a limit sell after 100%. So overall, I missed out completely even though I was trying everything I knew.

Can someone please explain what happened here?

The service you are looking at has all the ear marks of a "PUMP & DUMP" operation. Read their disclaimer and see if they have promotion contracts to promo the stock.

Look up a couple of my post and the charts will show how I trade. I am not selling an idea. It's just the way I trade. (No affiliations of any kind)