Medium-term Stock Spread Betting Journal

[leonarda]

Good luck with them leo. I had SSE.L for over a year in my ISA, but it didn't move much and the main profit was from the dividend in the end so I ended up getting rid of it, but that was last year. If it holds up during the current panic it looks like your target is certainly reachable for it.

Having just thumbed through the SSE web site, I'm hoping this is going to be a good move, since they are a major nat-gas provider and storage.

 

[isatrader]

Having just thumbed through the SSE web site, I'm hoping this is going to be a good move, since they are a major nat-gas provider and storage.

That's probably a good thing at the moment, as the shift from nuclear will push countries towards other cleaner energy solutions including natural gas as a bridging solution. Plus I saw last night that Japan is going to need to import a lot of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from places like Britain and Australia etc to meet their energy needs to replace the nuclear. But another analyst said they are more likely to lean towards oil as it's easier for them to get crude into the marketplace. Stick to your plan, you have a stop loss, so if you're wrong then you are protected.

 

[leonarda]

New Position

Reentered LOG.L on weakness. Might be a misstake, but I like both it's fundamentals and it's current technicals.

LOG.L 126.0 target: 160 stop: 121.4

 

[leonarda]

Logged onto my IG account last night and saw the FTSE at 5500, last November's low, so I thought there is a very good chance of a bounce from there, so put on a min size bet on the FTSE £2/pt. Just closed it for a nice £265. Not my usual cup of tea, and I wasn't keen on the bet size but that's the min on IG. Anyway, helps boost my account and gives me some cash to lose over the next 20 trades...!

 

[advfntrader]

I've been looking into Finviz.com to screen US stocks. Its really good and automatically draws patterns, terndlines etc. Anyone know anything similar for UK stocks ??

 

[leonarda]

I've been looking into Finviz.com to screen US stocks. Its really good and automatically draws patterns, terndlines etc. Anyone know anything similar for UK stocks ??

interesting, I would be interested in that for UK stocks too

 

[leonarda]

I've been looking into Finviz.com to screen US stocks. Its really good and automatically draws patterns, terndlines etc. Anyone know anything similar for UK stocks ??

of course there is always the Autochartist feature which you get for free with IG

 

[leonarda]

Current Positions

Well what a turn around, thanks to some strong stock selections during the FTSE breakdown, and also a couple of very useful FTSE bets, I am now nicely in profit YTD.

Long  ITV.L     age:   3 days  current:   87.0   (P/L:  3.0%) stop:   81.2
Long  MGCR.L age:   3 days  current:  293.8  (P/L:  6.1%) stop:  264.6
Long  SSE.L     age:   3 days  current: 1234.0 (P/L:  4.4%) stop: 1155.0
Long  VOD.L    age:   3 days  current:  170.6  (P/L: -1.6%) stop:  167.2
Long  LOG.L    age:   2 days  current:  126.1  (P/L:  0.0%) stop:  121.4

Account: £1085 (YTD: +8.5%)

 

[leonarda]

Position Closed

Take profit limit reached.

MGCR.L 298.4 P/L: +7.71%

Account: £1130 (YTD: +13%)

 

[leonarda]

Hedged

Took a bit of a gamble and shorted FTSE at 5777, stop 5817

 

[leonarda]

I'm taking a bit of a risk as it's not really hedged equally since the min bet size is £2/pt on the FTSE. My current positions are equivalent to £3000, so 50p/pt would be roughly hedged. I could use my CityIndex account to do that, but I don't have any cash in that at the moment. Oh well, I guess i'd only be giving back a bit of what I made on the previous hedge...!

 

[leonarda]

Hedge

Moved FTSE stop to breakeven.

 

[leonarda]

Hedge

Stopped at breakeven. No harm done!

 

[leonarda]

Position Closed

Stopped out.

ITV.L 79.9 P/L: -5.26%

Account: £1070 (YTD: +7%)

 

[JRP2891]

Hi Leonarda, well done on getting yourself out of that drawdown. What's your rule about % risked, seems variable and quite high...?

 

[leonarda]

My position stops are based on technical levels, but are normally about 4-5% below entry. I use manual exits, so it's possible for exits to scoot past a bit, but I take that as all part of the trade, sometimes it works for you in that you avoid a tree shake etc.. sometimes it works against you like it did on my Pace trade where it gaped down big time.

The position is sized such that that is about 2.5% of account risk. Which is higher than I would like, but I have the issue that I only have a small account and minimum bet sizes typically dictate my risk.

 

[JRP2891]

Ah i think i may have interpreted your results wrongly...So when you post your P/L result for a particular stock, is that the % the stock made/lost on it's value since your entry, or is that your % you made relative to your account balance (my initial thought) ?

 

[leonarda]

Ah i think i may have interpreted your results wrongly...So when you post your P/L result for a particular stock, is that the % the stock made/lost on it's value since your entry, or is that your % you made relative to your account balance (my initial thought) ?

yes sorry I should have made it a bit clearer. I state the P/L for the position purely on its stock price. The account P/L percentage based on my current leverage is about half that value. So for example on ITV.L the position lost -5.27% by price, by my account P/L it was about -2.7%.

 

[leonarda]

Ah i think i may have interpreted your results wrongly...So when you post your P/L result for a particular stock, is that the % the stock made/lost on it's value since your entry, or is that your % you made relative to your account balance (my initial thought) ?

I like to post position P/L based on price as it is independent of leverage. When my account grows I will reduce my leverage a bit, but I want my statistics of position performance to still be comparable historically.

 

[JRP2891]

yes sorry I should have made it a bit clearer. I state the P/L for the position purely on its stock price. The account P/L percentage based on my current leverage is about half that value. So for example on ITV.L the position lost -5.27% by price, by my account P/L it was about -2.7%.

I see, understood. Obviously i take back what i said about risking too much, 2.5% is weighty but ok, and i appreciate you don't have a choice at the mo.