Week of 2013 AL 05

IWM fell by 3.3% this week, while my account rose by 1.8%.  The loss-floor is now -2.5%.

US news: Friday’s nonfarm payroll report was horrible: 88k new jobs last month, only half of what had been expected.  It is reasonable to expect (but not guaranteed) that the market will fall for the next three days.

End of week allocations:

Daily % gain size │ Max loss Sym  Buy │  Thu  Mon  Tue  Wed  Thu  Fri │ Beg   End   TZA  MR26 │ -0.1  19  +0.6  19  +0.9  19  +1.9  20  +1.4  20  +1.5  20  │ -0.3 -0.1 SRTY ¹  AL01 │ -0.2  19  +0.2  19  +1.1  20  +1.0  20  +1.0  20  │ -1.1 -0.7 SRTY ²  AL05 │ -0.8  19  │ -1.5 -1.5 IWM │ +14.4     +12.9     +12.2     +10.4     +11.4     +11.1     │ me │ -2.1 -1.5 -0.9 +1.0 +0.4 -0.3 │ floor │ -2.4 -2.9 -2.7 -3.3 -1.2 -2.5 │

floor: There is something wrong with the max-loss calculations.  The changes on Monday and Wednesday make no sense.  I’ve tried fiddling with the calculations, but the attempted revisions just made it worse.

Stock-trading robot

Ticker Symbol		Buy date			Buy price			Sell date			Sell price			Acct Profit
		Model	Actual		M	A		Model	Actual		M	A		M	A
TZA		(Not yet)	MR 26 09:34			$37.04		(Not yet)
SRTY ¹		AL 01 13:00			$24.11			AL 02 10:00	(Didn’t)		$23.67			-0.4%	+1.0%
		AL 03 10:00	(Didn’t)		$24.44			AL 04 12:00			$25.42			+0.8%
SRTY ²		AL 05 10:00			$25.98	$25.99		(Not yet)

TZA: Reverse stock-split before Tuesday’s open, so adjusted buy-price is now 4× (and share count now ¼×) its original value.  Still waiting for the model to issue another “buy” signal, which might happen next week.  Profits OK so far!

SRTY ¹: Because of the stock-split, my standing stop-loss order for TZA was silently cancelled.  As a result, the robot errored out while trying to update the stop on Tuesday at 10am, so it never got around to selling SRTY.  On Wednesday, the robot once again failed to update the stop for TZA and thus failed to “buy back” SRTY (which I still had anyway, due to Tuesday’s problem).  For once, the errors were in my financial favour!

SRTY ²: Bought at nearly the worst possible time: SRTY opened with a gap-up, then I bought it, then it spent the rest of the day falling.  If the market tanks next week due to the NFP report, this will turn out to have been a good move, if poorly timed.

Week of 2013 MR 28

IWM rose by 0.6% this week, while my account fell by 0.8%.  The loss-floor has fallen to -3.2%.

Euro news: Cypriot banks have reopened, but with restrictive capital controls: max €300/day withdrawals, max €500/day can be hand-carried off the island.  Capital controls are supposed to be illegal in the EU.  Effectively, there are now two currencies named “Euro” and they are not freely interchangeable.  And this is the “good news” that will supposedly make the US markets soar?

Markets were closed on Good Friday.

End of week allocations:

Daily % gain size │ Max loss Sym  Buy │  Fri  Mon  Tue  Wed  Thu  Fri │ Beg   End   TZA ¹  MR19 │ -0.5  19  -0.9  19  -0.9  19  -0.9  19  -0.9  0  │ -0.9 -0.9 SRTY ¹  MR25 │ +0.1  19  -0.0  19  -0.0  19  -0.0  19  │ -0.3 -0.3 TZA ²  MR26 │ -0.1  19  -0.1  19  -0.1  19  │ -0.3 -0.3 SRTY ²  MR27 │ -0.2  19  -0.2  19  │ -0.6 -0.6 IWM │ +13.8     +13.8     +14.2     +14.3     +14.4         │ me │ -1.3 -1.6 -1.8 -2.0 -2.1 │ floor │ -1.7 -2.0 -2.2 -2.4 -2.4 │

IWM: Dividend payment on Monday, which I didn’t notice until Wednesday.  Adjusted my database after the close.

TZA: Stopped out on Monday, but it seemed (because of the dividend problem) that the underlying IWM woudn’t have stopped out, so I bought back TZA the next day for about the same price.  After adjusting for the dividend, now the stop-out was “supposed” to happen, so TZA ² is a “rogue” purchase — added a special rule to the robot so it would know that I have this and need to pick a sell-time for it.
      Note that Wednesday and Thursday that the price of TZA did not change, while IWM crept slowly upward.  This unusual divergence may indicate that the US Fed was printing money and buying IWM (but not selling TZA) in order to create the appearance of calm before the April storm.

Stock-trading robot

I changed the historical price-data after Wednesday’s close (to account for the dividend), so the robot was actually using “wrong” data for most of the week.

Ticker Symbol		Buy date			Buy price			Sell date			Sell price			Acct Profit
		Model	Actual		M	A		Model	Actual		M	A		M	A
TZA ¹		MR 19 14:00			$9.62	$9.63		MR 26 10:00	MR 26 09:45		???	$9.21		-0.9%
SRTY ¹		MR 25 12:00	MR 25 14:00		$23.53	$23.30		MR 25 13:00	MR 26 10:00		$23.30	$23.28		-0.2%	-0.0%
TZA ²		(Do not buy)	MR 26 09:34			$9.26		(Not yet)
SRTY ²		MR 27 11:00			$23.57	$23.55		MR 27 12:00			$23.32			-0.2%

SRTY: Has been producing nothing but losses all year.  Hopefully this ”topping process” will end soon.

Week of 2013 MR 22

IWM dropped by 1.0% this week; my account did the same.  The loss-floor fell to -1.7%.

Euro news: Cyprus isn’t getting any better.

End of week allocations:

Daily % gain size │ Max loss Sym  Buy │  Fri  Mon  Tue  Wed  Thu  Fri │ Beg   End   SRTY ¹  MR19 │ -0.1  19  -0.4  19  -0.4  19  -0.4  19  │ -0.8 -0.8 TZA  MR19 │ -0.3  19  -0.8  19  -0.4  19  -0.5  19  │ -1.0 -0.9 SRTY ²  MR21 │ +0.1  19  -0.1  19  │ -0.5 -0.5 IWM │ +14.8     +14.2     +13.8     +14.7     +13.7     +13.8     │ me │ -0.3 -0.3 -0.7 -1.5 -1.0 -1.3 │ floor │ -0.3 -0.3 -2.0 -1.6 -2.0 -1.7 │

Stock-trading robot

Ticker Symbol		Buy date			Buy price			Sell date			Sell price			Acct Profit
		Model	Actual		M	A		Model	Actual		M	A		M	A
SRTY ¹		MR 19 12:00			$23.84			MR 20 10:00			$23.32			-0.4%
TZA		MR 19 14:00			$9.62	$9.63		(Not yet)
SRTY ²		MR 21 15:00			$23.56			MR 22 11:00			$23.46			-0.1%

The robot is functioning properly, but it is not making any money.

Week of 2013 MR 15

IWM rose yet again this week, to yet another lifetime high, while my account and loss-floor are stable at -0.3%.

Euro news: Cyprus went bankrupt on Saturday.  When the EU bailed them out, the people holding bank accounts got only 93¢ for every Euro they had deposited.  A bank run is in progress — money kept in Cyprus is no longer safe!  But it never was, and the other countries of Europe aren’t really much safer — and now everyone knows that.  Perhaps the US market will go down now?  Nah, too much to hope for.

End of week allocations:

Daily % gain size │ Max loss Sym  Buy │  Fri  Mon  Tue  Wed  Thu  Fri │ Beg   End   IWM │ +13.5     +13.3     +12.1     +13.8     +14.9     +14.8     │ me │ -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 │ floor │ -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 -0.3 │

Stock-trading robot

No trades this week.  No positions held.

Week of 2013 MR 08

No trades this week.  No positions held.  No change to account balance.  The market just keeps going up.  Bears are crying.

Week of 2013 MR 01

Didn’t feel like writing a report this week.  Two more loser SRTY trades.  Now my account balance is slightly negative for the year and I have no investments.

			Daily % gain size												│	Max loss
Sym	Buy	│	Fri		Mon		Tue		Wed		Thu		Fri		│	Beg		End
SRTY ¹	FE21	│	-0.1	19	-0.1	19	-0.1	19	-0.1	0					│
SRTY ²	FE22	│	-0.1	19	-0.3	19	-0.3	19	-0.3	19	-0.3	0			│	-1.2		-1.2
SRTY ³	FE26	│					-0.0	19	-0.4	19	-0.4	19	-0.4	19	│	-1.4		-1.4
IWM		│	+10.3		+7.9		+8.3		+9.4		+9.9		+10.1		│
me		│	+0.3		+0.1		+0.1		-0.3		-0.3		-0.3		│
floor		│	-0.7		+0.1		-1.2		-0.3		-0.3		-0.3		│

Stock-trading robot

Upon further analysis, I am no longer sure that there is actually a bug when there is a new low in the morning and then a “buy” signal later that same day.  So, no fix for now.

Ticker Symbol		Buy date			Buy price			Sell date			Sell price			Acct Profit
		Model	Actual		M	A		Model	Actual		M	A		M	A
SRTY ²		FE 22 13:00			$26.39			FE 25 10:00			$26.07	$26.02		-0.24%	-0.30%
SRTY ³		FE 26 10:00			$27.66	$27.60		FE 27 10:00			$27.01	$27.07		-0.41%	-0.40%

SRTY ²: Sold because IWM was a penny over its SMA – then IWM plummeted!  Oh well.

SRTY ³: Yet another loser trade.

Week of 2013 FE 22

Week of 2013 FE 22

IWM fell 0.9% this week, while my account fell by 0.2%.  The loss-floor has dropped to -0.7%.

US markets were closed on Monday for Presidents’ Day.

End of week allocations:

Daily % gain size │ Max loss Sym  Buy │  Fri  Mon  Tue  Wed  Thu  Fri │ Beg   End   IAU  AU14 │ +0.1  17  +0.0  17  +0.0  17  +0.0  17  +0.0  0  │ +0.1 +0.1 SRTY ¹  FE21 │ +0.3  19  -0.1  19  │ -1.4 -1.4 SRTY ²  FE22 │ -0.1  19  │ -1.2 -1.2 IWM │ +11.2         +12.1     +10.1     +9.0     +10.3     │ me │ +0.5 +0.5 +0.5 +0.8 +0.3 │ floor │ +0.6 +0.5 +0.5 -0.9 -0.7 │

IAU: Sold manually on Tuesday.  Good thing, since gold spent the rest of the week at lower prices.  Too bad I lost all my profit, though.

Stock-trading robot

Still haven’t fixed that SRTY bug when the ETF makes a new low followed by a “buy” signal later the same day.

Ticker Symbol		Buy date			Buy price			Sell date			Sell price			Acct Profit
		Model	Actual		M	A		Model	Actual		M	A		M	A
SRTY ¹		FE 21 11:00			$26.76			FE 22 10:00			$26.71	$26.70		+0.00%	-0.07%
SRTY ²		FE 22 13:00			$26.39			(Not yet)

SRTY: They say that “topping is a process”, meaning that the market spends some time thinking about maybe going down for a change, but keeps turning itself around and going back up — until eventually it doesn’t.  Maybe next week…