Q&A

From the mailbag - Q & A

Hi,

you are truly an idol as far as your trading goes. Great chart reading and great discipline in your trade management. You are already at the level where I want to be at some time :-)

I have a question for you ... how do you scan for stocks to play intraday? Only per HCPG or also some scanners or some fixed watchlist with always the same stocks? Do you also do scans on daily charts for stocks that are sitting in a tight contraction (like Jim mentioned the other day)?

Thanks for your insights!!!

Thanks for the kind words.

How to scan for stocks intraday - Jim and I both use Trade-Ideas scanner. I use TI for pre-market gappers as well. But during the trading day, the TI scanner tells me which stocks from my fixed watchlist are running/consolidating (NR7 scan). Plus we also use pre-defined scans for finding momentum stocks. Also, sort the fixed WL by % change at various times of the day to concentrate on outliers.

Review HCPG newsletter for charts of interest and trigger plays which are added to the focus list. Nightly scans of dailies for contraction setups as well as chart patterns, B&B, candlestick reversal patterns. Also make extensive use of Briefing.com Platinum for gappers, analyst ratings, swing trader, intraday scans, sector leadership, floor talk...

I don't like when my focus list is too long, because it becomes unmanageable and I end up missing good trades. So 10-12 names in addition to the fixed WL, is more than enough for me.

Hi,

Looks to me like the uptrend is broken in the post market, which brings up a couple of questions? Are you still only using Interactive Brokers and not holding positions overnite? Are they very cost effective? Have you seen Zecco who advertises--$0 stocks trades ? Or anyone else that is dirt cheap?

I have two trading accounts: one for day trading and one for swing trading. Still using IB as my broker for US markets. IB is very cost effective, but I live in Canada, and Canadian brokers are still charging a fixed rate per trade, so IB is very cost effective by comparison. IB also very reliable when it comes to fast executions. Not sure Zecco can provide same level of service as IB.

Trend appears to be breaking down after hours with earnings disappointments from large cap tech. Will review weekly chart over the weekend, but it's looking highly likely that we will have a failed BO of inverse H&S.