The U.S. stock market returned to its range-bound ways, with the major indexes little changed from the week before. Prices had generally been on the decline throughout the week until a rebound on Friday – thought to be due to an easing of regulations on financial institutions by President Trump.
Our stocks still remain a mix of longs and shorts. New weekly highs are back to outnumbering new weekly lows, but together are producing quite a bit of “green” on the list below (green is good!). Not many trades this week with so many stock trends unchanged.
Our review of key behaviors of successful traders has covered “the more positions the better”, “set it and forget it” and “leave the charting to us”. Our focus continues this week with an emphasis on maximizing potential gains:
Keep 100% of your capital invested – when creating your initial portfolio, and maintaining positions in your focus stocks thereafter, be sure to utilize all your capital, leaving no cash sitting idle. Other than an occasion when a focus stock may be an AVOID for a short period (and those instances have declined with recent improvements in analytics), all your capital should be put to use to maximize your potential return from your subscription.
Think of your brokerage account as your own company, and you are CEO. Each dollar is like an “employee”, whose purpose is to multiply through participation in a stock position. Leaving account funds un-invested is tantamount to allowing your employees to remain idle, goofing off. It’s your responsibility to see that every single one of them remains constantly productive. Don’t be the investor who complains about low returns, then mentions having $______ “just sitting in an account, not doing anything”.
So, be sure to: 1) utilize all your funds when initially creating your portfolio, 2) keep re-investing all gains, 3) resist the impulse after a discouraging losing trade to “sit the next trade out” and allow funds to sit idle (it is rare to have two, even rarer to have 3 or more, losing trades in a row – in many instances the trade following a loss proves to be a large gainer), and 4) understand you do not need a “cushion” of cash in your account. Stay vigilant and aggressive – put all your “employees” to work every week for the largest possible investment return.
Highlights: 8 new weekly highs in long positions. 12 stocks with double-digit long gains:
ABX +18% ERF +21% KMT +30% CYBE +48%
IVTY +13% FRPT +25% NGL +34% NEFF +45%
SLW +14% HUN +24% PIR +37% TROX +42%
3 new weekly lows among short positions. 2 stocks with double-digit short gains:
URBN +21% AGEN +30%
Locking in short gain of +23% in NPTN (16 weeks).