Author: enhanced

TradingWinner Back in Action

Last week I had a horrible experience. My car was broken into right outside of the office building I work at. It gets worse. I had forgotten to grab my backpack containing my laptop and my mobile computing gear. The thieves got my laptop!

I was very busy the day it happened, working on a complex database project for a client. Normally my laptop goes with me every time I go into the office. The police actually telephoned, alerting me my car had been broken into and needing to speak with me to file a report.

My laptop is still missing. I do not expect it will be recovered.

Anyways, I do most of my online development and personal surfing on my laptop. Without it, I have been barely able to manage my emails and websites. Thus, the lack of updates to TradingWinner.

I still do not have a replacement laptop. But I did get my desktop machine at my house in usable shape to perform research, browse the web, and update my sites. My laptop ran Windows XP, while my desktop computer is running FreeBSD – quite a switch to make for all my online activities!

By the way: Factory alarm systems only go off when your car door is opened. The thieves simply bashed in my rear windows and grabbed my backpack. I did not know this, but the police officer that helped me out explained this to me. I was disappointed. Time to invest in a real car alarm. Any recommendations?

TradingWinner is Back in Action.

Leadership Quote From Donald Trump

Here’s a quote from Donald Trump regarding leadership and personal ability I find very truthful. I was browsing some blogs and came across Donald Trump’s Blog.

If you’re in a leadership position now or have your sights set on one, it’s important for you to figure out what your strengths and weaknesses are, then assess where to go from there. Take some time to sit down and try to review your personal strengths and weaknesses. I think you’ll find it’s a very eye-opening exercise. – Donald Trump

Personally, I see Donald Trump as great businessman, evident by his success. When it comes to leadership and creating successful businesses, I hold Donald Trump’s thoughts and opinions in high regards.

Applying this quote to trading: As a trader, we are our own leaders. We do not command a team, but we make all the crucial decisions. These decisions, whether good or bad, affect our most valuable employee: ourselves. Just like Donald says, we need to review our strengths and weaknesses. Example: Do we get scared holding a stock we’re losing money on? If so, this is a weakness, and we need to re-think our trading strategy to minimize risk and minimize the effects of emotional trading.

BlackBerry Patent Settlement Reached

Research In Motion, the maker of the popular BlackBerry, has a reached a settlement with the patent holding company NTP.

In the settlement, Research In Motion (Nasdaq: RIMM) has agreed to pay NTP $613 million for the rights to use the patent. RIMM’s use of the NTP patent for the BlackBerry will run out in 2012.

In after-hours trading, shares of RIMM drastically jumped 20% (+13.68) upwards, closing at 85.60, due to the positive news of the settlement agreement.

For more information, check out RIMM @ Yahoo! Finance.

A Simple Candlestick Chart Guide

I have made a simple tutorial for people unfamiliar with candlestick charts and candlestick trading techniques. I primarily use candlestick charts whenever I view stock charts. The benefits of candlesticks are numerous.

What are candlesticks?

Candlesticks are a gift from Japanese rice traders. The traders developed them to predict future rice demand, in order to take full advantage of the fluctuation of rice prices. The rice traders wanted to buy low and sell high, which is our same goal.

The picture below outlines the major characteristics of candlesticks.

A Simple Candlestick Guide

Each candlestick represents 4 pieces of data:

  • The opening price at the start of the trading session.
  • The closing price at the end of the trading day.
  • The day’s high price.
  • The day’s low price.

Candlesticks also show if the price went up (white candlestick body) or down (black candlestick body).

Some candlesticks have long bodies and others have very short bodies and look like a cross. The size of the body means a lot in candlestick trading. Candlestick patterns and various candlestick trading strategies use the size of candlestick bodies to determine when you should buy and when you should sell. Those topics are for a later date.

My belief is that using candlesticks, with 4 pieces of stock price information and many useful patterns and strategies, gives me a trading advatange.

Stock Market Business News Research

Stock market research can be a daunting task for many people, especially beginning traders and people new to stock market and mutual funds. As beginners, we haven’t learned the kind of information and news stories we need to filter, and to spot the news that will positively or negatively affect a stock’s price. Constantly staying informed and having good business news sources allows us to maintain a competitive advantage over other traders and investors.

There are many great business news websites. Here are 3 of my favorites:

Yahoo! Finance – I use Yahoo! Finance pages daily to get news about the stocks I’m watching. I also get stock prices, charts, news – easily. I can research stocks based on their sector such as gas, technology, financials. I also research upcoming IPOs (Initial Public Offerings) of companies that will begin trading on the markets. Yahoo! Finance makes it easy to check out a company’s financial situation by reading their Balance Sheet, Cash Flow Statement, and Income Statement.

Google Business News – I enjoy reading Google Business News because of the comfortable, user-friendly interface. Google Business News also displays a thumbnail picture related to the news story. This allows me to quickly scan pages for news stories I am interested based on the picture and headline alone. I cut down the chatter and efficiently filter through vast amounts of new business articles and reports.

Newsvine – This is a new news site I have been using recently which I find very nice and clean like Google Business News, with a twist. Newsvine is partly a community driven news site and partly a traditional wire news site. You can read AP and other wire articles, or you can read articles and news stories by everyday business people in a blog-like way. Currently, you have to be invited to Newsvine or sign-up at their page and wait weeks to be added. I have 10 Newsvine invitations available to give out to friends and readers, which allow you to setup a Newsvine account immediately. The first 10 commentors will receive Newsvine invitations.

What’s your favorite business news website?