building a play structure

Well, I'm sure by now all of you know that today was an ugly, ugly day in the market. 

There's a saying in the market with the ole' timers and that is ... sometimes you are better off turning off the computer and walking the dog.  Or ... as "the Gambler" said, you gotta know when to hold then, when to fold them, when to walk away, and when to run.  Today, I chose to 'walk away'

Before the opening bell, I saw that the market was going to open with a 2+% loss and decided at that moment to find a project to spend the day ... I didn’t walk the dog, but I did build a play structure that my 3 year olds had been begging me to do for over a month.

This was one of those days where you just have to trust your trading plan and don’t get wrapped up in the emotion of the moment.  As you knew from my previous emails, I was mostly in cash, but did have a few small trades going but my stops were in place (and all kicked in today for a small loss).  Traders that survive (and thrive) in good and bad times follow a well thought out plan and don’t stray from the plan regardless of the situation, and today was a good example of that.  Although I wasn’t thrilled about today, I didn't fret it since I was prepared for it ... and just walked away and focused on something positive.

Please know, that I am not trying to rub today in, because I am certain all of us lost A LOT of money today, INCLUDING MY OWN 401k which I don’t manage.  I'm not thrilled that I left that alone.  In any case, as most of your know I am starting to take on clients and hope that my market timing over the past few months will help you to see the value of my service.  My trading portolio is up approx. 19% since February 14th compared with the S&P500 which is down over 8% for the same time period ... a 27% difference.  Not bad.  If you would like to find out more about my services ... please shoot me an email and we can schedule a time to talk on the phone OR I would be happy to email you details.

And with that I will sign off ... but before I do, I wanted to answer a question that I received from a few of you today in email ... Many of you asked, 'what happens tomorrow, should I sell everything or stay in'.  Well unfortunately my same comments from a few days ago still applies ... I am waiting for a bounce that is long overdue and the strength of that bounce will tell a lot.  But ... all in all ... I am still quite bearish, I don’t see a lot of good things out there and the underlying internals that I study every night look just ugly right now.  So, although I don’t think selling out of the market right now is the right thing to do, I also feel we have further down to go before we start climbing back up again.  We will all get through this in one piece.

Hope everyone has a wonderful evening and that tomorrow is much better for all of us.  And if it isnt ... well then ... maybe come outside and "walk the dog" next to me or take up some project to get away from the TV screens.