50/50 for the day

Another in the money finish on the double-up at www.umoo.com. I also tried a normal day tourny and finished just out of the money there. I'll probably stick to the double-ups for now since I can't spend all day monitoring charts. Finishing in the top 50% isn't too difficult, but trying to finish in the top 10% is if I can't watch things like a hawk for intraday. I didn't even open a chart until 3 hours into the trading session. To do better at the normal tournaments I'll need to be ready to go at the open.

I'm finally funded and tomorrow will be my first real money tourny. Tonight's homework is setting up my charting package for a variety of stocks. I'm reverting back to my old system because it's the quickest and easiest way to screen prices for setups. I might not be picking tops and bottoms like I do with the cycle methods, but the system is sound enough I'll have a definite edge over a lot of these guys that probably have no clue about even basic technical analysis.

Another In-the-Money Finish

Finished in the money again. The one thing I learned about UMOO today is that there are no stop loss orders. I timed shorting a bunch of stocks perfectly and caught the top on most of them but had no way of locking in profits as the market plunged for the first half of the day. I was in the top 5 at my highest point.

Had I known there wasn't a way to set a stop loss I would have just covered all of the positions before lunch. But my ride was waiting and I had to jet. Ended up dropping from #5 to #54. Still in the double up money, but I missed my timing exits. Hopefully they'll add stop losses to future versions.

I'm going to try the week long tournament next week and get the funding going. One thing I've really noticed is how different stocks behave compared to the forex market. Forex is like flying down a mountain bike trail. Lots of bumps and hair pin turns that can put you in some hurt if you're not on top of things. Stocks are more like a road bike. They can be fast, but the road is a lot smoother and predictable.

If you haven't checked it UMOO out yet, check it out! www.umoo.com It's fun, there's practice/fun play, and you can make some money.

First win at UMOO

I don't recall how I stumbled across www.umoo.com, but I'm glad I did. This is something I've been wishing existed for years. I've been in a few forex trading contests through various forex brokers, but it's always a risky prospect when you're trading account is at stake for a fixed small winning or reward. Not to mention trading with a tournament style like a poker tournament is a recipe for disaster on a real trading account.

It's not like a poker tournament where you're only out your tournament fee. Even if you open up an account just for a trading contest and put in the account minimum, you're still going to be at a disadvantage to someone who opens up with more money. Even though winners are typically decided by overall account percentage gained, the larger account will still have an advantage. This would be like a poker tournament where your buy-in determined your initial starting stack. Or in a round about away.. a re-buy tournament.

The biggest disadvantage to more forex trading contests is the risk/reward. Most winnings are a fixed amount. It's not like where the more participants the higher the winnings.

But back to UMOO. Like most online poker rooms, there are multiple tournament types and durations. There are even some that only run for 60 min. I haven't tried one of those yet, but I'll probably give those a run next week. My scalper systems should do well.

Today I played in a Double Up Fun tournament. This one wasn't for real money.. just "fun" money. But the tournament is one where half the entrants get their entry fee back doubled for finishing in the top half of the field.

I've was as high as #10 and as low as #59 out of 237 players. Finished at #43 which is still in the top 2%. And that's without really trying and not even making a trade until 2:00 EST. (There's a strategy there. More on that in the future.) I think with a little more trade management and applying my intraday techniques, I could really mop up. But since I only needed to finish in the top 119, I didn't stress it. I imagine the field for real money tournaments like this one would be smaller.

I'll be doing a few more just for fun tournies and then I'm funding and playing for real. Stay tuned!