What a Great Month for Swing-Trading!
- A 60% Win Rate
- Profits both long and short
- A market that went nowhere, but SharePlanner has awesome profits.
Consistent profits were the name of the game. The market had a few monster sell-offs, but ultimately bounced higher as a result of those sell-offs.
Here’s the breakdown of my swing-trades and what happened with each of them:
Let’s dig down a little deeper to see the areas of success and failure:
- I was profitable on 15 out of 25 (60%) of my trades
- 11 out of 16 (69%) of my trades were profitable that were focused on bullish/long setups
- 4 out of 9 (44%) of my trades were profitable that were focused on bearish/short setups
- 4 out of 8 (50%) of my trades were profitable using exchange traded funds (ETFs)
- 11 out of 17 (65%) of my trades were profitable that were done with trading equities
With how noncommittal this market was during the month and how it managed to swing higher and lower at the flip of a coin, I found a real sense of accomplishment at month’s end. So, yeah, I’ll give myself a pat on the back for that.
RELATED: 7 Years of Swing-Trading Past Performance – All Of It!
Self-gratification aside though, the short setups were the only class of trades that did not have a 50% or better winning percentage. Ironically, my two biggest trades came from SPXU which is a bearish 3x ETF on the S&P 500. Because of my success in SPXU during the August trading month, I managed to make some hefty profits to the short side still.
And that is the thing with August that made it a very profitable month for me. You had two major sell-offs: 8/10 and again on 8/17; I hit both of those sell-offs and profited with unbelievable precision on them both.
If August didn’t rally 43 points to close out the month, the S&P 500 would have been down! Think about it, prior to the last three trading days of the month, the S&P 500 was down almost 2% overall. That three-day rally managed to allow the S&P 500 to close 1.35 points higher. It was absolutely nuts.
Nonetheless though, the month went great for me and for traders in the Splash Zone. It was a testament to always being flexible with your trading direction, and when necessary, to flip to the short side, as the charts permit.
What worked for my swing-trades:
I was pretty spread out this month in terms of what I traded; there simply wasn’t one area in particular that I focused in on, like technology or industrials.
- Long Trades
- Short Trades
- Banks
- 3x ETFs
- Risk Management
The first two are obviously very broad, but like I said, it is hard to pinpoint a specific industry or stock that stood out. Instead it was really being fluid with the market’s direction. That is what ultimately won the day for me.
RELATED: Splash Zone Trading Profits + Analysis for July
Finally, risk management. I say this a lot, but all the profits in the world don’t mean a lick, if you don’t manage the risk associated with the trade. If you let your losers run out of control, no amount of profits will make you profitable. In a month where there wasn’t any mega winners in the portfolio, keeping losses very small while consistently winning in a much bigger way was the big difference maker for me.
What did not work for me:
- 2x ETFs
- 1x ETFs
That’s about it. There were no major eyesores on the list of trades that I made. You had unrelated losses in Boeing (BA), Tesla (TSLA) and Facebook (FB), But there wasn’t a pattern to grab hold of. And that is a good thing too. That means I wasn’t inflicting damage the same way over and over again.
On the 1x and 2x ETFs, those didn’t pan out well for me. Usually because they were a result of me adding to my existing exposure to the short side, with my 3x Bearish ETF, SPXU. With both of the major sell-offs from August, neither of them lasted for very long. You had one major day of selling followed by a sharpe “V” shaped rebound thereafter.
As a result, it was necessary to trade quick to the short, side, and while I profited well on the short side, I could have done even better had I been quicker to book the profits and not piled on additional positions.
Final Thoughts…
I am always my worst critic! I always feel like I should have done better in any given month. That is the downside to being a successful trader, in that I am never satisfied with my overall performance. I always think I could have done better. But in reality, I actually did do really well, considering the market went nowhere, and the profits were substantial – for both me and for members of the SharePlanner Splash Zone.
Speaking of which, have you given the Splash Zone a try yet? Well you should. It is FREE to try for the first 7-days. You can cancel at any time. With your membership you will get all my swing-trades real-time via text and email, as well as inside of my members-only chat room, where I trade each and every day from. Give it a try, and I’ll see you there!