The Trading Rollercoaster...

It's been a crazy week! Boris Johnson's election in the U.K caused the British Pound to drop like a stone against the USD.  The U.S Federal Reserve lowered interest rates, and volatility went though the roof for a short while. It's been a week of shocks really...

Harshsmith trading like a champ

Last week he was the most drawn-down trader in my portfolio. This week he's the superstar, and is now the second highest performer out of all of my traders. That's an amazing feat. He's made around 5% in the last week, with the shift coming as the Fed Rate news was released.

It was an amazing thing to watch actually. There I sat, listening to the Fed news online, glued to my screen watching my portfolio. The moment the news came out, I watched Harshsmith's profit start to change. It rose rapidly over the next 30 minutes or so, and in the the days since it just kept gaining. Excellent.

I'm sure there must have been other traders on the 'wrong side' of that news. That must have been hard... But thankfully, our man Harshsmith was well prepared and positioned going into the announcement.

First profitability since I started copying him

This is actually the first time he's been in profit since I started copying his trades 2 months ago. Just after I copied him, a large trade he had opened in Baidu drew down heavily after a bad earnings report. Since then, it's been in red consistently, and slowly drawing further and further down.

That's a difficult thing to just wait through. You watch, and wait, and see more and more red. It's no fun. But he's a skilled analyst and trader, so I've hung in there and just waited until his strategy pays off. He's my only equities trader, and these are strange times for equities. I think everyone's anticipating a crash whilst at the same time the markets are rallying to all time highs. Which way to you place your bet?

For now, Hashsmith's 'Net Short' strategy seems to be doing well. 'Net Short' just means that overall he's got more 'sell' trades open than 'buy' trades. Now, whilst this is true, he's been making significant gains of his buy trades too. So, in a market rally, even though he's net short, he's been managing to control his losses - off-setting them with gains on the buys. Great job 🙂 He's currently at around 14% of my overall portfolio size.

Is Berrau still trading like an ox?

Strange use of that phrase, but when you think about it, it makes sense. an Ox is slow, steady, dependable, and gets the work done. That's pretty much been Berrau lately.

He's still making small gains once every 2 or 3 days. It's pretty much like clockwork at the moment. There's a winning trade, then a break for a day, and then another winning trade, and then another break, and then - etc. He's been really consistent, and he's the top performing trader in my portfolio. Excellent. He's also currently at around 24% of my overall portfolio.

Where did Alanayef go??

I stopped my copy of Alanyef. It's a real shame, as he was one of my strongest traders... But there's been months of basic inactivity and no communication.At the same time, he's had all those leveraged trades open - some for around 8 months - all racking up fees, and just sitting there slowly drawing down further.

Should I just be more patient? It's possible. I mean many of the instruments he's trading are at or near historic support levels. That would suggest that a turn upwards may be imminent and now's not the time to stop the copy. But there's also the opportunity costs - could my money be used more efficiently elsewhere? I think so right now. I've waited for 8 months for some of those trades to be closed and the money used elsewhere. It hasn't been. the trades have just been left there, endlessly. Fees have risen. All available funds have been used in new, losing open trades, and at this point the copy is just stuck.

There aren't more available funds to open new trades to offset the losses. So I've just been watching it slowly (and recently more quickly) draw down. It's a real shame. I'm still questioning whether stopping the copy was the right move, but for now, that's where I am. We'll see in future.

How's my new trader been doing?

Woe is me... Very soon after copying my latest trader - Gianlucal Conte, he opened some higher-risk trades which then promptly turned against him and lost a lot of money... Not good. He lost, in 3 days, as much as Alnayef lost in the last three months. Too risky.

Was it a mistake to copy him?

No, I still think that given his recent stats (last 2 years), and his risk scores over the last year, it was a good move. What wasn't a good move is that I copied him with slightly too much of my funds. I should have kept it to the minimum... I didn't. The little gambler in me was there. I rolled the dice a bit, and copied him with around 14% of my portfolio instead of the 6% minimum I should have started with. My mistake.

With the big drawdowns which I could see in his 2018 stats, I should have taken more precaution. It's there to see... He's been doing well. He appears to have reduced his risk. Things have been stable for the last couple of years. But STILL, the evidence was there of his previous risk taking, and I should have stayed cautious as much as possible.

So what now with him?

The major losing trade he has open is near historic lows, and support levels. I think he's expecting it to hit that historic low and bounce back upwards... He's said as much in his feed, and the charts back up his analysis. We'll see. Two things could happen:

1. The trade hits the support level and it bounces upwards and recovers the losses.

2. The trade breaks through support, and we see how well he handles that. Would he close the trade and get out? Or would he keep it open and keep losing?

I don't know yet - I've been reading comments about him and I see evidence for both possible scenarios. I'm nervous about it, but we'll see.

I'm withdrawing some of the money I copied him with so that his future trade sizes will be smaller. I'm also having to adjust my Copy Stop Loss to give him fair room to trade, whilst controlling my risk. I'm working it out.

Is Olivier Danvel Still in green?

Yes 🙂 It was very close there though on the last day of July. Olivier was involved in a number of trades which had drawn down heavily at the end of last month. As GBP got hammered by the Boris Johnson news, his trades were moving heavily into red. It genuinely looked like he was going to end his first month in red...

On the last day of the month, there was a bounce back upwards, and Olivier closed all of his open trades at a loss, but potentially much less loss than it could have been. At the time the trades closed, they looked like they were on their way back down again.

The 'FED' and volatility...

It also coincided with the Fed rate news. When the U.S Federal Reserve (know as 'The Fed') releases news about what its plans for interest rates are, everything goes nuts.

Volatility flies through the roof whenever there's news from the Fed, so Olivier wisely closed all the trades before that news came out. Holding trades open during the fed press release can be a major gamble given the volatility which often ensues. So I think it was a wise move on Mr Danvel's part 🙂

It scared a lot of people, and there was talk about whether he closed all of the trades just so that his stats stayed green for the month. But I think it was a very wise move. He got caught the wrong way in some trades, and managed to control his losses and potential losses well.

So, Olivier has draw down in my portfolio from last month, but he's still profitable and he's got open trades again, so we'll see how it goes this month. I'm still copying Olivier with around 24% of my overall portfolio.

So,  Olivier, Harsmith, and Berrau, account for around 72% of my overall portfolio between them. Nice.

Kela Leo - how's he doing?

He's drawn down a bit more since the last video. He's still applying roughly the same strategy, and unfortunately still seems unable to stem the slow draw down and slowly-increasing losses. I'm not sure what to say about him. He still isn't making huge losses - he's not doing risky things. He just seems to be on the wrong side of trades consistently.

I'm not sure if it's possibly just very unlucky timing... He's not actually doing stupid things. They all make sense - it's just not really working. Still waiting for now...

The new trader I've copied

So, I've copied a new one - mtsnom015. She's got 7 years experience according to her bio. The last 3 years of stats are solid, and low risk. Her risk scores over the last year are low, and her drawdowns are under my 15% target for yearly max drawdown.

She's another forex trader. (I know I'm very heavy on Forex traders, but I'm still limiting equities exposure). I've copied her with the minimum of around 6% of the portfolio 🙂

I didn't copy open trades - let's see how it goes.