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Posted by Martin November 17, 2019
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Stocks watch list November 2019


Here are the dividend paying stocks we will be reinvesting dividends, options profits, and trade options (exceptions apply) in November 2019:
 

Helmerich & Payne Inc. (HP)
Meredith Corp. (MDP)
People’s United Financial (PBCT)
Weyco Group Inc. (WEYS)
3M Company (MMM)
Archer Daniels Midland (ADM)
Realty Income Corp. (O)
Consolidated Edison (ED)
Sonoco Products Co. (SON)
Johnson & Johnson (JNJ)
Automatic Data Proc. (ADP)
 

EPR Properties (EPR)
Gladstone Investment Corp. (GAIN)
Gladstone Land Corp. (LAND)
Main Street Capital Corp. (MAIN)
STAG Industrial Inc. (STAG)
 

The first batch of stocks above are dividend champions (aristocrats) which meet our screening criteria for this month. The second batch are stocks which increase dividends regularly but are no necessarily champions. The reason I pick them is that they pay dividends monthly and they are on the list of dividend growth stocks.

Next month, we will update this list and stop buying stocks which do not make it to the list, however, we keep them if they stay in a CCC list, (see the link for the CCC list). We sell these stocks if they do not make it to our narrower list but are also removed from the CCC list.

We will be selling naked puts against these stocks (although if opportunity occurs we may take a different stock too, such as SPY, IWM, MSFT, etc.).




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Posted by Martin November 16, 2019
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WHAT DO I EXPECT NEXT WEEK?


The market rallied to 3100 as I expected last week. It was probably a bit too fast though. Now, that we are at this level, what’s next?

I think, we still have some room to go higher, unless Trump spoils it with his trade wars, which I think is less likely since he now has other problems than a trade war, but you never know. One tweet can change it all. But, looking at the weekly chart ① we can see that we are at the top of the rising wedge with some small room to go. Will we go higher or are we bound to reverse? The daily chart ② assumes that we still have room to the upside. But I would be cautious.
 

SPX

SPX
 

IWM also indicates on its weekly chart ③ that we are on top of the long sideways channel and that we may be reversing to the downside. However, on the daily chart ④, it is forming a nice bull flag, indicating that we may in fact clear this resistance level and breakout to the upside. We need to wait now and see. Overall, I think, we may see going to 3150 and then we will see where we go next.
 

SPX

SPX

 

Open trades:
 

#42 – SPY long call box – https://tinyurl.com/y6cv5r22
#43 – PBCT naked put – https://tinyurl.com/sajds2z
 

Stock holdings:
 

1 MCD
2 MSFT
1 PBCT
 

#40 – We took profit in our MSFT butterfly this week. The stock had a nice breakout and then entered a consolidation, or high base from which we broke up again as expected ⑤. But, it seems, the trade is now extended to the upside. It may fade next week or continue higher. If it fades, we would look like geniuses that we took profits, if it keeps blasting up, we will look like idiots for not letting it run. But, if MSFT fades, and consolidate, we may re-take the trade. So far, we made 295% profit in this trade. We then took the profits, and purchased 2 shares of MSFT to build our wealth.
 

SPX

 
#42 – We closed our 308 SPY long call trade but we still hold the debit spread of the box. We expect this trade to go away next week (unless the market sells off). As of now, we have a profitable trade and in good shape. By closing the 308 long call we achieved a 52% profit. Not as great as last time, but the market slowed down and we were running out of time. So we decided to close the trade and take profits. If the debit spread closes early next week, we will add more profits to this trade.
 

#43 – We were also able to release some of the bad SPX trades this week and re-allocated our funds to our equity trading plan. We opened a new naked put against PBCT stock. The stock is a dividend champion, paying nice dividend (current yield 4.31%), and increased the dividend for consecutive 26 years. The stock recently broke from a downtrend on a weekly chart ⑥ as well as daily time frame ⑦ and is now in a consolidation pattern. We think this pattern will hold and the stock will resume its uptrend. If not, and the stock dips below, we will take assignment, buy 100 shares and sit on the holding, collect dividends, and if the stock returns up and above our purchase price, we may start selling covered calls. We will not be selling covered calls if the stock is below our cost basis. The reason is, that this stock has thinly traded options and doesn’t offer much ability to roll or otherwise adjust the trade.
 

SPX

SPX

 




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Posted by Martin October 20, 2019
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Equity Options


One trading strategy does not work all the time and in every market. There will be time when one strategy stops working and another strategy has to be used while waiting for new opportunity to trade the first strategy again.

We traded SPX options lately, Iron Condors, Put Spreads, Call Spread, or Iron Flies, but in this market, I started seeing being whipsawed way too often. This is a hard market to trade. Of course, there will be traders out there who would thrive in this market. There will be traders who would make killing trading this volatility but, sadly to say, I am not one of them. I do not have means and time to sit behind the computer and adjust our trades minute by minute. I can’t respond to a market which is up 0.80% in the morning and down -1.20% in the afternoon because of a tweet.

And even if I was able to adjust my trades it all turned out to be wrong again and I got whipsawed. I tried to adjust and do something about my trades just to find out, it didn’t work. So, in situation like this, the best thing one can do is to stop trading, step back, and evaluate the situation. And that is exactly what I did. I rolled all my bad trades away to gain time and see what I can do next and stopped trading.

That’s why you may have seen no activity, no posts, no trades in our Facebook page.

And, while evaluating our trading I found out that I was trading way too aggressive and too much. Trade often, trade small. Well, I think I was trading way too often and not small. And this contributed to my “piss off” mood. I was at attention all the time, constant stress, watching the monitor all too often… That was exactly the time to step back and calm my soul again.

And when the whipsaw mode went to the point when I shouted “I can’t trade this market anymore!” I realized, this was a time to change.

 
So, what will we be doing?
 

1) As of now, we will not be trading SPX trades as often as you may have seen. We will be primarily rolling our bad trades to get out of them. This may take months or years, but it is important. Time to time, we may open a small trade, usually right after a large selloff, consolidation, or breakout. But it will be more of a wait and trade than a regular weekly trading.
 

2) We are adding equity options trading, meaning we will be trading options using dividend stocks as underlying. We will be selling naked puts and covered calls.
 

3) We will be selling naked puts against dividend stocks with 25 – 30 delta and 30 to 45 DTE. If the puts get in the money, we will attempt to roll the puts into the next expiration cycle only if the roll will be a credit trade. If it cannot be a credit trade, we will take assignment and buy 100 shares. In this case, it is important to have enough cash in a trading account to be able to buy 100 shares without getting into a margin call.
 

4) Once we get assigned, we will start selling covered calls. The strategy however is to build a dividend stocks portfolio with intention of NOT selling our stocks. We want to keep all stocks we acquire. If the calls get in the money, we will hedge the position to protect our position. One strategy may be to sell new puts to get back into the lost position. For example, a stock is trading at $30 a share. We sell a $32 strike covered call. The stock moves to $34 a share. We may let the calls call our position away but we sell new $34 strike puts to get back in. We will also adopt rolling the calls gradually up and away (as long as it is a credit trade), or simply closing the position.
 

5) Here comes the wealth building part. These days, many brokers cut the commissions to zero. That is a great opportunity to build your portfolio at no cost! You can literally buy only 1 share of a company stock and it will cost you nothing. What an opportunity! This will also allow us to invest all proceeds – premiums and dividends – into dividend stocks. If, for example, we sell a naked put, and collect $34 credit, we can buy 1 share of a stock trading at $34 or less. And even 1 share will allow us to start receiving dividends and participate in a price appreciation! And the more credits we receive and more dividends we receive, the more shares we can buy at no cost!
 

6) One important thing to mention, trading this strategy requires enough savings in one’s account. We will be trading in a margin account to lower the capital requirements. In a margin account, a stock trading for $30 a share will require approx. $1,300 buying power. In a cash account, a trader will need $3,000 buying power. If you do not like trading on margin, you must save the entire amount before you start selling puts (in this case cash secured puts). The worst thing which can happen to you is to be forced to close a newly acquired 100 shares (when assigned) at a loss because you got a margin call due to lack of buying power.
 

7) As mentioned above, we will be investing all dividends and all credits from options into dividend stocks from our watch list – cheaper stocks at first, more expensive stocks later (as the cash flow increases). Our watch list is shown below:
 

Watchlist
 

And, what about SPX?

We will still trade SPX. This is not an abandonment of a strategy. We are just adjusting our trading to mute what stopped working for us and add a strategy which, in my opinion, would better suit this market, our time available to be dedicated to trading, and peace of mind. As our trades will be repaired more and more, this market calms down a bit and shows direction again, or I will get more confident trading SPX more often, I will start adding more and more trades. As of today, my state of mind is fear. Fear of being wrong, fear of losing money. Fear of being whipsawed again. Fear of not knowing what to do. I think, it is bad, very bad for any trader. I want trading to be not just a business but also fun. And these days, it was not fun; it was frustration. Let’s make trading fun again.
 




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Posted by Martin September 02, 2019
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Quarterly reporting


August is over. My trading was in a “damage control” mode as my trades got whipsawed. I made money, but not as much as I wished for. I also adjusted my trades to long term trades (45-60 DTE), although I take 0-2 DTE trades too but very little. I also reduced amount of trades to prevent damage from the erratic market moves. Now, I use long term trades’ credits to adjust my short term trades which are in bad shape (to either close them or roll them and all debits are offset by long term credits).

September is historically bearish month (with few exceptions), and given the escalated trade war, I think we are heading to an interesting month. I expect bearish month this year.

However, I also decided to report my progress and never ending struggle of trading options on a quarterly basis as I have a lot to do and not much time writing. My a bit detailed report will be out at the end of September 2019.

Good luck all! Trade small and stay safe.




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Posted by Martin June 29, 2019
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June 2019 financial freedom report


June 2019 finished fast and sound. I was following my path to financial freedom strictly, although I must admit, I got a bit greedy and did a few adjustments to collect more credits. These adjustments were not necessary and could potentially endanger my efforts to become financially free.

I am aware of this deficiency and getting back on path with my goal and strategy.

I had many discussions over my strategy with many investors and followers. Many didn’t like that I collect $30 – $35 dollars per contract. They say, it is not worth it.

But my strategy is to collect “crumbs” which would allow me to widen my strikes so far away from this crazy market, that I can sleep soundly, calm, and well. What is it worth to collect large premiums when the trade goes bust later on? If you see my track record you will find out, that I have mostly winners. So is it worth to me to collect small premium? Yes it is, as it allows me to collect it week by week without losses. And if you want large premiums and potential frequent large losses, go ahead. But not my style. Not anymore.

In June I followed the rules but I over-traded a bit. Although, there was a lesson in it. I learned how much fees and commissions I pay. And it was not a pleasant discovery.I learned it cost me 30% to trade!

Before, I ignored the fees and commissions. I saw it as a necessary business expense. The only difference here is that – one – your journey to financial freedom is slowed down – significantly! – and two – you cannot claim those expenses as a business expense unless you achieve a Traders Tax Status (TTS).

As I mentioned before, in my May 2019 post, I had to adjust my minimum premium requirement from 0.30 to 0.35 per contract just to account for fees. And that gets me closer to the market and make my trade more dangerous.

But recently, about two days ago, I decided to dust off my old theory of what is better – a 5 dollar or 10 dollar wide Iron Condor? There was a very heated discussion and debate on Facebook about this matter. There were people who claimed that it doesn’t matter, others were claiming that 10 dollar wide is a bad idea, and some liked it.

There was definitely one good reason for a 10 dollar wide trade – commissions. With 10 dollar wide trade, I can trade fewer contracts, achieve same result but reduce commissions. Thus, next month, I will investigate this opportunity and will try a few trades 10 dollar wide to see how that goes.

 

 · June 2019 results:

 

But let’s go to the June 2019 trading results.

June income has been great and exceptional. However, I do not expect it to repeat at all in the future as the income has been achieved by over-trading and for the next month it must not be done again.

It was not that I traded too many contracts but I was rolling them. For example, the very last trade #23 was going well and as the market kept sliding lower and lower, I started lowering the call spreads down, collecting additional premiums. It was an exceptional trade. But I endangered my call side and realized my mistake as soon as the market reversed on Thursday and continued rallying. Fortunately, I wasn’t punished for these unnecessary adjustments, but it reminded me not to touch the trade until it is really necessary. It was good and it felt great collecting additional premium, but it could turn into a large loss.

In June 2019 we made $4,945.43 revenue (double of the plan).

 

report
 

 
June 2019 trades:
 

Trade #23
Trade #22
Trade #21
Trade #20
Trade #18

 

Here is a link to my live 5 year plan spreadsheet.
 

 

 · Weekly short term trading strategy

 

Here is a quick list of our short term (3-4 DTE) strategy (simplified):
 

1) Open a new trade on Tuesday morning only.
2) Open with the same week Friday expiration (3 DTE).
3) Collect min. 0.35 credit.
4) No wider than $5 per trade.
5) Multiple contracts based on available buying power (BP).
6) Let the trade expire.
7) Wings at 5 delta or near as long as credit is 0.35.
8 ) Close one half of the position when tested side reaches delta 30 and roll the entire untested side down (or up) to offset the cost.
9) Close another half of the trade when the tested side reaches delta 40 and roll untested side lower (or higher).
10) Roll the remaining tested side higher (or lower), open more contracts, and roll untested side down (or up).

Here is an example of above described adjusting strategy:

We open 10 contracts with delta 08.
Put side gets tested and reaches delta 30.
We close 5 put contracts and roll 10 call contracts down.
Put side gets tested further more and reaches delta 40.
We close additional 3 put contracts.
We roll 10 call contracts lower.
The put side gets tested even more (touch).
We roll the remaining 2 puts down and open new 3 (or more) put contracts (at delta 16).
We roll call side lower.

 

 · Monthly long term trading strategy

 

We are also trading long term Iron Condors. We split the buying power to trade between the short term trades (3 – 4 DTE) and long term trades (50 – 60 DTE). However, the traded buying power of both combined trades shall never exceed the total allowed buying power.

Here is how I will be trading those long term trades:

1) DTE shall be 50 or more.
2) The IC width shall be 25.
3) The collected premium shall be $3 or more, the more the better (12% of margin)
4) The short delta 10 or less as long as collected premium is $3 or more. If a premium at delta 10 is less than $3, increase DTE.
5) Adjust the trade up or down if any short strike reaches delta 30.
6) Close the trade to collect minimum of $1.25 or more (5% of margin).

The adjustments for these kind of trades will be rolling the entire trade, when the tested side hits delta 30 or more, down or up. However, as soon as the trade reaches the minimum required credit, we will close the trade and immediately opening a new a new one.

 
Previous posts related to this plan:
 

May 2019 financial freedom report – June 01, 2019
My 5-year Plan to Freedom Update – May 22, 2019
April 2019 financial freedom report – May 05, 2019
Fed up with my own lack of discipline, putting down a plan to reach FI – April 17, 2019
 
 




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Posted by Martin June 26, 2019
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Strategy update


The recent strategy I adopted for my 5 year plan to freedom works perfectly. Well, I knew it would work. I have traded that strategy for about two years earlier in the days when I started trading options. That’s what I was taught by my mentor. I might have been financially free already if I hadn’t abandoned it.

Since mid April 2019 when I started trading my SPX 7-day trading strategy (in fact, it is only 3 day), I opened 27 trades. Out of those trades, only 2 were losing trades and they were very small loses, mostly due to mismanagement when I was not yet sure how to react properly to the market’s behavior.

But May and June trades had no losing trades at all. Pretty much a 100% accuracy. OK, I shouldn’t say that. I had a few trades which I adjusted and these were losing trades, but the adjustments brought in enough credit to offset the loss plentifully. I only made less money, but I made money. I didn’t lose.

And I am happy to see and share these results.

You can follow those trades on our Facebook page and paper trade them to see for yourself. You can follow the open and closed trades in our spreadsheet. You can even subscribe to our free email or text alerts, (just send us an email to info@zzcapitalmanagement.com with your email if you want email alerts, or phone number, if you want text messages, or both, if you want both). Whenever we post a new trade, you get an alert to check the Facebook page for details. Whenever we adjust the trade, you also get an alert. And it’s free; at least for now.

I wish you all good luck and blessings.




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Posted by Martin June 01, 2019
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May 2019 financial freedom report


May 2019 is over. For many this month was very difficult and a lot of people lost money, that was at least, what I have read in Facebook Groups. Of course, there were savvy traders and investors who made money in this volatile market. I made money too.

In this month I met the goal as planned. I was very careful to follow the plan and trade as described in my goal plan. Following the rules strictly helped a lot to no lose. Although, the end of the month was very shaky and I was very afraid of what the outcome may have been, I started even panicking at some point and started adjusting my last week trade too much. I noticed that and stopped doing it. Sometimes, it pays to really do nothing but it is easy said than done.

 
May 2019 results:
 

In May I stuck to the rules to the tee! No rules broken, no violations! I started also trading increased number of contracts. My first month going with 10 contracts and going up to 16. It was scary at first. I was well aware that increasing the contracts would bring more premium but also wipe out more of the previous gains should the trade go bad. But that was a risk I was OK to take to grow my account into independence.

I learned another thing which at first I considered negligible – fees. Once I started trading larger amount of contracts, I realized that with the fees (even though low fees compared to others) I will not be able to meet my goal as planned. I had to adjust my minimum premium to account for the fees if I wanted to stay on track. So I decided to increase the minimum premium collected to 0.35 from 0.30 a contract.

 
Monthly long term trading strategy
 

Another adjustment to the trading was adding a long term Iron Condors. I decided to split the buying power allowed to trade between the short term trades (3 – 4 DTE) and long term trades (50 – 60 DTE). But the traded buying power of both combined trades shall never exceed the total allowed buying power.

Here is how I will be trading those long term trades:

1) DTE shall be 50 or more.
2) The IC width shall be 25.
3) The collected premium shall be $3 or more, the more the better (12% of margin)
4) The short delta 10 or less as long as collected premium is $3 or more. If a premium at delta 10 is less than $3, increase DTE.
5) Adjust the trade up or down if any short strike reaches delta 30.
6) Close the trade to collect minimum of $1.25 or more (5% of margin).

Here is an example of a first trade I opened in this manner. My goal is to hold this trade no longer than a month. That means, I want to be opening this kind of trade every month. If it cannot be done, I will probably stop trading these long term trades. I do not know yet.

The adjustments for these kind of trades will be only rolling the tested side (delta 30) down or up and moving the untested side closer to offset any debit needed to roll. But, as soon as the trade reaches the minimum credit, I will be out and immediately opening a new trade.

 

Here are the results:

 

In May 2019 I met all goals as planned:

1) Starting value was as per the plan
2) Number of traded contracts was as per the plan
3) Monthly premium collected exceeded the plan (the plan was $1,680.00, collected premium was $2,690.00)
4) Monhtly deposits slightly exceeded the plan (the plan was $2,600.00, deposits were $2690.00)
5) The ending value was slightly below the plan (the plan was $14,342.00, final value ended at $14,337.00)

The shortage was caused by fees and due to the plan adjustments in the middle of the month. But overall, I consider May as accomplished per the plan.
 

report
 

 
May 2019 trades:
 

Trade #17
Trade #16
Trade #15
Trade #14
Trade #13

 

Here is a link to my live 5 year plan spreadsheet.
 

Weekly short term trading strategy
 

Here is a reminder of my strategy and way how to trade (simplified):
 

1) open a new trade on Tuesday morning only
2) open with the same week Friday expiration (3 DTE)
3) collect min. 0.30 credit
4) no wider than $5 per trade
5) multiple contracts based on BP
6) let it expire
7) wings at 5 delta or near as long as credit is 0.30
8 ) close one half of the position if the loss reaches $1.00
9) close everything if the loss reaches $1.50
10) if the market swoons through $1.00 and reaches $1.50 or even swings further, close everything.

with 5 delta, (2 SD) the swings still may happen (you never know what crazy people would do on Wall Street) but the breach is very rare. It still may happen, everything may happen, but it should happen occasionally, when panic hits…

 
Previous posts related to this plan:
 

My 5-year Plan to Freedom Update – May 22, 2019
April 2019 financial freedom report – May 05, 2019
Fed up with my own lack of discipline, putting down a plan to reach FI – April 17, 2019
 
 




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Posted by Martin May 22, 2019
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My 5-year Plan to Freedom Update


At first I didn’t want to post the entire plan to my freedom because I was afraid. The numbers in the plan look so ridiculous that I was afraid that after posting the whole plan it would be ridiculed. So I decided to post it only a year by year. I would post a year 1, then two years, three years, and so forth.

But I also take this plan as a challenge. I am aware that the numbers in the plan look unrealistic and maybe they are. But if they are not, I want to see for myself whether they are achievable or not. And if they are achievable, I wanted to have a record of this plan from day one. I wanted to show to all people who follow my blog and my trading that this is what I said in 2019 and this is what I have achieved in 2024. And posting my plan in 2024 could be seen as cheating. Like I have posted this only when I was sure I could meet the plan but avoid posting it if I fail. This doesn’t go with my strive to be transparent.

Therefore, I am posting here the full plan to freedom I set in April.
 

5-year Plan
 

Lately, I was playing with the numbers how to adjust the plan to achieve the goal faster. The reason for that was some personal life issues which made me to think that I need to achieve the freedom earlier than as planned above. I will post about the reasons later, not now.

I am still aware of all the risks. I am aware of possibilities of losing trades which would delay the plan. But I have a plan and trade management in place and thus I am aware of potential risks.

To speed up my path to freedom, I decided to further consolidate my accounts and liquidate my Motif account and transfer the funds to my trading account. This would bring in additional $2,600 dollars to this account.

I also decided to raise my traded contract from current 50% to 70% of available buying power. With these adjustments, the new plan would look like this (and it would also shorten the entire time to freedom by one entire year – given, there will be no stupid loses…):
 

5-year Plan
 

Here is a link to my live 5 year plan spreadsheet.
 

I have tools, I have determination, and I have a money management to achieve the goal. All I need is a discipline to follow the rules and mitigate potential losses to minimum. If so, I should be able to achieve this goal. Let’s see…
 

 
Previous posts related to this plan:
 

May 2019 financial freedom report – June 1, 2019
April 2019 financial freedom report – May 05, 2019
Fed up with my own lack of discipline, putting down a plan to reach FI – April 17, 2019
 
 




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Posted by Martin May 05, 2019
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April 2019 financial freedom report


April 2019 is in the books. In this month I met the goal as planned. There were a few changes I made which modified the entire plan:
 

1) I decided to combine my trading accounts into one. I closed my TD Ameritrade account (TD) and transferred funds to my Tasty Works account (TW).
2) This transfer increased money in my TW account and adjust the goal (see below).

 
The Original Plan:
 

report
 

Adjusted Plan:
 

report
 

April 2019 results:
 

How did I do in April 2019?

I did well:

  • The starting value of the account was as planned.
  • However, I violated number of contracts. There were occasions were I traded more contracts than what the plan allowed. I “approved” this to myself saying that I traded more contracts to catch up with short trading weeks available to me. The plan was to trade all four weeks in April but I only could trade three weeks. Although this didn’t backfire (unlike the breaking of the rules at the beginning of May 2019) I made money, not lost money.
  • We exceeded the premium collected over the plan.
  • The deposits were made as planned and actually exceeded the plan.
  • The ending value exceeded the plan.
     

Here are the results:

 

report
 

Here is a reminder of my strategy and way how to trade (simplified):
 

1) open a new trade on Tuesday morning only
2) open with the same week Friday expiration (3 DTE)
3) collect min. 0.30 credit
4) no wider than $5 per trade
5) multiple contracts based on BP
6) let it expire
7) wings at 5 delta or near as long as credit is 0.30
8 ) close one half of the position if the loss reaches $1.00
9) close everything if the loss reaches $1.50
10) if the market swoons through $1.00 and reaches $1.50 or even swings further, close everything.

with 5 delta, (2 SD) the swings still may happen (you never know what crazy people would do on Wall Street) but the breach is very rare. It still may happen, everything may happen, but it should happen occasionally, when panic hits…

 
Previous posts related to this plan:
 

May 2019 financial freedom report – June 1, 2019
My 5-year Plan to Freedom Update – May 22, 2019
Fed up with my own lack of discipline, putting down a plan to reach FI – April 17, 2019
 
 




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Posted by Martin April 17, 2019
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Fed up with my own lack of discipline, putting down a plan to reach FI


I started trading and learning trading options in 2010… I think it was 2010. I made money, lost money, made money, lost them again.
 

In 2012 I thought I knew everything. I didn’t.
 

In 2014 I started my own trading business. I though I knew everything. I didn’t.
 

Then I made money again. And almost lost them. This time actually I didn’t lose them. But, I locked my accounts in a deadlock of bad trades and they tie almost all money. Instead of trading for a living, I am dragging a few big, bad trades around.
 

And you know why?

 

Because I was constantly breaking my own rules!

 

I was constantly over trading and usually excused it with “it will expire and if not I will roll it and deal with it later.”
 

And this time, I got fed up of myself! This is not what I was taught, was I learned! This is not a strategy I wanted to do! I always told myself that even small amount of money could compound into big returns. Yes, if you f**king follow the rules!
 

dream
 

I laid out a 5 year plan to raise my account to a level which will allow me to retire early, in 4 years. The 5th year should be a retirement year. The cumulative numbers I will be trading in retirement are very scary as of now. It seems like I will never be able to trade such a big account and be comfortable. But, I planned it so I can start teaching my mind to it.

In January 2023 I should be on my own if my plan works.

 
All it needs is discipline and do, what I said I would do. A hard thing if you are undisciplined like I am/was! How I am planning restraining myself? I lay down how much money I will start to trade at the beginning of a month, how much money I can risk per trade, how many contracts to trade, how much money I want to make every month, and how much the account should end up with at the end of each month.
 

So, here is my year 1:
 

plan 1
 

Granted, the plan may not be accomplished if something goes wrong, but all it can take is that it may take longer to achieve my goal. But, I hope not!

But, I learned that it was not enough for me to just say what I would do next. I learned I needed a check mechanism, something what will make me self-aware of what i said I wanted to do and that I am really doing it.
 

And thus I decided to put this plan down which will state:
 

1) My account monthly starting point.
2) Number of contracts I am allowing myself to trade.
3) Monthly premiums I plan on making for each particular month.
4) Monthly deposits I plan on adding to my account to grow it.
5) And… end value for each particular month.
 

And, every month, or every week, or as often as possible, I will write down a report on fulfilling and following the plan. For example, if the plan says, that I will take 1 contract per week, then I will be required myself to trade only 1 contract! I need to act like a proprietary firm. Here are the rules and if you break them, you are out!

I once made a decision that I would limit amount of money to be made (in other words how much I can trade and how much it will make per month) and once I reach that goal I would stop trading. And then another member of the FB group told me why to limit my ability to make more money if I could make more money. So I broke my rule. And now I am in deep (well not that bad) shit. Don’t listen to others who have no idea and one day will learn the lesson the hard way.

So, below, I am posting my monthly reports. I will also be posting the plan for the upcoming years and monthly reports on my Facebook page.
 

April 2019 report (continued)
04/17/2019
 

1) We started trading with the beginning value as projected. ✅

2) We exceeded the number of contracts traded, but we did that to catch up with “mo premiums” plan as the plan expected all 4 weeks in April to be traded and we could trade 2 weeks only; thus this temporary exception was approved. However, if the “mo premiums” will be reached (for example this week) then we will go back to trading only the number of contracts allowed for the month. Also, the number of allowed contracts is determined by the available buying power. ✅

3) The ending value is projected to meet and exceed the plan, unless something unpredictable happens by EOM; ❌

4) We deposited cash as per plan and slightly exceeded the plan. ✅

5) Premiums, so far; are projected to exceed the plan. ❌
 

report

 
Previous posts related to this plan:
 

My 5-year Plan to Freedom Update – May 22, 2019
April 2019 financial freedom report – May 05, 2019
 
 




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