Breaking Through, Travelling On

Karmacat

A trade came along, and I took it, made a couple of points profit (i.e. piddling :rotfl:) but more importantly, it shed light on the whole thing about the markets being "the science of fear and greed". Those are the two extremes, of course, but there's a biggie in the middle thats completely unmentioned, and goes a long way towards explaining that other cliche: the way that newcomers do the opposite of whats recommended in the saying: cut your losses short, let your profits run.

Newcomers <KC sticks her hand up immediately, nice and high, like Hermione Grainger> do the opposite, they let their losses run, and cut their profits short.

I've actually cracked the whole cutting the losses short thing - I have a stoploss (can't be automatic, its too close to the market price :rotfl:) and I keep to it, I learned that a long time ago.

I've also learned to cope with the whole crossover point between the natural wibbling when you first enter the market, and the start of the steady surge in profits.

And its the steady surge in profits I haven't learned to cope with yet :eek: and I never, ever thought that would be true of me. Its about relief and uncertainty! The uncertainty of loss, fine, dealt with it. But the uncertainty of how much profit, and how quickly it might be taken away by something unexpected, ah!, thats a different kettle of fish. Entirely different. Think of a prawn, think of a blue whale, there's that level of difference.

Shows up very strongly in two trades I made this week: I profited 5 points, the trade went on to give an exit signal at 30 points. This trade I just did today, it wibbled quite a lot so I got out quite quickly after it became profitable, just a couple of points. But its currently showing over 15 points profit (its still going!).

So, the Science of Fear and Greed gives way to the Bog of Uncertainty and Relief :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Normal service will now be resumed :T

edinburgher

Trading, profits, signals, technical analysis -

I wonder whether consideration of the intangible is naturally difficult for humans, perhaps more so when it contributes to our livelihood?

Systems aside, it sometimes feels like we're all sitting in the dark, grasping on to patterns to try and make sense of a universe that refuses to behave the way we expect it to.

It feels very far removed from even a couple of generations ago (I sit at a computer all day, my Grandad was a coal miner).

Please excuse my noodling in response to yours :coffee:

Karmacat

:wave::coffee:

No excusing to be done, edinburgher, I appreciate your thoughts. I even agree with them! I definitely think there are patterns, but that on so many, many levels, they get overridden by random events, and even by larger patterns. Which is why, I think, even with perfect execution, no system ever works 100%.

Same with the work I do - the concept is great, very close to reality, but because our knowledge of the brain, and of personality's dependence on the brain, is still incomplete, the theory is incomplete, so sometimes its going to be wrong. (Eek! I should really blog about this ).

And if ZTD is reading this, he'll recall our discussion about Black Swan events ...

The point about it relating to our livelihoods is real too, and again, thats something that I thought didn't apply to me - if I was doing the trading as a board game, it would be really different from me doing it as a way of making money, totally!

And yes, totally different from family background - my dad, and his dad, worked in a factory, my mum got a scholarship to attend secondary school (and her dad made her stay, because otherwise she'd have been called up) and her dad worked on the Mersey River. And I'm a counsellor! Bit different

Karmacat

After another convo with edinburgher, on his thread, I updated my linked in profile slightly - blimey, its complicated! Did a bit, couldn't bear it, so came away and read Martin's newsletter instead.

Result! Used the 25% ocado saving on new customers - tried to shop as cheaply/normally as I could, otherwise there's no point doing it, and got a £49 shop for £37 :j and delivery cost all of 99p

Karmacat

Just done a trade - and I can't believe I was so careless! I could see perfectly well that it didn't fit my criteria (I won't bore you with how) - but I heard myself thinking "just a quick in an out". Nope. Life doesn't work that way in this context. I got out when I realised quite how dumb I was being, and count myself lucky that it was only a four point loss - that loss would have increased to ten by now, ha!

I evolved my system for a reason! Doh!

Today ... today is about cleaning supervisee is coming round tomorrow, and the dust is, well, its a bit shocking to anyone else

Plus I need to be out in the garden, like I said to Dedicated further up this page, weeds and grass are *definitely* taking hold. Its so tempting to use the raw mulch I just got in areas where I won't have time to plant this year, but I *know* thats wrong, grrr. Well, best to just keep going - I also have some bags of topsoil I can use, so there's that too.

And I can use my Holland and Barrett voucher in the last day of their current buy one, get one half price offer - their prices are completely untrustworthy, of course, they have so many offers on, but I'm not paying their full price for anything, ever, so today is good enough.

edinburgher

You really need to pay attention KC, don't you?

I was thinking the same thing yesterday with MB (made two 'mistakes' that cost me a risk free £12). Small beer in financial terms, but more than sufficient to buy several good beers in real life

As long as the general trend is positive, I think we just need to let these things go?

Karmacat

Very true, Edinburgher, about the attention and about the letting go, absolutely. About it being small beer, too; mine would only have paid for a single pint :rotfl: but I still don't want to give the market anything at all

Am currently working on the Amazon shop for the moggies - angling it much more towards what my website actually talks about, thanks to chatting on here.

But there's nice looking sunshine out there, even if a little hazy, and I can hear Holland and Barrett calling

Karmacat

Went to H&B - they're toerags, I do hate their stupid pricing policies and also popped into M&S - cheese is on offer as is their Victoria sponge :p:p

Then I spent an hour in the garden - weeding, setting up a bit more border between the grass and the beds - made of anything really, old rooftile, old scaffolding planks, scavenged timber, old bricks - a few bits are made of clods of earth, because when I dug them up I could see a worm disappearing into them, and I didn't want to hurt it, so I just left it I don't like the way digging in the garden hurts worms, so I'm very careful when I do it

Anyway, I've been thinking about pensions (again). I was loving the whole tax dark thing, as laid out originally on monevator, but edinburgher tells me, correctly, that that loophole has been closed this year. Pah! Still, it got me thinking about a financial goal, rather than "oh my god, I can't wait to stop work". Thats what the next post is about.

Karmacat

1. personal allowance next year, 2014-15, is £10,000.

2. aim to have enough money in the pension pot to provide £10,000 a year. This is not huge, of course, but at least its a goal. that should be achievable, though only by some fairly draconian means.

3. I'm less than halfway there right now _pale_ Two big chunks of cash would be freed up by:
- moving back north. "North" is very different from when I left, I'd have no problems living there now
- getting rid of the s*dding French apartment. I wouldn't get out what I put in, but at least I'd be shut of it, and its huge servicing fees.

3. State pension will kick in, in 7 years time, with another £6k or so.

4. I've never actually made an SOA - mostly because I'm self employed and there's no point saying "I can spend this on treats this month", but in the new tax year, I'm going to lay out the basics - bills, food, necessary subscriptions, an average amount each for Christmas, rail travel, clothes, that sort of thing.

5. And since the month/year when I want to stop work is getting awfully close, I'm going to monitor my spending: I've done the occasional spending diary, but thats all. This will be a year long attempt to ensure that I max out my pension efforts.

Karmacat

- get rid of the French apartment. What would be the financial implications at various stages? Much investigation needed.
- sell more stuff - I want fewer and fewer of the books I have :T as well as the CDs. I never actually listen to CDs at all.
- the lilac sofa I've been wittering about recently, I want it to go.
- I also want my big desk to go. Its only about 15 years old, but I certainly wouldn't want to take it with me when I go, so I need to plan accordingly. I'll keep the office chair for now, simply because its got wheels, and it makes life easy, but I won't take that either.
- the work on the garden is part of this push - fruit bushes will provide some of the treats, and salad veg and sprouting will provide some of the nutrition, keeping costs well down, without too much heavy effort.
- rationalise my pension savings: next year, take out an ISA that accepts transfers, the few that I *do* have are out of their bonuses now, so they need to be transferred somewhere better.
- fairly new (small) 3rd pension with Aviva, that needs to go into gilts/bonds or something, not shares. Other pension pots, could at least look at divvy income, rather than capital growth, more appropriate for this stage of preparation.
- bits and bobs I make along the way - amazon, music magpie, vouchers, whatever, I'll transfer them to the new secondary cheque account I now have, and then to the savings account attached to that - if they go into the ordinary savings pot, they just get lost, and I know from long experience that I need to see those efforts adding up.
- I have shares that aren't in an ISA! Sell them, and put the money into an ISA, for heaven's sake!
- income is from counselling work, and I plan on making income from the cat website, and from trading. Other possibles are from the novel, and from the foraging book. Consider re-starting matched betting.

The aim is that between the personal allowance and the legitimate expenses I claim (professional insurance and memberships, work travel, etc etc) that I'd pay as little tax as possible, so that I contribute as much to my pension as possible. I'd be keeping an eye on income/expenditure and adjust pension payments and ISA contributions to suit. Of course, you can withdraw a certain amount from an ISA without penalty, yes? I've never done that ... that will help.

This starts in the new tax year :T:T:T