Yesterday was my first day back at the gym and managed to snap right back into my full routine in stark contrast of me barely being able to walk upright just last Sunday. As the saying goes: No Pain – No Gain, or in Yuletide terms: No Lift No Gift! Which pretty much has been my motto for most of this year as I’ve been working my ass off 10 hours plus seven days a week on the quant system front, all of which is slowly starting to pay off now. More on that to follow over the coming weeks after alpha testing has completed.
Equities futures are rolling into their March contracts today which is in part why we saw a distinct increase in realized volatility over the past week or two. Not being a huge fan of rainy winters in the Mediterranean I for one can’t wait for expiration day which also happens to be my spring vacation season. Then again I shouldn’t complain about the weather judging by what some of my trading buddies in Chicago are going through right now. Scraping ice from your windshield is one thing, scraping it off your contact lenses is another.
Not surprisingly we are now seeing a bit of post Thanksgiving profit taking on both the equity and currency side. Had I not been stopped out on Friday already I most definitely would have been yesterday. And now the trails of both of my forex campaigns also received a visit so I’m almost all in cash. Holiday weeks are great periods for break-out formations due to less liquidity allowing institutional traders to leverage their market moving capabilities and pin the tape to their liking.
While you lowly mortals are slowly awakening from your tryptophan induced slumbers the mighty Mole is already banking coin whilst selecting future victims for lawful extraction of ill-gotten gains [insert evil laughter of your choice] As tough as this racket may be at times and despite the personal toll it invariably takes on us over time – you’ve got to love that feeling of waking up in the morning and realizing that your campaign has produced yet another R overnight. As a trader by heart and evil speculator by trade this more than makes up for all those dark times when find yourself on the losing end of the market’s zero sum equation.