Just came across an interesting website, http://www.texasholdeminvesting.com . I’ve been playing Texas Hold’em poker for a while now via Facebook/Zynga and unlike past experiences I now really enjoy my time playing it. I’m not sure why in the past I didn’t catch the holdem bug. If I try to think about it then maybe it’s a developmental thing. In the past I was attracted to holdem, and did reasonably well but found it too similar to trading on the emotional side and therefore a bit of a drain while now that aspect disappeared and I can play it for hours.

Anyways, as the title of the post and the website indicate there are countless parallels between investing / day trading and Texas Holdem Poker. In fact the Texasholdeminvesting website came up with a book dedicated to identifying the similarities. I’ve just downloaded it (free intro), and looking through he’s got most of the topics covered, like: managing emotions, thinking in probabilities, performance analysis, and bankroll size and position sizing. I’m hard pressed to find a game with more similarities with trading than poker. Depending on your personal traits poker can be a good way to sharpen some trading related skills or just have some fun during market downtime.

H/T to Meir.

P.S. If you’re playing texas hold’em and haven’t tried Zynga I think it’s one of the nicest free fake money poker out there that I’ve come across. If you’re on my facebook list give me a buzz if you want to play a few rounds.

Tags: Buzz, Day Trading, emotions, experiences, facebook, game, market, parallels, performance, performance analysis, position sizing, probabilities, stocks trading, texas hold em poker, texas holdem poker, trading, Zynga

Lots of cool new stuff from Google these days. An eBook store (watch out Amazon), a cross platform eReader (Kindle on the sights) to go with it, new Google Nexus Two S (S? Because Samsung doesn’t like to be number two), touted as “Best phone on the market today”. Android Gingerbread with a number of usability and speed improvements. Motorola tablet (10 inches?) running Honeycomb. 3D Google maps, VOIP built-in, and all kinds of customizations for Tablets. I’ve have some hands on with the Samsung Galaxy Tab the other day (and also the iPad), Samsung has done an excellent job with the Galaxy, it was a real pleasure to use. The smaller screen and form factor were much more convenient and easy to hold and play with than the heavy iPad.

Anyways, so far I’ve got the Gingerbread keyboard flashed over to replace the Froyo stock keyboard. But this presents a problem… I like Swiftkey, Swype and the new Gingerbread keyboard, which one should I use?? Decisions.. decisions.. (if you’re an iPhone user you’re probably snickering right now ;-) ).

I’m now on Froyo 2.2.1 build FRF83 and can’t wait for the flashable ROM with the new 2.3 Gingerbread, yes I am a geek. I’m not likely to change from Nexus One to S, the changes are too small to be worth it and some things I like about the One more, like having the option to change the SD card instead of the built-in 16GB of the S.

I should probably do another post of my favourite Android apps. Since the explosion in the number of apps on Android recently there are some really awesome ones I’ve installed like replacing the stock browser with xScope (looks and behaves almost like desktop Chrome).

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Tags: Amazon, android, Android Apps, Chrome, ereader, froyo, Galaxy Tab, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, iphone, Kindle, market, Motorola Tablet, Nexus One, nexus s, phone, ROM, Samsung, Swiftkey, Swype, tablet, VOIP, xScope

Big Mike who has had very extensive experience with NinjaTrader came to the same conclusion I have: the myriad of problems and hassles surrounding NinjaTrader – all versions: 6.5 beta and 7 alpha – are just not worth the effort and investment of time. Check out his blog post: Big Mike’s Trading Blog: Tired of NinjaTrader?. There are several good reads in his forum about alternatives for anyone trading with a DOM.

One good solution I haven’t seen mentioned is a combination of InteractiveBrokers and ZeroLineTrader. I like this combo for a number of reasons:

1. IB’s TWS is rock solid, excellent stability and the broker itself is one of the more reliable ones (most of the time).

2. IB’s commissions are very reasonable, at $2 they might not be the cheapest around but not that far off for a small retail trader either. For a nice comparison of commissions see HPT’s post here.

3. IB’s universal account means I don’t need to split my account, I can trade stocks and futures in the same place. Including most futures contracts around the world.

4. ZeroLine Trader platform itself has been rock solid with a lot of very nice options for a very reasonable price. There are other alternatives like the cheaper BracketTrader but it’s bare bones, and ButtonTrader which is too complicated and expensive to my taste.

Anyways, this topic of IB TWS+DOM (ZLT or others) probably merits a proper separate post of its own. But the main point is that there are many alternatives and options available that one should spend some time to find what works for them, which is a better approach then trying to force their trading on something that doesn’t work too well.

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Tags: Brokers, buttontrader, commissions, comparison, DOM, futures, hpt, interactivebrokers, ninjatrader, ninjatrader for mac, ninjatrader interactive brokers, ninjatrader mac, NT, platform, Stocks, trading, trading platform, TWS, X-Trader, XTrader, Zeroline trader, Zerolinetrader, zlt

Looks like the almighty Goldman Sachs had an iffy bet on volatility this summer.

“Primarily in response to our client needs, our equity derivatives business was short volatility entering the second quarter and posted poor results,” Chief Financial Officer David Viniar said on a conference call with reporters today. The firm didn’t break out the size of the loss or the overall results from the equity derivatives group responsible for the business.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-07-20/goldman-sachs-lost-money-betting-volatility-would-drop-in-second-quarter.html

It’s certainly been one of the more interesting summers that I recall. Usually I would get almost no candidates in June-Aug but at the moment I can’t even tell it’s summer based on the action.

Anyways, back to GS, I wouldn’t be too worried for them ;-) whatever they dropped in their derivatives they’re making hand over fist with their evil high frequency trading algos.

Tags: bet, Chief Financial Officer David Viniar, derivatives, Equity derivative, Goldman, Goldman Sachs, high frequency, size, summer, summer trading, trading loss, volatility

I was thinking about trading strengths, weakness and was going to create a list for myself but found it hard to decide where to start. So I just started with brainstorming all the positive trading skills and traits, personal attributes and characteristics I could think of that successful traders might have. Here’s the list, see if I missed out on anything.

Discipline
Resilience in the face of adversity
Desire to continue and improve
Persistence
Curiosity
Creativity
Networking
Calmness
Courage
Competitiveness
Pattern recognition
Numerical skills
Practical (as opposed to idealistic)
Self confidence

Btw, INO is hosting a webinar and offering free access to MarketClub for 2 weeks, this isn’t one of those offers where you have to pay up front and cancel withing a certain amount of time, this requires no payment
info and cancels automatically in 2 weeks. Sign up here.

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Tags: competitiveness, courage, creativity, desire, discipline, free access, pattern recognition, personal attributes, resilience, self confidence, strengths weakness, successful traders, Trader, trading

Update: I’ve been using the Ascaso i-Mini 2 coffee grinder for 2 weeks now and I absolutely love it! I’m now on an obsessive quest for the Perfect Coffee. And this relatively inexpensive home grinder has been one of the best investments I’ve made towards a perfect espresso. The consistency of the grind, the ease of filling up the portafilter and gorgeous smell of coffee in the morning (and afternoon, and evening lol) right after grinding. Fantastic.

Had a great weekend in Singapore catching up with all my friends. Now that almost all of them have moved back to Singapore we can meet more often.

Anyways in between the excellent pubs, restaurants, discussions on the meaning of the life the universe and the markets, champagne brunch, cigar bar, back alley roti prata joint, football finals etc. I managed to squeeze in a bit of shopping and picked up this little beauty:

I paid $270 for the I2 Mini Steel version (conical burrs and doserless) which is quite reasonable compared to the US price of $249. In Thailand it costs almost double that.

Had my first shot using it this evening. Marvelous. You can read more about it at the home barista forum which has some good reviews, comparisons and user experiences such as this one.

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Tags: ascaso, Ascaso mini, barista, beans, coffee, coffee grinder Singapore, espresso, home coffee grinder, iMini, Perfect, portafilter, shopping, singapore, thailand

So yes I’m still alive. No updates for a while, I know. Not that things are quiet, on the contrary, lots happening, especially since we got back from trekking in Sapa. 2009 was a good year, may 2010 will be at least just as good :-)

Anyways, after trying a couple of times to watch Avatar at the IMAX just to find out all normal timeshows were sold out (who goes to watch a movie at 3am??), we finally managed to watch it yesterday. It’s a good movie, especially the visual effects. Story-wise it’s a mix of Pocahontas / Matrix / Dances with Wolves / Last Samurai, i.e. an outsider white guy falls in love with a local, ‘goes native’ and saves a world from the bad guys with some Jurasic Park elements thrown in too. Maybe it’s the amazing graphics together with the 3D and IMAX huge screen but I didn’t feel the movie was long despite it being over 2 hours. The flying scenes and the forest at night were especially fantastic. Go and watch and see for yourself.