Getting chopped up

I haven't posted a trading idea in a while, because to be honest I'm having a difficult time predicting anything lately. My suggestions and postion on the Euro-Dollar relationship were good for quite some time, and I like that sort of trend. As I noted in a post here, that trend ended with a "head and shoulders" chart formation, and there has been no consistent movement since.

Well, the rest of the market has been that way for me lately too. I am fairly risk-adverse these days and the fact that I'll soon be taking an extended scuba vacation has kept me from playing the upcoming earnings season.

That "risk-adversity" has seen me getting chopped up and out of several daytrading positions in recent days. I've taken some small losses on positions that later on the same day would have been good profits, but there was no way to foresee that. CFC is a good example. I had puts on that bankruptcy rumor, and covered quickly after their PR, and trading resumed. I'm not going to lose sleep over the few dollars lost in that trade, but looking at where the stock ended yesterday, I can't help but get frustrated.

I've also played IWM recently, but the wild swings there have hit my stops before I would take profits, profits I could have taken just a couple of hours later. And today I stopped out of a few MDC puts, and I top-ticked that one. Ten minutes of patience would have saved me quite a bit of money. Frankly, these markets seem to know exactly what my pain tolerance is.

I've been getting chopped up, so I'm getting out for a while, and going on vacation. I'll be back in February, when hopefully the markets will be a little more sane, and a little more predictable.