2017 & 5 Years Review

An entire year gone by since I last posted, here are my 2017 & past 5 years results.

Year	Absolute Gains / (losses)	% Return	Styles
2013	$   3,595.89	8.4%	Penny, intra-day, dividends play
2014	$   4,182.00	5.9%	Insiders following, intra-day, technical analysis, candlesticks
2015	$(2,785.44)	-2.8%	Value Catch (more like Value Traps)
2016	$   4,244.83	3.2%	Unwinding previous holdings, divergences, dividends play
2017	$   2,111.68	1.6%	Divergences, caught falling knives

Honestly, I am not a great trader, looking back I struggled with same mistakes as I did in 2015, 2016 & continued to today. At times, it were ok to hold on beyond cut losses, with some bounced back, other times when it don't, it became too painful to hold.

As such, I decided to top up $7,000 from my year end bonus to my CPF SA account to lower my taxable income as well. This was my first time doing so, as it is a leap of faith to lock up the monies in CPF SA and ultimately to believe in the government in maintaining prudence and prosperity of the island country Singapore until my retirement 29 years later (I am age 33 this year), presuming retirement age was still 62 then.

I also transferred my CPF OA monies to SA account and managed to hit the minimum sum of $168K in SA in Jan 18. This showed that if one is to spend prudently and worked 10 years with an below average to medium income (I started with salary $1.7K in 2008 and only earned about $4K, both gross figures), its possible to reach the minimum sum.

The big caveat is to avoid buying big expense items like house and car and delayed gratification for 10years if possible. Many peers held alternative beliefs that travel twice a year to exotic countries and luxury eating each weekends are deserved relaxations, well each to their own. As long as one spend within its means and not use debts to purchase doodads or liabilities, thats fine.

I guess my circumstances is getting common, as a bachelor single, I do go out occasionally and nearby countries for travel, hiking but I dont crave for car since the COE is so high. 

Also, I stayed with my aged parent, being the only single in my family; naturally the filial piety burden falls on me, though without having to rent or pay mortgage, it allows me to save & direct this monies to trading. 

As I plan my personal work plan in 2018, I do foresee more time to be involved in my Master studies starting in 2018 to end 2020. I also had to divert more of my disposable income now to engage a maid to care for my aged parent, I have to say currency difference is really a big advantage for affluent countries to utilize precious human resources that would otherwise been too costly to hire. Still the costs of wage & daily expenses had reduced my disposable income, I had to make my money works harder by honing my trading skills better. Each time I went on a series of wins, I became overconfident, and when loss hits, I tend to hold it for too long and stun like vegetable, unable to act.

Q4	$601.58
Q4%	0.45%
Q3	$3,769.99
Q3%	2.84%
Q2	$328.92
Q2%	0.25%
Q1	-$1,828.81
Q1%	-1.38%

My returns by quarter was actually quite good except each huge loss often took me several good wins to cover.

A = 30%+ of channel			14	40%	49%
B = 20%-30%			3	9%
C = 10%-20%			8	23%
D = 10% or less			2	6%	29%
F = Loss			8	23%
			35

In fact, out of my 35 trades for the year, majority were wins that grabbed more than 20% of the channel (based on ATR+2 daily band), but the trouble is some channel lacks volatility and not enough to profit or even breakeven.

Worse still, that 8 loss trades hit me hard, with 6 trades above $1K loss and 2 trades almost $1K loss.

Had I not make those 8 losing trades, I would be $8K richer; well common fantasy in trading (similar to gambling, had I know the toto numbers... )

To end with a resolution for 2018, I hope I can be wiser in my trades and hold those uptrends longer; to move from trading divergence swings to ride on uptrends and grab 30%+ of weekly channel for longer term trades.

Happy, Healthy and Wealth 2018!