The markets were so horrendously manipulated that only a fool would get involved...especially when there's a Barney Curley runner involved
To think I can crack these markets is futile - and I know this - but the challenge of getting one up on the people steering the prices is more than I can resist. To cut a long story short, I got smashed from pillar-to-post and ended up -£100 down by tea time. Approx -£70 of that was from pre-race trading, the other -£30 from in-running
Should've just stayed in bed this afternoon!
Since I started jotting down my pre-race and in-running totals for each race, it's been a real eye opener just how slim my pre-race edge is some days; quite often, I'm just glad to break-even and today was one of those days.
While it's tempting to carry on sitting at your desk hoping for a miraculous turnaround, it's likely your brain is already tired and your confidence shattered from the disappointment of one negative total after another. I had no choice but to pull myself away as the weekly grocery shop at Aldi beckoned. I don't know which is worse, sitting at my desk losing money or trudging round Aldi for an hour buying the same old crap I bought last week.
Anyway, the break away from desk seemed to do the trick and I managed to rake back the deficit and half the grocery bill in the remaining 8 races :-)
post-Aldi
Even after all this time, I'm still perplexed by the way some days play out. I could've stepped away at 17:00 just -£35 down but the "lure" of one more trade is hard to resist and it ultimately cost me another -£65 over the next 3 races. As I've said in the past, I hate losing days and the bad feelings it brings - it's really exacerbated by my OCD too which insists that I don't leave any "loose ends" and a losing day is a loose end that I can't fix until tomorrow...it really bugs me!!
In other news, this weekend brings the Eurovision Song Content 2012 and to be honest it's about the only other thing I do outside of horse racing that I'm confident I can profit on at the moment. I made a measly £30 in 2010 but managed to triple that last year, so let's hope it's another good one. It's such great fun to watch and the betting side of it is fascinating - pity it's not on more often.
Hi Mets
ReplyDeleteI lost a small fortune on a Nag aptly named "Red All Over" today myself.. i should of known!!
Do you have an example of what you mean by the markets extremely manipulated?
Cheers
AL
Ah crap AL, that's no good. If I'd seen it, I think I would have treated it as some kind of omen and stayed off it!
ReplyDeleteI haven't got an example of the manipulation to-hand, but the danger signs are there if you find you're getting only a small % of your bet matched on a good price movement, and all of your bet matched on a detrimental movement! If I capture it on video I'll post it up on the blog or something - seems to be happening a lot more often these days.
I've noticed the market becoming increasingly more difficult to grasp of late. I've had to re-adjust the way I trade to taking a longer term view. So less scalping and more swing. It's a whole new approach for me so it's taking time to master entry & exit points. The markets are evolving and what once worked for me, like for you, is becoming less effective and it began showing in my P&L. Time to evolve your trading style Mets me owd china
ReplyDelete@Steve - I'm glad there are a few others who have noticed the change. I've been chipping away at the swing trading since Feb (when I first noticed things getting tougher) but I'm quite a way off mastering it! To be honest, I've been avoiding swing trading for a long time as it's never been my strong point, but as you say, we all have to evolve our styles to suit the conditions.
ReplyDeleteHi Mets,
ReplyDeleteI thought that was just normal market behaviour but definetly i think there are limited opportunities for scalpers at the moment.
Keep it green.
AL
An informative with interesting article which helped me a lot.Really an outstanding job. .
ReplyDeletethanks,
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