... watching Paul Lawrie marching down the 18th at the end of his third round today, berating himself for a day of missed opportunities I thought to myself 'there's a beaten man'. Sure enough in that fantastically atmospheric amphitheatre he contrived to three put from about as many feet to hammer the final nail into his Open coffin.
In a similar way, Tiger exhibited his emotions when in the last few holes his chosen strategy of taking irons off the Lancashire tees left him with just too much to do with his approach shots, especially when his putting is patently not what it once was.
So it seems my back bet on Lawrie is effectively toast, whilst my lay of Tiger is very much alive and kicking. Various other trades, some successful, some not, mean that I can now contemplate a final Sunday in which the prospect of a bit of wind and a GMac charge suggest that Scott might well be a bit light at 1.79 - 1.81.
Laying at odds on on the final day of a major will never really threaten you with the poor house these days, so I'm prepared to invest all my green from the first three days and a couple of hundred more to lay Scott for £350 - liability of £280 at 1.80 - minus my cumulative green of £70 ish. If he starts well and hits 1.4 I'll take the loss and move on, otherwise my initial would be exit point is 2.5 or better to round the week off nicely.
Saturday, 21 July 2012
Friday, 20 July 2012
Will the 'summer' weather yet play a part?
A quite sublime chip from a greenside bunker puts Woods in a great position at the end of the second day's play at Lytham St Annes. He is 4 shots off the lead and in a clear third place. Yet he is joint favourite, at the time of writing, at 4.4. The other joint favourite is Adam Scott. The leader, Snedeker, is at 6, with a one shot advantage over the Aussie.
In my opinion Tiger is one of those characters who causes a massive over reaction in the markets, and, for that reason is a lay for me at that price. Snedeker was playing quite controlled, resolute golf from what I could see and whilst I don't necessarily see him holding on to win I think a four shot cushion over the prowling Tiger will enable the latter's price to swing in and out from its current value.
There is talk in some quarters of a windy, possibly wet, day on Sunday in Lancashire. I hope there is some of both, not in extreme, but enough to 'put the cat amongst the pigeons'. The cat I have in mind is Paul Lawrie - currently at 32 (although I must admit to having had a sneaky tenner on him at 80!) and playing probably the best golf he's played in quite some time. Blustery, squally conditions are right up his street, and Tiger will hate them!
Saturday's tee times and pairings have yet to be confirmed but it looks to me as if Woods will be paired with Olesun and Lawrie with Matt Kuchar - should be an interesting day tomorrow but unfortunately I'm working. Good luck if you trade it.
In my opinion Tiger is one of those characters who causes a massive over reaction in the markets, and, for that reason is a lay for me at that price. Snedeker was playing quite controlled, resolute golf from what I could see and whilst I don't necessarily see him holding on to win I think a four shot cushion over the prowling Tiger will enable the latter's price to swing in and out from its current value.
There is talk in some quarters of a windy, possibly wet, day on Sunday in Lancashire. I hope there is some of both, not in extreme, but enough to 'put the cat amongst the pigeons'. The cat I have in mind is Paul Lawrie - currently at 32 (although I must admit to having had a sneaky tenner on him at 80!) and playing probably the best golf he's played in quite some time. Blustery, squally conditions are right up his street, and Tiger will hate them!
Saturday's tee times and pairings have yet to be confirmed but it looks to me as if Woods will be paired with Olesun and Lawrie with Matt Kuchar - should be an interesting day tomorrow but unfortunately I'm working. Good luck if you trade it.
Thursday, 12 July 2012
Growing the bank
Betfree247 made an interesting comment to my last post, prompting me to think a bit more about what building a bank actually entails and how to go about doing it. I started trading primarily to see if I could generate a full time income from it and 'retire' from the rat race. Some four years on I can safely say that, yes, you can generate a full time income from it.
You can. I can't.
I simply don't have the right mindset to do it ~ and it's no good trying to pretend otherwise. Although my trades are generally speaking profitable I still, with monotonous regularity, get in too deep, let a loser run, panic out of a winner for fear of it becoming a loser etc etc etc. Sometimes, having committed one of those crimes I chase to recover. The reason I carry on is because I enjoy it and because I'm NOT dependent on it to help with my domestic finances, at all.
Having said that, who couldn't use a few hundred quid a month, tax free? So what's the best way of doing this and what do you need to to do to achieve it?
Other bloggers have written about the dangers of setting short term targets. The theory being that if you have a target of say, £20 per night, and the first trade loses £10 that you then enter another trade for the wrong reasons. The converse is that if the first trade makes £50 you then enter another trade for different, but still wrong, reasons. In both cases the smart thing to have done would have been to take the plug off your pc and sit with the missus watching Eastenders, tomorrow being another day. It would seem you can't win if you approach it in this way. I'm not 100% convinced by this argument, but as time has gone by I am concluding that there's a lot to be said for it.
So if you aren't trading to a financial or percentile target, how else can you make long term gains? The only other way, surely, is to only enter the right trades and to have in your mind one of two outcomes... 1) that the trade will either win or it won't and you'll live with the result or 2) that at the outset you set pre-determined exit points so that you make or lose an acceptable amount. If your immediate reaction is that 2) is similar to setting short term targets I'd have some sympathy with that viewpoint, but if you stop and think about it they are totally different in terms of mental approach. Both approaches, to be successful, depend on you making enough on the winners to outweigh the loss on the losers. That sounds like stating the obvious, but it leads nicely to my next point...
The other point that I would make is that to succeed long term, like it or not, you need to put effort into choosing your trades. Spraying money around across lots of different sports and markets without some clear strategy is a no hoper in my opinion. I know that IF I just restricted my trading to my favourite trade I would make money in the long run. I've honed and tweaked it just about as much as I believe I can now, although to be honest it hasn't changed in essence that much. My problem is, always has been and probably now always will be, a lack of discipline. I don't seem to be able to stick to the straight and narrow.
As Betfree247 concludes in his comment: 'Trying to work out the right theory for yourself really is the key to this I believe, we need to find out what we're comfortable with and try to implement that. It's definitely not a one size fits all scenario.'
I couldn't agree more!
You can. I can't.
I simply don't have the right mindset to do it ~ and it's no good trying to pretend otherwise. Although my trades are generally speaking profitable I still, with monotonous regularity, get in too deep, let a loser run, panic out of a winner for fear of it becoming a loser etc etc etc. Sometimes, having committed one of those crimes I chase to recover. The reason I carry on is because I enjoy it and because I'm NOT dependent on it to help with my domestic finances, at all.
Having said that, who couldn't use a few hundred quid a month, tax free? So what's the best way of doing this and what do you need to to do to achieve it?
Other bloggers have written about the dangers of setting short term targets. The theory being that if you have a target of say, £20 per night, and the first trade loses £10 that you then enter another trade for the wrong reasons. The converse is that if the first trade makes £50 you then enter another trade for different, but still wrong, reasons. In both cases the smart thing to have done would have been to take the plug off your pc and sit with the missus watching Eastenders, tomorrow being another day. It would seem you can't win if you approach it in this way. I'm not 100% convinced by this argument, but as time has gone by I am concluding that there's a lot to be said for it.
So if you aren't trading to a financial or percentile target, how else can you make long term gains? The only other way, surely, is to only enter the right trades and to have in your mind one of two outcomes... 1) that the trade will either win or it won't and you'll live with the result or 2) that at the outset you set pre-determined exit points so that you make or lose an acceptable amount. If your immediate reaction is that 2) is similar to setting short term targets I'd have some sympathy with that viewpoint, but if you stop and think about it they are totally different in terms of mental approach. Both approaches, to be successful, depend on you making enough on the winners to outweigh the loss on the losers. That sounds like stating the obvious, but it leads nicely to my next point...
The other point that I would make is that to succeed long term, like it or not, you need to put effort into choosing your trades. Spraying money around across lots of different sports and markets without some clear strategy is a no hoper in my opinion. I know that IF I just restricted my trading to my favourite trade I would make money in the long run. I've honed and tweaked it just about as much as I believe I can now, although to be honest it hasn't changed in essence that much. My problem is, always has been and probably now always will be, a lack of discipline. I don't seem to be able to stick to the straight and narrow.
As Betfree247 concludes in his comment: 'Trying to work out the right theory for yourself really is the key to this I believe, we need to find out what we're comfortable with and try to implement that. It's definitely not a one size fits all scenario.'
I couldn't agree more!
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