Guys and gals!! Good news! Today I traded Tesla (stock) and I earned… now check this out… are you ready? Here it comes… at least 40 euros! Bam. 💶. Yeah, baby. That’s four times 10 EUR, y’all! Wow. Such a great feeling, hard to describe. Another 50-60 such trades and I’m back in the game. Haha. Ok, enough of that irony. Irony is a poison anyway… forget about it…
Wait, don’t forget it yet. Let me brag a bit more. Yesterday they announced that Tesla Inc. will be accepted to S&P500 next month, so I bought a few shares. And, as predicted (by literally everyone in the financial world), Tesla shares went up, up, up.
Only, for me it went like: “up, up, ok, sell!”
I closed the position at 384 EUR (hm… “closed the position“; yeah, right, as if I was in a couple of million, haha 😊). Anyways, this is what todays Tesla Inc. chart looked like at the end of the day:
Tesla Inc. stock chart on November 18th, 2020
See that flat-ish line around 10:48 AM? Yeah… Well, that’s when I sold my shares. Because, you know… you never know in the stock market… it can go up or fall down the very next moment. I could have earned a few hundred EUR instead a few dozen, had I played it differently. Lesson learned: leaving too early can be just as bad as cumming too early…
But… since my FOMO move last time, I’ve reflected a lot on how I went nuts on that last trade a few days ago and also read a lot about (trading) psychology in the meantime. Check this out: there seems to be a cure for FOMO! It’s called JOMO, which stands for “Joy of missing out”. No kidding! Essentially, you’re supposed to train yourself to be happy when you’re NOT participating in a trade (or other activity).
Oh well… as they say: “sometimes you lose and sometimes the others win”.
Nah, that was silly… 😊
On a more serious note, this situation reminded me of the Buddhist concept of “mudita” which means feeling sympathetic joy, joy for the success of others. So, yeah… after I exited the game at 384 EUR, I was still checking the chart from time to time, questioning my today’s reasoning / trading strategy and also feeling happy for those dudes and dudettes who stayed invested as the share price went up.
I mean, I don’t lose anything if other investors win. So, nothing prevents me from feeling happy for them. It’s a strange, uncommon feeling, really.
I hope, some day soon, I’ll be the one whose stocks are going up, up, up… 📈 and some capitalist empath out there will be rejoicing my success… 😇
For some time now I’m trying to become the best version of myself. In every possible way: physically, mentally, spiritually, you name it.
And, of course, whenever you wish for something, followed by taking action to achieve that ‘something’, there’s almost no way you can fail (unless you wished for something that is objectively unattainable in this world or in your particular situation 😇). So, yes, I’m seeing some progress. I’ve radically changed my way of thinking and also the way I look at things (and people). But, it’s a long road ahead, I can feel that…
Since I embarked on this self development journey, every now and then I would run into people who (I recon) are probably not even aware of the possibility of taking the personal development / self improvement path. So whenever I bump into an old friend who is (obviously) not very much into competing against his yesterday’s self and we touch the subject of self improvement, the conversation goes approximately like this:
Old friend: “Dude, you’re just overthinking and making it too hard on yourself. Relax, man. Chill. Have a beer. And don’t forget to enjoy life, ok?”
Me (thinking, but not saying out loud): “But… I am enjoying life. I’m truly and totally enjoying this transformation from a pessimistic, chronically broke, financially uneducated, materialistic, drinking, smoking, fat, lazy, crooked teeth, planless, disorganized, nothing-ever-works-out-my-way-anyway, victim mentality, spiritually unawaken, sleep-walking-through-the-9to5-life and ungrateful type of guy to a… complete opposite!”
Also me (actually answering the question): “Yeah, sure! Enjoying life is important. And of course, you could be right about overthinking. But, you see, once you actually start thinking about the various aspects of life, about the reasons of our existance, our purpose, you can never be sure if you actually are overthinking or is it your deep reflection that went too far, too deep… ah, never mind. Forget it. Have a good one. Bye! 🤗”
What usually comes to my mind in such moments is that cute illustration with the caterpillar and a beautiful butterfly sitting at a dining table, drinking wine like two old friends and the caterpillar says to the butterfly: “You’ve changed.” The butterfly then replies: “We’re supposed to.”
Does it hurt? The transformation? When the cocoon rips open and the butterfly tries to slip through this small opening, before entering a whole new, different world as a new being, with a different perspective… well, sometimes it does. In my experience at least. But in a nice way. Let’s call it the “pain of creation”.
Wait a second. I gotta check something… Ok, so I just googled for “the pain of creation”. Oh, well, this expression exists already. For the moment I thought I came up with such a great new expression… haha. Yep. My Ego us still quite alive (but I’m at least aware of this). And… I’m obviously still somewhat naïve (or uninformed) in my mid-40’s. Like a grown up child. Haha. 😊 Ok, now, back to the topic…
So, yes, this (re-)birth does hurt. Sometimes. The only analogy I can think of right now is: building muscles. Do muscles hurt after a really good workout in the gym? Yes. But, do you worry about it? No. Do you focus on that pain? No. You’re actually looking forward to it. So, if big muscles (i.e. self improvement, starting a new life) is what you’re after, then you’re looking forward to this pain.
I guess only a person who is not on this “self improvement” trip could then ask: “Why are you doing this to yourself if it hurts?? Why don’t you just chill on the couch and enjoy life? Why do you have to change?”
Today morning I woke up very early, feeling totally positive and confident that this day will be “my day”. Yeah baby. The world is mine. Yep, FU Tony Montana… Today the world is mine.
So I opened this huge window which is almost as big as the entire outer wall of my little flat, let the fresh Berlin morning air enter this little kingdom of mine, launched YouTube and sang along “Good morning, starshine” (OST from the motion picture “Hair”; beautiful song, one of my favorites; make sure to check it out).
Why all this enthusiasm? And what’s the deal with FOMO? Well, as I already wrote, since April or so I’ve been more or less actively trading on the stock market. You know, buy low, sell high. And it worked for me so far.
And as of yesterday evening I had only a handful of stocks in my portfolio:
– Cisco Systems which I decided to keep when it dropped 22% after last earnings in August – Nokia, which was supposed to be my long-term 5G play but it became my trading cannon fodder (which, unfortunately, I bought right before it tanked from ca. 3,60 EUR to ca. 2,70 EUR) and – Varta AG, which had earnings report scheduled for today.
Now, there was all this hype regarding Varta for at least three months i.e. since their last earnings (Q2 results presentation). Everybody was like: price per share is about to explode: two fold, ten fold, whatever.
And I believed the hype. Not to a 100% but I was carried by the optimism of the others. A friend of mine (who’s opinion I respect a lot) warned me once that there might be a bit too much hype built into this Varta AG stock and that it might retreat very soon… and there are the short sellers, too, pushing the price downwards.
So I was unsure what to do. Believe all the hype in the discussion boards? Or trust my knowledgable friend? I thought, come on, his crystal ball could be just about as good as any other…
Therefore I decided to do the following: purchase Varta stock BUT sell before ER (earnings release). Ha! Just how cool am I? Sometimes share price goes up right before the earnings (and sometimes plunges right after the results are announced).
And that’s exactly what I did. Purchased a few shares and sold at a small profit yesterday evening, a minute before the market closed. Yay! 🙂
The whole market setup, stock movement and my gut feeling was very similar to that August evening when I failed to sell the shi**y Cisco stock, which made me a major bagholder ever since… You see, when every mom and pap are discussing a stock in various trading discussion boards and looking forward to the big surge after the ER, but the stock itself is reluctant to move up – then you know something is fishy. Ok, I’m lying. You can never know how the stock markets will react to ER, otherwise there would be many more billionaires than there are now. But, from my humble experience, that’s a good indicator.
So I sold bloody Varta stock yesterday evening and today morning I woke up with only Cisco Systems (my current gains from this stock are at -1.500 EUR; yep, that’s minus 1.500 EUR) and Nokia (with an avg. purchase price of 3,17 EUR and a sell order standing at 3,185 EUR).
And this is where FOMO comes into play… FOMO stands for “Fear of Missing Out” and it is probably the biggest psychological challenge for anyone who’s into trading or investing. I woke up extra early today, to read the Varta AG press release which was so ridiculously positive and hurried to buy 30 shares at any price (‘knowing’ or expecting that the stock will surge after such a positive earnings release).
Ok, but, was that all? Unfortunately not, dudes and dudettes… read on…
The stock did surge at first. Bam 💥. But then… I got greedy beyond comprehension and I sold all of my Nokia shares at a huge loss in order to purchase more Varta AG shares (which in the meantime already went up by an euro or two…). Wooohooo! I’m in. All in, so to say. Oh, yeah, BTW, that’s another stupid thing to do – going all in is usually not a good idea…
So I sold Nokia (BTW, to make it even ‘better’, bloody online Broker/Stock Exchange had split my order and sold a smaller portion at a somewhat higher price and the rest went dirt cheap. Like, really, really cheap. So cheap that I’m now expecting a loss of ca. 2000-3000 EUR). With these funds I bought another 170 shares of Varta. Yes, baby. Let’s go! Bam. 200 shares packed in a rocket. Now there’s no stopping before we reach the moon… 🚀
My rationale was: Varta will cover for Nokia loss, so everything is gonna be just fine. And then… Varta stock took a plunge. Like a stone. Blump.
So now not only I have incurred losses with Nokia (oh, you know what’s even better? Nokia reached and exceeded my previously set TP at 3,185 EUR just half an hour after I sold all the shares at a huge loss (as the mater of fact, it even went up to 3,2 EUR). Meaning – I could have exited Nokia position today morning with ca. 200/300 EUR win. Haha. FU Murphy. Yep. FU big time dude. And F your stupid law, too).
Lessons learned:
1. No FOMO 2. Don’t be greedy 3. Making a big buck in a single transaction depends a lot on luck (which may or may not come) 4. The big money is not in the buying or selling. But in the waiting (Charlie Munger) 5. Never go all in
Overall, my portfolio is still positive (I hope; we’ll see tomorrow; haha 😊). But today I decimated my gains which I’ve been slowly making since June and that’s a pity. But, you know what – I’m neither too sad nor mad about today’s experience. Of course I’m not happy about it, either. It’s just another lesson. Big money comes slowly. This is one thing I definitely need to remember.
