How I’ve Improved Productivity in My Trading DayI’ve been trading for a long time, and over the years, I’ve learned different ways to make the most of my time.
Today, I want to talk about three ways I boost productivity in my trading day:
- Using my PowerX Optimizer to quickly scan for long and short trading ideas.
- Using my Wheel Income Calculator to find attractive premium collecting ideas.
- Having a trading plan and following that plan.
In this article, I’m going to break down each one of these and explain what they are.
I’ll also explain how they help me streamline my trading. This gives me more time to focus on other things I’m interested in, like my business and real estate.
3 Pillars To Trading
I always say there are three pillars to trading:
- You need to have a trading strategy.
- You need to have the right tools.
- You need to have the right mindset.
For me, I trade two strategies: PowerX and the Options Wheel.
And I developed my own software tools to help me trade these strategies quickly and efficiently.
The PowerX Optimizer software shows me what I should trade, when I should enter, when I should exit based on my preferred criteria, and my Wheel Income Calculator tells me which option strike has the best risk/reward.
If trading software doesn’t show me this, it’s not allowing me to make the best use of my time.
Let’s take a closer look at these software programs, starting with the PowerX Optimizer.
PowerX Optimizer
With my PowerX strategy, I’m looking to buy calls on stocks trending higher or buy puts on stocks trending lower.
The PowerX Optimizer is a software I programmed for myself, my head coach Mark, and my son.
A few years ago, we made it available to everyone.
This software answers the three questions I’m looking to have answered when I’m looking for stocks
- What to trade.
- When to enter.
- When to exit.
The PowerX Optimizer will answer all three of these questions for you.
Now, I had the software programmed for myself because I wanted all my criteria in one place.
With the PowerX Optimizer, I can scan for my basic criteria that I set within the software.
For instance, I want to see a 60% return on investment over the past year, I also want to see stocks that are between $5 and $200, and I want a profit factor higher than 3 and a risk/reward higher than 2.
This is the criteria I use for trading this strategy. Your criteria may be different.
The scanner finds the best stocks and options for me based on my criteria.
I certainly don’t want to just stumble across a stock or trade everyone on TV is talking about.
Worst case scenario, if nothing meets my criteria, I simply move on.
Every day this scanner produces a list of stocks that I potentially want to trade — in less time than it takes to make a cup of coffee! Talk about a time saver!
In the beginning, I would just use charting software like TradingView, and I would go through a bunch of stocks every day to see if they met my criteria.
It got to the point where I figured there had to be an easier way, which is why I had the PowerX Optimizer developed
Instead of spending hours and hours sifting through charts and doing the math, I’m able to find a handful of stocks to look through every day in just minutes.
This frees up my time to focus on other things.
The Options Wheel Calculator
With my Options Wheel strategy, the idea is to “get paid to wait until you buy the stock.”
So I’m looking to sell a put and collect premium, and I want to pick a strike that coincides with the level I would feel comfortable buying the stock.
Ultimately, I want to get assigned, and then I’ll look to potentially sell covered calls on the stock.
The tool I use to identify stocks and options I want to trade with this strategy is the Wheel Income Calculator.
The Wheel Calculator pulls up stocks and tells me the minimum option premium I need to collect to make this trade work for me, and the risk/reward setup for each strike.
I have set aside $500,000 in buying power for this strategy.
That’s what works for me. It does work with smaller accounts if that’s what you have to work with.
That’s why I love these tools. They have made my life so much easier.
I’m not just picking a trade based on a gut feeling.
Instead, I’m trading with a systematic approach that’s based on data.
Remember, I like to trade for SCR Profits.
SRC stands for Systematic, Repeatable, and Consistent.
Trading Plan
And that leads me to the last thing I want to talk about today: having a trading plan.
You see, having a trading plan is key to having the right mindset to trade.
There are three key parts of a trading plan that I’ve already mentioned, but again, they are:
- What you’re going to trade?
- When you’re going to enter?
- When you’re going to exit — both for a profit and a loss.
This is also where those limit and stop-loss orders I mentioned earlier come in handy.
Limit orders allow you to tell your broker the price you want to get filled, and if you get that price, you move on.
Same with stop-loss orders. You tell your broker what point you want to get out of the trade, and if the stock hits that level, you’re out.
This allows you to not be tied to your computer, watching every tick the stock makes and opens up your day to allow you to focus on other things.
I cannot stress enough how important it is to be prepared when you’re trading — and to have a plan before you enter a position.
So, as you can see, by defining my strategies, I developed tools like the PowerX Optimizer and Wheel Income Calculator to help me find trades quickly and efficiently that work with my rules and my plan.
I hoped this helped and I’ll see you at the next one.
