Bohen’s Take: New Year’s Resolutions for Traders, an Awesome Earnings Winner, Plus Why I Bought a Peloton

Welcome to the very first edition of Bohen’s Take for 2020…

In this edition, I’ll tell you how I responded to outrage culture by purchasing an exercise bike…

You’ll hear my thoughts on exactly how to set a New Year’s trading resolution — that you can actually stick to.

Plus, we’ll examine one of 2019’s best examples of an earnings winner. It’s one of our favorite setups in StocksToTrade Pro. Let’s get right to it…

What’s the Haps?

Well, gang, the new year is here … I hope you all had an awesome holiday and you’re ready to start dominating 2020.

For Christmas, I got myself something pretty cool … a Peloton exercise bike.

I know, I know… Bohen got more exercise equipment … Big deal, right? For me, this situation is a little different…

If you listen to the SteadyTrade podcast, you might recall the episode where my co-host Kim Ann Curtin and I discussed outrage culture and the scandal around one of Peleton’s ads.

The company Peloton released an ad a few months back where a husband purchases one of the exercise bikes for his wife. At first, the wife is underwhelmed. But as the ad goes on, she becomes ecstatic with her Peloton experience and ends up thanking her husband for the present…

This commercial sent the internet into a meltdown…

The complainers and social justice warriors of our society were outraged! They were acting as if purchasing the bike for his wife was abusive, and that the husband was forcing his wife to work out.

But the wife seemed pretty happy … Plus, at the end of the day, it’s just an ad. The complainers need to take a chill-pill.

So, as a big middle finger to outrage culture, plus the fact I love all things working out and fitness … I had to get one of these bikes for myself.

They’re pretty pricey at around $2,000. But I gotta say, these bikes come with a pretty cool, modern experience. They have a screen where you can connect online to a live spin class with a motivating instructor.

I think the whole thing is a pretty cool experience. It really feels like you’re in a class at the gym … But are they worth $2,000? I’m not so sure about that for the average person…

After Christmas, came New Year’s. How did I ring in 2020? Did I have a massive party, get drunk, and make a fool of myself?

Absolutely not! I like to go to bed a little after the stroke of midnight and get a good start on the new year when I wake up. That brings me to a special feature of this edition of Bohen’s Take: my views on New Year’s resolutions for traders…

New Year’s Resolutions for Traders

Personally, I get pretty fired up at the start of each new year. I sit down, think about what I want to get done over the next twelve months, and write down some specific goals.

A lot of people set lofty New Year’s goals. But studies show that most people last an average of two weeks or so before reverting back to old habits.

That said, I think resolutions can be awesome for traders. So I want to make sure I give my readers some advice on setting them. Because I think a lot of people make a common mistake when they set their goals for a new year.

Too often, they bite off more than they can chew…

Think about it … when the new year begins, a lot of people set really ambitious goals. They’ll quit smoking, quit drinking, exercise more, spend more time with the kids, become a profitable trader, and on and on…

There’s nothing wrong with those goals. They’re great. But look at it this way — just one of those goals is a pretty massive endeavor. So what are the odds that someone who tries to pursue them all will fail? Pretty high, I’d say…

That’s why my advice is to set realistic goals. Start with focusing on one major goal, then maybe add other goals after a few months.

Don’t aim excessively high. A lot of people come into trading and want to become a millionaire within a year. Is it possible to make a million dollars trading in your first year? Sure, but it’s highly unlikely.

I think this is a smarter approach … Make your goals more process-oriented, such as learning to only take A+ trade setups or developing a solid risk-management plan. Those are outcomes that you can learn to better control.

I also think it’s also important to write your goals down and re-read them often. In my experience, writing down a goal makes it substantially more likely that I’ll achieve it.

Trade of the Week

For this edition’s trade of the week, we have another example of an earnings winner, one of our favorite setups at StocksToTrade.

An earnings winner, in the simplest sense, is when a stock announces earnings and makes a big move. We saw that with Rite Aid Corporation (NYSE: RAD) just last month.

On December 19, the company released earnings that pushed the stock to gap up from the $7s to around $11.

After that, we saw five green days in a row. On the sixth day, the stock gapped up from $19 to $21, rocketed up to almost $24 intraday, then collapsed and closed around the $20 level.

This is a fantastic example of an earnings winner — one of the best in the past year, I’d argue.

The great thing is that with these setups, you don’t have to be there on the first or second day to find a good trade. The stock had five green days and even produced its biggest candle on the sixth day … all highly tradeable.

And, throughout the entire move, this stock was pretty easy to spot. Each day, RAD closed near its highs, regularly making the red-to-green moves we look for.

If you’re running your scans, looking for stocks that are up a large percentage and closing near their highs, you probably caught this setup…

These are the exact kinds of setups we look for each trading day in StocksToTrade Pro. If you’re ready to develop your skills and see how a professional trader navigates the markets each day, come join our StocksToTrade Pro community!

StocksToTrade Feature of the Week

Since we’re just past Christmas and I’m feeling a little generous, I want to tell you about a few great StocksToTrade features this time…

And, the great thing is … they’re all free!

First, we have our weekly watchlist. That’s an email we send out each Sunday, alerting our subscribers with a few interesting stocks to watch for the coming week.

We’ve called out some awesome setups for high-moving stocks on the watchlist. Make sure to subscribe here if you’re not currently on our list.

Next up, we’ve got our blog — yep, the one you’re reading right now. The team and I are really proud of this blog. We strive to produce posts that are highly useful and on point for traders, whether they’re newbies, intermediate, or advanced.

Feel through to click through the blog archives. You’ll find posts on day trading, value investing, chart patterns, trading psychology, and so much more…

If watching videos is more your thing, head over to our YouTube channel and click subscribe. We constantly add to our video collection and you can find a ton of educational content there.

Last, but not least, we have the SteadyTrade podcast.

I host SteadyTrade with my friends Kim and Stephen. We always have a ball and try to put on a great show for our listeners. Sometimes we discuss individual stocks or trading concepts … Other times we review great books or interview successful traders and finance personalities.

If that sounds like fun to you, head over to SteadyTrade and subscribe.

What I’m Reading

I’m still stuck in my architectural nerd phase…

I just finished “Michigan Modern: An Architectural Legacy,” a huge coffee-table book on the mid-century modern architectural style…

Next up, is a book on Herman Miller, the famous American furniture company.

Now, you may be thinking: Tim, this is a trading blog … what the heck do these architecture books have to do with the markets?

To be honest, absolutely nothing … But reading these books will have a positive impact on my trading. Here’s why…

It’s one thing to be obsessed with trading, but I think it’s also important to find ways to spark your creativity … away from the market.

Keeping your brain active like this is a bit like working out in the gym, but for your mind … My main hobbies, away from the markets, are reading and fitness … But you don’t have to follow my lead here. Find hobbies that inspire you.

It could be knitting, golfing, or doing sudoku puzzles. None of those have much to do with trading, but I can see how they’d help you mentally in trading…

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Conclusion

That wraps up this edition of Bohen’s Take…

I hope you write down your New Year’s goals. But please, take my advice and keep them simple (keep it simple, stupid!) and realistic. Small steps will get you reach your destination.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank all of the readers of this blog for your time and loyalty throughout the past year. We’ve got some big plans for 2020 at StocksToTrade, and I hope you keep tuning in so we can provide you with some of the best trader content on the entire internet.

If you’d like to make 2020 your breakout year in trading, then it may be a good time to consider joining StocksToTrade Pro.

StocksToTrade Pro is our trader education and support community. As a member, you can see my trading screens and hear my thoughts on the markets each trading day. You’ll also have access to regular trading education webinars where I share cutting-edge trading techniques. Plus, you can interact with traders in our trader chat room.

I truly believe StocksToTrade Pro is the best place to learn about trading stocks on the internet, come and join us today!

What are your trading goals this year? I love to hear what you think. Leave a comment!