I was trading yesterday before the stock market closed ahead of the Eid’l Adha holiday today. I know I could trade lower so I halved my allotment for the month. First half I offered 102.5 for the First Metro ETF when the last price was 102.6. I was surprised somebody accepted my offer and it got executed.
I took a break then I saw it went up to 102.8. The market was about to close in a few minutes so I didn’t bother sitting at my table and did my trade on my phone. I told myself I’m just going to stick to 102.5 and that’s it.
Lo and behold! My offer went through! And the funny thing is I didn’t know my fat fingers typed 102.00 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣. I dragged down FMETF, much to the chagrin of whoever bought at 102.8 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Yes, I’m back to trading because I’m done with the house payments. 👏👏👏👏 I have more disposable income now because I’m no longer paying for a regular maid (only a weekly cleaning lady) and her school tuition, no longer paying rent, and I just had a raise and bonus. I can replenish my investments quickly. With interest rates still elevated, the stock market will remain tepid for the rest of the year. I just have to be alert for the dips.
I learned from colleagues the past few months that some of them have been trading even though we shouldn’t because of the kind of knowledge we have. We are only allowed ETFs and index funds. The ideal are mutual and some iteration of that like UITFs or other funds because we do not actively manage the funds.
I could trade freely given that my grandfathered contract is more loose than what they draft now under the new parent company. But somehow I feel—it’s not right. For example, I know that a PE is aggressively buying from the open market to gain a board seat in one listed company, and the target company’s board doesn’t like it. I could play it but…I will feel guilty.
Just like when I broke the story more than a decade ago that one conglomerate was buying a power company, slowly accumulating from the open market. I could have traded and made a lot of money because the share price went from PhP 90 to PHP 300 after I broke the news.
But it didn’t feel right.
I let it go. It’s not for me.
I will just buy really low, like when the market crashes. I’m good at timing the market anyway. Part of the funds that I used to build my house came from my Lehman Brothers crash investment. 🤑
A lawyer friend who used to be a reporter (we were both stock market reporters then) is now into forex trading and is making money out of that. While I know the fundamentals behind forex trading as I started as a banking and macroeconomy reporter, I do not have the fortitude for doing so. You need to be fast because you make money in the short-term. It’s active trading and you lose money as quickly as you make money. You have to be glued to your trading platform. It consumes you. This friend is always on her phone, watching and trading, reading news all the time because currencies react quickly. I don’t have the patience and time to do that. Maybe when I retire I will do that.
I’m much better today but the diphenhydramine I took the night before knocked me out flat. I briefly did some washing up and stowing away of dishes at 9 am and slept again. I woke up at 2 pm to have lunch at my mom’s. So basically, I slept half the day away.
Feeling more energized, I finally installed this afternoon the washing machine in my laundry area that is now functional. Did one load of bedsheets to check for leaks in the new hose I installed. No leaks. Perfect.
But it has been raining heavily the past few days. It takes a while for clothes to dry 😩
Right now there’s a thunderstorm and I’m thankful that I no longer have to worry about the roof in my kitchen/laundry area leaking.