What are you going to do with that YTD port that you were planning to abandon from the last YTD race? Reset it, maybe, and use it for this year’s race? Use it as a keepsake memento and wear a copy in a locket around your neck? Sell it on E-Bay and buy Beavie a case of E-Z Cheese or pay back Fielding for all his Krispy Kreme stash you helped yourself to in late-night trading sessions?

Jimmy Impossible and I ended up #1 and #2 for the year, along with our sitemate, Aaron who was #5. That left us with a portfolio of around $250M and with lots of stocks, bonds and options. They are too big to daytrade and too small to be on the Lifetime Leaderboard. These days, it takes about $350M to make it to #99.

So, rather than abandon those ports to languish with the other 400,000 or so ports not currently being traded, Jimmy and I decided to put together a strategy to take our ports into the realm of the (*drum roll*) Lifetime Board traders. Since we traded together and stayed neck-and-neck during the year, we devised a plan together. And, since we played leap frog with some of the top finishers, we decided to solicit their advice for you too.

Txredd

I already have one port on the Lifetime Board. It is my YTD port from last year’s race, which sadly, has fallen from a high of #29 to the bottom. I have decided to play both ports using a different strategy than the one I used on the daily races, YTD, STD, WTD.

One of the nicest things about playing a long term port (besides rocking in a rocking chair on the porch sipping lemonade and reminiscing with your friends about the good old days) is that you don’t need to measure your gains “daily.” There is no pressure. If you have a bad day, you aren’t going to drop more than a place or two. You can afford to sit on a stock that might be temporarily dropping or an IPO that has merit but has fallen from grace. I used to buy the IPOs the night before, watch them like a hawk, milk them for profit, then short till they hit bottom. Unless an IPO is a blockbuster like HPOTT, TBWP2 or OCEAN, I buy one radar, let them bottom out and on Saturday when commissions are free, I max on them.

After the reset, I used the $50M I had in cash and bought every popular stock, every release from March on and shorted every opener through Feb. I checked the Bond Charts and added any bonds that had any chance of adjustment. For the first two weeks, my port went from $251M to $278M. We are now in the middle of a zany correction so I haven’t moved up or down since Saturday. I suspect that in the space of a few days, some of those losers in my port are going to move up, so I didn’t waste my time or commissions in selling or trading.

Last but not least, I can afford to wait for Saturdays to realign my port. I do buy IPOs if there are any of interest and on Friday, re-arrange my openers. On Sunday, after adjusts, I set the openers to long or short as I think they will end up delisting in four weeks and then leave them alone. But that will be it unless there is a major news story that will have an impact on a stock or bond. The daily fluctuations mean nothing anymore.

*Rock, sip, rock, sip, rock, sip, rock, sip*

 

Jimmy Impossible

 

You mean you trade in your port after YTD is over? *shrug*

I haven’t actually switched into “Quest for the LTD board” mode just yet. I’ve pretty much been coasting and brushing off multi-million dollar day loses. I’ve mostly just been picking up IPOs and playing adjusts. With a port this size, you have to develop a thick skin. Depending on the current market trends you can easily log in to a million dollar day…or a million dollar loss, before you even make one trade. And once you develop this thick skin, it will be easier to just “walk away” from a bad day and wait for it to rebound.

One of these Saturday’s I’ll rework my port for the long haul. Once that day comes, I think I’ll pretty much play it easy. Buying IPOs and trying to keep track of news. Using commission free Saturdays to the best advantage I can. Loading up on long term properties and dumping anything that deserves it. Once your port gets this big, it becomes quite difficult to daytrade it. Maybe pick a stock or two to watch, but I doubt you’d be able to ever keep everything in your port in check.

And most importantly, don’t forget coldcash! If HSX wants to give me money for nothing (sorry, no chicks for free), then I’ll take every cent I can get!

 

texx:

So you wanna take a YTD port to the top, well here goes.

No more sleep, just forgetaboutit. Put the Pizza House on speed dial and learn to love it.

You’ll need three windows on your puter, First Screen-. Price movers….ride the bounce. Second Screen-. TT, follow all the gossip.. Third Screen-. Check all the movie sites-IMBD-Cinematter-BOG and so on, never stop looking. Look for anything to shill and make a buck. Be ready for the News when HSX updates, trade fast and furious when market resets.

On Saturday when Commish is off, keep a can by puter to pee in. But the most important thing for good luck and continued success, always keep Pink2 in your port.

 

Ash:

I’ve been thinking about this for a while. My problem is that this is uncharted territory for me. A lot of YTDers already have big ports and some big port experience. I got out of my depths very quickly when my port’s growth outgrew my HSX learning curve. But this is what I’ve come up with.

There is a balance between reacting to the market and being proactive, that is going out and actively seeking good investments. The first tends to be a short term strategy and the second a long term one. For a smaller, or if you’re good at it, a medium port only the reaction is needed. Manifesting itself, of course, as day-trading. As your port grows this is not sufficient and you have to shift the balance more towards finding long term solid-growth investments. Which is something I’ve been doing a lot of lately.

A lot of it is just looking at stocks in a slightly different way now. A good example is an IPO that’s just been issued as I write this. DRIVN, a serial killer thriller starring KREEV which may have a late 2000 release date. In the past I’d see that stock and think “I have to get that, it should go up ant least 6 or 7 points today”. Now, with a bigger port I’ve been waiting for them to IPO ENEMI because I think it could hit H$40 or so by the summer. Which represents great growth.

That’s a long way of saying that my post-$200 million stragey is to buy lots of cheap stuff that goes up a lot.

 

Grendel

So, I’ve finally gotten around to writing a paragraph for the kind folks here at HSBR about how to make it onto the leaderboards. Really, it’s pretty simple. Spend every single waking moment reading Ticker Talk, Variety, online sites, and print news to catch every story as it breaks. That’s all there is to it.

Of course, if you have a life, this isn’t so easy. So here’s the less time-consuming version.

1) I check TT a few times a day. Maybe once every couple or three hours. This lets me stay fairly current with what’s going on amongst traders, while ensuring that I can get my daily work done and enjoy my life. Once I leave my office, I’ll check the boards one time during the night for sure, and possibly a second time before I call it a night. On weekends, it’s fairly safe to ignore the boards (and HSX as a whole.) There’s almost no news that may affect a stock’s price that breaks on a weekend.

2) Learn how to daytrade. This is the key to survival for a small port. It’s essential to grab the gains you’ll need during the initial port startup, and parlay those dollars into a respectable net worth. If you can effectively daytrade just one or two stocks a day, it’s worth a bundle to a baby port. Another way to approach this is to “reset trade.” Around 4 am EST, the daily change for all stocks resets to zero, and the market enters a new day. The two hours following reset are money-makers, if you can stand to be up and coherent at that time. (It’s rarely worth it to me.) I typically don’t trade on weekends, but others do with great success. The lack of commission typically yields larger swings in any given stock.

3) Clean out your port every night. (This only applies to tiny ports, worth less than, say, 15 million.) If you’re daytrading, the last thing you want is to be stuck in a position while you’re asleep. Funny things happen at reset that may result in massive losses to a small port. Further, if you’re busy the next morning at work, or school, or home, or have to fight of yet another alien invasion, it’s nice to know that your port can’t possibly be crucified by the latest SSPIE rumor.

4) Know how far out you can invest. Short- to mid-term investing is for mid-sized ports. Once you’ve hit a certain dollar threshold, it no longer makes sense to empty a port every night. Instead, start looking at movies opening within the next few weeks to a month. Buy accordingly.

5) Never short anything more than two weeks out. It’s a losing proposition, because the general trend of the market is upward. If you short a movie two months before it opens, then you’re begging to take a loss at some point before adjust.

6) Figure out how to play openers. This is the heart of HSX in my opinion, especially when coupled with long-term investing. If you can objectively analyze a movie’s chances for making its current price, then you’re halfway onto the YTD boards already. If you can quantify why you think a movie will open to a certain amount, then you’re golden!

7) If you’re big enough to invest in long-term stocks, then commission-free days are your friend. Take an hour every now and then on the weekend and sit down to look at what you’ve got in the port. Reevaluate whether it’s a good investment, or whether it’s just taking up H$. As long as the movie’s fairly far out, there’s no need to make this decision to dump losers any time except when you can do it comm-free.

The most important point of all: know how news will affect a stock, and trade accordingly. News comes from a bunch of different sources: online sites, Ticker Talk, IRC, and so on. It all has the potential to move a stock, sometimes dramatically. (MREPO? how I hate you some days.) If you happen to catch this information early, lead the traders in buying, selling, or shorting.

 

BB and ABbond led the YTD race for much of the year, but due to last-minute technicalities, were eliminated from the top 10, but we asked them for their input too.

 

BB offers the following tongue-in-cheek advice:

If you want to be on the leaderboard:

1) Live in front of your computer. Have your family/friends deliver meals to you in your computer room. Have a catheter surgically implanted. Sleep should come in the form of catnaps, no more than seven per day, and no longer than 20 minutes at a time. The HSX World never sleeps, and neither should you. News happens all the time and you need to be ready, even if it is 3AM.

2) Quit your job – HSX is all that matters. Note: If your Net access at work is faster than at home, keep your job and play at work – until they fire you. If you have a government job, you’re golden. Play 40 hours a week from your desk. Volunteer for overtime.

3) Refresh HSX Talk (Ticker Talk) in your browser at least 1500 times per day.

4) Forget personal hygiene – you’re online, so no one will know or care anyway.

5) Save time – get a divorce now. Losing the spouse now will make it easier to concentrate later on when you need to focus on making H$. Note: If your spouse/significant other is the only person available to prepare and serve your meals, wait until they file for divorce…it won’t take long.

6) Spread as many rumors as possible – but try to make sure at least 10% are true so no one questions your credibility. Remember to buy the stocks you shill BEFORE you post your rumor to HSX Talk (and reverse positions quickly after the rumor is squashed by David, Ash or texx.)

7) Bookmark the Market Movers page, IMDB, cinematter, showbizdata, HSBR and The Numbers for quick reference to facts, stats and rumors.

Always brag about your performance. Post daily updates on HSX Talk. The more you talk about how well you are doing the more popular and respected you will become.

9) Just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you. Trust no one. Every other player is just a competitor looking for an edge, and when you least expect it you’ll get stabbed in the back.

 

And then in a more serious tone, BB offers this advice:

“If you are serious about playing HSX and making a run at the leaderboard, decide exactly how much time you are willing to devote to your endeavour. Include how much time you will spend trading, reading the boards and doing research. Realize that there are some people who devote 15+ hours a day to the game and others who trade only a few times a week. Determine how much time you are going to spend and then set your goals accordingly. Learn whose advice to follow and whose to ignore. Pay attention to trends in the market and at the box office. Think for yourself, trust your gut. You will be wrong sometimes, but the more you’ve played the more likely that your instincts will prevail.

Play Cold Cash first thing in the morning so you’ll have the cash available when you begin the day’s trading. Put spare cash into penny stocks. There is minimal downside, great upside, and commissions are cheap if you have to liquidate them later.

Finally, the leaderboard is a marathon, not a sprint. A slow, steady gain is preferable to a flash in the pan. Unless you have the stamina (and lack of a life *G) you have to pace yourself or you’ll burn out.”

 

10 Tips for driving a port to the top 10 YTD

By ABbond @HSJ (formally from HSXAdvice)

1) Play Openers:

Almost always hold an Opener. Adjust is the quickest way to gain dollars (and sometimes loss), with the least amount of time invested in trading. If you have trouble picking which way to hold, find someone that has better instincts (or luck).

2) Learn the market:

The market usually behaves in patterns: Yearly, weekly and daily. A yearly example: The market reaches it peaks during the summer and after the winter holidays. Which if you think about it, is predictable, since this period is after the Blockbusters delist cash enters market. A daily example: Usually around 11pm-2am HSX time (PST) a few stocks have a sudden 10 point drop, then recover and do it again. If one (and I bet a few did) catch this, its an easy way to make a few million dollars. (Comment: I am not sure if it still happens or if it will happen after HSX staff *wink * read this, or if any other example posted below will ever happen again.)

3) Day trade:

I did it mostly on Saturdays when no commission was active. But to have a top 10 YTD port, you need to trade on a daily basis. If you study the market, you will find that some stocks are move volatile then others each day. I usually traded the top 10 up/down movers (can be found on HSX movers board.)

4) Be online at HSX “event” periods:

HSX “event”, ahhh? When I say “event”, I mean when HSX adjusts/halts openers, adjusts bonds, screen counts are publicized and so on. Sometimes HSX messes up adjusts/halts and if you are quick, you can take advantage of it. Sometimes HSX doesn’t adjust a bond which most people thought would adjust and its price shoot opposite adjust direction (do to other trades who are online catching it and dumping their holdings.)

5) React to Movie/Star news first:

If you hear/read some news about a movie (like date change or a major star signed up), it almost always effects price. If you are first, you will probably make a few bucks. Sometimes HSX posts the news in its journal, then you will surely make a few bucks.

6) Read TT:

If you don’t have time to go over sites that post movie news, this is the place to look. If someone saw it before you, s/he will post it on TT, and other players will react (Its called playing-the-players, opposed to playing-the-market.)

7) Checkout the following sites:

Cinematter & UpcomingMovies at Yahoo! – For future release dates and reviews.

Box Office Guru – Past history box and on Thursday (around 00:15-2:00amEST) he posts weekend screen counts, which is almost always accurate.

The Internet Movie Database & Movielink – General data about movies: Actors, Length, MPAA rate, genre and more. And of course HSX fansites.

Free up cash when no commission starts (on weekend):

When you have stock/bond/option shorted and it made money. Cover and re-short it when free commission is turned on. In this manner you free up cash, since by doing this you will need to invest less in the re-short.

9) Be on #hsx (Undernet IRC channel):

To catch online news, tips, gossip, strategies, meet new people and pass some time.

10) Be lucky:

Never hurts!

———————–

Jimmy and I thank all the guys for their valuable input. What I find most interesting about the top 10 finishers in the YTD race is post-race plans. From all reports, I retired from day-to-day trading, Jimmy is semi-retired, Aaron and AB stopped trading YTD, BB retired, texx and Ash took a break. We all got burned out and just went “Phew! Thank God that’s over!” No more late nights checking BOG, no more raids into super fast food and no more anxiety drugs. Watch out, Lifetime Board, we’re coming’ atcha!