March 27, 2009, 6:06:38 AM

Today I got up late and first data I could save was at around 6 AM (Toronto time). My software produced following picks:

Barclays Call 2009/09 2.00 R267 1.50 +2.09 3.1 +24.32
Barclays Call 2009/09 2.50 R268 1.50 +2.09 4.8 +33.95
Lloyds Call 2009/09 1.00 R321 0.76 +1.68 4.8 +18.10
HSBC Call 2009/09 5.23 R272 4.10 +3.33 2.3 +10.66
Tesco Put 2009/09 4.00 R337 3.30 -2.81 1.1 +1.11
Vodafone Put 2009/09 1.20 R200 1.18 -2.75 2.3 +1.49
BP Call 2009/09 5.00 R203 4.80 +4.46 2.2 +0.03

Today I decided to do it differently. First day I actually went to my UK broker's website to grab real data using their trade entry interface. It gives real data alright and also it highlighted the problem of size. Later during day I shall write another ilog on size problem. Second day I again used the broker's site but went through their limit order interface. This I did because I found the size numbers somewhat strange. Even though size was insufficient (that is, my size was bigger than maximum) it is giving me a quote. This happened for one share. For another share only N/A was showing as maximum but after halving my amount it finally gave me a quote. So I decided to not use "market" order interface. (Another reason being fear that I may accidentally complete the transaction). Instead I used "limit" order interface. It too gives me live bid/offer prices. Which is all I want. Today I thought that since RBS website shows delayed data, why not look up "current" data 20 minutes later? 20 minuted is the delay they have in delayed data. That should give me "current" data at the time of decision. Or better still download data 25 minutes later to account for 5 minutes I may take to start my number cruncher. And even better download every 5 minutes after that, one download for each share I am going to buy. In real life there will be some delay in entering orders. So today I did that. The order in which I will enter orders in my paper trading account will be in decreasing order of profitabilty potential my software calculates. So today I will buy in following order:

Barclays Call 2009/09 2.50 R268 1.50 +2.09 4.8 +33.95
Barclays Call 2009/09 2.00 R267 1.50 +2.09 3.1 +24.32
Lloyds Call 2009/09 1.00 R321 0.76 +1.68 4.8 +18.10
HSBC Call 2009/09 5.23 R272 4.10 +3.33 2.3 +10.66
Vodafone Put 2009/09 1.20 R200 1.18 -2.75 2.3 +1.49
Tesco Put 2009/09 4.00 R337 3.30 -2.81 1.1 +1.11
BP Call 2009/09 5.00 R203 4.80 +4.46 2.2 +0.03

I shall amend my software to exclude those shares for which profitability potential indicator (last number) is negative and also as a last step sort in reverse order on same column.

I shall post positions in paper trading account later today. The data saved for decision at March 27, 2009, 6:06:38 AM (Toronto time). So it was at 10:06:38 AM London time. For order entry purpose data were downloaded at:

2009-03-27-10-28-38
2009-03-27-10-33-27
2009-03-27-10-38-22
2009-03-27 -10-44-06
2009-03-27-10-48-22
2009-03-27-10-59-21
2009-03-27-11-01-25
2009-0 3-27-11-06-21
2009-03-27-11-11-18

I used alarm to remind me for every 5 minutes save. By mistake I forgot to save after 10-53 because could not hear the alarm. And by mistake I have apparently saved one file at 11-01. I will use only following saves for order entry purpose:

2009-03-27-10-28-38
2009-03-27-10-33-27
2009-03-27-10-38-22
2009- 03-27-10-44-06
2009-03-27-10-48-22
2009-03-27-10-59-21
2009-03-27-11-06-21


Both of following saves will be ignored:

2009-03-27-11-01-25
2009-03-27-11-11-18

So ... it looks like I am getting my daily routine all set and I guess from tomorrow onwards there will not be any on-the-fly changes to that. Await my orders post later during day. And later at EOD (which is around 12:30 Toronto time) I will post last post showing how our trades did during the day. Today I am going to set target at 2% nett gain or if not liquidate at close.