Band-to-band moves paid in a slow tape
The morning's money came from long entries taken as price left a VWAP band with clear room to the other side, scaled out in thirds rather than held for one target. Our desk also took two smaller attempts — a half-size long off a reclaim and a late short into a gap-fill level — and cut both quickly once the tape stopped cooperating, and closed one starter flat for lack of room to run.
The 1h 20m session is on the other side of this.
Everything above is the write-up. This is the morning itself, with the names on every call and the room talking through it.
The first real trade set the template for the day. A long was started with room left to add, and when the first push came half the position went out, the add order was cancelled and the stop moved to breakeven. From there it was a matter of letting a consolidation resolve rather than guessing at it, with the last piece taken near the far band. The same structure — band to band, on names with enough average range to make the trip worth it — was worked repeatedly on the desk, twice in the same rocket-launch name on separate entries.
The discipline that mattered more than the entries was the room check. One chip name was started and then closed flat within a minute, not because it moved against the position but because the distance to VWAP was too small to justify carrying risk. Two other candidates were passed on for the same reason, and one low-volume idea was skipped on a wide spread. That is the same decision three times: the setup can be valid and still not be worth taking.
The friction was real and small. A half-size long off a VWAP reclaim was cut within a minute when the reclaim didn't hold. Fills were poor for parts of the morning — an exit order sat unfilled while price traded through it, and a late short took several attempts to get on at all, which is exactly where chasing becomes tempting. The late short into the gap-fill level was sized and stopped tightly above the level, and it got snuffed out. Worth noting that the last trade of a slow session is usually the one taken for something to do.
The morning in figures
Net points are per share. Apply your own size to get your own number: at 1,000 shares, 1.68 points is $1,680.00. At 100 shares it is $168.00. At one share it is $1.68. The desk publishes the move, not a dollar result, because the dollars depend entirely on how you size, and that is your decision rather than ours.
Every trade called that morning
Losers included. Rows with more than one leg were scaled out; open any row to see each exit.