Friday Markets, did you buy ?

I have a discussion on Stop Losses, here.

On Friday morning (January 16, today) I was on CNBC. Udayan asked me what my Nifty strategy for the day is ? I explained that as a day trade, I am looking to buy Nifty futures. The market has fallen 450 points in seven days or so. It is ready for a rally. We remain in an intermediate downtrend, but going long was the trade for today. After a few minutes into the open, he asked me: what is the stop and what kind of profits are you looking at ? The stops were around 4700, yesterday’s low. There is minor resistance at 2800, so I was looking at a rally to this level. There was the possibility of a 50 point gain. (All levels are for January futures).

This did come about. Nifty Futures moved between 2735 to 2750 for an hour or so, before moving up. Eventually, futures crossed 2800, closing at 2816. This was a low risk, high probability trade.

Now, my question is: if you were watching CNBC, did you take this trade ? If not, ask yourself, what should you do after you hear out the morning ideas ? How do you integrate the CNBC suggestions into your daily plans ? This also means that you must have a plan. If you do not have a written plan, ask yourself, can you survive in trading without any clear ideas of what to do ?