One of the most frequent requests has been the automation of tracking sell stops. While I use my data base and a customized spreadsheet to do that, some readers are not always near their computers and are looking for an alternative solution.
I have found another site called SmartStops.net that provides this type of service. I have not tried it myself so I can’t vouch for the integrity, but they offer a 14-day trial period. Take a look and see if their set up will do the job for you.
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Comments 4
Ulli,
I found SmartStops a few weeks ago and I love it. It lets me track open positions using both your 7-10% trailing stop method as well as other types of "alerts" in case you want to be on top of things even if not activating an actual sell.
It also let me set up a watch list (actually several portfolios of such) that I use to call my attention to when a watched ETF from a select group passes over a moving average. That way I don't even have to scan anymore. It's a big time saver.
I wonder if, as an alternative to a trailing stop-loss, buying puts at some point near the stop-loss point might be a viable alternative. The problem I see is that you would have to keep selling puts and moving to a higher strike price to maintain the same level of protection. This would result in a lot of commissions.
Another option would be to avoid stocks or ETFs and buy calls, selling them after they moved up in value and replacing them with calls with a higher strike price.
Again, there would be commission expense.
These strategies might be viable in a very strong bull market or very strong bear market.
Taxxcpa,
These may be viable choices, but I only dealy with ETFs and no load mutual funds, so we are limited in what we can do. However, I am sure there are readers using options as alternatives.
Ulli…
I am the founder and Director of Analytics at SmartStops.net and would be happy to answer any questions about SmartStops. We are launching the new reentry portion of our service this weekend after several months of effort. The reentry signals will tell our users when it is safe to reenter an ETF (or stock) after being stopped out.
When using trailing stops as protection an occasional "whipsaw" is unavoidable. The remedy is to be prepared to reenter so that you don't miss a large gain as the result of being overly cautious.