I just wanted to check in here after being away for quite some time. I have been extremely busy at work trying to grow my practice and frankly just keep my job. This career requires so much time, effort and dedication that it is hard to make time for anythign but work in the first year or two. I am enjoying the journey so far, and have made a little money along the way. Hopefully next year will be a huge opportunity for me, but a lot of that depends on how well the economy does in the first two quarters.

Hope everyone is well,

-Ainkurn

I am a little behind on updating my progress here, but I have been in the process of moving. I will start work tomorrow morning at 8:00, and I am quite nervous. Now for the exam results.

I had planned on taking my Series 66 second, but I ended up having to squeeze my insurance testing in between the 7 and 66. I gave myself three weeks to study for the 66 but when I found out that I had to take my insurance test first, that really killed a week of preparation time. The Dept of Insurance here is really picky and you have to sign up for the test 5 days before taking the exam and you have to complete 20hrs of classroom study for each line of authority. Since the 7 covered Variable Annuities, I only had to get 40 hours of training before taking the exam, but I only had one week to complete the course.

The training is delivered as an on-line course through The University of Alabama, which made it possible for me to study long hours to complete the class. I started studying on Monday afternoon and my test was scheduled for Friday morning of the same week. I had to convince the proctor of the class to mail me my Certificate of Completion on Tuesday so it would arrive in the mail in enough time that I could take it with me to the test. After cramming for four day, I had to drive to Tuscaloosa, AL to take the test and then drive to Montgomery, AL to take my results to the ALDOI to get my license issued, and then drive to Birmingham, AL to meet with some people at work. The studying was pretty intense, but the material was very easy. I got to Tuscaloosa to take the computerized test and finished the 150 questions in just over an hour. I came out with a 93%, which is about what I was expecting.

Having lost a week of study to the insurance test, I wasted no time getting to work studying the material for my Series 66 exam. For those of you that don’t know, the Series 66 is the Combined Securities Agent and Investment Adviser Representative exam. It mostly covers state and federal laws such as the Uniform Securities act, The Investment Company Act of 1940, The Securities Act of 1933, The Exchange Act of 1934, and The North American Securities Administrators Association. It is very legalistic and many of the rules are slightly different between state and federal law, which adds a layer of complication. Going into this study process, I knew that I was not going to be able to devote the same level of concentration to my studies as I did for the Series 7 simply because I was tired of studying. I just wanted to pass the test, not try and impress with high scores.

I bought my study materials from Keir Education which included one study book and one practice test book. I took several of the tests and was scoring in the mid 70’s to low 80’s, which is what I was expecting. Two days before my exam was scheduled I talked to one of the recruiting officers at Ameriprise and she recommended that I take some online practice exams put out by Kaplan. These tests are meant to help you find areas of weakness in your study program. So, the night before the test I take one of these tests and it is NOTHING like the questions that I was accustomed to with my other practice exams. I was totally stumped and when it was over I scored a 68. I started to freak out and worry that I was a lot less prepared than I thought I was. My test was the next day at 11:30 so I stayed up till 3:30 reviewing, slept for two hours and was back studying again at 6:00. I then took another of these Kaplan practice tests thinking my late night studies would improve my score. My second attempt was another failure coming in at 62. At this point is is three hours before the exam, I have a 2 hour drive to the test center and I am in full freak out mode.

I was sweating bullets and studing while driving the whole way to the test center. I arrived about 30 minutes early and continued studying. I finally gave up and started the test 30 minutes early. Now I am not a superstisious guy, but when I got put on computer #13 I knew I was done for. I got to the first question and was a little releived. The further I went the more comfortable I got with the test and by the end of 130 questions I was confident  that I had done well on the exam. My score didn’t dissapoint, as I came out with an 80%. Not as good as the Series 7, but much better than I was expecting. I was disappointed by the fact that there was no summary of national scores for the test, so I don’t know how well I did compared to others.

I am finally through with all of my testing, and will begin the 10-week training period this week. I am hoping for the best, and if you need some financial advice you know my e-mail address.

-Ainkurn

As you may know, I stopped trading about two months ago to pursue a job as a Financial Adviser. As part of my pre-employment qualification process, I have to pass the Series 7, Series 66, and Life, Health, and Variable Annuity exams. Most of the last 6 weeks has been spent cramming my brain full of securities related garb in preparation for the 7. I have read two books totaling about 800 pages (one I basically read twice), handwritten about 150 pages of notes, highlighted about 100 pages of crap, and answered over 600 multiple choice questions. What does all of the work add up to; sitting for a 6hr 250 question exam.

Yesterday I studied from 7:00 AM till midnight and got up at 5:00 this morning to drive to Jackson, MS for my test. I was quite nervous because my practice exam results were pretty pathetic. My scores on the four practice test were 84, 75, 65, and 62. Not so great. My trip this morning was a bit edgy also, as I drove about 100 miles with one eye on the road and one eye on study materials. “Municipal bond interest is tax-free except when… WHO IS THIS FOOL PULLING OUT IN FRONT OF ME!” You get the picture.

Any way. The exam is a two part test of 130 questions each with a 1hr break for lunch. There are 10 “bonus” questions on the Series 7, which I find to be quite juvenile. It’s all computerized so you can easily mark questions for review and go back over them at the end. One other advantage (maybe disadvantage) is that you know your score immediately upon completion of the exam. I am accustomed to waiting a few days or weeks to get test results after 6 years of college (don’t laugh, I changed my major twice and switched colleges about 5 times). So I get through with the first half of the exam in about 1.5 hours, and I am feeling pretty confident. My hour lunch break was spent shoving down buffalo wings at Chili’s and contemplating ordering a Presidente Margarita to calm my nerves. I wonder if FINRA (NASD) has any rules about TWI (Testing While Intoxicated). The hour went by much too fast, leaving me only 5 minutes before signing back in for the final push toward certification.

When I got back, some bastard had taken my computer so I had to be re-deployed to another machine. Sorry about that Computer 9, I really wanted to finish what we started. Computer 15 is a loser! The room was cold, and the hum coming from the A/C unit did nothing to help my concentration. The second part of the test was more difficult. I came across several questions that totally confused me, and some that pertained to information that wasn’t in the two books I read. “Ennie-Meeny-Miny-Mo” came in real handy on a few occasions. As I got closer and closer to the last question, tension began to build to the point that I was reluctant to click the little “Exit” button signaling my completion of the exam. The worst part was waiting the 10-20 seconds it took to actually calculate my score. Boy did that ever seem like a lifetime! Did I mention if I fail the exam I have to wait another month before taking it again?

When my score was finally processed it was not what I was expecting. I was expecting to see my score prominently displayed on the screen in bold font and flashing colors. Not the case. When I finally found my score it was neatly tucked away in a small corner of a large report showing all the statistics from my exam. The first thing I see is “Pass”. A little relief. “Where is the damn score”? Ah, there it is “84%”. Nice! I skim over the report and see that the national pass percentage is currently 66% with the national average score coming in at 73%. I guess I am above average, or maybe I just studied 11% more than the average joe. Next up, Series 66. I will be back with the details on that one later.

-Ainkurn

The past few weeks have been difficult trading for me. I cant remember the last good up day I had where I really felt like I was able to catch some good moves. It seems like every day I just come in and churn my account… make a little lose a little. I ended last month down just over $1,500 which I guess is acceptable considering this market. Most of my losses came from two swing trades Short the Market and Short Oil. The Oil trade just flat did not work and I got stopped on my market short on 5/19 the day the market ran up through most of the day and then sold hard in the last hour or so. The DOW then proceeds to fall over 650 points in 4 days. I have also had to try and adjust to working alone every day now. It is a lot different without someone else’s opinion on your market ideas. I aso mentioned that I am trying to change some things about the way I trade and have experimented with different things over the last few days. When you combine all these things it can only lead to one thing… Frustration. I am just burnt out on trading and this crap market!! Good thing I am leaving to go on vacation tomorrow. I will be in Panama City for a week. There is no Internet access in the Condo so there will be no posting or trading during next week. All surf and sun. I will however use this time to reflect on my trading, consider new trading ideas and maybe try and find a way to turn this sinking ship around. Good luck to everyone next week.

Tradeitup

I was just going to put a post up to let everyone know that I am still alive and will try to get back to regular posting in the next couple of days. I am still trading, although it has been bad of late, and currently have a lot going on. I also wanted to leave my bros. post on the top of the site for a few days, which is a good excuse for my laziness. Not only do I have a lot of personal things going on, I am also reevaluating my trading. This includes time frames, setups, money management and my style. I may have to do a whole revamp of my trading on the scale of how DT has changed in the last few months. I also maybe changing up the site some,  by stopping the daily recaps and change to a weekly recap with a post about how I traded during the week. I really want to keep the site going and try and keep the readers coming to the site. On top of all this, I am having some technical problems with the blog which I have not resolved and am also attempting to take the two monitors from my brothers computer and have a 4 monitor setup.  So that is what is going on here and I will try to keep updates coming as things change.

Tradeitup