Prior to putting on an Intraday or short term horizon Swing Trade I scan for the following criteria:

I like to see the stock price at least $35 per share ($25 if the stock meets all the criteria for the $35 + stocks but the current price target) Trading on an A.D.V. of at least 3 million shares, and A.T.R of 3 to 3.5, Higher Implied Volatility at the time of trading the stock relative to its Historic Volatility, a sector leading stock that's running in a hot sector and more specific criteria I add to pre screens and my scans.

Once I have looked over the overall environment, I plan the trade with an entry point, lot size (according to my risk calculation and reward potential), I pick my logical profit objective - contracted and expanded objectives as well - check my technicals - scan the fundamentals, check for splits, dividends etc... and eco data for the time I will potentially be in the trade.

Once everything looks good - it's Go Time!

I don't double down on the initial merge - I prefer to scale into the trade to test it with half of my potential lot size. The same is true for the short swing, except I'll be scaling out to start.

When it looks ripe I’ll continue to scale into or out of my full lot size.

On my entry order, I set my buy / sell limit and sell stop / buy stop loss at the same time depending on if I'm going long or short.

Once I hit My L.P.O. I scale out / in of half my position until I have my initial investment plus cost of commissions safely back in my account at the same time adjusting my stops to lock in profits.

I then manage the rest of the trade with the remainder of my position, locking in profits and scaling out (scaling in on the shorts) of the position along the way.

No it's not buying bottoms and selling tops or selling tops and buying bottoms with an "all my total account in" approach - but riding a trend with the market's money and safely locking down profits while proficiently managing the trade is key.

You're only as successful as your next trade...