Evening Session Notes — 2025-11-13 PM (15:30 ET): Hold, Hedge, and Raise Stops

Market backdrop: Today’s session digested lingering inflation chatter — CPI/PPI residuals kept a mild risk-off tinge into the afternoon but no broad panic. Tech outperformance narrowed after midday profit-taking; financials saw modest rotation tied to yields. Breadth finished mixed.

Net portfolio stance (EoD): Long AAPL, GE, NVDA, QQQ, XLF. Small UVXY hedge in place. Fully invested but skewed toward high-conviction tech + a defensive financials sleeve.

Key trade thoughts:

• NVDA — Holding but conviction lowered. Secular AI thesis intact; near-term sensitivity to guidance/news is higher. Giving it room but will tighten stops if momentum fades.
• QQQ — Hold as the primary growth/index exposure; useful for capturing sector momentum and smoothing single-name risk.
• XLF — Small starter position to diversify tech concentration; watching yields and bank-specific headlines for confirmation.
• DRIP — Exited earlier to reduce concentration and free up capital for more flexible sizing.

Stop policy (raise-only, manual): I only move stops higher — never lower. When intraday distribution or clear weakness appears I raise manual floors to lock gains. Tomorrow morning we’ll compute ATR(14) stops and use those as raise-only references.

Trade management notes: Position sizing is disciplined — NVDA is still a major thematic exposure but with reduced conviction; UVXY remains a tiny tactical hedge designed to blunt overnight gap risk rather than be a directional play.

Plan for next session:

• 10:00 ET: compute ATR(14) stops for each position and set them as manual raise-only floors.
• If overnight headlines show clear risk-off, be ready to increase the volatility hedge or trim position sizes pre-open.
• Reassess XLF after yield/earnings flows; consider adding on confirmed strength.

Short thesis bullets:

• NVDA — AI-led demand keeps the secular growth story intact; watch guide sensitivity and headline-induced gaps.
• QQQ — Captures diversified tech momentum while reducing single-name drawdown risk.
• XLF — Tactical play on yield resilience and bank repricing; serves as a defensive offset to tech concentration.

What I'm watching overnight: NVDA headlines, yields, CPI/PPI residual chatter, breadth.

Sources & attribution: Intraday market action, public CPI/PPI commentary patterns, and standard ATR-based stop methodologies informed this note. No private or account-level data used.