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Breaking Down a Successful Weekend Trade

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Written by Timothy Sykes
Updated 7/6/2026 6 min read

Let’s talk about my recent weekend trade.

What turns a chart that looks like THIS…

Mystery ticker, 6-month, daily candle, weekend trade candidate,
Mystery ticker, 6-month, daily candle, weekend trade candidate,

Into a stock that I’d want to trade (ESPECIALLY before those green candles the last two days)?

Talk about beaten down, right?

Not only did I trade it, I held it over a long weekend.

And it played out almost exactly like I thought it would.

Why Trade a Beaten Down AI Stock?

On Thursday (July 2), Yiren Digital Ltd. (NYSE: YRD) announced its board of directors had authorized a share repurchase program for up to $20 million over the next 12 months.

Source: Yiren Digital Ltd. via PR Newswire
Source: Yiren Digital Ltd. via PR Newswire

Why Does a Share Repurchase Matter?

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On a purely technical level, first there was an initial spike on the news.

YRD faded into the open but there was a nice breakout over the premarket highs in the early afternoon where it set a new high of day.

YRD, 7/2-6/26, 1-min candle, premarket highs became morning resistance
YRD, 7/2-6/26, 1-min candle, premarket highs became morning resistance

As you can see, the premarket highs became the morning resistance. After the breakout, the $1.30s became support.

So, my question was…

Can It Have a Second Leg?

I liked that YRD was holding right near the morning spike highs.

Remember, former resistance becomes support. So, theoretically it wasn’t likely to dip below the $1.30s.

But what if I was wrong?

I would have followed rule #1: cut losses quickly. At the lowest. I might have cut in the $1.20s if it dipped too quickly.

Long story short, I liked the…

Risk vs Reward

When I bought at $1.37, I was risking roughly 10 cents a share. If I was right, and there was another leg up, I figured it could retest the high of day at $1.55.

YRD, 7/2-6/26, 1-min candle, weekend trade with catalyst
YRD, 7/2-6/26, 1-min candle, weekend trade with catalyst

I didn’t think the stock could get back to where it was trading in March (the $3s), but I did think there was 10-20% of upside over the weekend.

YRD had a nice little spike at the open. I decided to lock in the single because it wasn’t taking out last week’s high.

Let’s dig a little deeper into the catalyst, because again, a few months ago YRD was in the $3s.

Then, this happened…

YRD, 6-month, daily candle
YRD, 6-month, daily candle

When you see price action like that, it’s very important to…

Understand What Causes Spikes and Dips

YRD dropped 44% in one day because the company had weak Q4 results and suspended its dividend.

Source: Yahoo Finance
Source: Yahoo Finance

The article went on to say the dividend suspension “directly challenges the earlier income-and-growth narrative and brings balance sheet resilience and credit risk management to the forefront. Short-term catalysts now hinge less on headline growth and more on evidence that credit costs are under control […]”

Fast forward a few months and….

There Is a Clear Momentum Shift

Before it suspended the dividend, the company was trying to conserve cash.

Now, the company is spending cash to buy back its own shares.

Why is the company repurchasing shares if it is so worried about cash or bankruptcy (which is what the market was pricing)?

That tells me (and anyone paying attention) that they have enough cash to weather the storm.

And THAT means the stock could have a multi-day runup.

Millionaire Moves

I recently had the pleasure of watching Jack Kellogg trade using his new AI tools. Check out his setup, too…

Keep in mind that Jack didn’t start with this setup. And when he first started it took him YEARS to make what he can now make in one day.

How did he do it?

He made the decision to apply for my Trading Challenge.

Then he got after it.

Key Takeaway

On a trade like YRD, it doesn’t matter whether I make 10 to 20 cents a share…

Get a full move up to the $2s…

… or lose 10 to 15 cents a share.

The most important thing is to understand why the stock was moving and set a smart risk level and goals.

Because of the share repurchase program, and knowing why the stock dropped when the company didn’t have enough cash…

That told me that there was a clear momentum shift.

In the end, it turned out to be a single.

That said, it closed yesterday (July 6) right at the price where I sold, so there may be another leg.

Cheers,

– Tim Sykes


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Timothy Sykes

Tim Sykes is a penny stock trader and teacher who became a self-made millionaire by the age of 22 by trading $12,415 of bar mitzvah money. After becoming disenchanted with the hedge fund world, he established the Tim Sykes Trading Challenge to teach aspiring traders how to follow his trading strategies. He’s been featured in a variety of media outlets including CNN, Larry King, Steve Harvey, Forbes, Men’s Journal, and more. He’s also an active philanthropist and environmental activist, a co-founder of Karmagawa, and has donated millions of dollars to charity.
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* Results are not typical and will vary from person to person. Making money trading stocks takes time, dedication, and hard work. There are inherent risks involved with investing in the stock market, including the loss of your investment. Past performance in the market is not indicative of future results. Any investment is at your own risk. See Terms of Service here

The available research on day trading suggests that most active traders lose money. Fees and overtrading are major contributors to these losses.

A 2000 study called “Trading is Hazardous to Your Wealth: The Common Stock Investment Performance of Individual Investors” evaluated 66,465 U.S. households that held stocks from 1991 to 1996. The households that traded most averaged an 11.4% annual return during a period where the overall market gained 17.9%. These lower returns were attributed to overconfidence.

A 2014 paper (revised 2019) titled “Learning Fast or Slow?” analyzed the complete transaction history of the Taiwan Stock Exchange between 1992 and 2006. It looked at the ongoing performance of day traders in this sample, and found that 97% of day traders can expect to lose money from trading, and more than 90% of all day trading volume can be traced to investors who predictably lose money. Additionally, it tied the behavior of gamblers and drivers who get more speeding tickets to overtrading, and cited studies showing that legalized gambling has an inverse effect on trading volume.

A 2019 research study (revised 2020) called “Day Trading for a Living?” observed 19,646 Brazilian futures contract traders who started day trading from 2013 to 2015, and recorded two years of their trading activity. The study authors found that 97% of traders with more than 300 days actively trading lost money, and only 1.1% earned more than the Brazilian minimum wage ($16 USD per day). They hypothesized that the greater returns shown in previous studies did not differentiate between frequent day traders and those who traded rarely, and that more frequent trading activity decreases the chance of profitability.

These studies show the wide variance of the available data on day trading profitability. One thing that seems clear from the research is that most day traders lose money .

Millionaire Media 66 W Flagler St. Ste. 900 Miami, FL 33130 United States (888) 878-3621 This is for information purposes only as Millionaire Media LLC nor Timothy Sykes is registered as a securities broker-dealer or an investment adviser. No information herein is intended as securities brokerage, investment, tax, accounting or legal advice, as an offer or solicitation of an offer to sell or buy, or as an endorsement, recommendation or sponsorship of any company, security or fund. Millionaire Media LLC and Timothy Sykes cannot and does not assess, verify or guarantee the adequacy, accuracy or completeness of any information, the suitability or profitability of any particular investment, or the potential value of any investment or informational source. The reader bears responsibility for his/her own investment research and decisions, should seek the advice of a qualified securities professional before making any investment, and investigate and fully understand any and all risks before investing. Millionaire Media LLC and Timothy Sykes in no way warrants the solvency, financial condition, or investment advisability of any of the securities mentioned in communications or websites. In addition, Millionaire Media LLC and Timothy Sykes accepts no liability whatsoever for any direct or consequential loss arising from any use of this information. This information is not intended to be used as the sole basis of any investment decision, nor should it be construed as advice designed to meet the investment needs of any particular investor. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future returns.

Citations for Disclaimer

Barber, Brad M. and Odean, Terrance, Trading is Hazardous to Your Wealth: The Common Stock Investment Performance of Individual Investors. Available at SSRN: “Day Trading for a Living?”

Barber, Brad M. and Lee, Yi-Tsung and Liu, Yu-Jane and Odean, Terrance and Zhang, Ke, Learning Fast or Slow? (May 28, 2019). Forthcoming: Review of Asset Pricing Studies, Available at SSRN: “https://ssrn.com/abstract=2535636”

Chague, Fernando and De-Losso, Rodrigo and Giovannetti, Bruno, Day Trading for a Living? (June 11, 2020). Available at SSRN: “https://ssrn.com/abstract=3423101”