Currency Crisis

I have recently consumed myself in every bit of news and listened to Peter Schiff, Ron Paul and many others as well as people with different views on the current situation in the US economy. The desperate attempt by people like ben bernanke to artificially stimulate the US economy is just making matters worse, as his solution is to print more money and to give it to the banks and businesses such as Freddy and Fannie, which now have 100% of their loses covered by the government. The government is getting bigger and bigger, intervening with the free markets. The housing crash was brought about by too much easy credit, you only needed to put down about 5% to get a house, and people believed housing prices would just continue to rise I mean how dumb is that. After the crash what then would have happened would be that lenders would tighten up on lending and be more cautious to lend to people who were too likely to default. But the government stepped in and said we will guarantee the loans so then people started to lend, the interest rates were also set to 0%, encouraging no one to save and again encouraging people to take risks they wouldn't have had the government stayed out of the free markets. The government encouraged more spending, more debt in many ways.

The country is massively in debt and they desperately need to let companies that are failing to be productive fail, let resources be bought up and let new companies start up, which aren't owned by the government and aren't a drain on tax money. They need to allocate resources to allowing the country to be productive again. The only reason this has been able to go on as long as it has is because the US dollar is the reserve currency. If you look at England, who is closely linked with US, our debt is a bigger percentage of our GDP and I am sure it would be less if our currency was the reserve currency. With the US, their currency used to be backed by gold so they convinced people to trade with dollars because it was good as gold, and gold is real money, but since they moved of the gold standard it no longer applies, it allowed the government to borrow and spend and now the world is realizing. It is inevitable that the dollar will eventually become worthless, it has always happened in history, it cannot hold its value forever. The problem is the dollar isn't backed by anything only faith and the world is losing faith. They have good reason to because the US is based on borrowing money from china to buy more stuff, and china are just giving the US money because they would lose even more if they didn't. China are slowly trying to move away from the dollar and have said they are buying gold on dips only because they don't want to push the price up. Really its a lose lose situation whatever china do, but its only a matter of time until they stop lending the US money. I believe soon a currency crisis will hit the reverse currency and seize to exist.

I am still in Mwana Africa, but only just, it has slipped to 12.5p but apparently it seems to have strong resistance slightly above 12p. A strong buy imo and I am in for £600 now but if it slips 1p I would be out.

Merrwaarrna

Well Mwana Africa has slipped a little so far, I topped up to £400/p. Also I have made £650 currently on betting gold would go up since friday. I placed the bet straight after the 4% drop after the news of dubai. Pretty surprised Mwana Africa hasn't made gains considering the price of gold. I read some more articles on gold and still expanding my knowledge, all very interesting.

Im predicting good things for mwana africa today, currently 0% change. Also Mwana Africa release how much gold they have mined in novemeber on the 10th december.

ya, this is now my stock market journey blog :)

No poker played since I last posted about it

MWA + 1 week

After the first week Mwana Africa finished up slightly, It rose 12% on monday but was likely due to a positive boost from the telegraph. I think gold will continue to rise strongly due to the dollars weakness. It is interesting to see China and India buying up all the gold they can, it looks like China are trying to become less dependant on the dollar. As Peter Schiff says, China are only lending the US money because they would lose more money if they didn't. I think as time goes on and with the US goverment consistently making wrong decisions by trying to fight the recession by artifically stimulating the economy the price of gold will only go up. This will increase the profit margins of mining companies and I think mining right now is a good investment.

Mwana Africa's share price dropped from 80p to 2.5p due to the collapse of their currency (zimbabwe dollar) and their mines then closed. It is only recently they have recieved funding to reopen their gold mine and with increased profit margins on selling gold they have great potential to do well like they orginally were. They also have deposits of nickel and copper I believe which should open once they earn enough from the Freda Rebecca gold mine. Their share price is on the road to recovery and I believe they were in better position for the future now than they were before trading at 80p a share. I think perhaps the politics in zimbabwe could be holding the share price back, but the fundamentals for mwana still look good.

Mwana Africa PLC

Well badugi is meh, limit is pretty boring, i had a smallish winrate after i mega tilted lol and i ended up playing $5/$10 and making $120, withdrew and then lost $100 playing pot limit badugi, it was pretty rigged losing with 7 high badugi's 3 handed, people called incorrectly played awful and sucked out. Just done with poker and moving on to stock market :)

I had been betting on Mwana Africa since it was at 5p in July and its now at 14p, made £90 (betting £10 a point) and things are looking really good for the future. I been researching loads since July and decided to go ALL-IN with this company so to speak. I will risk ~£900 and bet £290 a point/penny on it going up. Lots of good news for the company, i.e rise of gold price, lots of funding and now there trading in USD after the collapse of the zimbawbe dollar, risky investment perhaps but could be good to go back to 80p which would bring a £20,000 profit!

Hold'em -> Badugi

I carried on to about the 20,000 hand mark at $200nl. My win rate was about 3.5ptbb/100 but we blew some money on tournament poker and short stacked once at 5/10 for fun and lost a flip. Anyway I started working recently and as I was getting tired of hold'em I withdrew and paid my friend £760. Awesome to have played $200nl but I don't think I can play without tilting right now. I was keen to reach my targets but I just burnt out so fast playing, I really have lost love for the game itself and only enjoy making $$ which isn't a good recipe for winning, but..

I recently started playing Badugi which is really awesome, its my 2nd attempt at playing it and I think I understand a lot more this time round. Tonight I will 3-table 0.25/0.5 on poker stars, it will be my 3rd night playing and hopefully post a graph soon!

First 2 weeks of $200nl

Not really many hands for 2 weeks, but I was playing no more than 4 tables, and often 3 tables so I could really concentrate, so about 20 hours of play, which is ok considering I was quite busy / ill recently.

12.5 ptbb/100 is better than I could have ever asked for for my first 7000 hands.

I have always wanted to beat $200nl but my ultimate goal has always been $400nl because to me this is where you make serious amounts of money. A few months back I felt like I was often making plays against what I thought was right, making calls I know I shouldn't. I think having this good run has really brought peace to my head and allowed me to improve and also fold those hands I know are beat.

The goal between me and my staker was to make $10,000, and to be 35% of the way already is awesome.

Whats happening !

I dunno what it is, I know I am running good, so probably partly because of this but I think my post flop skills have really clicked recently.

I made a call with ace high today which is always satisfying The board was something like QT6QT and he played his hand in a manner where he couldn't have a queen and he wouldn't bet pot on the river with a ten or JJ, he had K high. Another hand a aggro fish slightly overbet the river after check calling the flop as PFR, I checked back the turn, board was 363hh 9h8, and I called with A8, he also had K high.

Another hand today I floated flop and turn with ace high and then bet river when he checked to me, haha im crazy...

Today I seemed to avoid big hands and set ups just alot of small pots and went well, almost + 2 buy ins for today, over three 40 minute sessions or so.

Bluff !

I started today down about $600-$700 but nothing too bad, I was lucky enough to win a $600+ pot with a set vs overpair (QQ) vs q-high flush draw. I recently made some big call downs for stacks, the craziest being with A8 on 448Kx where most the money went in on the river when flush got there, he had A7o ^^. But today I made a big bluff, which you can watch from the link.

KQ Bluff

I ended the day +$371

Reached $2500

I had my birthday recently, felt hungover then the following day had family over then had an interview and I have been feeling ill for the last 3 days.

I managed to find a small amount of time to play, and add $550 to total.

$1K day!

I spent the day with my friend as I find the daytime on wednesday the worst possible time to play. I played no more than an hour later on and had my first $1000 day at $200nl.

Here is my last 3 days in total

2nd day at $200nl

I woke up ate half a pizza.. and got to the tables. I had an interesting hand, I raised QJ UTG and had 2 callers. Flop: Qh4h4c, I bet and button calls and we have effective stacks of 100bb. Turn is 5c and I bet, alot of draws and worse hands can still call. River is ace of spades and I check to see what he does. Although the draws missed, there are Axs hands that had a flush draw and would now have top pair. The pot is ~$140 and he shoves ~$160 and I am getting ready to fold, I start to think what he could have and I quickly disregard Axs hands now as they would almost certainely not overbet the river. It seems he has AQ and even then would he overbet? Perhaps 45 and then alot of missed draws could play this way. I make the call due to the fact alot of the hands that have me beat like A7,A8 etc and KQ would not bet the river like this and he shows 33 !

I made a good bluff last night, tripple barreling for the first time and getting $90 of his stack when he folded river to my king high. I played quite late today and was a bit annoyed when I did some spewy bluffs, it can be hard as there are alot of people playing back from what im used to at $100nl. I see alot of floats and I had someone call flop with AQ (ace high) and raise 2.3x on the turn with ace high and then shove the river. I had KT, bet the flop with (king high), turned top pair (pair of tens), bet again called the small raise and rivered a king and check called the river shove. Unlucky for him, in general I am coping well although its pretty annoying when a fish opens and I call on the button and like what seems like everytime i get squeezed and I often get shoved on if I 4-bet bluff. I know people are just absoultely nuts as I have had AK vs A9 and QQ vs AQ both all in pre flop for 100bb. In general im not 3-betting and squeezing as much as some regulars but I think they have issues lol. Approximately +$450 for the day.

A change in the wind !

Recently I am feeling good, perhaps genuinely feeling good for the first time in about 3 years. The news on microgaming site is that I made $590 and then lost it all, but cashed out just over $300 of bonuses, so not too bad.

I recently met a girl, it was a quick encounter when she came to my front door to sell frozen meat, I gave her my number and she text me... a couple weeks passed and then last saturday I went clubbing with her, just us. She is just amazing and I had the best night of my life that night.

On the poker side of things, I thought I now had the right mindset to play. I felt calm inside, I feel like there is no rush and felt so good etc. I decided to take up my friend on his offer to stake me. I got straight to work playing $200nl 6-max, 4 tables max and lost 3 out of 3 flips, I felt calm, I know it isn't my money but I feel like I can take beats alot better now! I was soon down $800 but playing well!! (imo)

I carried on playing all day until my head hurt and finished the day up $444. A good day, seems such a lot but its only 2 buy ins haha! wow.. This is my chance !!!! Thanks Andy! (my staker and friend)

1987 hands!

Soon as I sat down I was getting raised everywhere, I was losing money by betting flop so I cut it down a touch but I was just running into hands everywhere...

I tried my best to fold when I was beat, I knew I was making the 2nd best hand or I was being rivered and getting raised on the river and I know its a bet fold but got a bit annoying to bet/fold constantly. These guys were most likely not exploiting my high cbet as it was happening from various people across all 5 tables.

Here's my biggest fold of the day and I showed a few people and they all agree I beat virtually nothing that takes this line. I think im looking at AJ/A9/flush/JJ so I folded.

- JohnnyG sitting in seat 1 with $50.00
- NoRhino sitting in seat 2 with $57.28 [Dealer]
- GET_IT_READY sitting in seat 3 with $103.05
- Raziel sitting in seat 4 with $49.50
- elbutrex sitting in seat 5 with $74.81 [Sitting out]
- Dunken69 sitting in seat 6 with $28.27

GET_IT_READY posted the small blind - $0.25
Raziel posted the big blind - $0.50
** Dealing card to NoRhino: A of c, Q of s
Dunken69 folded
JohnnyG raised - $1.50
NoRhino called - $1.50
GET_IT_READY folded
Raziel folded
** Dealing the flop: A of s, A of h, 9 of s
JohnnyG bet - $2.00
NoRhino raised - $8.00
JohnnyG called - $8.00
** Dealing the turn: 4 of d
JohnnyG checked
NoRhino bet - $12.00
JohnnyG called - $12.00
** Dealing the river: J of s
JohnnyG went all-in - $28.50
NoRhino folded
JohnnyG mucks:
JohnnyG wins $70.07 from the main pot

I played on euro tables at the end as they had more action, so taking into account i won euros instead of dollars you can add $16 to this + $20 bonus = -$36 for the day.

1,648 hands

+$341 at $50nl, running well in general and $40 above EV, all played yesterday.

Playing 1/4 of my hands

I played on pacific again and made $335 at $100nl then discovered a new site!

I discovered the network MicroGaming and I am finding it really soft and didn't realise it was MicroGaming at first. I have cleared $175 in bonuses in just 13 hours of play, giving roughly 57% rakeback so far, additionally made 6 buy ins at $50nl. Its a good start and really loving the style of the site!

And actually running well, here's the first 5000 hands! more to come! :)

UNREAL!

so i drop $215 at $50nl... i played bad today I admit.. i felt ill infact.

I felt so bad.. because i blew £840 in 3 days, i dont regret it cause I think it was very +EV. But im so tilted now I install 888 poker casino and smack £46 on 11 and win. Its unbelievable, I just cashed out £1696 from my £100 deposit.

So im up £740 in 3 days or ~$1233. these 3 days have been so unreal.. extreme bad luck to amazing good luck. Bad method, but omg thank you so much.

A bad start

I lost $1200 at $100nl in total.. extremely annoying.. so many bad beats i dont even wanna talk about it. So i redopsited for 50nl and just made a video for my 5/10 friend to review! I have been meaning to do one for ages, it should be great to get some feedback.. and hopefully i will start to run better

Returning to poker.. perhaps..

Well my challenge mentioned in my last post lasted no more than a day. I was too tilted just from poker not so much variance, perhaps burnt out from the game. I haven't played since only here and there maybe every couple weeks i play 1 tournament or so, nothing big. Well I kinda ran out of money as I wasn't playing poker and I have had no job in this time, but I am making an aggressive shot at $100nl cause I dont think I can be bothered with poker below $100nl. Even though I have a 60% rakeback deal on betfred I feel so much more comfortable at pacific and I believe the softness makes up for the high rake and lack of rakeback.

I made $143 in about 50 minutes of play, winning a $60 pot with a bluff catcher on A55 with a flush draw, flush completed on turn and I time down on river and call with 66 and its good. Well that sounds like a fishy start but the site is just as soft maybe softer as when I left it in march. I hope to run my $600 deposit into a bankroll for $100nl and repay my savings account back to what it was several months ago! Wish me a variance free start!

I also recently graduated! woo!

10 Day Challenge

After playing 5 days online and one night at a casino, I have made about $1200 and have set myself up with a sweet rakeback deal on a new site. I have decided to take 10 days to try and hit some targets.

This challenge should hopefully be a good way to get some money in and get myself boosted back into 100nl so I can finally look to get to 200nl.

My targets for this 10 day challenge at 50nl 6-max are:

- 50,000 hands
- $5000 profit including rakeback

Wish me luck. I will start monday-wednesday, depending on plans of people around me. Updates to follow!

Good Day II

I should play more but got other things to do ^^, I will certainely try harder tommorow to put more hands in. Up $400.0 today ($298 ev adjusted) although perhaps lucky to find some donks at the table, such as the one in this hand.

Good Day

Today was alot better, I thought I played well and I wanna try and keep my winrate above 10 big blinds per 100 hands. I really feel like I am playing well and I have the potential to make hundreds day in day out, and hopefully more later. I went to the pub today so didn't play as long as I could.

BetFair

Today was my first day back at the tables after deciding to BR myself for $50NL, I decided to make use of the rakeback offer at BetFair giving 60% rakeback for up to $2500 and then 30-40% afterwards. I cant believe how good rakeback is, I have definately been missing out, especially as BetFair is really soft. The players are passive and very nitty pre flop although I am quite used to this but I actually think it is less aggressive than pacific. I have to say I dont enjoy playing at poker stars and getting 3-bet relentlessly from the blinds when in late position.

Twice I got QQ all in pre against AA, and after playing 3000 hands I didn't see anyone else go all in pre, unless they were less than mid stacked and one guy paused on calling with QQ for 40BB against me and I had JJ and i was like wow... It is just so transparent you spend an hour playing against some people who always are calling and playing weak post flop then eventually they 3-bet you and then on the flop they pot it... its like erm i wonder what you have lol! Its in spots like these where JJ becomes hard, can you really fold JJ-QQ pre to these nits I think you can, maybe i can learn how to fold.

Post flop I saw some really crazy calls resulting in back door flushes in craziest spots ever and people stacking with 2nd/3rd pair and rivering me. Although one guy bluffed 80% of his stack on the river for a large overbet and I had rivered the nut straight, so shoved the rest in and he called with 6 high lol, snap called then left. He must hate money. My bluffing had mixed results, but I feel pleased because the times I got picked off, I had read the hand correctly, just I had made a bad read on thinking they would fold. This is easy to adjust and in spots like these I can value bet thinner. After a few hours playing I was down 6 buy ins and 4 buy ins below expectation, which doesn't count some annoying spots where they hit but you have a set and have to pay the unlikely part of their range.

Overall down $86 but I believe up $120 in rakeback, but not 100% on that.

Thoughts for future

Well I quit poker for virtually 2 months. I completely switched off from the game and thought I would never play again. After 1 month I felt no desire to play and the thought of playing sounded boring. Despite being in the final run up to my final exams for university which I will take in a few days I gave alot of attention to producing a techno track, something I ocassionally do in my spare time. Although I am happy with my progress I dont like the way I cant compete with professionals, i.e quality of kicks and I think there is so much learning to do. So... having gave music another shot I decided im not good enough at it.

I think there is still much more I can achieve in poker and I want to give it another shot. I like the whole image surrounded around playing poker, gambling money, just there are things that have annoyed me, such as the fact I never got past 100nl which I felt was because of the fact my BR never could grow due to studying and paying bills out of my BR. Now I have had a proper 2 month break I feel my patience has been restored even though I haven't actually played yet. On my last couple of sessions I was really getting frustrated with the game not so much bad beats as I was running good although any kind of suck out made me angry. It was more having players who are clueless making semi decent moves or even just making awful moves and just listening to people at the casino talk about "strategy". Ye my mind was definately not focussed and I had lost all love for the game.

When I play again I want to make the following improvements from the way I was playing before. The first is mainly thinking more... it sounds stupid but I know I am capable of just thinking more and sometimes I choose a more safer router and stack of saying to myself this is standard... when I know I could have analysed the situation I am in better and thought about the other factors. 3-betting AQ for a reason!! and thinking about how I will react to a 4-bet and considering flatting AQ and then thinking how I will react on certain turn cards and then considering all my options. Obviously I do this already but I think changing my mind set to think more outside the box will help my game.

The main problem I will face is how will I BR myself, having not played for 2 months I have run out of money lol. When i finish uni forever on the 22nd of may I will be down to virtually £0. I have the option to use my savings. This feels pretty... umm.. bad but I am confident in my game. There is a chance I will lose money then quit poker again but I think its pretty low. I guess at least I dont owe anyone money from university. Although I could consider getting stakes and I know a couple of people who would likely be interested. The upside is they take my risk but the downside is it slows me down. I will likely choose to not get staking but then I wonder if I should start at 50nl instead of 100nl. Now comes the really awful thing, If I bankroll myself for 100nl, I wont be able to use my savings as most of it is tied up in an ICER until august meaning I would have to use my overdraft lol.. Thus I would be gambling with the bank's money, BANKROLLED by LLOYDS TSB, BRAG OR BEAT? Anyway if i lost some money I would pay the interest free overdraft with my savings in august. LOL so complicated, and actually sounds worse than it is. My current online winnings stand at $15K and I aim to make the next $15K quicker than I did the first.

Short Term Goal: Hit the $20K life time mark (thus make $5K). I hope to do this within 2 months.

Live Cash Games

Played some cash games live in a bar, no rake and very soft competition. £100 stacks and I was deep 3 way and had AsJs, we saw a family pot.. std. me as PFR.

flop: Ts Qs Kh. So I am like fist pumping when I get so much action and just have to call to get it in vs J9 and KT and even one of his 4 full house outs gives me a royal flush, river is a king and it isn't the king of spades and he takes down a £500+ pot. sick. Anyway I split ££ after the game with 2 friends and ended up £30, despite my friend getting queen's full of two's vs quad two's we netted a profit. Wow competition is really soft.

Last time I went we split over £1000 in tournament winnings, but this time I went for the cash games only as the tournament just is soooo long and I am better at cash.

Still not a fan of the atmosphere at the poker table but oh well...

Played a little PLO the other day and made 3 buy ins at 50PLO was kinda cool, had done alot of reading over the last couple of months so was pretty prepared, and will probably slowly start playing PLO we shall see.

Anyway been doing alot of discussing hands with people alot of thinking and checking hand histories thoroughly and not much playing. Watching videos and just spending hours studying the game. Hopefully will put some hours in at the tables but its good to be able to take time to improve as I went through a phase of not really improving towards the end of 2008.

Weeeee

I have been playing 9-11 tables on stars and have been discussing many hands and trying to improve. Here is a hand against a pretty bad player.

http://www.pokerhand.org/?3976091

Pacific Poker

I have played on pacific poker since 24th of may 2008 and I played my last hand on the 3rd of March 2009. A total of 184,107 hands. GG pacific

20th!!!

Omg I am on the top 20 biggest winners for 100nl for today at pokerlistings.com with $767. ship ship!

Moved to Poker Stars

Since my last post I had a loss of $1700 and then made $900 back. I found the games had become pretty bad on pacific with too many good players sitting at all my tables. There games can be soft but I decided to check stars out and even though the average pots are smaller and you dont as often get super donks splashing around you haven't really got regulars constantly making life hell and there are many breakeven players just trying to make FPPs etc. I would say the competition is similar but less tilting, I cant stand all the min betting on pacific lol and the gap between the best player at the table and the worst is closer I would say than pacific and maybe poker stars is tougher overall but you get better rake back and there is less rake and more tables. I only played 4000 hands at 100nl but running hot hot hot.

Last 33 days

Here it is, $3800 at 100nl and $400 at 200nl. lol omgz0rs.

Need more monies lol

Today I decided to play a $100 rebuy and doubled up early and then added on, so didn't rebuy. I went out with KK vs 77 AIPF lameeeee. After that I felt pretty meh, especially as a few days ago I tried a $50 6-max freezeout and lost 3 all ins at the end, two of which I was miles ahead and another was a flip. So down $264 to tournaments lol... but I think I am done with them for now. I guess my motive was to boost me into 200NL but instead I took a shot today at 200NL and made $400 and about $300 or so at 100NL the other day. I was a bit concerned because the tables I were playing on at 200NL were quite similar, same regulars on each table just 1 or 2 fish on each table, but some not that fishy. I think the action is pretty dry on pacific higher up but I will stay there for now and see as I didn't find the 200NL games that tough and felt the most aggressive in the games, although hit sets often.

I am just not sure what to do now as I transferred £1000 from saving into my current account so I would have money in my account to pay tuition fee's for university. Now to pay that back I should cash out some of my roll but hmm... so annoying how will I ever make it into $200NL, omg.. lol. I guess I should cash out and grind 100nl, that would be wise... Infact if I put back the money I took out my savings the money I am left with is equal to my winnings in the last month from poker so I think it was a good decision to start playing again.. sigh... lol. My life is fun??? :D

I Win Flips

Woo my winnings since end of may back up to the $10,000 mark. I really wanna grind more but uni work is stopping me. Total made since return sometime in Jan: ~$2450

So after paying £600 tuition fee's my bank account has hit 0 pretty much and now I bank with pacific :D, just need to get myself a pacific credit card so i can spend my BR in shops that would be nice.

Well anyway all is going relatively well and really nice to win coin flips once again ^^.

GL to me.

Long Break

After my last blog post and still during my christmas break I went on to run really bad, as shown by the graph and felt frustrated. I had so many coolers against me and so many suck outs, I felt so sick and just felt that I didn't deserve to run bad as I felt that the last 2 months had been a struggle against variance.

I took a 3-4 week break and switched completely off from the game, I wasn't sure whether to continue playing. I hadn't much money, but once I spend the last of my money then I am forced to use my overdraft and then I cannot play and I will be in debt after univeristy. Well after listening to my friend talk about poker I couldn't resist, I had no temptation up till then, So I guess I have him to thank as I have made $1550 in the last 2 weeks playing mainly in the last few days and running so much better!!

Downswing Graph