Trading day Tuesday, February 19
Not a good day. I was up very early, about 2 AM, to take Seamus to the bus for the DC trip. I have not gotten the tapping done. I did pray/meditate for a half-hour, well prior to the open. I did not have homework prepared. I had the levels laid out but I did not have a plan for what I was going to do. Chart is a 5 minute chart with a 20 period ema, a volume profile and a lower window of cumulative delta.
I was biased short on a low strength trend up day. The first bar went up from the open and never challenged the open again. There were two sideways doji bars that never gained negative Delta momentum. Despite that, I was looking to short for the entire opening drive. I did short at 22.50 at the upper end of a large uptrend bar. I was then stopped out at a set 2 point stoploss. Very poor trade location, no reason to short at all.
I entered at the point where traders who had gone long off the open or had gone long on the large uptrend bar would have been taking partial profits. This was assuming an initial risk from the top of the open bar to the top of the close from Monday's short session. This profit-taking was approximately when I entered. The drive up continued to 1524.75. The drive then went sideways for approximately an hour and a half. It did establish the initial balance high at 1524.75. There was a pullback from 1524.75 that went less than half the distance of the measuring gap of the large bullish gap bar. This pullback stopped at my initial short entry of 1522.50. This pullback also failed to penetrate the 20 period EMA.
Had I not been stuck in the belief that the market was going to correct there were three other acceptable trade opportunities that came later in the day. 1st trade at of 11:40 am, there was a two legged correction down to a channel line and the moving average. Price than advanced approx. three points. Price then went sideways through the lunch hour and at 1 PM touched the same trend line before advancing another three points, also bouncing off the 20 EMA. Late in the afternoon price than had another 2 legged pullback. This left a EMA gap bar and price advanced for 2.75 points. Although not large trades, they were appropriate for the day and actionable.
The daily volume is below average and the market has been trading in a very tight range for the last seven trading sessions. The average daily range is under 10 points. Today the market broke out of the prior trading range that was previously 1522 to 1511. The market closed strongly at nearly the days high. The market may test down to 1526 and 1522. I expect the market may move higher before any correction. It is possible that this is the final flag or an exhaustion movement prior to a significant correction.
I need to quit paying attention to outside influences and trade what I see. If I'd left all outside distractions alone for the trading session today and had entered with a neutral bias I would've had a chance at a successful trading day.
The positive aspect is that I am journaling for the first time today and will approach tomorrow with some grasp of reality. Prior to tomorrow's open I commit to getting one hour of tapping in tonight or early tomorrow morning. I also commit to having an explicit detailed plan of execution for the Wednesday, February 20 session.
Disappointing to be stuck in my same rut that I've been in for approximately 3 years. Once again procrastination has left me fantasizing about trading professionally and not executing the necessary work to be successful. Today was the first day of a trading evaluation program. It is a 10 day program with a minimum profit target. The loss that I took today is not the issue as much as the loss of psychological capital on the first day of an important event for me. I did not compound my errors at least. I still have a headache but at least now see that I am holding the hammer. End.