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Trade 1: Faded strongish bear bar in a trading range. Profit target hit, +8t.
Trade 2: Took a long trade reasoning there would be follow through of the 730 bull bar with a strong close. Unfortunately it closed in the upper portion of the trading range, a fact that I overlooked. Mental error. -14t.
Lessons learned:
1. Squeezing in a few trades before work is difficult to do. It will require overcoming the urge to make something happen in the limited amount of time I have. I suppose it means taking only the most high probability trades. Which is probably a good idea no matter how much time I have with the market on any particular day .
You are in the same situation as me. Keep the faith, I'm learning that if I'm prepared and focused I can see the opportunities in the small amount of time, hopefully we will both get to expand our trading time in the future. Its a grind but I think its worth it.
Same here guys have 1hr to trade CL in the morning before work. There are many days you just have to sit on hands and not force a trade and be ok with it. Then there are other days where the market moves with lots of triggers for entrys during that short period of time.
I need to figure this part out...and to pass on the not so great opportunities. I've been spending a lot of time studying, which for me at this point in my career, is more valuable than actually trading. I am very much still scaling the learning curve...and it's steep!
I was able to trade all day today, which was nice. I did 6 trades of ES with 4 winners, 1 loser and 1 scratch for +13t.
Trade 1: I Faded the bear bar near bottom of a trading range for a scalp. +8t.
Trade 2: I Faded the 920 bull breakout bar thinking there would be a gap fill (blue rectangle area) and more trading range. This was a legit breakout though so -3t.
Trade 3: Because there was no 920 bull bar gap fill, it was time to join the long side of the market. I used the 920 bar to measure out a target. I didn't have much confidence in my measured move target because I've never really used MM to plan out a trade. It turns out I should have honored my MM target because I would have locked in a better profit. I was a little confused during this trade because there looked to be another measuring gap created by the 1000 breakout bar. But this gap was filled in a short amount of time so I figured the buying was pretty weak. I exited on what I thought was a weak rally, +6.
Trade 4: I didn't realize a channel was forming. I bought during the 1110 bar reasoning that ES was holding above resistance at a possible double top (1005 and 1050 bars with selling tails). It turns out I was buying near the top of the channel. Mental error, scratch trade.
Trade 5: I bought the false breakout below the bottom of the channel. I thought the market would move pretty quickly back into the channel. But I didn't get the strong buying that I expected. I sold after a pair of doj'd out bars near a possible double top area. +1t.
Trade 6: I sold the close of the big bear bar at 1305. I was certain there would be at least a little follow through and I would get a nice scalp. NOPE! I guess it was a second leg trap? It trapped me anyway. But I figured there was a big chance of a trading range ensuing due to quick 2 big bear bars followed by 2 nice bull bars. I held through the close with my price target moved to my BE, down at the close of the 1305 bar. When the evening session opened my price target was hit and I got positive slippage. +1t.
Lessons learned:
1. Would have been nice to use limit orders in that bull channel. Probably would have captured a few more ticks.
2. Seemed like pretty forgiving price action today, as long as I stayed on the right side of the market.
I made 4 trades in ES with 4 winners, 0 losers for +7t. Three of those winners should probably be considered scratches as they were good for only 1 tick each.
Trade 1: I faded the opening bar breakout (bar 1) expecting a trading range--ie. open in yesterday's range, overlapping bars, tails, etc. I entered on the close of the opening bar and let it go just a shade early as I had to go to work. In my opinion, this trade has way better expectation if I wait for the next bar to see if there is follow through. I got the doji I was expecting. But if there is a second leg down, the losses are going to squash the expectation. This can be avoided by waiting for the weak follow through. +1t.
Trade 2: I was able to get back in front of the screen for the last two hours of trading. I shorted within the top 1/3 of the trading range. This entry could have been better. But it didn't matter much because ES wasn't being sold off below 2868 and the market was holding the 20EMA. Bought back my short for +1t.
Trade 3: Entered long in the lower part of the new small range area. But sold off before the false breakout. I thought things were moving lower. But I was wrong and sold out +4t.
Trade 4: Bought the breakout (bar 4). I didn't expect it to hold over yesterday's high but that's what I was playing for . The breakout ended up reversing and I escaped with +1t.
The trade I wish I took: I wasn't in front of the screen at the time, but the false breakout from the bottom of the wide bear channel was a pretty sweet setup. I like to think I would have made a few points on that one. But today I was having a hard time capturing more than 1 tick a trade!
One trade today. A scalp before the open on ES for +8t.
Trade 1: Selling from the 600 bear leg dried up and I entered with a limit order near the trend support line. I got two nice bull bars and then no follow through on the 625 bar, so I exited on the 630 bar. Looks like it was a well timed exit. The opening bar is down ~4 points as of now on a lower high reversal. Out just in time...how lucky! +8t.
I also tried to get short on the 510 bar using a limit order. I wasn't the only one getting short. There was a gap down on the open of the 515 bar and I never was filled. If traded perfectly, it only would have been ~1 point scalp so oh well.
The trade: I went long on a bull flag, or so I thought. My entry was a bit ham-handed--what's becoming a patented Salao style entry. The bull flag was more of a ~50% pullback of a bull leg that started at 520. The 520 bull leg occurred during a series of HL's starting from yesterday around noon (PDT). It was also near the bottom third of a trading range and near the bottom of a trend channel line. The trend channel line was drawn using points from the beginning of the week so I was a little skeptical of the validity of the channel but I went with it. I had a confluence of setups that suggested high probability...at least to my neophyte estimation. I set my measured move target...which was about 5 points. The MFE was about 6 points...So my profit target worked out pretty well for me at this stage of the game. The market quickly reversed shortly after exit. +20t.
Lessons learned: I'm feeling WAY less emotion trading this week. All the work I've put in studying has made my analysis more clear and focused. This leads to confidence which acts to deter fear. Experience, getting whacked, has kept greed in check. Those are the reasons I attribute to my new found clarity. But who really knows? I could wake up tomorrow a basket case. The clarity has been welcome. I hope it stays!
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. The breakout ended up