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The PandaWarrior Chronicles

  #1 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
Experience: None
Posts: 3,165 since Mar 2010
Thanks Given: 6,329
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This is my first post in my new journal. In it I will attempt to document my set ups, my reasoning behind why I took the trades, along with the emotions I was feeling during the trades.

I will also attempt to post a chart daily and at least once a week, my spreadsheet summary.

The chart legend is as follows:

An arrow with a number is a live trade with the gain or loss notated.
A triangle is a trade that I saw live but did not take for some reason. I will attempt to notate the reasons for this as best I can live.

Indicators are as follows:

Mydynamic Fibs. These are mostly for context and they help me maintain situational awareness.
Anavolatility bands. Everything set to transparent except the ATR function.
jhrangemarker. This helps me plot where the range bar will end.
Super Trend set to ATR with a multiplier of 3
ADXVMA set to 15.
Prior OLHC with open and close set to transparent on the globex chart and the Close set to yellow on the RTH chart. This is for gap fill info only.
TSEconews anchored to the bottom of the chart and closed when all news events are over, otherwise set to open.

Coming soon: Fat Tails Opening range indicator IF I can get it to work right on the ETH chart. I have also asked him to do some programming for me in terms of building some other work off the opening range. More on that later if he is willing and able.

Basic premise is this:

I have several bar patterns that develop on a 12 range chart. These patterns are TREND patterns only. So I must be trading in an established trend. I do that with three tools.

1. Basic trend line drawn by hand.
2. Super Trend
3. ADXVMA.

The idea is that the two indicators help identify trend. My job is to trade with that trend using my bar patterns.

Over the last two weeks, I have been trading mostly naked. I added the ADXVMA and the ST back over the weekend after looking at them historically to see if they helped validate my patterns and my thinking about when to take those trades. While not 100%, they did a reasonably good job of showing me where to take trades.

In time, I will delete one of these indicators and just use one as I dont think both are necessary but for now, I am using both in evaluation mode.

The best trades seem to come at or near a trend line. While my patterns do set up away from the trend lines, the lowest risk ones appear to be very near them.

There are also a couple of patterns that appear during a run. Those patterns are the hardest for me to take. They are pure momentum and therefore there is no real basis for taking those trades other than momentum.

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
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  #3 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
Experience: None
Posts: 3,165 since Mar 2010
Thanks Given: 6,329
Thanks Received: 13,404


Here is a pic of the chart as it finished the day. Trades are not marked because I accidentally deleted the chart markers but I will put them back on as soon as I go through the trade log.

2011-07-25_1731 - aztrader9's library

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Started this thread
  #4 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
Experience: None
Posts: 3,165 since Mar 2010
Thanks Given: 6,329
Thanks Received: 13,404

Today was super slow. I almost fell asleep twice. Literally dozed off once or twice. But I managed to be profitable early then give it back plus a bit.

When the tape is slow, I get lulled into complacency and often times I just trade to trade. Today I really tried to wait for set ups before I entered. I think I did well with that today.

On the down side, slow tapes also cause me to second guess signals as well second guessing "trends" even if those trends are slow and small. This caused me to pass on 2 excellent trades and bail out of 2 early. Both of which were winners.

Even though it was slow, I controlled for the most part, my impatience. It helps that I am looking for specific things to happen so I don't feel so bad just waiting even if I do almost fall asleep.

There were three trades I wanted to take that were not in my trade plan. I actually had orders in on two of them and even though the trades were really nice winners, I eventually took the orders down before they were filled and stood aside to watch those trades go by. I felt bad because of the money but I felt good for following my plan.

This week I intend on working on the following two areas.

1. Holding the trades I do enter to either target or stop.
2. Being more patient with the set ups. There are more optimum points in time and space in which to take trades. I need to wait for them. I am doing better but this area needs more work.

2011-07-25_2025 - aztrader9's library

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Started this thread
  #5 (permalink)
 
Mickey Caine's Avatar
 Mickey Caine 
Kent, England
 
Experience: Intermediate
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I still think PANDA-MONIUM was a better tittle. Good luck my friend.

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  #6 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
Experience: None
Posts: 3,165 since Mar 2010
Thanks Given: 6,329
Thanks Received: 13,404

Well not so much killer stops as poor trade selection driven by fear. The stops were also driven by fear in that they were improperly placed.

First of all, I was anticipating a break out day today following 4 back to back narrowish range days. What I was not expecting was the immediate nature of the break down. The break down appears to have been a stop run on the daily chart as it reversed to take out any tight stops and went to make new highs.

Secondly, I was not expecting a major internet disconnect. I was down for almost thirty minutes this morning in the middle of one of the nicest set ups and runs I've seen in a while.

I got a couple of bites out of the sell off. Then in a fit of greed, proceeded to take two trades in a row that quite frankly were just stupid. They were motivated by only one thing....greed and fear....the desire to make more than was being offered and fear I would miss more of the move down assuming it kept going. So I sold it twice in a location that is never part of my trading plan.

Immediately after taking these two trades, my internet went down. After I restored my connection, I saw I had missed a wonderful long series of trades. I was somewhat frustrated by this but as the connection was not my fault, I was only mildly irritated. But then, in an effort to capture some of it, I took a valid pattern but in a non valid location. I got out with less than a full stop.

To compound things, when I did get a great signal in a valid location, I took the trade only to have it stop out at BE because I used an aggressive stop for fear of maybe being at the beginning of a reversal. Bad move. The thing went on to have another nice run.

I then made it worse by repeating the same sequence of errors later on in the move that I had made at the bottom of the sell off. Thats when I called it quits.

As a result of this, I have elected to revisit my risk reward ratio, the exact premise of my trades, the location of my trades and how those trades are managed. I'll be reworking my targets to accomodate better R:R. This is part of the two issues I am working on. Closing winners early and choosing better locations for trades.

With regards to the two issues I am focusing on, today I did not manually close a single trade out early. This is a major improvement for me. The second issue is waiting for better location in time and space. There was less improvement in this area and will continue to require more work.

I dropped the ADXVMA today. The super trend is enough. I can recognize PA and my patterns in the context of the super trend. I'll be using that for at least another week and then decide if I need or want it past then.

In the context of everyday being a great learning experience, today was a good one. Other than that, it was a bust in terms of money. The lessons I learned today are ones I have repeated. But for some reason, they really sank in. I've modified my ATM's to accommodate the stop rules for my pattern trades instead of being in charge of moving those manually, I'll let the computer do it for me.

I've also put the exact nature of where I'd like to see the entries set up in my trading plan. Until now, I've had them in my head. While I know what they are, its really easy to fudge on them if there is no accountability to a written plan. Over the next few days, I will be revising my written plan to delete a few things and add a few in. I may post the plan on the forum if for no other reason than to be accountable to it.

Ok thats it for today.

2011-07-26_1543 - aztrader9's library

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Started this thread
  #7 (permalink)
 
Big Mike's Avatar
 Big Mike 
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  #8 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
Experience: None
Posts: 3,165 since Mar 2010
Thanks Given: 6,329
Thanks Received: 13,404

Today was a pretty tough day for me to trade. The slower pace, the directionless drift and the seemingly endless number of possible head fake signals all contributed to an exhausting day.

I took as many as I could. The trades seen are the total of my trades. I netted 60 ticks today plus a few more in sim that were experimental in nature after I got to 60.

I made a few mistakes today, but I compensated for those by holding my good trades as long as I could. This was easier than I thought and gives me hope for the future. I'll settle at some point on an exact number to use as the target but for now, 20 ticks or so is good. There are some 30 tick trades on the chart. I was experimenting with a certain type of trail stop with a 30 tick target and those worked pretty well...

I used two lots several times today and took one off early to give myself a free trade. This is the chicken sh!t way out but it sure felt good to be in a free trade. I think I can use this in the future to really capitalize on some of my entries. Using the combination of 1 and 2 lot trades allowed me to hit 60 ticks without actually getting a total of 60 ticks with one lot. When I was down, I used 1 lot and when ahead, worked with 2. A double edge sword to be sure but it worked today.

In the end, I netted 60 ticks. I am happy about this with the caveat that if I can narrow down my trade locations better, it could be much more with less stress.

Chart is messy but it includes all the live trades and all the sim trades toward the end of day.


Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Started this thread
  #9 (permalink)
 
worldwary's Avatar
 worldwary 
Williamsburg, VA
 
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PandaWarrior View Post
I used two lots several times today and took one off early to give myself a free trade. This is the chicken sh!t way out but it sure felt good to be in a free trade. I think I can use this in the future to really capitalize on some of my entries. Using the combination of 1 and 2 lot trades allowed me to hit 60 ticks without actually getting a total of 60 ticks with one lot. When I was down, I used 1 lot and when ahead, worked with 2. A double edge sword to be sure but it worked today.



Good job on the winning day. My one comment is that I'm not a fan of this two-lot, scale out-type method. The additional ticks from the runner seem like a "free" trade only when the trade works out for a decent profit. When the trade stops out for a loss, your loss is twice as big as the winners where you profit on the first contract but scratch out on the second, which due to the "Murphy's law" nature of trading seem to be the vast majority of the trades.

I'm sure you've seen this yourself so I'm probably not adding anything groundbreaking. My experience with the scaling-out concept is that it works best when the initial profit target is at least twice the size of the initial stop. This will help prevent you from getting into a situation where the average loss is larger than the average gain, which is never a good situation in my book.

-----------------------------------------------------

"If you must forecast, forecast often."

-- Edgar Fiedler
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  #10 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
Experience: None
Posts: 3,165 since Mar 2010
Thanks Given: 6,329
Thanks Received: 13,404



worldwary View Post
[/URL]

Good job on the winning day. My one comment is that I'm not a fan of this two-lot, scale out-type method.

I'm not a fan either, but it does take the pressure off letting a runner run. I will eventually get to the place where the initial target is twice the size of the initial stop but not there yet. Currently its just 1:1.....I did let a sim trade go to thirty ticks without the benefit of the scaling out concept....but that was sim....and we all know how different that is.

Its a baby step for sure but I need to get in the habit of holding trades longer and this is the only way I feel I can learn to do that without a ton of stress. Once a trade gets going, i can manage it pretty well, but its that first 10-15 ticks that make me nervous. So getting a contract off inside that range is good. At least for now.

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
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Last Updated on May 14, 2014


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