bluemele 

Hey, no stealing plans..... haha... Forex is murder in December. I think all things traded are terrible in December....

Thats why I am sim. But it does keep me in practice......I would sim Crude but I want to see if I swing trade forex off much larger time frame charts.

I remember you mentioning you were swinging forex a while back....sorry to steal your stuff....thankfully there's enough to go around.....

Its 10:15PM here in the desert southwest. I had a question about some brokerage issues and so I emailed @Matt from not really expecting an answer any time soon especially since I don't have an account there. I just know him from the forum.

To my surprise, back came an answer in about 15 minutes. Then a follow up with more information from him unsolicited. Needless to say, I gotta say I'm impressed.....that being said, its midnight in Florida and Matt should be resting up for another trading day tomorrow......

Thanks Matt.

I'm glad you brought up the concept of knowing what kind of trader you are. This is an issue I've been dealing with lately and it likely explains a lot of the difficulty I've had in the past.

After years of experimentation with different trading styles, I've come to the conclusion that I am not a scalper. I prefer to look for larger moves that can play out over the course of several hours to several days. This generally means larger stops, which in turn means smaller position sizes.

Like you, I feel much more relaxed when I resolve to take only the kinds of trades I'm good at while ignoring the setups that don't match my aptitude. It is difficult to go back and forth between the two trading styles and if you try to trade both ways, you can drive yourself crazy thinking about all the setups you've missed.

To add to that, a worse problem is when you see a good longer-term setup, but trade it with too much size as if it's a scalp. This is a recipe for disaster. You will almost always get stopped out.

Trading tactics (position size, stop placement, etc.) need to match up with your trading style and timeframe. A difficult lesson that I've learned over the years.

got a nice simple chart on the side with TF on it to play around with on sim when 6E is fluttering around..



one thing i know for me personally that would be troublesome would be that if i sit and watch the chart for the hours that i trade i would try taking all setups and would imagine wouldnt be profitable for me.. i know this will sound funny but i feel like it works better for me if i am not constantly watching but glance over occasionally and see it setting up, the trade then usually works out..

thats prolly confusing but ive noticed that in my trading overall..

also you were talking about another guy(when you were referring to the size of the entry candle, its size, and risk) who works with this method as well. do you have any other resources for this type of method of trading?

madLyfe 

got a nice simple chart on the side with TF on it to play around with on sim when 6E is fluttering around.. one thing i know for me personally that would be troublesome would be that if i sit and watch the chart for the hours that i trade i would try taking all setups and would imagine wouldnt be profitable for me.. i know this will sound funny but i feel like it works better for me if i am not constantly watching but glance over occasionally and see it setting up, the trade then usually works out.. thats prolly confusing but ive noticed that in my trading overall.. also you were talking about another guy(when you were referring to the size of the entry candle, its size, and risk) who works with this method as well. do you have any other resources for this type of method of trading?

Nice simple chart but I can't seem correlate the two MA's you have. Are they the 89SMA and 21EMA?

I watch charts for exactly 3 hours a day. No more. I get decision fatigue after that. I to have noticed that if I am otherwise engaged and I glance over and see the set ups, those seem to work better. I have no idea why, they just do.

Actually the guy I mentioned uses a different method than I do but he does not hesitate to enter on a large bar like that. I think for him it represents a strong entry bar. In other words if you are looking for momentum, thats better momentum than a small bar.....I can't wrap my head emotionally around that yet but I supposed one day I will. For now though, I am quite happy with the way things are progressing.

PandaWarrior 

Nice simple chart but I can't seem correlate the two MA's you have. Are they the 89SMA and 21EMA? I watch charts for exactly 3 hours a day. No more. I get decision fatigue after that. I to have noticed that if I am otherwise engaged and I glance over and see the set ups, those seem to work better. I have no idea why, they just do. Actually the guy I mentioned uses a different method than I do but he does not hesitate to enter on a large bar like that. I think for him it represents a strong entry bar. In other words if you are looking for momentum, thats better momentum than a small bar.....I can't wrap my head emotionally around that yet but I supposed one day I will. For now though, I am quite happy with the way things are progressing.

ya those are the 89SMA and 21EMA.. i have also added the 50SMA too just to see if that works better for me instead of the 89.. and thanks for the explanation!

PandaWarrior 

Nice simple chart but I can't seem correlate the two MA's you have. Are they the 89SMA and 21EMA? I watch charts for exactly 3 hours a day. No more. I get decision fatigue after that. I to have noticed that if I am otherwise engaged and I glance over and see the set ups, those seem to work better. I have no idea why, they just do. Actually the guy I mentioned uses a different method than I do but he does not hesitate to enter on a large bar like that. I think for him it represents a strong entry bar. In other words if you are looking for momentum, thats better momentum than a small bar.....I can't wrap my head emotionally around that yet but I supposed one day I will. For now though, I am quite happy with the way things are progressing.

When I use to trade stocks on minute bars with this type of risk management, on very large bars that negate my risk/reward, I would risk half the bar instead of the whole bar. The idea would be, if this is truly strong momentum, then the bar should not retrace that much.

one situation that has always puzzled me, is trading around the news.Some people say, dont trade 10 minutes before or after.What i think, is, when price really moves because of the news, it pulls the mas way out, and the question is, is the 1st retracement to to the ma actually reliable, as there typically isnt a trend.Honestly, it seems to me, that i have to wait till the market resumes a reliable trend.Any thoughts?

bobarian 

one situation that has always puzzled me, is trading around the news.Some people say, dont trade 10 minutes before or after.What i think, is, when price really moves because of the news, it pulls the mas way out, and the question is, is the 1st retracement to to the ma actually reliable, as there typically isnt a trend.Honestly, it seems to me, that i have to wait till the market resumes a reliable trend.Any thoughts?

Yes, stay away from the news...