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OMG................i just got my Saturday laugh before I starting my lil girl's bday party........... If he(oiltradingacademy only knew your already certified with the goverment,referring to FBI statement) btw ur a weirdo too. Scammer--- only one issue there what are you selling?, this shit was too funny(his youtube video).
I have spoken to him as well, about 6 mths ago he was on futures.io (formerly BMT) blogging Im always interested in learning lol,,,,,So he skyped in with his code, he did 4 live calls over 30mins, but he read his code wrong so "he" said ... they all failed but as we know its 50-50 so he did have a shot
great trading this week, ttys R
Im still trying to learn Sierra,reply time before party
FBI Complaint Big Mike Trading Website - YouTube (
He has officially put a complaint on the FBI site about Big Mike's Trading for doing and saying the types of things he has been doing for years and years about dozens of companies and people that …
GFIs1 - with no more comments!
Have a great weekend
That was a tough one. Your request coupled with @Private Banker suggesting seeing my charts to give an opinion on "overtrading", caused me to sit down and really work to explain what I am doing. This took me at least an hour to get these two charts notated so that it was possibly readable to someone else.
Keep in mind that I am a self-taught trader for the most part. I watch webinars, read books, and then get in there and try to make it all work. I have learned to survive in my own way, and with that comes some sense of accomplishment, or pride, but also a sense of... what word am I looking for... I will get back to that, but it is something insecure.
Well, in some ways every single entry I make is related to that experience. "Technique" meaning very strict rule based entries and exits, it does not work that way for me anymore. I spent insane amounts of time backtesting various indicators and "strategies", (which today I consider a very loose and widely misinterpretted word).
But what I got out of the whole process of trying to be a scalper, was an intense focus on watching order flow. The way I did it until this year was to watch Time & Sales + 1 minute volume. But now that I am getting used to footprint, I have completely eliminated T&S, and I do keep 1m VSA up but only for major inflection point confirmation.
I really have no idea. I think because it takes a lot of busy work that I am not sure proves anything. But I have an opinion, or belief, that what happens is the scalping part keeps me tuned in to what is happening, and basically breaks even, and the larger wins make the difference. Market Profile is only a percentage of what I use today, I just got into it not that long ago. What it does is gives an additional layer f information or confirmation, or maybe an additional filtered lens through which to view the markets, that when added makes the colors much more discerrnable? Mostly, it gives me a faster way to get up to speed with what the market is trying to do, and, it helps to give more precise locations for where to be interested and where to stand aside.
I have now read my 1000 pages, but this morning opened Mind Over Markets again and want to reread parts. That was the toughest read to me for some reason. It seemed to get bogged down in more detail than was easy to "read" and required a lot of study on a few pages at a time.
My "plan"? lol... It's not funny, I have had a lot of lengthy written trading plans, and I guess I still do have one but it is in my head and in my experience. I needed it in writing for a long time, for lot of reasons. First, to learn discipline. And after that, to define risk and reward, to stay at the same process long enough to see if it is working, to have an approach that resembles professionalism. But my "plan" now is 90% on the charts I keep up. The high timeframe has it's rules, like don't fade a major stop area, go with a major break, stay on the side of a well-defined trend or wave leg. The market profile tells me within that higher time view where things are today, and if I want to be long, for example, where I might expect to get in. The VWAP charts define points of in-the-moment confluence to get in there just a little deeper, and then it all rides on order flow.
The parts that are not on the charts are max down, max leverage, those are burned into me deep. I don't need anything to remind me, and I still feel the pain of some of it.
And then there is the fluid part as I try new things, like recently how to press a trade. I don't know until I try it, and have had a few I really screwed up recently. Let's say I was up 30 ticks on one contract, and instead of close I was going to let it ride. It comes back to up 10, I add in 2 more, it move up to +15, I exit one, it pulls back I add 2 more, it stops me out and I just missed a great trade... But I have been doing this for 6 years now, and I just know now that it takes time, and I quit wondering how long. Stay alive, keep working, relax, it works itself out eventually.
So here are two examples;
Example #1 used to really piss me off. If I had a 15 tick stop and a 50 tick target I would have been golden. But, how am I supposed to know which trades will win, which will lose, which will make it to 15 or 50? So, I keep my risk low, and even if it stops me out, if I still believe in the trade I watch order flow and go again. If I had a golden rule in trading, it is "winners bigger than losers", but have never been able to define it into exact numbers. It requires faith to some degree. So what happened below, I tried twice and got nailed in 5 of 6 entries, but very tiny cuts. when it finally took, notice the difference in stop size versus profit. And, I left a lot on the table, that was the irritating part for so long to me. But, I gave up trying to know the future, and I loved the term "banking risk" that I picked up recently. It made me feel like I was doing to right thing, and that in itself is huge.
EXAMPLE #1
In example #2, I was trying to short something. I removed all the indicators from both charts because it was so busy I could not show the entries and exits clearly, but for whatever reason this was my place. Notice in the first group entry, there had been an attempted turn down. See my stop at the top of that? That was another things that used to really bug me, but I digress...
So it turn again, this time a single black bar, and I don;t enter on this chart so I can't say what happened, but something else made me get back in to 5 contracts, but in my head some of those had a very short shelf life. My stops were probably spread out so if t runed it would take me out in steps, reducing my biggest risk first and then finally down to one contract with a stop above the high.
This is where I am most questioning "overtrading" because I was all over that areawith 11 different entries, and only consider the "trade" to have 2 contracts, maybe 3. My guess is 3, and I just accidently dragged the wrong bracket (one of the scalp exits was really form a sell higher up).
Thanks for pushing me and making me get that out. When @Private Banker asked I felt more like procrastinating about it today. and dealing with it in my head instead of on paper, but now I have charts that show me more what I am doing. This is a perfect example of why I journal online. The journal is alive and makes me think outside of myself.
I am interested in hearing how the rest of you feel about Big Mike Trading.
To me, it is the best trader website available anywhere. It provides a sense of community, it offers free help and advice, it has the best library of indicators and of free …
Thank you Gary! Great detailed response!. Looks like you are going through a great a process of self examination and self evaluation.. I am sure you will come out a better trader.. Thanks for sharing!
I already am. But when I decided to start a journal it was not really clear why. I just knew that psychology played such a big part of being succesful, and that without getting stuff "out there" I had the potential to twist my thoughts into whatever I wanted them to be.
Journaling was tough at first, and mine is a little out there sometimes (in a different way), I see that. Many of my posts are just garbage. But, similar to how I never really know if a trade will work or not, I never really know what will come out here that will show me something differently. But there have been some real gems in my shotgun approach, and I get more and more comfortable with just saying what I think at the moment, trying to explain myself. It has made me a better communicator as well as a better trader.
I hope what I posted gives you some of the answers you were looking for. Remember, that none of us know the future, and that concept has to sit a certain way in a trader's mind for them to have a chance. What works for me may not for you.
Accumulation of edges. There is not one solution. But as they accumulate, the balance starts to tip in the intended direction.
I received a PM from a member who was asking about Market Profile, VWAP, scalping, risk versus reward. I prefer to answer here if it is something that someone else might also find beneficial. Keep in mind, that while I am ahead of where I was last year, and improving daily, I am not ready to call myself a Master Trader. That is my direction, I have less doubt on a regular basis that is where I will wind up, and I do believe that I have some good advice to share based on the experience I already have. But as traders we all have very simlar questions, some of which may never get answered. And we all have our own paths to discover. There is no single way.
Anyway, the main question:
Would it be better to use a market profile framework that has fewer trades per day with larger targets, or scalping with many more trades per day with smaller targets? Or, could you merge the two?
He felt that trading using Market Profile could provide a higher ratio of reward to risk, enable one to have a lower win rate and still make money. But, at the same time he did not want to throw out a profitable plan I have and start from scratch...
Wait a minute, did I ask that question?
Let's see, I was a scalper, decided to completely change my charts, did not want to let go of what I had learned, all in the pursuit of greater reward with less risk...
Blessing or curse, we build on experiences more than we replace them. It is very difficult “throw everything out”. Once you have been trading for awhile, you already have formed opinions that you did not have when you started trading. That is called experience, which is not something to let go of. However, our responses to those now-known situations might be. That is how we progress.
I wish I had a great answer to that one, but am in the middle of that myself. My logical side says it is obvious to trade less and improve the risk to reward. But my response to situations is taking time to develop. And that is what I work towards with every new study, every different exercise I go through, day after day.
My guess is that pursuit never ends. Can one ever have too much reward for too little risk? Can a trader ever remove the risk from the equation? One word answers both; No.
What I am doing is;
1) Keeping my scalping knowledge to give me the best entry I am capable of, and constantly sharpening those skills.
2) Added market profile to my overall analysis, but still studying many different timeframes, depending on the conditions. At some point in probably every trading week I look at a monthly, weekly, daily, 480 minute, 240 minute, 60 minute, plus market profile, just to get some idea where the market is in general. Where are the major inflection points?
3) Added VWAP in RTH and ETH, which replaced my trade entry chart. But all I wanted to see in my prior chart is the same thing I see in those; which way is it going now, and when does it look like it had a major shift in direction? The indicator in that sense is not that important, however, VWAP starts over every day and gives some degree of daily consistency for me. And, as I go back through day upon day of market reply, price responds to confluence of those probably better than any other indicator I have watched.
4) Working on my psychology to get more and more comfortable staying in winning trades and getting out of losing trades fast. Working on my knowledge of price action to know the difference as quickly as I can. Knowing where to be more concerned based on structure.
5) Working on a new angle of reversing the thought patterns that cause traders to add to losers but not winners. @josh made a great post about this recently, and I have yet to get into it, but I promise you it will not be long before I do.
In addition to that question, there were a few other comments I thought were worth mentioning.
One was about how many times VWAP (or whatever) will suggest going short, but something else suggest going long. Conflict. In those cases, I default to the higher timeframe. I might “freighttrain” VWAP sometimes, but only when there is some really good reason to on a higher perspective. And also almost exclusively fairly early in the day. I do not like fading the afternoon. I have done it with some success, once recently when @Private Banker made a comment about the day being rotational (and he is the man regarding market profile), but he knows that condition far better than I do, so it is just not a trade I take very often.
As I get more familiar with it I may, but what if I never get comfortable with that? What if I just stand aside? Do I need to know how to take every trade? I think I only need to take the ones I know, for the most part. Sure you will see me take trades I know nothing about, and even state that most of the time. I learn by “feeling” being in a trade for some reason. I wish that were not the case sometimes. But I accept it, I know my potential for losses, and just add it to my bill.
And the other two comments, to me, signaled potential trouble;
1) “It is a methodology that also enables one to trade and assess multiple markets during the same day.”
2) “Most any market can be scalped at most any time.. so you can be in the market constantly. Conversely, it is very difficult to scalp multiple markets simultaneously...”
They are similar, but I'll address each of them.
First, in my opinion, you cannot be in the market constantly and still call yourself a good trader. If there are not certain things that signal far better opportunity to you than is available most of the time, you need to back off and become more choosy about what needs to occur before you are willing to get into the market. The more selective you become, the better your results will be. Whatever blend of trading methodology you wind up following, you need to become a specialist. You need to find what suits you and stick with it. That does not mean you don't always work to improve, as I went through above, but you continue to refine YOUR craft.
An second, the ability to assess different markets to find the best opportunity is great, but wanting to possess that knowledge so you can be in many at the same time, in my opinion, is not.
Similar to why you do not want to be in the market all the time, you want that depth of knowledge to allow you to be more selective. For example, to decide that because of market structure, you feel ES offers you the best opportunity for the day based on your specialty. But trading one market at a time is hard enough as fast and furious as futures can be. If you want to swing trade, that is different. I am referring to daytrading here.
Consider this as you go forward; How many trades does it take to make a million dollars? Do you remember the Tootsie pop commercial about how many licks does it take to get to the center of a tootsie pop? It took that guy three licks, and then he figured out very quickly that was a stupid approach, there was a better way.
Less is more. That comment is always relative, but if you take 20 trades a day now, which were your best 10? Get in there, gain experience, digest that experience, and use it to improve on what you know.
Made this for someone today and then it was not what they were asking. But, it is a picture of how to get Sierra Charts to show Prior TPO Value very simply and visually.
@Private Banker had a better version, but it was so busy for me that I reduced the information for now. I don't even know what to do with what I have some of the time. But, I have seen it show some incredible things.
lol,,,,,So he skyped in with his code, he did 4 live calls over 30mins, but he read his code wrong so "he" said ... they all failed but as we know its 50-50 so he did have a shot
