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I'm very lucky to have guidance of The Wizard, Jeff (creator of All You Need thread) and Big Mike.
Believe Jeff won't mind sharing the following here as well:
Essentially the day can be divided into three parts....the times to NOT trade are right at the open (this is known as "clearing" of accumulated orders that are being filled at the open)....going into the close ( this is when the ETF's and other money managers need to get their orders filled before the end of the cash session last 15 minutes)....... lunch is usually not good due to lack of volume and last but not least is "Grim Reaper" this is between 11:30-12:00 PST ( the bond market closes at 12:00 PST and big money managers are moving $ between indexes and bonds...this can cause erratic market behavior.
Sometimes there will be good moves when it is usually not a good time to trade.....don't worry about missing these moves they are the exception NOT the rule.
If I were you I would examine my trades and see if any losses could have been avoided by only trading at the optimal time of day.
Also, I would make sure you have the Economic News indicator on your chart......it's a good reminder of news events. It's a good idea to stay clear of major news......both before and after the news release.....around 10-15 minutes each side of news is about right.
Believe it or not .. I do have a daily game plan for ES .. haha ..
Position Size: 2 contracts per trade most of the time
No of Trades: 3 trades and/or 6 contracts
Trading Time: 9:30 am to 11:00 am (+/- 15 minutes)
Initial Target: 3-4 ticks for the 1st contract and let the 2nd contract run (move MM to BE after hitting the 1st target). If the trading range is very narrow, may exit the 2nd contract at 6-8 ticks. Never let a winner become a loser!
Initial MM: 6 ticks. I quite often move it to 4 ticks after checking the previous price bars + S/R. Strive NOT to have MM get hit!
Early Exit: Yellow bar, ADXVMA white choppy dot and d9 trend reversal etc. After checking the KP indicators, may try to exit BE or 1-2 ticks from entry. If most indicators are still aligned with the trend, may choose to stay in longer.
Other Trading Rules: Stop with PT @$300 or MM @-$150 or after 2 consecutive losing trades (applicable to real $ trades)
Preserve Precious Capital is the No 1 priority item on my trading list + there are always high probability trades waiting. I used to be too anxious to be in a trade OR stay too long in a losing one. No more ..
Happy & Successful Trading Always!
Beth
~ Trading is NOT about being right. It's about Trading RIGHT! ~
Excellent job on covering the details of your plan. Also great job in identifying that it is equally important (in fact, probably much more important) to identify when NOT to trade than when TO trade.
Now you've simply got to execute on your plan. Take it slowly. Each day you naturally want to execute on your entire plan to the best of your abilities, but I find that in the beginning you can really focus your thoughts and have better success by narrowing in on just one or two key aspects of your plan, and tell yourself "no matter what, I will make sure I do these two things". Rinse, repeat - for a week or so at a time, then add another one or two to the list.
Good job and I look forward to you sharing how it is going.
Thanks Cory for sharing your MA alert with me. I added the 2 MAs to the 7500 volume chart. Their crossovers have been very close to the KP one. Good news! Thank You!
Funny that when I tried to activate your strategy on the volume chart, it's not on the list. I can edit it and F5 compile successful. It's listed on the Strategy folder and yet I cannot locate it for activation on a chart?!! I did a quick strategy, ie creating a simple crossabove/crossbelow of the 2 SMAs. Will email NJ CS to find out why I can't find your sophisticated one.
Check the top of the indicator list, some people put a " " (space) before the name so it is at the very top. Also, NT7 had some bugs with escaping special chars in the description (not sure if it ever got fixed), so if there is a dash or colon in the description it caused the name to be blank in the indicator list.
Thank you Big Mike for your kind encouragement and suggestion. Yes, I will focus on 1-2 key aspects and they will be:
1. Preserve Precious Capital (esp when a trade does not look good anymore after entry, I would like to manage it to my satisfaction and can successfully exit BE or 1-2 ticks)
2. Decide when to trade and when NOT to trade. Maximun No of trades and contracts per day is not set on stone. It's fine if there're no good signals and I will SOH while waiting for a great signal.
Note: Emotion is my biggest enemy. Trading in real had turned me to a "monster" that I did not recognize myself. People said public speaking is the No 1 fear for most. I spoke in front of close to 1,000 people ... so I may be able to fix this emotion "monster" in me .. Wish me luck .. haha ..
Thanks Mike. Yes, I went through the list at least 20 times and Cory's one is not there. I am going to ask my lovely hubby to go through the list for me this morning. His eyes are a little bigger (2 pairs with the assistance of his glasses) and may do the trick. Else I will email NJ CS shortly.
Have captured my post-trade comments on the enclosed trade log. The first long trade @9:45 am was a good one, ie 4 ticks PT got hit. I tried to get in twice and Mr Market did not fill me ooooo. Is it always the ones we did not get in ended up Profitable?!!!
Goals Accomplished:
1. Followed the NO overtrade rule and stopped after max 3 trades.
2. Exited the 2nd trade (Trade No 14) at a reasonable timing after the first one. Note: The first one (a 10-minute trade) was scary because I experienced what I did extremely bad in real life and was doing it again even it's sim trade! I simply don't like the "losing" idea which I MUST ACCEPT for trading.
Lessons Learned:
1. When the trading range is too narrow (say for ES a 2-3 points range), may consider taking the day off. Not even SOH?!!
2. It's fine to do 1-contract trades. I have friends telling me a thousand times that doing 1-contract trades is the dumbist thing to do. As a newbie, my personal experience has told me that 1-contract trades are fine as long as we manage them well. What's the point of doing multiple-contract trades if they affect our psyche or one is not ready?!! Well, no one knows how I feel ..
How to move forward:
1. I need to check my hypnosis script folder. Believe there's one on losing trades. A healthier approach will be: Cut losers small with winners exceed the losing ones! The most successful traders may have losing days and losing trades. It's part of the game LOL!
2. Prepare a new cute card with NO COUNTER-TREND TRADES. I need to have it in front of my nose/eyes .. haha ..
My hubby is unable to find Cory's strategy though he pointed out there's one named "SampleMACrossover". Not sure if it clashes with Cory's. Just emailed NJ CS and will keep you posted of any further development.
You will notice the trade log started with No 13 because I have 4 YM strategies running (testing). At least they were together else I will need to do more cut-and-paste.
