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Wookie 's TopStepTrader Combine Journal


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Wookie 's TopStepTrader Combine Journal

  #21 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
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@ BigMike, I agree with you. I think you worded it correctly and I don't need to add anything to your comment. I'm looking forward to my next combine. I'm saving up for the 150k and will attempt it on the 20 day combine. This should buy me time to find those perfect setups and maximize profits with more lots. IF I lose I lose, but at least I tried.

Today, I traded even though my combine is a bust. I was -$665 on the day. My big screw up today was trading before I was even awake and alert. It's a bad habit because there is a lot of unknowns early in the morning. Adding sleepiness on top of it doesn't help. So most of my losses occurred within the first 2 hours of trading and then after that I traded pretty good. I was pretty much up against the daily stop limit most of the day and that kept me from getting any long term setups going. Most trades ended up being scalps to try and get back to break even on the day. I was able to put together 14 consecutive winning trades, so there was some positive things - moving forward...

For tomorrow, I want to focus on no scalps for the first hour after pit open. The goal is to follow price action and to figure out the pattern and look for great long-term setups. I won't get into a trade unless there is the potential for a great trade. After the volatility cools off; then scalps are fine. The emphasis is to not burn through my daily loss limit before a great trade.

I like emoticons.

Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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  #22 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
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Thanks Received: 30

On this day 7 (Friday) of my combine I got it wrong and ended down -$995 on the day. My net P/L started down and that put my trades on the defense and I wasn't getting out at the right times because I was so certain that crude oil would stop uptrending and run on the bear more. Obama had a spontaneous press conference in regards to Syria. That 'news' made my technical indicators work in the most obtuse fashion. I felt I was a wookie in combat with the emperor in a metaphoric Star Wars way. Obviously, Obama's jedi mind tricks worked and I was sadly defeated single-handedly.

In any event, I have learned that I am not experienced enough to win on news-driven markets. It would be more cost-effective if I just watched the chart develop, but sit on the sidelines until news coverage is done.

Later in the day, when all the dust cleared from my reckless ambition - I found a technical pattern on Fridays action. Although, during the trading day I didn't recognize it because my judgement was clouded from being in the negative. Watching the news unfold didn't help either. I should just not trade it until I gain a bit more experience.

Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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  #23 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
Thanks Given: 10
Thanks Received: 30


On this Monday, I traded up +$1030. I quit when I got above the $1000 mark because I wanted to get the acheivement badge for my trade profile on the TsT website.

My mentality going into today was to trade the most probable of setups and get that cushion going. No need to take a trade if I didn't like it. The desire to make money wasn't as important as the desire to take a dumb loss. So it took a while to get the first few hundred. I distracted myself from the mouse by playing a few video games. As the day progressed I got a better understanding of the pattern as it developed and key levels that price was bouncing off of. After the prerequisite of having a positive net p/L and getting a firm idea of how price was moving; I got a bit more aggressive and that is when my net p/L started knifing up.

Obviously, happy about my performance today and definitely thought I was overdue for a good day. This combine has exploited some big weaknesses in my trading. Lack of experience trading news-driven days is one that comes to mind off the top of my head. So for that I'm humbled and hope this is a turning point in my trading development.



On a side note, football started! I won my first 2 fantasy football games and the chicago bears won too! I even subbed on softball team and helped them win 2 playoff games, so I do win at somethings !

Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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 Big Mike 
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chuckchucker View Post
On this Monday, I traded up +$1030. I quit when I got above the $1000 mark because I wanted to get the acheivement badge for my trade profile on the TsT website.

Nicely done!

Oh and BTW...

Go Cowboys!

Mike

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  #25 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
Thanks Given: 10
Thanks Received: 30

Thanks BigMike maybe I could come up with a webinar when I get some more street cred, .

Woah, I cannot believe it is already day 9 of this combine. Today was Tuesday and let me tell you - it was boxing match. I ended up +$635 on the day. Stats detailed:

Date-- Net P/L-- Comm/Fees-- Trades-- Won/Lost-- Win %-- Consecutive Win/Loss
Tue, Sep 10---- 635---- 405---- 78---- 59:14--- 81---- 10/5


Today was a news-driven day again. Russia and Syria were working on their diplomacy efforts to give up chemical weapons. So CL downtrended quite a bit in the ETH session and definitely ran lower at the beginning of the RTH session. I noticed that an inverted head and shoulders pattern was forming and looked for s/r lines to support that hypothesis. I ended up correct and made some money. Although, this wasn't before I lost quite a bit and was near my daily loss limit. At the apex of my daily loss, I was down -$750 before I went on my big run up. Commissions were more than I would have preferred, but when your trading only 1 contract most of the day it's going to take a bigger piece of the pie.

My weakness today was the stop loss factor. I had 1 contract that lost 30 ticks and had scaled in that order up to 3 lots. So that entire trade cost me well over $500. I don't like to be that exposed to the market in a live trade going bad. I stopped out when I did luckily. It would have bled plenty more. The trade would have been profitable - price came back, but I would have hit my daily loss limit in the interim. Long story short, stop the bleeding. Use indicators as guidance when in a trade. It will save.

Tomorrow I won't be able to trade the morning open in CL. I have to go to the DMV to renew my drivers ID. I will probably trade the combine though. I would prefer to finish it and start on a clean slate. I'm expecting a news-driven open though because of Obama's press conference tonight. I prefer to miss the open because of this. Its better for me to read the pattern after it had 2-3 hours to develop in the RTH session.

I will post the combine summary in an image format after tomorrow. Sorry I haven't posted more images. It gets to be a lot of work and not as fun to post when your in a slump.


Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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  #26 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
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Edit: I will post my trade summary tomorrow.

On this day, Wednesday, it was my final combine day. I ended down -$965. I was actually up on the day until I decided to try for a home run trade at the pit close. It was profitable several times, but I wanted to make enough to bring my combine back to break even. It didn't go that way and price hit my stop and that wraps up this combine.

Otherwise, I thought I traded fairly decent. It was an inside day, as far as price action goes. So there wasn't any serious action. No big news from Syria. There was an EIA petro report, but I wasn't around to trade that. I made it a point to not trade news anyways. The fib lines worked well today also. Although, I did take a big stop when there was a fib near the High of the day. I entered to go short and I should have waited because they ran the stops above the HoD.

Where do I go from here? Well I know I am capable of big days. I just need to be sensible on when I decide to trade. Like what part of the day and when markets aren't reacting to news. Minimizing my losses when price goes against my trade will keep me in the game longer. No one is right 100% of the time. If I get the opportunity, I would opt for the 150k combine over 20 days. Of course, I would have to be comfortable trading more contracts.

Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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  #27 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
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Thanks Received: 30

Here's the trade summary of my combine from start to finish. I will be doing another one soon, so I will periodically update this thread with status reports. I prefer to update after good days and procrastinate on my bad days. Thats usually how I operate - happy to report good news! Thanks for the views it keeps me motivated to post.




Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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  #28 (permalink)
 
chuckchucker's Avatar
 chuckchucker 
Chicago
 
Experience: Intermediate
Platform: NinjaTrader Takion T4
Broker: Interactive Brokers, Kinetick
Trading: CL, Stocks, ES
Posts: 51 since Oct 2012
Thanks Given: 10
Thanks Received: 30

I haven't updated this lately. Here is a random sampling of my trades as of late. Its a practice account on T4 trading platform via TsT.

Today was a slow day on crude oil chart. My attention wondered off so I started trading Gold. I traded gold pretty well and so kept trading it.





I was surprised how friendly the movements were in gold today; despite it being New Years Eve. Anyways, since my last big combine I have been researching my butt off trying to adapt my trading plan to my trading style. Its probably not a good idea to have a trading plan that conflicts with your trading tendencies.

Happy New Years!

Alligators and crocodiles are not the same. A lot of people don't know that.
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Last Updated on December 31, 2013


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