I never interacted with much fellow traders, but loving to read serious traders discussions on futures.io (formerly BMT).

Due to job I don't get to see my terminal every tick.. So I take position only when I see an opportunity and wait for 5-10 candles price action on these important levels (Pivot, S1, S2, R1 and R2) and watch stochastics crossing. I trigger only when I see that its a perfect with risking 2% trail to hold my profit $100.
My rule is simple If I earn or loose $200 close for the day and NO trading for rest of the day. To control my emotions, I close my live trading account and open Simulation just in case. My first important rule is preserve capital.

Today will be hard to trade as market will open big gap down below S3.

Pivot: 4263.75
S1 4252 R1 4282
S2 4234 R2 4294
S3 4222 R3 4312

chipps1983 

I never interacted with much fellow traders, but loving to read serious traders discussions on futures.io (formerly BMT). Due to job I don't get to see my terminal every tick.. So I take position only when I see an opportunity and wait for 5-10 candles price action on these important levels (Pivot, S1, S2, R1 and R2) and watch stochastics crossing. I trigger only when I see that its a perfect with risking 2% trail to hold my profit $100. My rule is simple If I earn or loose $200 close for the day and NO trading for rest of the day. To control my emotions, I close my live trading account and open Simulation just in case. My first important rule is preserve capital. Today will be hard to trade as market will open big gap down below S3. Pivot: 4263.75 S1 4252 R1 4282 S2 4234 R2 4294 S3 4222 R3 4312

Ok so just trying to get you to think a little bit, how did you come up with the $100 target?

Is that just what you are comfortable with, or is it based off of the MFE of the average move?

You say you have backtested for 6 months with a probability of 60% success rate, so what is the total number of trades you backtested? Are you sure it is enough?

How many low volatility market cycles did you test your conditions under, as pivot points can really shrink during periods of low vol, and do you add more contracts if pivot levels are not wide enough to reach your target?

And probably the most important one, not knowing your account size, is your profit target of $100 at least a 1:1 risk reward compared to the 2% account stop loss? I know you say the probability is 60%, but you want to have a little cushion for trade errors, commission, and slippage.

Sorry Lovetotrade, I am not able to explain properly. Let me try again and more in details.
I started trading with $9550 (Infinity futures). I was looking for intraday trading since I don’t have much funds to trade in positional which is my ultimate end goal. I am reading “Mastering the Trade” by John Carter. I liked his Pivot trading strategy and started to observe with the levels.
Then I started trading with levels only in NQ100 emini, I initially put 1% risk of my capital and 2% tgt. But It used to hit my SL and run to target. That’s where I started to look for one more confirmation and I added stochastics indicator. I applied and started to observe the price action at Pivot levels along with stochastics with crossover.

Since using this strategy, I am up by $550 so far. I always trail my SL. Let’s say If I enter and price is moving towards my target, I will ensure that I do not end up giving all. If I am up by $100 then I will trail SL just a tick below my entry. If I am up by $200, I will trail my SL to $150. I will continue this strategy until I complete 3 months. And if good profits, I will increase my lot size to 2.

Hope I was able to explain in details. I will post my trades P/L after I complete a month.

Lovetotrade, Todays Pivot of NQ100 emini futures. Watch closely the pivot levels and Stochastics levels.
Pivot: 4173.67
S1 4145 R1 4205
S2 4114 R2 4233
S3 4085 R3 4264

Good day. made $485 on 1lot. Strategy is 5/10 mins crossover and stochastics crossover at overbought. thats a good signal in trending market.

chipps1983 

Good day. made $485 on 1lot. Strategy is 5/10 mins crossover and stochastics crossover at overbought. thats a good signal in trending market.

Cool, sounds like you are getting some consistency. I strongly recommend you start your own journal to document your trades and have a reference. Then you can write out your plan, any psychological issues that come up, and any improvements you might be able to make to your strategies. I also recommend you start a spreadsheet documenting your trading metrics.

I don't mind you asking questions, or wanting to talk about trades or ideas, but these posts of your trades really belong in your own journal

sure LovetoTrade. As soon as I complete a month, I will be writting a journal with all the setup/strategies. I would post real trades performance as well.

This blog is making me to follow my rules/patience etc. FYI, See the chart pic, Pivot S1 and stochastics crossover for perfect entry. I didn't take the trade as I am done for the day already.

Couldn't risk more than 2% so aovided. But could have been good day.

So I am adding the final element to my trading plan, and is one of the most important aspects that will have been added to my trading. I have mentioned volume spikes in the past, but I am able to filter between large buying/selling of position initiation and profit taking now, and I plan to ride on the coat tails of these large trend initiating orders. They lead to the largest and best trends of the day, and these are the main trades I will focus on.

So my plan is now complete with a combination of the following:

Larger time frame market context
Tracking squeezes of various time frames(periods of low volatility)
Breakouts and failures of these areas as volatility begins to expand
Tracking of large volume coming into the market around these areas.

I am in the process of documenting data points around all of these to finalize my process going forward. As I realize with this being a marathon and not a sprint, that making sure I have my strategy down 100% is much more important than trying to get back into the market as quickly as possible. Gathering all this data is a very time intensive and tedious process, but is so important to my long term success.

I am super anxious to get back to trading, but until everything comes together I must wait. And I am sure it will click once I am at that point.

I would love to see your full trading journal. I didn't get setup from last 2 days. I am working on writting my journal.