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Just realized all the entry date discrepancies in the last 3-4 posts... I dont know what I was thinking lol. Refer to the date posted for the actual entry date, I suppose! Haha.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
One trade today, a winner. Limited in off resistance on the topside of the range. 1pt scalp on 1 contract. Good way to end the week.
Stats:
1 trade, 1-0
P/L - 1/0
I love futures because a 1 point day could have been +$50 like today, +$500 w/ x10 contracts, or even +$2500 w/ x50 contracts. The contracts just scale up. The goal is to get 2 good trades, scalp in and out, work up that WR, and scale the contracts, not the trades.
Have a wonderful holiday week, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, etc. etc.
4-3 day today. I started off with a swift loss at 9:31, which I'm finding is really messing with the rest of the day's performance. More on this later.
ES Trades:
1. I flubbed the stop order entry on this EMA touch, and prices sucked me in for a quick 2pt loss. My stop order was supposed to go a tick above the close but my small laptop screen screamed disaster. I miss my mouse and monitor. Lol
2. 2el with a big signal but after a trend break so hoping to retest the highs or make its way up at least. 1pt scalp
3. Prices touched ema and bounced off, I took the large signal bar which opened high and closed low - not exactly a hammer. I need to avoid signals like these: both >2.5 pts AND ambiguous body. My favorite signals are hammers/inverse hammers with 1/2 body confirmation or less, and little to no wick rejection on the trading side.
4. Gann line fade. I'm ditching the Gann lines because I cannot seem to figure out why my lines are different than others' - we have tried altering the settings and the ambiguity leads me to believe it's not exactly a science.
5. 2 tick scalp off a trap long breakout pullback on a tight range. Entered because of the beautiful inverse hammer signal. Got out too early! But I was worried we wouldn't quite hit the other end of the range and tick through to get me out.
6. 2el with a nice hammer signal. Great trade. Still, the intrabar movement spooked me and I got out at .75. Today's low volatility meant trades were having a hard time getting the full point + tick through to 5t.
MES Loss: I am supposed to be using MES 1350 as confirmation - not as a secondary chart that I can take setups off of just because it has a better signal than ES. The trades need to be confirmed by BOTH charts - not have it look bullish in one and bearish in the other when I take a trade. Anyways, I took the breakout pullback with a HUGE signal - it was a hammer, yes, but the size should have completely turned me away. Worse, I had 2 opportunities of congestion to get out at BE+1 but kept my PT. Loss of the day.
Lessons:
Gann lines are rather arbitrary until I can pinpoint how to make somebody else's lines look identical to mine. Not using them anymore for now.
Focusing on: 2e's to EMA on trend, EMA touches on trend, bopb's on range. All with signal bar:
Signal bars NEED to be clean. <10 ticks, and with a body biased in the right direction, taking up 1/2 or better, 1/3rd of the candle. Little to no top wick rejection (for longs). Hammers are the best.
Entries need to be cleaner. I gotta zoom in more! These flubs can cost a tick, or the whole trade and create big losses.
Get out after 2 bars of congestion, and when you have an opportunity to get out at BE+1, take it if the setup is losing momentum. Better a small scratch than a loss. However - ideally I should be more selective with the trade setups and thus have enough faith in the trade that I do not need to worry about hitting the full point PT.
Continue to trade 1 contract as the inconsequential dollar amount really helps reduce greed and fear emotions.
Updated "stop trading" criteria: 2 wins, or 1 loss, +91 (2 wins of 1 contract and 1 point), -109 (1 loss of 2pts), 2 trades max a day until January.
Stats:
7 trades, 4-3
P/L - Not sure - $270 loss including comms.
My trading strategy has been developed by this point - I have realized that now is the part where one must reinforce and learn the strategy simply through practice. Just like a musician learns the notes, then practices the music over and over again in order to reinforce the right notes, develop their technique, and make improvements and refinements, I must apply the strategy into live scenarios. Yes, I have already been trading live! But 2 hours a day playing with real funds is not enough, so I will be methodically approaching NT's Market Replay to practice sim trading my strategies in real time. The speed up functions allow me to skip to when a potential setup is coming along, and I can get through the 9:30-11am session in about a half hour. I'm excited to dive into this methodical practice stage.
Beginning with the Oct 5 open, I took 5 trades for 4 wins and 1 +0 BE. Issues to work on are overtrading setups, not being discretionary enough and having to exit early because of a lack of faith in the setup, and continuing to flub entries and induce slippage or get into trades I should not be in.
1. Prices were in an uptrend through the overnight, and at open had the first break of trend into a developing range. The first breakout on the downside had a double bottom with a hammer signal close. In the screenshot taken later tonight it's showing as a bullish doji. Exited for .5, as the ATR for this last week of 2020 has been low, and I didn't want to push the trade. It would have worked out though - but only for .75. Therefore I am happy with the early exit. Double bottoms are not exactly outlined in my strategy, but my hypothesis was that prices would test the channel again after breaking it once.
2. Prices sold off to fill the overnight gap, and established a downtrend channel that was constantly shifting. It was a confusing morning. A big two legged pullback leading to a 2es formed, and it looked like two measured legs up, so after the nicely bearish signal formed I limited in for a better entry and got .5 pts. Again, exited early, this time because after two strong legs up I was weary about a full point (and low vol again). Plus, prices weren't that far back to the EMA. Would have gotten a full point but the intrabar congestion and other concerns were valid to exit early. Maybe I should be more discretionary so that I can have full faith in my trades and just walk away and come back when they've completed.
2-0-1 scratch. Great day. My gann lines were acting as support and resistance pretty tightly so I based trades off them today. Prices were sluggish today - as expected - and the ATR was so incredibly low; it seemed like my 8t stop was taking up half the chart. Very low risk entries, but I went for lower profit targets of .75 because of it.
Trades:
1. Scratch trade for -commission. Prices reached top of range area and had a 2es, with a bearish signal that closed blue... Not a signal I take. Still, prices seemed to reverse convincingly in the next bar, so I entered in. Fear got the best of me when the entry bar closed bullish and I got out at BE, after misplacing my limit at 0 instead of +.25. Yet another mouse flub costing me the commission. Should I have stayed in? Not sure - I just should not have entered in the first place, unless I identified the range and felt the bear signal bar was good enough (both I did not).
2. Gann lines were acting as heavy s/r, so I limited in on the next touch and got my .75 very quickly in the intrabar movement. On ranges these work well, so they're a go for me.
3. Came back from lunch to another gann bounce, missed out on two more earlier. This was the point where the bounces would be more risky since we had so many previous successful bounces. However ATR was low, so I limited in and intrabar it quickly gave me .75 and no more.
Additionally here is the Oct 6th practice round. BOPBs, signal flub loss, double bottoms, 2el's. One fail where I went short stead of long. Still got .5 pts lol. 5w-2l: 2.25pts profit subtracting the short flub.
See you tomorrow for the last day of the year! Sayonara 2020.
2-0 today, for the last day of 2020, I'm happy. Prices were slow but more volume than yesterday. Maybe people selling off positions for the end of the year.
Trades:
1. Gann lines have been figured out - they rely on the lookback amount of the data loaded - i.e. 3 days vs 21 days. Most recent price data makes most sense and so I now have the gann 1 + 3 lines plotted and can use the confluent areas as stronger S+R.
Did not know this before trade #1 - thus, I was basing the entry off of Gann 1. The lines were also higher before I somehow got them the way they are in the screenshot. Basically, every day reset the gann 1+3's initial price and use the converging areas as s+r.
Anyways! Limit entry in, prices plunged and stopped at the gann 3 line nearly to the tick. I almost added to my position as I had a hunch this happened but hesitated and when I got my gann 3 up, it was already pulling up fast. Exited at .25 because I wasn't sure how much left of the pullback prices were willing to give. Will avoid this scenario by having the two gann sets and confirming if prices have been respecting those lines.
2. After figuring all of this out I had a limit in place by gann 3, walked away and came back to it filled. Prices touched my 1pt target twice, and I settled for .5 as there were two bars of congestion. Prices never got the full 5 ticks. I should have set the target to .75 in the beginning as the ATR and volatility was down.
Stats:
2 trades, 2-0
P/L - 0.75/0
+$28.54 (comms)
I'm happy - I've got a good, comfortable set of trading setups - paired with a good entry signal and good management - I'm excited for next week.
Long time no see. First week of January was hectic, market and life wise. I lost a bit, had several losing days through a combination of unfocused trading, FOMO/Revenge trades, and bad signal bars. Probably the number one thing that causes my trades to fail is a too large (over momentum) or too neutral signal bar. Don't have charts for the first week but the lessons I learned were primarily psychological - I need a solid few hrs and a clear mindset to trade while following all of my rules. As I get that under more control the trading becomes easier and easier.
Here are some charts:
Thursday, January 07: 2-1, P/L .75/2pts
Monday, January 11: 3-2 on SIM, being on SIM saved me from morning losses. Then a 1-0 scratch .25 trade. Got spooked. Still was getting into the groove of 2021 on this day.
and Tuesday, January 12: 1-0, with a nice 2el + Gann + BOPB confluence long for 1pt. Left with one win.
Overall looking forward to things calming down and staying within the rules, finding good hammer entries. My charting is becoming more personalized to my style and I'm happy with my risk management, which is the only reason my equity didn't take a huge hit with the consecutive losing days. The 2 win, 1 loss system works really well to protect capital and limit risk, if followed - which I need to work on!
Limited setups today, I didn't see much. Took one trade on SIM for 1pt, semi risky. Another trade on live, for one tick profit, more or less a ceremonial trade to get off of the desk for the day.
Trades:
1. SIM +1pt - @10:28. HL with bull hammer signal.
2. Live +1tick - Entered after seeing a big EMA bounce bull hammer signal and smaller EMA rejection from the inside bars. Looks like I would have gotten the point. The LH scared me off and I just wanted to be done for the day. A small win is better than no trades or a loss!
Stats:
2 trades, 1-0 SIM 1-0 Live
P/L - 1/0 SIM .25/0 Live
+$8 bux lol
When the simple rules are followed predictable results come. Trying to remember not to take reckless entries and just sit back and watch.
