HealthWealthTrade 

what i meant was I would see the trade opportunity come....and i'd do everything exactly the same as when i had made money....trading it at exactly the perfect time.....and it didn't turn out to be a winning trade...im still not sure what the difference is. Im looking at the smaller trends during the day and so maybe what's happening is the shorter term trend ends and the longer term trend takes over.

This the frustrating thing about trading, you can do everything right and still lose money. No other 'job' that I've ever known takes money OUT of your account when you did what you were supposed to do, but the market does. If you trade a system and the system has a statistical edge, the goal is to trade the system according to the rules, and the edge will play out. The goal is not to always make money, the goal is to follow the rules, so the edge can bare itself out over time.
Some systems can make money with a 35% win rate- at that point the 65% of losing trades weren't mistakenly taken- it's just those trades are part of the system.

HealthWealthTrade 

I agree paper trading is essential to learning but at some point you have to put your money to the test...to feel how it really is and gain experience. its a different thing, mostly because the paper trading environment just isn't a great representation...the orders go through faster and they give you a break on your order ....limmit orders as well. so more of your practice trades are profitable. What you need to teach yourself is that the market is static and dynamic, teach yourself the processes / systems that are profitable and you're set for life.

Introduce Risk into paper trading to make it at least approach something real. Something you hate or something difficult etc. and make yourself do that thing every time a paper trade does not work. Maybe eat something you can't stand, a habanero or two? One habanero per unit of Risk. If the stop has to be behind S/R and that is 3 "units" away, you eat 3 habaneros if the trade does not work. It must be something you DO NOT LIKE. Something on the faster side seems better to me...like eating. Harder to put off. If you don't follow thru making yourself do whatever you decide this business is not for you.

Ron

If you can walk into a bank with your business plan...

HealthWealthTrade 

i do have a strategy though....everything i do is based on my experience as a trader.

and secure a big loan for your business, say $250-500k , because the bank sees a solid and sound "strategy" all written down and laid out in a professional manor then yes you have a good trading plan.

But to me it just sounds like you have ....some kind of loose...idea about what you are looking for and I'm here to tell you...you are only fooling yourself.

HealthWealthTrade 

..and sometimes use the 50 sma as a .....the es will come back to this spot indication. sometimes i trade based on support/resistance the way daytradingaddict does on youtube.

The best traders on the planet trade ES and they are 100% prepared and love the fact that you are not because it makes it very easy for them to transfer your money into their account and it's all wonderfully legal. And we are very patient.

Please write out a detailed trade plan.

Ron

Blash 

If you can walk into a bank with your business plan... and secure a big loan for your business, say $250-500k , because the bank sees a solid and sound "strategy" all written down and laid out in a professional manor then yes you have a good trading plan. But to me it just sounds like you have ....some kind of loose...idea about what you are looking for and I'm here to tell you...you are only fooling yourself. The best traders on the planet trade ES and they are 100% prepared and love the fact that you are not because it makes it very easy for them to transfer your money into their account and it's all wonderfully legal. And we are very patient. Please write out a detailed trade plan. Ron

There are a lot of parts to the system i didn't mention.
learn these:
doji, hammer, inverse hammer, wedge, head and shoulders, support /resistance, trendlines, trend channels

use doji as a caution may reverse
use hammer as a sign of bullishness
use inverse hammer ....in the right location as a sign to short(usually if rsi indicates that a trend downward is begining)
learn wedges
learn head and shoulders,
50sma, watch this for price to come and touch it and when its near it expect price to fancy fart around it for a while

trade trendlines when the market goes through the trendline with some speed then enter.

watch for trend channels and trade the extremes but enter with caution to spot the fakes/follow through
then i just watch the tick by tick, waiting for new bars to print....so i watch the how many ticks remaining.....idon't trade near new bars
i watch to see how many contracts go through within a small period of time to see if the market is trading enough volume to have momentum plays

watch for long term divergence on a higher time frame, if there is then don't trade until it has cleared
watch for dojis on a higher time frame and if there is one then don't trade that day
then it's just use your experience to tell when to get out of a trade

Something you might find useful. I do. Since your work involves a lot of price action/candles.

https://www.priceactionindicators.com/

These are great tools IMHO and Thomas is a great guy. And very reasonably priced. Although you do need a somewhat powerful PC.

Ron

Trading only works if you have edge period. No one should complain ever about trading or the mkts in general. They are always right always evolving trading randomness is never easy

whatever the answer to your question is... I think it is definitely not "trade more contracts"

you already had enough leverage to lose 27k why would more leverage be the answer?

I am not as tenured as others in this discussion, but if it were me, I would simplify the strategy and try to trade less per day, with less leverage. Going for more points on less contracts helps me build confidence in my trade ideas, and also doesn't stress me out as much when it goes the other way. also I would only make one change at a time, if you change a bunch of stuff all the time how will you know whats working?

Cheers,

HealthWealthTrade 

Hello all, im looking for advice to take my trading to the next level. I made a previous post but got banned for yelling obscenities. so this post im not going to do that instead iill try to give some details and thats it. so this past month i traded the ES about 184 times and ended the month down 411.20....i traded stocks(hence the 20 cents) a tiny amount but it was mostly the es. [strategy]: i look for very short term momentum swings and watch the tick by tick closely....i use RSI to get a feel for the overall trend.....and notice things like doji and inverse hammer, hammer ....along with trendlines to determine entries. i have the 200 and the 50 simpe moving average on my chart....and sometimes use the 50 sma as a .....the es will come back to this spot indication. sometimes i trade based on support/resistance the way daytradingaddict does on youtube. [some things i notice while trading]: a lot of times the tick by tick will tell me that the es is in a state of indicision and ill sit there and wait till theres momentum on one side or the other to place an entry....usually this works in my favor for a small 100-200 gain....with 1 contract but sometimes it ends up with a big loss as either the market is trading as a doji on the 3y weekly chart or there just isn't enough volume being traded/other things. [another thing i notice]: usually i start the day positive but within a fraction of a second im placing another trade that's a loser. as i thought i saw something in the market....an opportunity. but it turns into a loser and then i have to fight to get back to 0. [another thing i notice]: on some days i can make 1000 dollars with just 3 -5 trades but other days i struggle to make 50 dollars with 12 trades. [the underlying problem]: I either don't stop trading when i should or ill have 1 bad losing trade the kind that i enter and it moves really fast and i become stubborn because a lot of trades that start out losing become profitable but these are the trades that don't go profitable and end in a huge loss. i only trade with 1 contract and i dont add on. [advice to myself]:don't trade when it's a doji on a higher timeframe as it's wild and unpredictable at the tick chart level. I use a 7800 tick chart....i find that this is the best. i like being flat at the end of the trading session. [questions]: Is there anything in my strategy that doesn't make sense to you? is there something that im doing wrong? should i quit as a trader?(down 27k) been at it about a year. is there something more i could do to better my trading? should i only go for the 1k in 3 or 4 trades? or is the frequent 1-200 gain a good thing too? should i wait till i can trade with more contracts to trade again...like 5 contracts for example? should i wait till i can employ a strategy where you add on sucessful trades? thanks for reading and i hope you got something out of reading my post and i hope you can help me as well...thanks for your time. -Thomas

Hi
Hope you're doing better. Trading can be such a harrowing experience and also amazing.
While waiting for this US CLOSE short to come to fruition. IN the meantime wanted to say 7800t for day trading management seem very high. I use 15 second which is around 100-200 ticks. I found Volatility changes very annoying for the tick charts not being stable - so kept to time.
Are you trading at specific times around open and close?
Trading 2 hours at US open or US close session best imo. All the best.

HealthWealthTrade 

There are a lot of parts to the system i didn't mention. learn these: doji, hammer, inverse hammer, wedge, head and shoulders, support /resistance, trendlines, trend channels use doji as a caution may reverse use hammer as a sign of bullishness use inverse hammer ....in the right location as a sign to short(usually if rsi indicates that a trend downward is begining) learn wedges learn head and shoulders, 50sma, watch this for price to come and touch it and when its near it expect price to fancy fart around it for a while trade trendlines when the market goes through the trendline with some speed then enter. watch for trend channels and trade the extremes but enter with caution to spot the fakes/follow through then i just watch the tick by tick, waiting for new bars to print....so i watch the how many ticks remaining.....idon't trade near new bars i watch to see how many contracts go through within a small period of time to see if the market is trading enough volume to have momentum plays watch for long term divergence on a higher time frame, if there is then don't trade until it has cleared watch for dojis on a higher time frame and if there is one then don't trade that day then it's just use your experience to tell when to get out of a trade

This is your issue. Moving averages, head and shoiulders, candlestick patterns etc. They are not wrong BUT they are also not the way you want to look at the market. They are a CONSEQUENCE of whats happening. Sometimes they will work as they link up but other times they wont because 50 SMA or trendline was trending into a floor or ceiling / finished business.

I think you need to understand auctioning of price. Full auctions, Liquidity, Distributions, understand there are STRIKE OPTIONS trading and do all this at appropriate times. Market isnt 5/24 as advertised.

Thank you guys for all the replies, I feel like I am learning. A new thing i just figured out is that i lose money hard at the beginning of the month when volume is sporatic,....and then i try to make up for it the rest of the month. so im just not going to trade at the beginning of the month and see how well i do. everyone is different but i hope the rest of you guys are learning too....im sure some of you trade like i do haha.