Singapore
Experience: Beginner
Platform: CMC Markets, Phillips Capital
Trading: Forex, Stocks
Posts: 176 since Mar 2012
Thanks Given: 220
Thanks Received: 139
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Hello everyone,
I swing trade stocks and am also starting out on day trading /YM (sim trading e-mini Dow futures for now). Before each trading session starts, I do some prep work but i am not sure if they are sufficient or in depth enough and would like advice and opinions on whether there are other things which need to be looked at.
For swing trading stocks, my entry chart is the daily and secondary chart is the weekly. What i do is:
1) Check if price is approaching major support or resistance levels and also mark out obvious pivot highs and lows on the longer term secondary chart.
2) Check the trend, check if price is approaching S/R levels (based on the entry and secondary chart timeframes) and look out for setups on the daily entry chart.
3) Look for dividends and earnings release dates and avoid trading the stock near to those dates
4) If there is a setup, i find the entry, stop, target and check if the stop is within 1.5% risk
For day trading /YM, the entry timeframe is 10 minutes and the secondary timeframe is the hourly.
1) On the hourly chart, record major pivot highs and lows as S/R levels and note the latest trend
2) Check if price is approaching major S/R levels on the hourly chart
3) On the 10 mins entry chart, record noticable pivot highs and lows as S/R levels which may not appear on the hourly chart
4) Check for day high and low for the current and past 1 or 2 days
These are the pre-trading session preparation I do for stocks and /YM. The data I look at are technical data based on the chart. Are there other price action, timeframes or price levels which should be looked at ?
Also besides technicals, are there other fundamental data to prepare oneself? e.g. For the stocks I trade, i have a basic knowledge of what industry it belongs to but that's about it. What about for stock index futures?
Thanks
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