I am looking for advice. I've funded my own Account to scalp NQ/ES Futures in February 2023 but I just can't turn around to be profitable. When I started trading my live account, I was slightly profitable. My Winrate is a bit better than 50% (now after trading live for approx. 3 months), which should give me a decent edge IMO. Before that, I day-traded crypto futures for about a year (I gave up on that, now I only do spot/swing trades in crypto).
I have been journaling every single trade.. why I entered it, why it didn't or did work out etc., and therefore could work on my trading skills, to improve constantly and implement more rules for my trades.
A big lack at the beginning definetely was my almost non existent risk management and a lack of patience. I have put a lot of discipline into it, and can now say that I don't overtrade anymore, I stick to my daily loss limits and put a clear SL that can never be moved. It has been saving me money, but also costing me more stops. Thats why I am currently on a losing streak.
So what is happening now to my trading:
I get stopped out a lot, because I try to snipe the entries with (too) tight stops (because I dont want to lose more money than I can afford) or have a wrong idea/bias/setup/late entry
OR
I get spooked and exit the trade before my stop gets run, because I fail to believe in my trade idea sometimes (but then mostly see it working out just fine, but without me in the market...)
OR
I get wicked out (turtle soup) and then see my TP getting run right after (drives me mad), or I just miss my entry by a tick.
However, I am looking for advice from more expirienced traders with this post. Currently I am also going through the whole ICT mentorship. Its been a lot of great (and free) knowledge so far. I conduct my daily analysis and keep my charts quite simple (VWAP, cumulative delta, some EMA's, Volume profiles and the DOM).
I know that I can do this and turn around to be consistently profitable trader, but I have some gaps in my trading that I need to overcome. Below you can find my stats since I started trading live.
Thankfully I am financially in a position where I don't need to make money from trading in order to keep a roof above my head and have something to eat, but of course, making money from trading would be why im doing it..
Thank you for any help, advice, inputs... even if you need to be critizing me, so be it. I wanna move forward. Cheers and happy trading
Please move my thread if this doesnt belong here. Thank you.
The following 2 users say Thank You to Mysterion for this post:
Winrate without Risk/Reward ratio won’t tell you anything about having an edge, especially not wether it’s a decent edge.
In your case, just look at your statistics. Your average loser is bigger than your average winner. That is a losing strategy with a 50/50 win rate. With these stats you need at least around 60% win rate to break even, and that is probably BEFORE commissions and fees.
Don't close your trade before it hits the profit-target. This is something many traders do and why, because they want to feed their EGO and want to be right on the trade.
The following 2 users say Thank You to tr8er for this post:
From what you say, it sounds like your trading ideas are mostly good and your stops are too tight. In my opinion, stops that are too tight will kill your account. The trade needs room to work. Maybe you could start posting charts of your trading so that others can provide more commentary.
The following user says Thank You to richw for this post:
Hi! This are screenshots from my trading journal, for example from yesterday and some days before. Hope you understand my notes in there, otherwise im here to answer
Thanks for any help!
The following user says Thank You to Mysterion for this post:
From the images you posted, it seems that you are a discretionary trader, overall, like me, and your trade ideas seem to be pretty good. Your stops are likely not large enough for the timeframes that you are trading. I encourage you to go to SIM and test your ideas and get comfortable with whether your ideas and strategies are working well, and then, go back to live trading.
The following 2 users say Thank You to richw for this post:
