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Trading spot fx euro using price action


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Trading spot fx euro using price action

  #561 (permalink)
 
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 Adamus 
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Nothing tradeable that I could recognise. The chart is turning into one great mass of S/R lines.

8 o'clock though is not a good time to stop. Stepped out of the shower and see that it's all going on now that I'm done. OK just one more week of this and then back to 06:00 to 07:15.



In retrospect, if I had been trading beyond 8 this morning, honestly I think I would have missed the first move. It just shot up. Where the market descended just before 8 out of the resistance zone, that's a possible pull-back setup, but the trend at that point was the weakest imaginable - how can you have a big pull-back like that when the trend is so weak?

At the half way point at the resistance line in the middle of that resistance zone, it gave a small pull-back on the 1min, so that was a potential entry point as well. As it burst out through the top of the resistance zone, it made another. So it made pretty obvious pull-backs twice there -




I need to compare it to chop where it would have sunk back into the trading range instead of charging up again. Here's something similar from Wednesday where the market couldn't break out.



So, hmm. They look the same! Seriously I guess its all in the context. I'll have to look again tomorrow. It's too late now.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
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  #562 (permalink)
daij1944
san francisco, ca
 
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a lot of people mention al brooks

i bought one of his books and tried to read it but i thought it was incredibly long winded

all good stuff but trying to wade thru 400 pages (1200 if you wanna read all 3 books)

i confess, i just wanted a quick cure

i did think he was honest (which not everyone in this business is)

but oh so very very many words

there must be something simpler to read

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  #563 (permalink)
daij1944
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interesting

not sure if this is related but

i keep a track of the 10 min atr and when it gets below a certain level, i stay out

the problem is that when trading is really slow the signals are less reliable because anyone can steer the market up or down with a lott less money

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  #564 (permalink)
 
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 Big Mike 
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daij1944 View Post
a lot of people mention al brooks

i bought one of his books and tried to read it but i thought it was incredibly long winded

all good stuff but trying to wade thru 400 pages (1200 if you wanna read all 3 books)

i confess, i just wanted a quick cure

i did think he was honest (which not everyone in this business is)

but oh so very very many words

there must be something simpler to read

His webinars are much easier to follow. There are several on futures.io (formerly BMT). There are also several Al Brooks threads, you can search to find them.

Mike

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  #565 (permalink)
 
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 Adamus 
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daij1944 View Post
interesting

not sure if this is related but

i keep a track of the 10 min atr and when it gets below a certain level, i stay out

the problem is that when trading is really slow the signals are less reliable because anyone can steer the market up or down with a lott less money

I cant argue with that. That's the problem with the start of the European session. There's a boost in activity at 08:00 Frankfurt time as they get into work, and then again at 08:00 London time as they open. But I'm restricted at the moment in when I can trade. It's a massive test of patience. Most of my losing trades, I should just have stayed out.

re Al Brooks alternatives if you find it too much - check out Lance Beggs. He's generally well recommended. Google "yourtradingcoach" to find his website. It's the stuff I'm learning to implement here on this journal.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
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  #566 (permalink)
 
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 Adamus 
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Right after discussing how the signals are unreliable, along came a gold-plated setup. Missed it. I think I know why, will leave that til later.

In retrospect, everything was in my favour this morning. Got out of bed on time, had enough time to prepare, wasn't tired, no emotional baggage to contend with - so considering that, something must be wrong with my preparation or my process, i.e. the trading plan is not right.

The plan in my head was not the plan in my trading plan document. The setup I'm talking about started at 07:39 London time as the market pushed down to break thro the Asian low. As it progressed, I switched to the 1min chart and there were a lot of signals that the bears weren't strong enough.

- first up, the break-out dithered, putting in a doji with a long bear tail, as it went into pull-back mode. Shouldn't do that if it's strong, not IMHO.

- then it made a little swing low higher than the break-out low, another sign of bear weakness

It then pushed down past that swing low and pulled back, and back, and back and then was obviously bullish.

All that time I had a Sell stop in place to catch a continuation, but as I turned bullish too, instead of (a) canceling the Sell and (b) putting in a Buy stop above the pull-back, I opted to go with the confirmation of the failure, should it fail, by buying the break of the MA.

Two interesting reasons for this: (a) I thought it was somehow stupid to box the market in between a Buy stop above and a Sell stop below and (b) I was afraid the failure wouldn't continue.

What was I thinking? Bollocks obviously. Having 2 orders on the screen is perfectly legit according to my trading plan. Being afraid of getting long was a perfectly reasonable emotion in the light of the rubbish trading conditions during August. But taking a late entry isn't actually in my trading plan. It's crept into my approach around the edges of the trading plan because I think some of the stuff I read often refers to trades where the trader has got in on the second opportunity or after confirmation. But that's not in my trading plan, at least not for break-out pull-backs.

Here I was waiting for the market to overrun the MA and in some setups, that's a valid part of the setup, but in this case it's really only confirmation so it's not valid.

Funny how I actually missed the confirmation signal anyway. I wanted price to hit the MA, hang around there for a while and then decide to continue. In this case it just shot straight thro the MA like it was there and that totally disappointed me, since I was expecting a trade! Why was I so disappointed when I could easily have entered earlier at the failure? Anyway, in my disappointment I then didn't pay attention and in the last seconds before 08:00 price dipped back down to kiss the MA and then shot back up again. Totally missed that entry. Complete overreaction to my expectations getting trashed.

I'm reading a great book (so far) by Jonah Lehrer called How We Decide - I can't remember who recommended it to me but it's all totally relevant to trading - despite the fact that the author subscribes to the random market theory and talks about the impossibility of actually having an edge. Anyway, he still manages to describe and explain brilliantly the way we traders go wrong.

The disappointment syndrome I had earlier was directly from the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) which reacted to the failure of my expectations by raising it as an error to feel bad about, because that will teach my neurons to watch out in the future at this point. Positive stuff - although according to Lehrer, he will get on to the bad side of it later in the book.



I was also reading about the Oculofrontal Cortex (OCC) which produces emotional responses to situations before the logical mind picks up on them. Maybe I'm overreacting and attributing myself skills that aren't actually there, but around 6:30 before the market properly woke up, I got the impression price was going to make a higher swing high and a lower swing low - but I dismissed the thought as random chatter. Why should it do that? I had no evidence. Only, the market went and did that. It wasn't one of the wishful predictions I have about once a minute (if I goes up to resistance, that's 25 ticks) - it was literally just a random thought. I'm trying to remember the emotion attached to it, it wasn't that great. I'm pretty sure I don't get random ideas like that. Which is why I remember it.

Apart from that, I do remember a lot of fear as the setup was in progress.

I think the main problem here is my preparatory work. I've got 5 setups that I run through on paper - two that actually happened - a win and a break-even, and three 'idealised' scenarios - a win, a B/E and a loss. I should either replace or add to them - I need to see the idealised setups as charts. Then I won't miss it as I did today - I'm pretty sure I would have gone for it despite the fear, if I'd recapped the proper entry point for the failure trade.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
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  #567 (permalink)
 
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Lots of movement this morning. A BAB arrived out of nowhere, you don't generally see them at this time of day. Looks like the EUR/USD is trying to get its volatility levels back up to a respectable level.

So several potential setups presented themselves, all really quickly as the market put in a choppy rally up through resistance around 1.2800. Couldn't get in on any of them. Had to watch for that old anterior cyngulate cortex trying to make me regret how many ticks I'd missed.

Edit: Sorry, I'm misrepresenting the ACC - it's not responsible for that feeling of regret at all. Just checked back on the book I'm reading and in fact it is "somewhere in the ventral caudate", in one of its dopamine-rich areas. Fictive-error learning. An emotional mistake that is actually an attempt by the brain to prevent us missing out in future on a good thing.



So there you have it. That's the bit you need to get control over when tempted to dive into a strong trend without a low risk entry point.....

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
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  #568 (permalink)
 
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 Adamus 
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Slipped up big time - slipped back into the old ways. Didn't do the prep work as I saw the market was on an S/R line building a setup. This puts me back in the 'unable to trade' category which I thought I had patiently lifted myself out of. OK it's not drastic but it was in several violations of my trading plan. It would take two good trades to get me back to where I should be if I hadn't slipped up.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
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  #569 (permalink)
 
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 Adamus 
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Break-even on a short - got in late, still a valid entry I think, but then bailed out on bad price action as the market put in a couple of tails instead of breaking past the swing low. Probably a good call to exit because it would have taken out my stop later - after pushing further though. So it got choppy. The exit though was so hard. I almost couldn't, and I lost a couple of ticks as I hesitated after it went through my desired exit point. I hadnt pulled my stop down - I just exited at the market.

Yes, that was hard. I don't know exactly why either so I don't know how to cure myself there.


In retrospect, I think the bounce down at the Asian high was a decent setup, if a bit quick - but I was too nervous of getting chopped about after yesterday's poor trading.

You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
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  #570 (permalink)
 
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 mokodo 
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Adamus View Post
Break-even on a short - got in late, still a valid entry I think, but then bailed out on bad price action as the market put in a couple of tails instead of breaking past the swing low. Probably a good call to exit because it would have taken out my stop later - after pushing further though. So it got choppy. The exit though was so hard. I almost couldn't, and I lost a couple of ticks as I hesitated after it went through my desired exit point. I hadn't pulled my stop down - I just exited at the market.

Yes, that was hard. I don't know exactly why either so I don't know how to cure myself there.

Hi Adamus,

Reading your posts it looks like you have a lot emotion going on when you have a trade on. It appears that it is getting into your decision process, maybe even taking control of it? I'm only talking from own limited experience - and I do not know what methodology you use so I do not know even if it is applicable - but can you test out a 'set and forget' order management. That is: do the analysis, set the orders (stop and target(s)), wait for the trade to finish.

I know I suffered getting far too emotional about live trades and the only way I started to overcome it was to set set and forget. I also have a time stop so I would close manually it if that was hit. And that was the only interaction I allowed myself. Initially I had to not only set and forget, but set and walk away!

Just my 2 pennies worth. Best of luck with the it.

know thyself
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