Welcome to NexusFi: the best trading community on the planet, with over 150,000 members Sign Up Now for Free
Genuine reviews from real traders, not fake reviews from stealth vendors
Quality education from leading professional traders
We are a friendly, helpful, and positive community
We do not tolerate rude behavior, trolling, or vendors advertising in posts
We are here to help, just let us know what you need
You'll need to register in order to view the content of the threads and start contributing to our community. It's free for basic access, or support us by becoming an Elite Member -- see if you qualify for a discount below.
-- Big Mike, Site Administrator
(If you already have an account, login at the top of the page)
Catching Big Waves - a trader's journal of surfing the the markets
The gold trade was just being goofy. I was messing with gold in sim to see how it "felt" to be in a trade, and just picked long at the time for whatever reason. Then I guess I went to comething else, phone call, switched charts, who knows, and forgot about being in a sim long. I never would have known had I not tried to restart and Ninja said I had an open position I was not aware of. I got nervous, did I really do that? But turned out it was the meaningless sim I had.
So, instead of close it, and having taken a trade and then forgotten about it, I decided to trade like a moron and see what happened. Today it closed net profitable, but only after being down over $10k on a $2900 sim account. So the win was impossible.
The comment about "just gonna be rich" was just me goofing the part of the gold trader.
I know, i always read your thread in detail. I was messing about too. We have to have a laugh some times as trading on a serious level is not fun and games (I WISH IT WAS)
But on a serious note, taking trades like that is stupid gary as you know
It can develope bad habits and hope
But still "FUN" because we cannot lose....HA!
Have a great day and keep up the hard work, i love your style and i cannot wait to see the day you pull off a large scale trades on a daily basis
Focus on the ticks and not the money
Yes i know you know i know and every one knows
So easy to say but yet so hard to peform
Thats what splits the people who do this for a living and the people who fail to do this for a living
have a great day gary
" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
Yes, I thought about that nearly non-stop as I drove 2 hours back to Orlando tonight. I believe I see what I am doing wrong when I trade larger size. If I am trading one contract, I just kind of feel it out as it goes. I know roughly the probabilities, when it reaches it's prime expectencies, when I think it has a better chance, but the important thing is I feel the trade the whole time and do not really care if I drop it. Add contracts, and I don't always "not care".
My primary account in my business lost their account recently. We were their star players, and every project we have done has gone flawlessly. Just started a new job today and expect to get what may be the last one, in Boston, before the end of the month. It was a good run.
That news of a possible end to the lead income generator of my business is what has escalated my drive to go full time in trading. That also means I have pressured myself more than I should to make the transition.
I am a good trader. That is the irony. At one or two contracts, when I do not care, I trade very well for the most part. Certainly net profitable, but just not enough money to want to leave everything else behind to do it.
In my re-read of Market Wizards, I was reading about Tom Baldwin, at the time of the interview possibly the largest independent trader in the bond pit, ;
Jack Schwager - "At what point were you confident that you were going to be succesful at it?"
Tom Baldwin - "That is an interesting question. You are never really confident in this business, because you can always be wiped out pretty quickly."
That was from a trading legend, "never really confident"... That does not do much to build confidence.
I decided to trade larger I would go for larger targets and hold longer, but the problem is, that is not exactly how I trade when I am doing 1-2 contracts. I am quick to decide, quick to forget, hold when I feel like it and don't sweat the heat in those instances, smell a failed trade comeing when I am really in the groove. 4 ticks, 6 ticks, -4 ticks, just treading water and feeling things out, then hold one and done. Or two, and then done.
When I size up I start putting so much emphasis on the risk to reward, but in a textbook sense. Calculators even. When I trade 1 cntract, screw the calculators, there are no guarantees, and so I just keep my losses low. There are more than enough times when I feel really good about a trade to even consider keeping one that feels so-so. Or, so I operate at smaller size.
I have decided I do not believe in the variable size approach. I found a niche of how I trade, and there are no variables to "1". If I trade 4, it is 4, not 3, not 5. FOUR.
