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Catching Big Waves - a trader's journal of surfing the the markets
1) When this crosses that, buy. But if that crosses this, sell.
2) Only follow rule #1 when this is higher than x. But if x is higher then this, ignore #1.
3) If #1 and #2 are "true", then add "y", and if greater than "x" odds increase by 60%. But, if less than "x" odds only 55%.
4) Assuming rules #1 through #3 are making sense, plan on warmer months being more productive than cooler months. But only on years that are even. In odd years, Maintain rules #2 and #3, but disregard rule #1.
5) If #1 and #2 are questionable, do the opposite, but only for 45 minutes at a time.
6) Ignore everything above. Keep your profits larger than your losses. Learn how markets move, why they move, when they move, what the trend is on every timeframe.
7) Lucky number...believe in your decision to follow #6.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
In am sitting here, 3 beers into the evening, not anywhere close to being "trade ready", after talking with my wife for at least the past hour discussing the "rues" as I go into trading full time. Explaining that we can't expect any great amount of money, but that I am certain we will be profitable. And noticing the chart I posted earlier as it was obvious CL was going up... And I decided I still believed in down... and did not trade it... again....
I have done that same thing through the majority of this thread. Seeing things that jump out to me, never being 100% right, impossible, but being so right often enough that any amount of money per year is not out of the question, with the correct stops and targets... and realizing I am jumping into the unknown in a few short weeks, head first, and just said to my wife..."I can guarantee $500.00 per week"...
Oh, I can trade well... read markets like they were on truth serum sometimes...
I lost faith in myself several years ago, and am fighting to get it back. And to get there, I may have finally brought to the surface tonight, as I sat on the couch talking with my wife, years in the making, that I have been failing us lately because I do not believe myself. I have been failing me, mostly.
I am going into being a full time trader. And doing so with the attitude that I do not care about the money. And truthfully, as of this evening, could not care less. I am far more concerned with being observant. Being flexible. Being patient. Having beliefs but no expectations.
To trade correctly, I have to be as accepting of being wrong as I am of being right. I have to be as content to lose as to win. And if that is the requirement, why in the hell would anyone trade as an independent trader? As a paid trader, with rules and other people's money, OK, but independent??
Because, there are no guarantees. In every business there is risk. My wife talked of opening a health food store years ago. $100k in inventory, $50k in rent, $Xk in payroll. advertising... For what?
Potential.
In that scenario, you better have a good plan, and you'd better be able to execute it properly.
OK, forget "at risk" income. Get a job. That's "safe", isn't it? Benefits, retirement plan, 401k, pension...
Ah, but then your fate is at the hands of your provider...
There is no "risk free" life.
I believe I have attained the skills necesary to start my own business. As a trader. I have worked my ass off to get here, and STILL have no guarantees. Life offers few.
So said, "I can guarantee $500 a week". Both of us completely realizing, I have made impressive amounts of money in the past.
And she said, "OK, so I make X, and if you make X, we should be OK..."
The open may prove me wrong, and with the EIA today, plus Ben 2, I am not sure what to expect really. CL held in a tight range overnight, and the chart is still bullish overall, minor break above the prior high and in what could be a major W3...
But I am still watching for lower until the major prior low at 89.60 breaks. CL just taking out a top, but a top that failed to make it to high-side resistance, is not a breakout for me. CL has a way of finding all stops, and has a habit of returning for one final push on major peaks and valleys.
I have been following your thread for awhile now, keep up the great work. At some point you should consider writing a trading book, there's more wisdom in what you've posted than in many of the trading books gathering dust on my shelves!
I lost money today, but still would take the trade over again. I had defined resistance, I saw stopping volume confirmation and a large range move down, waited for a pullback (which occured on relatively low volume) and then cut my losses early, before the stop above the prior high. Net loss $220.00.
I knew this morning that the near trend is up, and theat W3 might be in progress, and if I was going to find a fault in my plan, that was it. That is one of the downsides to calculating lower timeframe SR levels and trading on smaller ranges. The reversal was at least swift and decisive, it did not take long for crude to tell me I was on the wrong side of the market this morning.
Crude tacked on another dollar +/- today to reach to $90 mark. On a higher SR level than what I was watching this morning, there is confluence at 90.42 - 90.60, next 92.25 - 92.35, and then a major LSP at around 93.30. Each break would have at least 100 ticks of open field to run.
But there was an obvious fight going on in the 89.80 - 90.00 area from the moment it made it there, and continuing all the way into the pit close. Tonight the price sits back at 89.88 as I type this. The "big round number" effect seems to be the dominating force, appearing to hold more power than fib lines or prior pivots.
You say its going up then you don' buy and ride. You say its goin down, then same thing. You need to put your money where your mouth is. you need somebody tellin you, you are the fuckin man, you go for it. you gotta take them waves when they're there bro. Put 1 contract on when you see it, and let it ride. You know, you worked for it. Make some fuckin money. I see you are calling it right, and I understand why you are not backing it up with 10 barrels, but you gotta at least take 1 fuckin contract. This is what you know, this is what you do. It's hard for me to understand what you do, but you are right. I'm makin a little sense to you, ain't I? I hope I am able to articulate this, I am not a very good speaker. There comes a time when you need to fuckin gamble. You may make only $5000, but you need to prove to yourself you can. Forget about making 50 grand. Get your trust back.
I saw a sign today, "Trust for sale, 50% off". I agree I should load up on it. I told Melissa a few days ago, if I had the trust in myself I used to have, I'd be making $1M a year. But, regardless of the sale price, I can't buy trust in myself. I would pay "Buy 2, only get 1".
I see that I do what I do. I commented about the 5WM down, ABC, then double bottom local and global, and something about "if it can make it above 79-80 (somewhere in that range), ... Sure, "should have" bought 50 contracts and let them run. Maybe even "would have", 10 years ago. Approaching the world with an attitude that "I believe in X", and then doubling down on it, can make fortunes. I did that and made millions.
But we come into the world wired to be a certain person, and we catch the world in a cycle, or "wave", of where it is headed at that time. When they align, millionaires are made. When they hit the exact crest, billionaires. And then, there are the 90% who catch parts of the move, based on what they believe and where they are in the world cycle at the time. Knowing when to get in may be obvious, but not when to get out. Or the opposite may also be true, who cares where you get in, as long as you exit correctly.
I would have sworn it was all about believing in something and having the tenacity to see it through... had I not been there, done that, and had the world dump me on my ass for thinking that way.
But, at that point, you adapt.
Not that adapting is the best thing, or the most profitable thing, it is a learned behavior for sure. But trying to de-program a learned adaptation is 10x harder than not having that need to start with.
We come to the world with dreams, and as long as the world responds with us, that is our reality. But if the world teaches us those were nothing but dreams with good timing, we become conservative, we "learn" to restrict ouselves, for a greater good. Or at least, a belief that it is a greater good.
"There are old traders and bold traderrs, but there are no old & bold traders". Well, maybe there are old and bolds, if their timing was correct. But timing is a tough concept to bet the farm on. If we are wrong (and we will be), we need more chances at being right to make to whole effort worthwhile."Slow and steady..."
I hear what you are saying. I am my worst critic. I called the move, think about that from my side. If there was a time to go all in, wasn't it when oil broke out off that double bottom? Where was my all in trade? Had I been 25 years old, knowing what I know today, but not carrying the memory of failures, and if that was my perfect moment of belief and timing, I might have profited $500k in a few weeks...
But that tiny little detail of "we never KNOW"... added to the math of "I failed before"... Screwed up math, I agree, but that is the current equation.
I am getting better every day, believeing a little more every time, getting a little more frustrated with my lack of action on a regular basis. A storm is brewing inside me. I will step out again. Why would I not? This is not life or death, it is not even as important as we try to make it. It is money, and nothing more. What I need, and what I want, have come closer together than they lived years past.
Every day there are a hundreds of opportunities to bet red or black. If the wheel one day changed to being 80% black, but still paid the same as with 50% red/black, that would be obvious. And even if wrong on the first try, keep doubling down.
But the price of oil, or the euro, or the S&P, or corn, are never quite that obvious without a lot of study and understanding. From the ouside view, there are always as many red slots as black. And even at 80/20, the 20% could hit 100 times in a row, in the realm of possibilities. But we learn, over time, to see the colors more clearly.
Oil had a certain pattern on a daily. Noted. It worked this time. Noted. Next time it may work again. Also noted. And I am working towards the final outcome of taking those moves and ignoring the rest.
But today, while caution does not make me a lot of money, while you might argue it "costs" me a lot in missed profits, it is where I need to be today. I am aware, just not that experienced.
But I will be. And when that time comes, I will have the money to do something about it
Platform: Sierra Chart, TOS, Tradestation, NinjaTrader
Trading: energy
Posts: 114 since Jul 2012
Thanks Given: 81
Thanks Received: 172
Really appreciate the sentiment here. My trading has cycles of profitability that send me to paper or 1/4 unit size in the multi week draws. At some point, i become back in tune and i explode from the gates. My greatest monthly results come after my losing months. After the 5th cycle of that, its not a random phenomenon.
