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Initial Balance: 1036.00 - 1024.75 (11.25 points) Value Area as at 11:00 am: 1039.75 - 1033.25 - 1028.25 (11.50 points)
Price opened @1025.75
Today's High and Low as at 11:00 am: 1041.75 and 1024.75
VPOCs: Top 1062.00 (1031.50 was touched) and Bottom VPOC ?? (Use today's Low since it's 15 points away) Overnight High and Low: 1026.50 and 1016.25
I think today's Bottom is in. Having a 17-point range so far .. possibly another 5 points to extend it a little bit IF Mr Market so desires.
Beth
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
My strategies made almost $1,000 .. Yet I have not made a dime so far .. sigh ..
You will see from the enclosed that there're 2 profitable Inside Bar trades (Yellow bar). The magenta reversal bar with a big yellow dot was a good signal as well, ie short 1 tick below its Low.
What happened?!!!
1. I was "too cheap" when placing my trades!
2. I was very "reluctant" in placing my trades!
3. I had some invisible barriers (I know could be my fear of losing) that have been haunting me!
Well, at least I am not placing sim trades to fool myself that I am doing fine. Instead, I have 2 NJ DOMs with my real account on. One for TF semi-auto trade and one for CL. For the record, TF does have trades triggered. Both were good for $200+/trade.
I dreamed about having the Inside Bar strategies on for my live account. Let's give me one more day (tomorrow). Else I will run them live Fri when we do not have many news.
Beth (Extremely sad and disappointed .. certainly another F for me ..)
Upon completion of my earlier post, we had an Inside Bar set up. My last chance before 12:00 noon. Okay, gathered all my courage and I placed a real trade. SL adjusted to 1 tick when it's 8 ticks from entry. Got hit!
It still looked good to enter Short again. I did it within seconds. Adjusted PT to 9 ticks and got filled. Soooo, I just made close to $90 after commission .. Hurrah!
Emotion: Nothing as it happened very fast + I had no time to think ...
Beth (feel a little better though have a river to cross .. and I don't know how to swim ..)
CL moves very fast and I am trading 1-contract trades (not multiple ones yet). My current ATM strategy does not work too effectively.
PT/SL: 12/16 ticks
BE/Trigger: 8 +1 ticks
I may end up with 1 tick very often. Should I adjust BE/Trigger to 8 +4 ticks .. at least have 3-4 ticks OR BE/Trigger to 8 -4 ticks to give it room OR simply remove BE/Trigger and manually adjust PT/SL when price movement tells me otherwise. Will learn as I gain more experience.
2. How did I do it?
To tell you the truth, I just thought it would be the last Inside Bar trade opportunity for today (if I don't count the afternoon session). Take it or leave it! I had to act fast as the Short was just triggered. Took a deep breath (I don't recall doing that .. I might have done .. haha) and here I came. The first trade got to 9 ticks and retraced a little .. Oh, my revised SL got hit. All that happened within 45 seconds.
I asked myself "Is that it?" I quickly checked the indicators and price movement .. Short still looked promising. Let's give it one more try. SL got revised again to 1 tick and I quickly adjusted PT to 9 manually (that's where it stopped last time). Mission accomplished.
I am quite happy with my trade management. When both trades started and closed within 3 minutes, they did not leave me time to worry/think. Simply focussed on the position. I acted normal then. Can I do it again? I don't know .. I am going to do my very best to repeat this success story .. that's what I promise myself.
3. Grade for Trader me
From F to F+! I missed very good set ups this morning. Tomorrow will be another Great trading day. Wish me luck and my trillion thanks again for your patient ears (eyes too)!!
22 ticks (1 + 9 + 12) for today. The third one (closed it seconds ago) was a little naughty. It touched my PT 5 times and finally filled me!!
Emotion: My petite heart raced a little (not as crazy as before) and my fingers were a little numbed. Nelson is here and his presence does make me nervous. He did massage my fingers upon my closing the position.
I'm officially closing my real account and NO more trades.
Hi Beth, I'm testing/using a similar ATM strategy with PT:8 & 15 ticks and a BE:8 & 9 ticks for 2 contracts. I've been unlucky manually adjusting PT/SL so far on the second contract, I don't adjust the first contract.
In my opinion if you are going to target 8 ticks, you cannot set your stop at +1. Your stop needs to remain the initial stop.
Ask yourself, what is the core reason to adjust a stop? The answer should be, in my opinion, that the stop is adjusted because the market has changed in such a way that in order for the trade to be "wrong" your stop must now move (in your favor).
However, many many people use stops in a pure money management sense. I do this too although I'm trying to stop doing it. Doing it this way you would use a stop as a protective measure to lock in profits. The problem is, in my experience, you will do it extremely inefficiently. Emotion takes over, greed, fear.
You will be far better off just:
- Identify original signal, take it or pass on it
- Identify correct stop, this is dictated by price action, not by an ATM
- Identify logical targets, also dictated by price action
- Take the trade
- Only adjust the stop or target if you made a mistake originally on their position, if the entire trade was a mistake exit immediately no matter what
Just my opinion. When trading multiple contracts, I do move stops for the 2nd or 3rd lots as the first and second lots come off.
No matter what you decide, you have to choose a method you believe in. You must own it. You also need to be consistent. If your backtesting or trial trades give yourself a 10 tick stop and you don't move it, then you must do the same thing in live trades.
Money management is a fantastic area of debate. We've all heard the axioms like "don't turn a winner into a loser", hence your BE+1 stop. The important thing is to test a system methodically, believe in it, and then execute on it as it was intended.
Thanks for your prompt response and tips (as always)!
For me, predetermined SL safeguards unexpected big loss (excl slippage) without which fear/panic will likely take over (based on my past experience). SL is now a MUST in all my trades. Once a trade is working, adjusting SL serves to protect some of the gains while giving it "hopefully" enough room to reach the PT. When price action indicates otherwise, I will go for the door like what I did in my second trade this morning.
I agree with you that 8+1 does not work for my 1-contract trades. Have adjusted it to 8 -4. My strategies do not have BE/Trail because I am not competent enough to program the code LOL!! Sooo IF I am going to run them live one day, I still have to semi-manage them .. smile ..
(Extremely sad and disappointed .. certainly another F for me ..)
