I wanted to start this journal to bring some transparency into this journey to becoming a full time trader.
My Story
I have been trading for 6 years now on and off. I have been in stocks, options, futures, and currencies with experience in all of them. I am mainly looking to improve myself as a trader and hope that this journal will help. I have never gone full time but have always had a part time job to go along with what I am doing in the markets. I used to trade on Infinity Futures but found the connection to be patchy so I moved to doing all my futures trades on Think or Swim and am very happy with the platform. My personality matches best with day trading and I am looking to capture intraday moves and trends. I had some success trading options but just didn’t like holding them for a week and found that I would ignore my positions if they became a loss, and that just didn’t work for me. Capturing intra-day moves in very liquid markets is what suits me.
Currently I work full time and am only able to watch the markets occasionally throughout the day but do have some free time to trade and post charts. I will try to be as consistent as possible but do have other obligations and am going to be taking a few weeks off this summer.
I have been through the works in terms of indicators and systems as is everyone out there that seeks to become consistent in the markets. I have found a style and methodology that matches my personality and it has taken years to develop and refine to get to this point.
My Current Trading Style Currently my focus is on trading Crude Oil (CL), I watch the daily, hourly, 15 min, and 400 tick charts for direction and entry. I am a day trader and rarely will hold something overnight. I use fibs to show support/resistance levels. I use pivots and Opening Ranges to add clarity but other than that I don’t use anything else.
I keep my risk to about 2% per trade, and 8% max per week. I find that as long as I keep risk under control I can be a profitable trader.
I trade live mostly Tue, Wed, and Thurs, and occasionally on Mon, Fri depending on volume and how it’s moving and reacting.
2 Full stop outs means I am done for the day and won’t be putting anymore trades on for that day.
I use pivot lines, and OR ranges for 30 and 45 minutes.
I am looking at trend topping/bottoming patterns, trend continuations, and intraday reflection points as I call them.
I am working on understand market profile and Mark Fisher’s ACD method.
I don’t use any indicators in terms of momentum or oscillators. As of lately I switched from candle charts to bar charts and turned off all coloring of bars. I found that coloring and candles affected my entries and exits from an emotional standpoint. I would see a large red candle form and wouldn’t be able to put on my long position even though it was a prime entry, and that just didn’t work for me so I turned that info off.
I trade 50% pull backs and anchors within a trend. I find those to be the best setups.
Lately I have been taking smaller profits instead of holding for longer targets that may or may not get hit. I am working to refine what is going to work the best in the long run.
I have a lifetime subscription to Stocktickr and love it, also to thinkscripter as well.
What I hope to gain from this Journal
Become a better trader
Insights into the market I am trading
Make a consistent profit each month and build on that
Any feedback into what I may be doing wrong, or what I may be missing in my methodology from other members would be awesome.
Thanks for participating in my journal. Feel free to chime and post charts, give advice, post links or other relevant info.
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I wanted to be long after the inventory report. I had a strong upside bias but was weak on getting a good entry that I could hold.
Lately I have tried waiting for some sort of low to get put in and then trying to catch it on a turn instead of having the market push straight into my limit order.
Here is a chart of my 2 tries at entries but I wasn't able to hold either of them. This has been an issue lately with me; getting into the right side of the move but not having a good enough entry and getting stopped out. Anyone else having that issue?
I usually have my stop at 10-15 ticks. Is that too small? Larger stop for me?
I didn't take the trade because I was away from my computer but thought I would post it with some notes of what I look for. I see this pattern recurring over and over.
I didn't take any trades today; the long took off and didn't give me an ideal entry. This is a current snapshot of what I am looking at. I am looking for the market to pull back 50% of its move and then retake highs by 23%. This is my main methodology.
One issue I have is pulling the trigger and getting in. I like to watch them play out rather than physically being in the move. Is that because of fear? or I just can’t seem to participate? I don't know. That is one think I am trying to overcome and get better at.
On a side note I was listening to a trader interview yesterday and one of the traders said there are 3 points to a traders progression. He said this is usually how they progress to profitability and consistency.
1. A trader learns technical analysis. They learn how to chart and find patterns and learn market structure.
2. A trader learns fundamentals and learns more of the supply/demand side and what pushes a market in a direction in the longer term. This takes time but builds on the technical patters that present themselves.
Most traders get to this point and think they are good to go. They find the patterns, pick the longer term direction and try to get entries but over and they fail to make money. They are missing the last piece of the puzzle.
3. Learning to be a trader. This takes a lot of work. A trader can learn all the patterns and fundamentals but if he has not learned to be a trader he will consistently lose money. This is often overlooked and isn't incorporated into the beginning education. Learning to be a trader is learning to execute, and to find that ideal position and add when it makes sense. It means knowing when to hold and when to fold on a position and not marrying an idea in the market. This is often harder to do and takes alot of time but is necessary to being successful in the markets.
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I've spent alot of this week churning out some new indicators for TOS. I have alot I want to get done to get up to speed. I have a weekly open, a weekly pivot, monthly pivot, and the NY open plotted on my chart. I also got the Opening Range setup.
Below is a shot of it.
One thing I haven't paid a ton of attention to in the past is volume. I am incorporating it into my trading on the 15 min chart. I want to learn more about how volume spikes affects turning points in the market. Anyone out there use volume extensively? How do you use it?
No trades today. Energy report came out today and there were some wild swings on the ES, Gold, and the Dollar.
Hi gsl8r, nice journal! Your method/rules are eerily similar to mine. BTW, you didn't happen to learn the 50% entry to -23.6% target methodology from a fellow named DH by any chance, did you?
Thanks for the response Futures Operator. I did learn that from DH. I found DH in the summer of 2010 and followed him for about a year. I learned so much from him and it really changed the way I look at the markets now. I branched off a while ago to do my own thing and gravitated to Crude. After trading and watching ES, 6E, NQ, YM, CL, GC and others it was CL that I found to be the instrument that fits my personality the best. I only follow CL now and that is the only instrument I trade as well. Making that transition was hard from watching a bunch of instruments to just 1, but now I find I am able to focus on it and trade much better. My results keep improving and I have never looked back.
I incorporate his ambush trade into my methodology but also incorporate a bunch of other support/resistance studies that have helped bring some clarity to the madness.
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Pleasantly surprised that I have much the same experience, learned an unbelievable amount from DH over a few years about all aspects of trading, traded ES, 6E, 6B, GC. Now focusing on CL, love the way it moves and can 'feel' the market of it, and my own methodology incorporating DH style fibs, S/R, ACD, and VSA. Excited that you have much the same experiences/methodology/risk management that I do, will be following your journal closely, and starting one of my own soon as well!
That is great! Yea I learned so much from DH and it was such a market paradigm shift for me. I am looking to hit things harder from here on out. I am getting some indicators up to speed to help with some new ideas I have learned from journals here on futures.io (formerly BMT). There is a huge amount of knowledge and history here to look at. What a great resource this site has been!
I am getting married next week and will be out all next week but will be monitoring things from my phone as much as I can..... don't want to miss anything good!
I look forward to seeing your journal!
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Today the market bottomed on high volume on the monthly pivot line and then ran up to yesterday's low almost to the tick!
I took a paper trade long at 92.70 and held until 93.48. On paper this week until I return the week after.
I am looking to hold longer and trail stops better when the market propagates in my direction. Still torn between taking many smaller targets and trying to hold for a larger move. Tight balance between the two.
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Glad to see people trading this method here on futures.io (formerly BMT)! I have learned much from DH as well and I'm currently experimenting trading this on the tick charts with ES & CL. What I have in process right now is developing my own set of rules for trading that fits my personality. Will be following along. Good luck
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Feel free to post a screenshot of what your looking at or your rules or whatever you would like. Tick charts are the way to go because they open up the high volatility times and allow you to see more price action rather than a single candle on a 5 min chart or whatever time frame you are looking at.
I posted my rules above but have a few changes already and will be posting those.
I like to hear of other DH traders out there cause they are most likely on the same page as me. I still have alot to learn but feel ahead having been down that road for a few years.
Same here. In case anyone recognizes screennames from EA/DH's site, I was n00btrader, in the room since the beginning in late 2008, until mid 2011 (then less active, as Futures Operator).
I'll try when I get a chance. I like the tick charts because it's quick and most of the time, price bounces at the 50% and goes straight to target or breaks below 61.8%. Higher time frame sometimes give you many bounces on 50% before anything happens. I like ES/CL/NQ with this.
I also rarely use extensions in the tick charts. I have my own set of rules regarding how to draw the fibs. Again, it's work in process and I still have many kinks to sort out.
the MM from current level will bring us to the 50% of wednesday high to low. from there i'm expecting current long moves to break their 61.8% and provide a nice short entry with a halfway back.
if the current 61.8% breaks at 1647.50 then i'll be looking to short pullbacks
if current move up continues higher and breaks 61.8% of halfway back from wednesday's high, i think ES will be going much higher.
Looks good @DoubleClick thanks for the charts. I see that you have simplified your charts like mine by going to bar and single color. I really like them that way. I saw someone else on futures.io (formerly BMT) with their charts like that and I've never looked back.
You just focusing on the ES? Or are you trading anything else?
I do recognize that name from the chat room. I was just gsl8r but I rarely participated in his chat room only asking a few questions every now and again. I mainly watched the webinar which was always top notch. I was in there from July 2010 to April 2012.
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Since we are just trading price, bar chart is best because it filters out a lot of unnecessary stuff.
Do you have any trades with CL today? I initiated the first halfway back with stop currently at breakeven. I anticipate the 50% support breaking at 93.34 since this is third attempt at it but anything can happen.
I didn't take any trades on Memorial day, no participation.
Today looks a bit better. One thing I have noticed is that price will come back halfway into its OR before moving to target, which also coresponds to th 50% line.
Took one trade short this morning at 95.64. Now waiting.....
Found this to be a tough week. Looking forward to some more stable market conditions.
I continually find myself being an analyst instead of a trader in the markets. By analyst I mean the guy that goes and looks at all the moves, and plots out what I think may happen and carry on without accomplishing much. Don't get me wrong I do my homework but the real money is made being the trader and trading current conditions as they are right now. I need to trade what I see and not what happened in the last few days.
Today I was looking for an early bounce and a rise back into the Opening Range but it didn't come until about lunch and by then I missed it. If I can just follow market conditions and not my morning bias I can usually do pretty well. Its a tough job in having a bias and whether or not to stick to it based on what you see. I like to go into the day with a bias of what I think may happen based on overnight and previous day conditions but I need to be more flexible in what actually happens as opposed to what I think may happen.
Today we had a very strong dollar that continued up until about lunch when it finally broke. If I could have followed that alone I would have done pretty well.
Another issue I am facing is pulling the trigger when a really nice setup appears. I am getting better at trusting my methodology and not having a fear of a loss but it still presents itself as an issue every now and again. I'm looking forward to a new week and hitting some of the moves. That is all for now.
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I went long about an hour after the inventory report on pullback and got stopped out. My long entry was 101.28, it didn't take long to stop me out. I was looking for a stronger market with the report but I need to pay more attention to the reaction rather than the actual number.
It will be a slow grind the rest of the day going into the 4th. Dollar had a big fall today from overnight highs. We will have to see what happens.
Looking for some feedback on this post. I have been looking at all sorts of different levels and plots and been trying to keep the good ones and weed out the useless ones. Here are my findings:
Monthly pivots: These are valid and make for a great bounce area
Weekly pivots: These work but aren't as strong as monthly
Daily pivots: Work good but hard to know what price is going to do.
Weekly High/Low/Close levels: Haven't found these to be very useful.
Daily High/Low/Close levels: Haven't found these to be useful either
45 minute Opening Range. I have found this to be useful. One thing in particular is the midpoint in the opening range. I find that price gravitates towards it most days and then either bounces and continues its direction or hovers on it then breaks the opposite direction. I definitely like following what it does there each morning.
I've always plotted the weekly open: I sometimes find this useful but most weeks don't. Anyone use this one?
I've tried plotting Asian, European, and US sessions in highlight for context. Mixed on if this is useful or not.....
Tried out the ThreeTen Oscillator but don't think i'm going to continue with it going forward. I have been on and off with oscillators but each time I integrate them I end up removing them. Going to try and keep them off my charts from here on out.
Volume spikes on 10 min chart. I never watched volume in the past but now find it to be an integral part of my trading day.
For entries: 1 or 5 min charts vs 400 tick chart. I definitely like the 400 tick over the minute charts. Everything seems more clear, I can spot typical price patterns much better and overall I get a better picture of price. I'm going to be sticking to the 400.
Thought I would share what i'm looking at and what I find useful/not.
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Short bias on the day as long as we stay below the OR for the day (highlighted in light grey).
Test of 105.10 is my line in the sand, if we can get through that with any kind of force we should see a continuation and retest of highs.
I've implemented Daily, Weekly and Monthly Pivot ranges as part of my studies to go along with those corresponding levels. Watching them as part of my reading of the Logical Trader
I have no position at the moment. Waiting during doldrums and consolidation.....
I feel like i'm at a tipping point but need a little bit of extra help. I have a plan, can see my setups and know where my entries, exits and stops should be but struggle to pull the trigger on all of them.
I hate watching an amazing setup just come and go and I get in the habit of that and its frustrating. In order to be consistent in this game I need to placing trades when entries are there. For me I feel like its the fear of a loss that prevents me from placing trades more than the fear of my edge.
Example, today after OR setup, bounce back to lower OR range, 105.10 short entry during European close. Wanted to take it, stared at it, looked at a few other indicators, time frames, looked back at original setup.... Still there to be taken.... Didn't take it and of course it worked out to be a nice 50+ tick target.
I'm going to work on being better at taking the setups when they appear.
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Got my painting bar idea live. Bars paint green when price goes above OR and red when price goes below OR. This will help with my bias and entries. I look for price to interact with daily, weekly, and monthly pivots and other S/R but my bias is created from OR.
We had a nice bounce on the ORH before rallying into the close. I notice that price likes to break out of the OR and then bounce on it before moving in its direction. You can see that happen every day this week. Also notice that the pivot point lines up with ORH today and that creates a nice area of support.
Ok everyone. I am experimenting with a few different ideas. I have what I feel is a good methodology but where I lack is in pulling the trigger. I can get the most awesome setup and get everything I am looking for to align up but then can't seem to pull the trigger.
I am experimenting with some structured signals that might help me pull the trigger. I have been playing with macd signal bars to try and come up with something the might be ideal to help me enter when I see a long or a short. Attached is a screenshot of what it looks like.
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Most people struggle with the issue of over-trading, I seem to struggle with the opposite issue. I can't seem to put on the trade with it is the right time and others get in and out 3-4 times based on the one entry. I hate to do this i'm going to go back to sim for a week or two to get over this. I need to be proficient at entering and exiting when the signals present themselves. I tend to over-trade on sim and undertrade live. I'm going to focus on sim on just the best entries and record them all as best as possible. The idea is to build confidence in my setups and to help overcome that issue.
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Trying to come up with a good way of showing my buys and sells on tos. Anyone have a good method you use?
I started out with a long bias thinking we were going to bounce on the OR that quickly put me under water but ended up alright the rest of the day.
9 RT moves all 1 lots on paper. I'm going to focus on consistent winning paper days and then go back to live.
One we broke below OR A-down was confirmed but it was a shake out back into the range for the rest of the day. You can see that I had 2 short winners both below the OR and then played the range the rest of the afternoon. The big long that I missed was at 11am right on the OR at 104.32. That was a high probability move but unfortunately I was away from my desk.
Another high probability move is the midpoint of the OR. I have it shown as a dotted line. The first touch of it there is usually a reaction that can be bought/sold. Today would have been a great sell right on it, I waited for it to react there and then got in but got out too early.
Have a great weekend all.
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My morning session so far. That last long trade I was hoping for more of a break of the OR but didn't get it, then kept holding for a retest of highs but never got it and then held it for a small loss! Not my brightest idea.
I had a few other good trades but not up very much today.
I will post another chart if I make more trades.
I need to focus on trades with the short term trend. I tend to like fading moves but those don't always pan out.
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No trades into the close today. Market participation slowed way down and no clear moves/direction.
Looking forward to tomorrow.
Important ideas from today is failed A-up move and rejection back into OR. Next time I see this scenario I will tighten up my stop in anticipation of failed A-up and if it fails I am out and preserve my profit. If it goes through then I hit my targets.
Also today there was a 4 tick front-run of the midpoint of the OR. I've been watching the OR midline which I show as a dotted cyan/turquoise line. Price usually reacts there on the first touch.
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One thing I have noticed in trading all these years is that Bias is everything! Without a system that gives you a good bias on the day you are pretty much setting yourself up to lose. Your system should also tell you when the bias is no longer valid and when you shouldn't trust it anymore and when the opposite bias is now valid. If your system doesn't give you this essential ingredient then abandon it and go back to the drawing board.
The second big piece I see out there is discipline. Discipline in following your system and in taking your entries and exits. Everyone has their own method of trading from complete automation to complete discretion. My system falls somewhere in between leaning more towards automation based on the rules of entry. I obviously pull the trigger on the trades but i'm trying to limit discretion as much as possible. The best traders out there take every signal and know when to press and when to hold. That is what I am working towards.
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My trades today. I'm not so proud of today's trades. We had some nice down movement and I didn't really catch any of it. I had a bunch of stop outs and my entries weren't very good.
I had a bunch of impulse trades that I shouldn't have taken and those added up against my overall p/n. I need to focus more on my entries and following my rules. I will do better tomorrow.
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I made a trade today on Cotton. Ended up being quite a good trade. I've notice that cotton has been in rotational box mode for a week now. Thought I would get a short on.
Not so great of a morning. I kept missing longs with my limit orders trying to get the market just a little bit lower. That led to short trades at highs which didn't end up working out so well. I had a good overnight trade on crude which put my p/l in the positive for my start. Overall here is the chart.
Per my rules I should have only been looking for longs since A-up was confirmed. Instead I was taking shorts. Not so great of an idea......
Wash day
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What is really funny is my brain is completely wired to do the wrong thing every day. I don't know what it is but when a strong uptrend presents itself all I see is short entries. When the markets gets hammered downward all I can see is long entries.
For some reason I find it really hard to take a long when the market is moving up. I always feel like its at its high and is just going to drop from there. Battling this has been my battle with consistency.
I trade with my father and he is a better trader than I am. He will take a long at highs and make a profit while i'm taking a short at highs and getting stopped out. I am going to really focus on trades with the trend. I know if I can conquer that I could get consistently profitable!
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I usually don't end my night being bullish/bearish for the next day. I might hold a position overnight to see if I get an end of day move. Today's didn't pan out so well but some days work out great.
Getting the right entry is key. The volatility is great for day trading. I am usually flat at the end of every night so overall direction isn't a huge thing for me nor do I spend alot of time trying to guess it, and that is about the best most people can do.
In terms of oscillators I'm not a huge fan of using oscillators and haven't used them in the past and have only recently started using them again after hours and hours of having a clear screen to understand price action. Getting a good foundation of understanding price action and then going back to oscillators seems to be the best way to do it. The one I chose is the macd histogram with very tight settings just to show momentum. I don't use it for entries but more for exits. My entries are based on ACD, fib pullbacks and other support/resistance. I find that those do so much more than moving average/oscillator/lagging indicator generated entries.
Thanks for sharing. To stay with CL, Fisher seems to use a 45 min opening range and an A value of 8 ticks and a C value of 13 ticks. Not sure that these are the most recent values. If they are only updated twice per year, why should subscribers pay the …
I went into this morning with an overnight loss which was nice to get into the positive for the day. Its nice to start a clean slate when possible but there are overnight trades that I like to take every now and again.
Well here are the moves:
1. My first entry was pretty stupid and was regretting it the minute I put it on. I was hoping for a bounce on the upper range of the OR. The market fell apart from there and had to wait to get out.
2. Great sell point here and had a nice move down.
3. This entry could have been better. I'm focusing on waiting for the high/low to get put in and then get my entry. This one I jumped in as it was going up.
4. With the /dx strong moves upward I was looking for a break downward in the forming wedge. Didn't happen, should have know it was going to break upward with the trend.
5. Got a good entry and exit on the upward momentum.
Overall today was good. I took my lunch right after my last sell and was regretting it. Could have booked a few more ticks.
Done for the day.
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As said by Hubert Senters, here is how he progressed as a trader and where he said he found success.
Most people want to be sold where exactly to buy and where to sell. Those traders just won't make it.....
He said this was his progression to becoming a successful trader
1. Holy Grail seeker
2. Its all about the setups
3. Its about money management, controlling risk
4. Trading psychology
I find myself honing all 4 parts to my personal trading. I never seem to be happy with where I am at with any one of the 4 peices. I find that when I can make trading much more simple and remove the complexity out of decision making I find more success.
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Tough day for me today. Some Friday days are fantastic and some aren't so much, today ended up being not my best performance.
I couldn't quite keep my head above water today and found that the market just kept going against me. I had a few good entries which showed immediate profits but then didn't take them and ended up with losses. You can see those entries on the chart.
I need to focus more on getting entries on the longer term trend but staying with the shorter term trend and exiting when it shows time to get out.
At what point to I decide to hold a good trade for a longer target or take my profit when given it? Still trying to figure that one out. Some trades I take my profit too early, some don't hit my limit order? I need a better method of deciding that.
There were bigger trades based on my rules that I didn't take. I feel like I was focusing more on the micro moves rather than the macro.
Next week will be better
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I was hoping for a better day today and also more time. Today got shot with meetings and ended up in an afternoon long that I couldn't manage and get out of, hence full stop out.
1. Long based on break of OR and anticipation of A-up
2, 3 Sells at highs. I think I will always be a contrarian and taking the opposite trade against the initial move. I am working to get away from this! If I could get this right I would be profitable.
4. This was my afternoon trade that I got stuck in a meeting over and took the full stop out on.
I noticed the markets ran into a ceiling and just couldn't push any higher. Should have found a good short at that point and held it. Its hard to do that with A-up confirmed but would have been a great area to short.
I need to work harder at being on the right side of the trend. No more fading moves is my goal for the rest of the week.
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He is a fantastic trader and has a great trading methodology. He looks for 50% pull-backs in the direction of the trend and enters on those. There are also anchor entries and extension entries. You will have to sign up with his site and watch the webinars if you want a full explanation. From my experience it is well worth the money. He should definitely charge more for that content but doesn't for some reason. I've read a hundred books, followed so many traders, and when I look at how I trade now, 75% of it comes from what he has taught.
Good luck
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Below are my results for today. Followed my plan today and did good.
1. Entry short based on new lows / lower highs. Once we bounced higher this is a great pull back entry long for some sort of a move. It is a high probability move but I just had my order too low. I thought there would be more of a pullback.
2. Entry long based on the above methodology.
3. Entry short, was hoping for a pullback to the OR and then a drop, didn't happen. I held this for a loss for a but and then exited for a small gain on the OR.
4. If you draw an extension from 106.15 to lows of 105 you will see the 50% pull back sitting right at 105.57. It is the orange line on the screenshot. This was the entry short. I got it slightly below it but should have nailed it. I got out of this entry way too early as it panned out to be a nice winner.
I had a really busy morning today at work with meetings and other commitments. I wasn't able to see the market until after everything had just happened.
No trades for today
I noticed that inventories were flat, nothing exciting there. It looks like a descending triangle setup and then a break on the OR. There were nice touch and move aways on the midline of the OR at 105.14. I need a name for those. Midline trades I guess.
Looking forward to tomorrow, attached is a chart for reference.
I did a single over night trade from the pivot high (upper grey line) down to support. My stop was 20 ticks. I didn't think we would get such a big sell off but this trade worked out nicely.
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Nice! Good to find someone else trading like me. I hate that there is no way of showing live orders on TOS and I've talked to them about it many times to hopefully get it in a future release.
Here is how I do that. I create a text box with buy, sell. Then click on the text box and go to edit properties, then do arrow YES, alignment RIGHT. I colored them green and red and then just draw a trendline to connect them. Once you have a buy and a sell setup you can just easily click duplicate to get another one easily.
I really like seeing my live entries on the chart and feel like it does so much more in documenting a day. You can see where you could have done better and see more info than just your price buy/sells.
Thanks for the tip. I am drawing "Time Levels" on my charts and coloring them green/red/cyan to mark the entries, exits and stops. Live orders on the charts would be awesome, like the Strategies tab on Studies. When documenting to review trades the entries and exits on charts make a big difference IMO.
One trade for today. Got a fairly good entry, could have been better, I didn't think we would get a full pullback to the midline of the OR. That is always a good entry point and that is where I should have had my order.
I have plotted 1 divided by /dx to show the direction of the dollar. I plot 1 over dx so I can see it in the direction of the dollar since they have an inverse correlation. My reason for exiting was solely based on the drop there. Anytime CL and DX go in the same direction one of them has to give. I didn't want it to be cl so I exited.
I'll be in the redwoods in California all next week, I may or may not have any service where I am at. If I do i'll try to find some time to trade if not I'll be back Monday the 19th.
Almost no time to watch the market on this trip, I did however have a day today to place a couple of trades.
I got in on the first one too early, could have pulled it off with a profit but held too long not watching price action.
The second entry was off the OR mid-line which panned out nicely. I pulled it off and am done for the day. There are probably a few more ticks in it but thats all for me.
So a little bit of background on me, I work a day job and am able to watch the markets on and off during slower times of the day. I get some good morning time in but am not actually watching the markets the whole time but am looking at it for a second and then onto other work related things.
Today was a bad day in terms of not being able to monitor things closely. I got a good morning trade in and then the next entry went really bad, I accidentally clicked the x on my stop loss and closed 1/2 of my bracket and didn't know how to put in a stop along with a limit to re-create the bracket. So I moved my limit order down to have it fill but the market never made it to it and then sold off hard. I of course wasn't watching it right during that time and that accounts for the bigger than normal loss today that could have easily been avoided. Lesson learned! I took another small stop out and didn't quite recover today.
Never be in the market without a defined stop to get you out in case something goes wrong!
I am halfway though Markets in Profile right now. It has been a good read. It doesn't give a ton of application examples, mostly just states that you need to put in hundreds of hours of looking at profiles before you will get good at it. I will have more to say about it in the next few weeks once I finish it.
Its always easy to spot trades looking back on a chart. You never know how far a move is going to go or how close to your stop it might approach. The best you can do is place your entries based on your trading plan and hope that your edge works out.
Today was no different. I captured a few smaller moves but failed to capture the larger swings. That is where alot of the real money is in trading, its just hard to stay in when you have a good move in your favor.
Today we had a nice breakout of the OR which continued upward until it was met by the daily and weekly pivot as shown in the chart. From there we sold off way beyond where I thought we would, even below the OR which made for a crazy volatile day. I was up alot more early on and then gave a bunch back at the end. I'm hoping to get better at this. My goal is trading 1 lots to end the day having captured 30-60 ticks in the profit.
I had a really bad start to the day and just couldn't get on the right side of the market. I got stopped out right at the top of the opening range and got a bit frustrated. The market ended up breaking down but I of course wasn't it in it as much as I would have liked.... Feeling a bit frustrated right now. Ended up profitable for the day but I should have been so much more ahead.
The psychology of this game is sometimes overwhelming. A few small losses and you can't get in or you can't hold onto the big winner that presents itself. I need to work harder on getting good entries, and taking profits at the right locations.
The following user says Thank You to greg9 for this post:
Do you set alarms for levels aor time or are you primarily looking at the charts for visual triggers?
As in if you are doing something for work, you are within a certain level you go back and look at the charts.
I'm talking about work as in my day job, not the markets. I am only able to watch the markets a patchy amount at best which just isn't sufficient to do spectacular as I would hope..... One day I'll get there.
For now I would love to automate my system or automate triggers or even alerts. It is just so hard to automate any levels that I am looking at since my system isn't a moving average, or macd type of a system. I follow the ACD methodology. When we have an A-up confirmed I am looking for longs above the Opening Range (OR) on pullbacks. I could write a system that said buy if the markets goes above the OR but that most likely wouldn't be a very good entry and then where is the exit? Once that initial trade has passed then what would the system do? I would love to have something automated beyond just alerts but for now its experience and screen time that has shown me what to do / not to do. I'm working at getting better at reading the markets.
So for now its visual triggers and experience to tell me when to buy and sell.
Really trying not to get eaten up today.... I end up getting eaten up. Here is how today ended up going.
I noticed in the morning OR area that we were going to have an up day. I try to get a good entry long but struggle. I do get a good trade on my 2nd try. Then after that we get the pullback down and I try to get long 2 times. Then thinking i'm wrong and the market is going to fall the rest of the day I end up with a short bias, when initially I was right with my long bias!
Days like today I wonder why I'm a trader and trying to make a buck at this game..... All I needed to do is keep my original bias of being long and I would have had an awesome day but instead it ended up being a loss day.
I'm still playing with market profile and looking at it from my reading of Markets in Profile. Not getting a ton out of the book but I'm only halfway through it. Maybe more will come towards the end.
Frustrated with trading today. I have some good weeks and some other not so good weeks. Today I missed the entry long in the OR and just struggled after that happened. Why is it that I can be so right some days and so wrong other days!
Questions I'm asking myself right now:
Keep trading?
Is crude really the best thing to be trading?
Should I change up my methods?
Why is this so hard! You think your getting somewhere and then get slammed
No chart for today, just some frustrations with trading.
One trade today. I had a short bias going into the day, should have held longer. Not feeling super great today, a bit of a head cold. I am done for now.
A couple of trades today. Not as much time to watch the markets as I would have liked.
Made some typical amateur mistakes today and let the market get away from me.
I was initially short this morning based on the strong dollar. We had inventories so it made for an interesting day. Hopefully the tension in the middle east settles down and we can have some more normal trading days.
BTW, you didn't happen to learn the 50% entry to -23.6% target methodology from a fellow named DH by any chance, did you?
