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)
this is a late entry as I took the weekend to decompress and re-evaluate. Traded like a complete idiot on Friday.
Won't go into the details of each trade, but took 5 trades with 1 winner and 4 losers. One of the losers had 5 ticks of slippage on a 4 tick stop. Just a bad day?
Over the weekend I reviewed the video of the trades and found that it was not just a bad day. I was not following most of my rules. I thought I had gained some understanding of how to use the depth and sales and I let that overconfidence affect my trading decisions. I got what I deserved.
I'm going back to what has worked for me before, trading the market reaction to news off the charts. I can then review the trade videos later and see if I can see anything helpful in the depth and sales. When not trading the news, I'll just watch the depth and sales and follow the rest of advice I've recieved on learning to the use that toolset. The current plan is to revisit using the depth and sales for trade decision making in a couple of months.
Since I'm only trading the news today, no other market analysis needs to be done.
Expecting two trading opportunities today, Canadian dollar on the manufacturing news at 0830 and the e-mini Nasdaq 100 at the market open at 0930.
Slept in a bit this morning as I don't have as much pre-market work to do and I won't be trading until 0830 anyway. I dusted off, reviewed and updated my old trading plan for chart based trading of scheduled news and events so my rules are fresh in my head and understood.
I plan to leave the office between news events to prevent over-trading. Should be a good trading day today, if a bit boring.
short day today since I'm only trading news and events.
Two events today: Canadian manufacturing sales and the U.S. market open.
CAD manufacturing sales traded with 6C. No setups so no trades.
U.S. market open traded with NQ. Two trades that basically cancelled each other out.
First trade: Price opened and moved up initially and then bounced around for a bit and dropped back to the open price. Entered short as price moved below the open and was stopped out as price bounced around that area. Good trade, wrong entry. lost 8 ticks.
Second trade: Price was still fitting the pattern, so took another short after price had stopped bouncing and moved down about 4 ticks and stalled. Price hit the first target so I moved my stop to break even. Stop was hit when price reversed. Good trade. Price continued well past my initial stop, so moving the stop to break even was the right trade management rule. made 11 ticks.
At least it's not a losing day. 4 events to trade tomorrow, we'll see if it's a better day than today.
News all day starting with Canadian wholesale sales and U.S. building permits at 0830, then BOC news releases at 1000 adn BOC press conference at 1115.
Didn't sleep well last night so I decided to sleep late. Missed the 0830 news releases although not much reaction happened in either market. Still sleepy but I have another 40 minutes to cat nap before the market open.
Canadian wholesale sales and U.S. building permits - no setups so no trades. In truth, I was also a bit late setting up to get into these trades anyway, if there were any. In hindsight, I'm glad there were no setups.
Market open, traded with NQ. got two trades off, both losers.
first trade was a 'bipolar' setup and I entered long as price moved higher than the open after the initial downward move. Price fell decisively and stopped me out. 8 tick loss, wrong trade.
second trade was a 'stampede' setup as price continued to move down and had a small pull back. Price continued down to within 2 ticks of my firt target before retracing to stop me out. This one was just poor trade management on my part. I should have moved th e stop to at least break even + 2 ticks when price got that close to the target. Correct trade, correct entry, poor trade management. lost 8 ticks.
Bank of Canada rate statement was traded using 6C. This was a textbook 'gunshot' setup and I entered long as price started bouncing around a bit at the bottom of the initial move. My first target was hit almost immediately after I entered the position and the stop was moved to break even + 2 ticks. Price bounced around the 1st profit target price for a few seconds before dropping back to hit my stop. profit was 15 ticks.
Overall a small winning day, like yesterday. This is how this trading plan usually works, with very few large losses, small wins and small losses cancelling each other out and the occasional large win that really grows the account.
Since there isn't much pre-market stuff I do anymore (other than check to see what news is due out) I think I'll just do the recap and skip the pre-market entry. Just save some reading for those that made it this far.
Unemployment Claims, traded with GC: Price moved up a bit after the news was announced but bounced around a lot. Waited to enter until after price fell below the open but got stopped out. Turns out there was no reaction to the news, it was just normal market movement. Wrong trade.
I chose to trade the unemployment claims news instead of the ECN press conference becuase press conferences can cause the market to move at any time during the conference, depending on what is said. I figured the unemployment claims news would cause a more immediate move in the market. Turns out it did not, probably was overshadowed by the ECB news conference, which produced large moves down and up. Just a note for the future. may still decide not to trade a press conference, but may decide not to trade other news being released at the same time.
Market open, traded with NQ. Three trades:
Price opened very choppy but moved upward and stalled for a second. Entered short expecting a bipolar setup and was immediately stopped out as price continued to rise. Wrong trade.
Attempt to join the upward move was stopped out immediately. Price dropped from 2 ticks above my entry. Wrong trade.
Attempted to get long to join the upward move again and the price moved against the position so fast that the stop order was rejected. Manually closed the trade for massive slippage. Wrong trade. Should have known the momentum was downward by this point and that there was no trade.
Natural Gas Storage traded with NG. Three trades:
Price slowly dropped from an initial gap downward on the news and paused. Entered long on a reversal strategy and was immediately stopped out. Price bounced around above my entry price after hitting my stop but did not get far enough into profit for me to have moved my stop to break even. Wrong trade.
Price continued to bounce around the same lows, making 1 or 2 tick lower lows and bouncing 3 to 4 ticks up. Entered long on one of the bounces and price continued to rise. Moved stop to break even, price rose to within 1or 2 ticks of the profit target and the stop was auto adjusted to entry + 4 ticks. Price reversed and hit the stop. Right trade, good trade management.
Another long entry off a bounce of the low that was immediately stopped out. Looking back at it, three trades, each long but entered at lower and lower prices. Should not have taken this trade as it was the third trade off the same news reaction, but also should have been looking for a short by this point. As it happened, price wiggled around the stop a little and then did rise up to beyond my target. Right trade, wrong entry.
Crude Oil Inventory traded with CL. Two trades:
This was a cross between a bipolar entry and a stampede. Entered as price dropped below the open of the candle on a steady move with small pullbacks. Stopped out by a few ticks and price resumed the downward move. Right trade, wrong entry.
Entered short as price was continuing to fall with very small pullbacks, very nice stampede entry. Moved stop to break even + 3 ticks when price went 10 ticks into profit. Price pulled back and hit the stop. Right trade.
Ended today down about 25 ticks. ouch. 9 trades and only 2 small winners. Had one stop order rejected due to the pace of price movement which caused most of the damage, but also had at least 2 trades I should never have taken (due to my two trades per event rule). Probably should not have taken the unemployment claims trade either. Many lessons purchased for those 25 ticks.
Canadian core CPI and retail sales, traded with 6C. Two trades:
CAD reacted with a bipolar move too quick and small to trade and then decided to bounce to the upside. Entered long when the bouncing stopped and price stampeded to the upside. Entry was a bit late and price continued about 4 ticks past my entry then reversed and hit my stop. Right trade, late entry. lost 8 ticks.
CAD started bouncing around and then moved decisively to the downside. Entered short on a downward stampede but was late and caught the very end of the move, price reversed and stopped me out. Late on the entry again. Right trade, late entry. lost 7 ticks.
Market open trade with NQ.
Market opened sluggish but to the upside then reversed and bounced down to the open price. Took the short when price broke below the open on a late bipolar entry and the market decided to run to the downside. Both targets hit. Great trade. made 40 ticks.
Overall dissappointed in my lack of ability to capitalize on setups I've used for a long time. I guess even a couple of months 'off' will allow the rust to settle in. Both of my losers today could have been at least first target winners if I had not hesitated on the entry and got in late.
Up a little on the day but down overall on the week.
