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Thank you for your kind reply. We do learn and this forum is so awesome that we can learn from others and thanks to others as well here.
I really like your explanation and your view point on the trade’s situation. We all have different way of thinking and different expectations and goals in trading. This makes trading so beautiful to me, to experience complete freedom.
I didn’t want to spend so much time with explaining and reasoning of the trades as they were not profitable trades and the main lesson was here for me and not others, however I can see that luck of explanation made you take your time and give your own point of view. Trust me I do really appreciate your effort.
I will take the time and explain fully my reasoning of my behavior regarding that day.
Trade #1
Monday 13-03-2017 VP created nice LVN separation and low percentile bar before close, suggesting that possibly my overall prediction of market going lower and together with Wednesday 15-03-2017 (today) macroeconomics and possible US debt issue makes major correction down.
As the ON session was respecting the high of Monday RTH and LVN levels form Monday’s VP I have thought that if the market push higher (completely against my prediction) I may risk it and catch the move if the price test the low of the consolidation.
I was getting ready for gym and as such wasn’t sitting in front of the screens. I was not aware of the 3 low percentile bars which have formed just before my entry. When I have looked at the screens again I was in the position and in my mind I was partly on the way to gym as I was being late by 10 min and partly just seeing the 3 low percentile bars thinking that this is the last retest before the price will test higher. By the time I have realized that this will not happen I was in the loss of -$40. Could I have closed the position? Sure in normal circumstances I could. Was I fully present and should I have place such trade knowing that if I have time issue I never make good trading decisions – definitely not.
I took calculated risk in case the market would fly away higher and does something completely unexpected at the time. Does it make sense or not to others – I don’t know. If the market would do that it would be the perfect spot for entry, however that didn’t happened.
I could not re-enter the market as I was in the gym. Otherwise I do agree with you that retest of the previously hold support would be great for re-entering short.
Trade #2
As mentioned in my post I come to the graphs late and with the knowledge that I have made mistake. It does not matter if I had reasons for the trade #1, the fact was I was not in the position time wise to place it and I was not paying full attention before the market triggered trade #1 entry. This in combination with late start of the daily analyses (when I have realized out of graph that the market is already in RTH session) de-railed me. I was determined not to trade for that day. I didn’t set the video recording and didn’t do other things I do in my pre trading session as I was one hour short. I have decided to work on my laptop to improve my clarity about my strategy for the rest of the day.
I am explaining my feelings and actions as they are the key here for understanding my behavior.
When I come back in front of the screens I have realized that the price is consolidating and there are two low percentile bars with the support at 5376.25. I have placed my pending order below and was filled in. The price did turn against me and that sometimes happen. With all your respect I do not follow double bottom formation on the 5 min graph if it happens in duration of 10 min. I do not care if the price makes bull bare or bear bar. I am interested in previously held imbalance areas and I have seen such area from the Friday 10-03-2017 which was top of the swing from which the price shoot up like crazy. That particular swing high and other things gave me few clues that the price may again attempt to go higher this time.
It didn’t and that is something which happens. My prediction was off and considering the fact that I didn’t finish my morning daily analyses I am quite pleased that I have pick up the clues so quickly, even though the trade was not profitable.
Trade #3
One has to understand that my revenge trading behavior was kicking in even though I was not aware of it at that particular moment.
2 losses, no pre market analyses, no morning routine except gym, eagerness to get my losses back with market bottoming out. I can make the money back with 5 contracts at the right spot and ride back to the VWAP… easy $1000……. NOT.
So here I am, price testing the last HVN from Friday RTH session and finding a reasonable support. I placed my order and it was not at the correct spot and at the correct time.
I have spent 7 years looking for $100 profit with God knows how crazy SL. If someone’s SL is big enough, one would make consistently money as the markets are basically made to rise and sooner or later the position comes back to at least to the BE point (within a reasons). I have been looking for an edge, living by the saying that the “Market is like an X-Ray, expose yourself for long enough and you are going to die”. Scalping is the way!!!
Well thanks to extremely kind and knowledgeable gentleman I was exposed to different kind of concept. The kind gentlemen selflessly spend so much time to write me tons of emails and kept explaining again and again things which were so different to all the information’s I have gathered by the snake oil sellers at the previous paid seminars (Thanks God for @Big Mike and others in nexusfi.com – I believe there is still hope in this world). Concept which challenges all my personal believes and what I have learned and believed during the past 7 years. I am still learning and repairing the damage which I have created. I am not perfect and have still a lot to learn and modify my behavior.
I really appreciate your kind input, time and effort in order to reply to my trades. You have kindness in you which is allowing you to help others and for this I hail you Alex.
My goals and aims may be slightly different to yours or others and because of that some of my trades will perhaps not make much sense to you or others looking at my journal. And that is fine. Trading gives us absolute freedom to do and perceive thinks as we wish. Each tick gives us the possibility to express our self’s. For me $50 SL per contract is more than enough to find out if the ticks will be in my favor or not. I do wish you and everyone else who is reading this post many profitable trades with as little risk as possible. May you be happy.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
I get what you mean and thank you for your usefull and exaustive post about your bias and behaviours during those trades, yeah i am more a price action trader and don't make really sense to me news and past behaviours of the price, even if i take my supports and resistances studying the past 4 days at higher TFs and when we are approaching important montly levels, like the approach of a really huge gap and so on. On trade 2 where i drew the double bottoms was just an intent to explain a possible but not probable sign to go long at that point.
Macroeconomics – all the red macros happened before the RTH session and most of them were positive.
The market yesterday pushed to new all-time highs and from the range which started on Wednesday 01-03-2017 creating LVN at 5402.50. The price has pushed higher during the ON session reaching a top at 5440.00. Since then it started decline. Just before breaking lower through today’s VWAP 3 low percentile candles were created. The price has find support on the last night swing high at 5431.00
As the price was in discovery mode I would expect either continuation of the move and further rise or inside day when the price will consolidate and establish some kind of value area before further move. There is still a chance that the top will be rejected and the price will attempt to go lower and test the newly formed LVN at 5402.50 for its support. With yesterday news being accepted in quite bullish way I would think that this potion will most likely not happen today.
The price is currently trading above yesterday’s VPOC and this level could be tested today as well.
The market created an inside day after such move from Wednesday 15-03-2017. It has tested Wednesday’s 15-03-2017 LVN at 5403.00 and started to consolidate, retesting the LVN again later on during the trading session creating Higher Low and formation of double bottom on 30 min chart. The lower part of Thursday’s VP in balanced.
During the early ON session the market didn’t attempt to go much higher, with open of the European session the price has find support just below Thursday VPOC creating round base what may be "Cup and handle" pattern. The price then attempted to push higher. The highs were rejected and now the price is retracing finishing the “handle” part of the pattern.
If the ON price is creating “cup and handle “pattern I would expect the price to test the region of Thursday 16-03-2017 open VPOC or slightly below, find solid support which would suggest that there is no interest to trade much lower and the HVN from yesterday is being exhausted and the price will attempt to push higher in search for more volume.
If the price finishes the testing of the yesterday open VPOC before the RTH starts and moves higher I would expect further rise with possible retest of 5420.00 for possible support.
Another possibility is that the price will test the lower parts of yesterday’s low and if it finds support there it will either consolidate or push higher in attempt to re-test yesterday’s RTH Open. Or if it does not find enough buyers it could test 5395.50 areas to shake off all the buyers which are holding their SL form the speculative buy orders around those levels before attempting to push higher.
So far it seems to be a chopping fest. The buyers kind of want to defend the HVN which is generating over this week. It is getting more volume then the Lower one, however somebody is either generating large position and will move the market somewhere or the price will keep ranging and perhaps move next week one way or the other.
It is important to have all SL and PT orders set to TIF (Time In Force) – GTC (Good Till Cancel) and not “Day” as they will be canceled around 30 min past the RTH session. Even though I knew that the Market is clearing the order book after the market close and even though I have received the warning that I can experience something like this in many previous emails from my mentor if I do not change the setting, I still end up losing the SL order.
After another 3 emails and detailed instructions from my mentor I have set the ATM orders to TIF – GTC and as I have learned about OCO Order (one cancel other) as well I have created new OCO Order with TIF set to GTC and placed new SL and PT into the chart. All looked great till the closing bell. I have send “thank you” email to my mentor and as I have pressed the “Send” button the SL order was yet again canceled as well as the PT order (As I didn't save the setting).
At least the OCO Order worked - right
The instructions to select the OCO:
If you have an open position and you wish to add a limit and stop order to protect the position please follow these steps:
• In the ATM Strategy drop down menu, set it to a value of "none"
• Right click in the SuperDOM or Chart Trader and enable OCO order placement by selecting the menu "OCO Order"
• Then place a limit order where you want to exit at a profit
• Then place a stop order where you want to exit at a loss
• Then right click again and select the menu "OCO Order" to disable the OCO order placement
• Now you have a target and a stop placed protecting your open position, and when one of these orders is filled the other will be canceled automatically.
To add an ATM strategy to an unprotected open position, please follow the steps below. This works only for NT8.
• Select the Positions tab of the Control Center.
• Right click on the position.
• Select Apply ATM Strategy and then select the desired ATM.
• Now your position will have ATM applied to it.
I have contacted NT support team and they explained to me that in order to change the TIF I must:
Select GTC within the window and save the setting by right clicking the ATM Strategy window >Manage ATM Strategy Template< Name my template again or select the name from the template from drop down menu <Click Save>.
I have realized later on that I must do that for every Chart Trader in every window as this setting didn’t change the TIF in all of them at once.
Now regarding the open position:
I have thought that the best way how to manage the open Long position at least for time of being, is to find good low risk Long entry point and act in a way I would normally do. So add into the trade more contracts as it is retracing and run the market for as long as I can.
I kind of expected inside day on Thursday (even though I was tempted to go Long at the first retest of Wednesday’s LVN at 5402.25, however I have thought that as that happened quite late, the market would not have enough time to go far enough and I didn't have that clear idea about the future progress with the position either).
My hopes were then placed on Friday move, all looked good up until 30 min prior RTH open. Then the price action becomes really slow. At the beginning of RTH I have thought that it is only because of the awaiting macros, however the market didn’t move in a way I would expect.
Right after placing an update in the journal that it is kind of choppy market (the market makers and the big dogs probably read my journal) the market started moving slowly up. The change of the trend was not really clear to me and it was too slow so I passed the option to get in and even though the market moved higher I was not really convinced that it will be a powerful move. So the order is still running, I will find out after the closing hours if my SL & PT order will stay in as well and if the market does not take me out I will attempt to ride the market with more contracts from decent imbalance level and with clear reversal signal.
It is not red macro; however the speech will be about current economic conditions and monetary policies and as such can create a bit of volatility.
On Thursday 16-03-2017 the price has find support around LVN from the previous day and created balanced VP with support on the previous day LVN. On Friday 17-03-2017 the price was ranging the whole day , however it could not trade much higher then the range from its previous day and the market closed at the lower edge of the Friday’s balanced VP. Friday’s VPOC was created at the exact spot where Thursday one was created. The fact though that the price has closed under high percentile bar at the lower edge of the Friday’s VP suggest a possible shift of the sentiment.
This has happened perhaps because of G20 meetings over the weekend and uncertainty about the possible outcome of such meetings.
The price pushed lower during the Monday’s ON session and find support at the exact spot where the move higher started on Wednesday after the macro economical announcements. This level can be challenged later on during the RTH session as many speculative Sl orders can be there and the market will clear them before possibly testing higher.
The price then pushed higher and during early European session finds resistance on the Friday’s close. The price is moving sideways under very low percentile bars with support of VWAP.
Daily graph: the price is declining from its all-time high for the last 3 trading days and showing balanced micro CVP for the days. During Monday’s ON session the price dipped into the previous range and it was for now rejected with buildup of volume at the possible support level.
120 min graph: The price has pushed lower under high percentile bar during the Monday’s ON early session and then climbing slowly under very small percentile bars. The price is at the LVN area of the CVP and as such can suggest that one side of the market does not want to trade here.
30 min graph: The price created at the low of the Monday ON session balanced VP and find support above the ON LVN and VWAP. The Low of the day or the HVN or even the LVN above it can be possibly good support levels before the price attempt to push higher.
Another possibility is that the market can push lower below 5394.00 or even below the Wednesday 15-03-2017 Lows to trigger all Long SL orders and if it finds solid support (perhaps around 5376.50 levels) push higher or if it does not it may continue the selloff.
As I am still holding the Long position from Wednesday 15-03-2017 I would be watching 5402.75, 5400.25, 5396.75, 5391.25, 5385.00 as possible support levels and possible entry levels to add into my trade.
Holding the position ON and waiting for low risk setup is proving as challenging as finding low risk entry after long streak of losses. It is so easy to see low risk entry point once the market moves out of such area.
Having the BE position at 5382.50 and PT (even though it is just above the all-time high) at 5471.00 created an issue regarding placing the pending order into the graph. If I had the chart trader open the bars were so squashed that nothing much was visible. Only later on I have realized that I can use indicator which is called MousePanToolbar and move the whole inside of the graph as I want. I just forgot to mention that in the post form 17-03-2017.
Waiting for the ideal low risk setup taught me how to be patient beyond my wildest dreams. Even if I end up losing the position or if I screw up when adding into it, this lesson was priceless. There were at least 5 occasions during the last 3 trading days when I was considering jumping in. Each time however something was not right or didn’t feel right.
Today as the RTH session started I was getting good indications to enter long in the first 10 minutes after open. The only thing which was stopping me was the fact that I was doing my daily analyses on 120 min chart and as such I was expecting the price to test the LWN on the CVP which didn’t happened by 10 ticks. I completely forgot at the time that the 120 min graph had many low percentile bars and the price already tested lower during the ON session and it will very likely push higher right from the start of the RTH session. It was really uncomfortable to watch the price testing above the Friday’s RTH High where my intended exit would have been.
The price then dropped lower during the afternoon and find support on the low from the last ON swing on 30 min graph. This was another good point to enter; however as the price was so close to the LVN I was holding my horses again and didn’t enter. The price moved slightly higher and then dropped down and created new RTH Low and finally triggering my intended entry level. All looked so good yet I still didn’t act as I was a bit concern with the time. Yes this was really good support level, there were many indications for strong reversal, but the time concern stopped me from acting.
I am writing that it was the time concern; however I must admit that I was afraid to screw it up as well. There was time concern, however I was not sure if the prices is acting out of the Evans speech and if the price will not test even lower. By the time I put all the pieces in my head together (strong support level, LVN on CVP from last week, good buildup of volume and strong reversal) the market moved nearly 20 ticks higher. Then with the time issue on my mind and knowledge that I was waiting way too much I didn’t act.
This is like starting right from the scratch with small portfolio and being sick worried to enter the trade as I could lose another $50 and lower my depleted portfolio size. Even though my portfolio is much bigger now and I am in already profitable trade the uncertainty is pretty much the same as I do not want to make a mistake. I am way too much in my head and this takes time for decision making. My only hope is that the market will give me the perfect scenario which I can use and long enough move to accomplish what I would like to do. For this there is hopefully tomorrow.
Yesterday the price has find resistance around the Thursday’s16-03-2017 RTH opening levels, then it re-tested the LVN on the CVP and find solid support and sharply bounce higher closing just above the VOPC from the last 3 days.
During the early ON session the price has find support on the VPOC and pushed higher, finding resistance on the low percentile bars from Thursday 16-03-2017 ON session. The price then keep consolidating under very low percentile bars even throughout the European session, suggesting that the price will likely move out of this mini range.
Daily chart: The price has created nicely balanced CVP. Yesterday’s action at the low of the day suggested that the price do not want to spend so much time around that levels building up LVN which is corresponding with the LVN on the CVP and pushed the price strongly higher. During today’s ON session the price has continued the move and find temporary support just above Thursday’s open. The Mini CVP is suggesting that the volume is balanced in the range and as such the price may want to move lover to retest the VPOC around 5414.50.
120 min chart: There is cluster of extremely low percentile bars holding above the Thursday open. If the price holds the level during the RTH open it may suggest that the price will attempt to push higher and attempt to create new all-time high. As the VP is balanced the price may sharply turn around the Thursday’s ON high and push lower using the low percentile consolidation as possible resistance level before testing the VPOC at 5414.50
30 min chart: Giving the fact that the price does not want to trade at the lower levels of the newly established range and it has pushed higher and that it is for now holding support on the Thursday open low percentile bar and today’s VWAP the price may attempt to push higher during the RTH open.
Even though the price is trading close to the all-time highs I am quite bullish in my prediction and I view the recent ranging as possible position accumulation before pushing higher. The price has find support above the yesterday’s RTH high and above the Thursday’s open. If the currant support and VWAP holds I would not be surprised if the price push higher and we will have a trending day. There are no important macro economical announcements scheduled for today so nothing can stop the price moving.
The CVP is nicely balanced and as such the price may continue ranging and instead of pushing higher it can retest the all-time high and find solid resistance and then retest the yesterday open VPOC and continue going sideways.
My overall intention was to go long. I have seen the signals of balanced weekly VP, price trading close to the top of the range and low volume percentiles on 120 min graph which would suggest that the price will move out of the consolidation more than just few ticks. I was holding my ON position for 4 day and was eager to make the trade happen. I was emotionally too involved and I was not even aware of it.
As the market open come near I have noticed that my NT7 platform is again freezing a bit. I have switched off my video recording, hoping that it will improve the situation. It didn’t, there was not time to restart everything (or at least I have thought there is no time to do so) so I have started the day with freezing trading platform. I wanted to place pending orders yet that was impossible as the platform simply didn’t respond. I decided to enter by market and thanks to the freezing the orders were all over the place.
I have seen the rejection of the new all-time high and thought “Okay not a problem I will give it a bit of space and at the end I can at least pull out around $800". There were two low percentile bars and my thought was “If I am wrong the price will go the other way, I can close the longs and drive the market on one contract to 5415.00 level”. As I wanted to move the pending stop order higher the platform yet again didn’t respond. The time was passing by and I could see that the time on my 10 sec graph does not match the time on my computer. Eventually the platform catch up and I was simply taken out of my position on my SL. I had the SL above my BE position so I get out with $95 in profit, however I have realized that I have put myself into a great danger. I have end up in a situation which could potentially wipe out my entire portfolio.
I have stopped trading for the rest of the day. I didn’t even attempt to place the short even though it would be profitable. When I was reading all the articles from all the books and my mentor about taking care of the trades I have somehow greatly underestimated the actual possibility that it could happen to me and I have underestimated the volume of danger which can occur out of such situation.
Whoever will read this – please judge me if you must, however if you didn’t take the precaution and any of it apply to you I am urging you to stop and start considering some improvements to your overall system while you still didn't loose any money.
I am running my desktop out of wireless connection through router. Even though I have the cable ready in the wall I have never bothered to put the connectors on both ends and connect the PC on the wire. This is obviously creating an issue from time to time with connection and in overall slowdown of the connection. This causes issues in the NT database. I have technician coming this evening to correct that.
For some times I could not back up my Windows and even though I knew that, I didn’t act as it was not something major – at least I have thought. Well I have realized that I would like trading to be at least for time of being my business. If I know about any issue, anything which can give me peace of mind, make my life easier in long run and help me to improve my professional approach - would I simply skip such information and not act on it? I would not, yet I did. This issue will be addressed this evening as well.
Every week I go through the procedure of cleaning and tidying my desktop. I check for any Windows updates, clean all the cookies and malware, run all kind of possible scans. I have contacted NinjaTrader support regarding the slow graph and after they checked some of the stuff they suggested “Repair of the Database” I am still waiting for they reply regarding additional suggestions and if I can do the database repair on weekly bases as a preventive measures.
Here is the instruction to repair the database.
Please follow the instructions below to repair the NinjaTrader database. (This can take long depending on the size of your database file and your system.)
• Disconnect NinjaTrader from any open connections via File > Disconnect.
• From the NinjaTrader Control Center window select the menu Tools > Options.
• Select the 'Data' tab.
• Press the 'Repair DB' button.
• Press the 'OK' button.
My repair took literary couple of seconds. But as it is mentioned above it may take longer depending on the size and system you may be running.
I have realized that it takes five and a half minute from switching on my NT platform to be able to use it again. My graphs were loading 150 days of data on 120, 30 and 5 min graphs. I had it that way when I was looking at the stuff during the weekends and I just left it that way not realizing how much strain it puts on the computer. Even though I had the computer build with i7 processor with SSDisk and 65GB of RAM it was unnecessary to have so many days on my graphs loaded during the week days. There were many unused indicators on my graphs which were running yet I was not looking at them on such a time-frame.
I had 5 unused NT workbooks running at the time not knowing about it and not using them what so ever. I have used this guide to strip everything to the bare and necessary minimum.
There is more and more stuff generated in my Document files regarding to NT platform and being quite ignorant regarding all PC stuff I truly do not know what to keep and what to delete. Hopefully the next email from NT support will help me regarding that. This is another thing which I was aware of yet didn’t act for months on.
The whole issue regarding my SL order being taken out and not knowing if I am protected at the time, triggered another issue I had on my mind for some time, and that is some kind of backup regarding internet connection and logging details for my CQG M. Having a sim card with internet access and bookmark on my smartphone with CQG M and logging details should not cost that much and it will give me an opportunity to close any open position if there is issue with my computer, electricity, router or anything else which would stop me managing my trades in the usual way. If the issue with my platform would prevent me in trailing the SL I would have 8 long contracts running in yesterday's bear move and by the time I would find a way to close it I would probably get margin call and lose all my trading money.
I did opened the CQG M straight after I was taken out of the trade just to double check it that really no orders are still open, however this again showed me how unprepared and unknowledgeable I am.
In a way I was quite fortunate with regards to yesterday trading. I have missed the bear move and knowing myself I would attempt to catch the falling knife and pick up the bottoms. Not continuing with my trading for the day has saved me quite some money. I have attempted to ride the market higher, even though the chance was slim, I am really happy I did that, even though it was wrong and I got out with such a little profit it gave me an experience which I didn’t have and pushed me to take action and address some of my trading issues. I have realized that there is so much more I must learn regarding reading the trade signals. How much I was affected by my want to go long and place as many contracts on the move just because I am holding long position, yet ignoring and completely pushing aside all the signals that the price can go low.
There is saying “My first is my worst” and yes I have so much to learn, apply, understand and improve. I have pulled out such a little money out of my trade and I have made many mistakes and perhaps silly moves. I am happy though, that I have done that. Everything which has happened showed me stuff which I was ignoring. I got the lesson with a bit of luck for free. I have realized how much I am affected by my want of something to happen. How little do I know about myself and the markets and how much I am unknowingly willing to risk just to prove my way.
I have set the 
I have send “thank you” email to my mentor and as I have pressed the “Send” button the SL order was yet again canceled as well as the PT order (As I didn't save the setting). 
