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jkmack's trade journal


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jkmack's trade journal

  #1 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
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have had another trade journal in another forum, but left it a few months back and really been slacking on my journaling. So getting back into it.

Just completed Topstep trader 50k combine, and starting funded trader prep, hopefully tomorrow.


I use market profile as a framework for analysis, and seek to get into swing trades on day time frame, but often regress
into more scalpy trading more often than I would like.


Looking forward to building out my journal on this forum.


Joel Mackey

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  #3 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12


(cannot post images until after 5 posts, so will add back in image after i get 5 posts.) imgur.com/a/XCb3P


I will not post each individual trade like this going forward, but wanted to get a first post out of the way to see what the actual process will be like.


This trade was very aggressive for a funded trader prep trade, due to the 1k per week loss limit, so i took profits and trailed very aggressively. Price has just touched the overnight low which is 45.96, retraced back up, but It should be going up much harder than this,if this is the demand area, so I put a sell stop for 2 lots under it and trail it. it comes back down to fill me and pauses a bit a -1 to -2 ticks, then breaks my way. I take the first off at +4 ticks the second time it hits that level
for more than a couple of seconds, it retraces a few ticks, but cannot get back to my entry before breaking lower.

This break lower is thru the overnight low, so i was really looking for a large break lower, but it only took it out by 2 or 3 ticks, so i tightened my stop, where it is hit before the real break happens. it is still trending down, so obviously i was way to tight with this trade, but I know I am going to have that early on, particularly with these aggressive anticipations of breakouts. It is just better to keep a tight stop and if you dont get the hard break you are looking for, take what profit you can get.

As i build a $400 and up cushion, in profits, i can keep full risk on much longer and let it develop like I should have with this trade. Alternatively I could just wait for A+ risk/reward setups and ignore these aggressive trades altogether...

+$82

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  #4 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12

FOMC announces, NQ moves up to test high of channel, then begins selling off thru the press conference down to a new low of day, retraces back up, looks as if it is putting in a double bottom, failure to match for a move up, but fails to get any more buying and starts selling back off to the low of day.


I put on a sell stop for 2 lots, 2 ticks under low of day. it slips me in at low of day (5712) and it is off to the races.

my first take profit is hit withing 3 seconds, +20 ticks. and then my trailing stop is 12 ticks, but the market is so fast that it gets hit before i can readjust it back up to widen it a bit (stopped out at 5706) was shooting for a run down to 5695. +24 ticks. (+44 ticks total)



imgur.com/a/s4wWJ

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  #5 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12

Gold retraced to hull moving average on 30 minute candle chart. It is also the origin point of a base breakout on the way down. as well as the origin point of the cpi catalyzed move up during rth. So prior support as resistance.

short 2 lots at 1268.1. first lot off at +10 ticks, stopped trailing at +3 ticks.

It then commences to trend down all. night. long. only left about 100 ticks on the table.

+13 ticks


imgur.com/a/1HkJU

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  #6 (permalink)
snipertrader23
Fort Lauderdale FL / USA
 
Posts: 6 since Mar 2017
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jkmack View Post
Gold retraced to hull moving average on 30 minute candle chart. It is also the origin point of a base breakout on the way down. as well as the origin point of the cpi catalyzed move up during rth. So prior support as resistance.

short 2 lots at 1268.1. first lot off at +10 ticks, stopped trailing at +3 ticks.

It then commences to trend down all. night. long. only left about 100 ticks on the table.

+13 ticks


imgur.com/a/1HkJU


That was a great trade...

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  #7 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12

So I started this journal and then abandoned it. I was still doing my journaling off and on, but not nearly enough.

Needless to say, I have struggled to got from Topsteptraders' second stage to the fully funded stage. Then a couple of weeks ago, I hit the $3k target, with 25 bucks to spare, but did so in only 4 days, so I had to still trade another 6 days to get funded... and I totally blew it up. down $900 bucks on two consecutives sessions, both on sunday nights or monday mornings i believe, so almost a week between session, then continued the revenge trading in the third week to blow up that account and reset and almost blew up that account as well. I have managed to get back to break even, and then today, have a nice day, so I am up $800 in the account, but under no illusion that I am a proven trader.

I did find out about Ray Burchett's site due to Rich Friesen's mind muscle for traders email list promoting Ray this past week., and a search for more info on Ray's program, that turned up Ray's webinar with Big Mike and topstep, so I may be mule headed, but obviously i need some help/work, and I bought Rays basic training program and went thru the video modules this past weekend, doing the exercises as I went. I still have to go thru the 90 day reflection things, and I have to finish the last exercise of matching the stuff to the stuff. But I started all the journals he suggested and have written them up, although the ledger journal needs some more work.

I do want to restart this online journal, but quite frankly, I do not know how much of the handwritten stuff will make it here, as the work load is pretty high, but I think I will adjust, and the work load will reduce as I get into the program further, as my trade selection and ability to hold a trade will improve as my trust in my process improves and i take less total trades.
https://imgur.com/a/ESvO0Z6 and https://imgur.com/a/ESvO0Z6


not sure how to get pics to show. but if you are interested enough to look at the imgur.com images I will write it up.

1. we got the sunday open after the friday pennant formation close. it traded up, came back and tested the open/ friday pennant point as support (2) and traded up hard enough and far enough for me to consider it a breakout to the up side. it then stayed up at the highs thru the eu session, only selling off as we approached the US session open (3).

the US session tried to go lower, but could not even get to overnight low, so as the YM was breaking out to the upside, I put in a long above current price (4) in anticipation of a move to the overnight highs.

Not real heat in this trade, just a matter of trailing it up. it did pause and retrace once before going to ONH (overnight high), but bounced hard to the upside. I had high hopes that it would break out of the overnighthighs and test up to the 6723 area above price, so i gave it a little more leash than I would normal, as everything was very bullish up to this point. It did not make it up there, and came back and stopped me out for a nice gain.

it sold off a bit, then retraced back up, but at this point, it is setting up for an entry that I call a failure trade short. Failure to go higher, short entry. So I take the short entry with one lot and get take a full stop out of 20 ticks, reducing my daily gain by $100. It try to take the same entry 3 more times due to (5) we have an unbalanced distribution in the volume, and I am convinced that we will break lower to build out a more balanced distribution. but after the second stop out for breakeven, The weekends words of Ray Burchett come to mind of managing performance risk, and the knowledge gap, so instead of chasing my conviction with too much risk, i do take the trade, but i trail it tightly each time, so even though i got stopped out each time, I was able to get my equitiy amount back up to what I earned on the first trade. I think that in the future, this series of trades will become one trade, and I will have the mental fortitude to hold it until the real move begins, either to take me out, or pay me off, but in this case, i played for getting back to equity highs for the day, and choked the trade out.

It finally broke lower, and went down to overnight low (ONL) and I took a break out trade lower trailing it aggressively for +41 ticks

entered another short just after, as it retraced to the hull, and took it for another leg down for +56 ticks. The reason for the two trades instead of one, is because I fear that it will retrace for a stronger test of the ONL as resistance before the real break lower.

Finally it has broken hard, touched the 200 ma on the 10k share bar chart, and bounce, found resistence at the 50 ma, but it is setting up for a failure to go lower, long entry, so I am not convinced that there is a short here, until that entry setup fails, where I get short in hopes of another big break lower thru the 200 ma, but it fails to match the lows, and so for the time being it appears the down trend is done. +21 ticks.


Now, ,this style of trading is very much how I trade usually, so this is not conforming to what Ray Burchett teaches really. I have a lot of work to do in that respect. But I just want to start the habit of documenting my trades as well as filling out the 3 main journals he reccomends, by hand. And you can watch as I progress, hopefully for the better.


The main challenges going forward will be adhereing to daily loss limits of $250, and weekly loss limits of $750. There will be more subtle stuff that will be challenging as well, but the loss limits are the main problem for me in being consistently profitable, so that is a priority. that problem has roots in overly emotional trading, so that is all part of the same problem in my eyes.

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  #8 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12

Took way too many trades today. got chopped up, but had the really nice entry at the hod the third time it touched it, and could only hold it for a $200 win, when it rotated all the way down to LOD/ONL for what should have been an $800 to $1000 winner on one contract.

I was up and down every other trade, not being selective, just a lot of my old destructive behaviors, but I did keep my losses smaller than usual. after transaction i lost $331 on the day. My daily loss limit is $250 though, so I am going to have to keep much closer track of transactions, or preferably, just stop trading more than 3 to 5 times per session, and stopping after first loss, or 1/2 my equity high is gone. I was up at one point $100, so I should have stopped after giving all that back, stopping all my trading at -50 to -100. It is hard to do in the heat of the moment, unless you have framed your perception to stop losses as a very positive thing, "loving to lose" as they say. I am working on it, I am seeing the wisdom in the saying, more so than just intellectually agreeing with a cliche, I see that keeping a tough day to a small loss, and taking the +$1100 days, and before long you can be a profitable trader. But I still have some work to do.

As far as Market action today, it was a choppy sideways day until afternoon when it was a choppy up trend that accelerated into the close, then apple earnings reaction at the close. My bearish bias really afflicted my trading decisions today, as I was trying to short that last bounce off the ONL level, when I should have been looking to get long, the volume bars were showing the way, the wicks were where they should have been, all I had to do is accept what the market was telling me, or stand aside. Lots of food for thought, to assimilate and improve upon.

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  #9 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12

Took some overnight trades. got drawn down on first two trades, down $160. third trade finally moved in my favor, tailed it up to some resistance, and just cut it for a small win so I could go to sleep. +24 ticks

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  #10 (permalink)
jkmack
Big Spring, Texas
 
Posts: 13 since Mar 2015
Thanks Given: 1
Thanks Received: 12


-


First trade of the day, full stop out. -17 ticks.

Second and third, trying to short the move, but cannot hold the position, moving stop quickly and choking the trade. +8 ticks and +3 ticks repectively.

Fourth trade: Same entry Idea as trades 2 and 3, with pretty much the same entry location, but price has evolved further, and the sense that it is about to go is greater. It does go as anticipated I get a good move. Trading one lot, I dont have a lot of options in trailing it for multiple legs. I just have to take profits when offered. so as it attempts to get thru a support area, I tighten up and am stopped out. +99 ticks.


Fifth trade. The down move has found buyers and bounced to the upside. Take a pull back in the move up, looking for a move to touch/test the ONH. It came withing a tick or two of my stop, so a little heat at the beginning, but then moved up as anticipated. trailed it tightly because of the traffic it has to get thru up here just to get to the ONH, and get stopped trailing. +93 Ticks.

End the day up about 181 ticks after transactions.

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Last Updated on July 14, 2018


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