$50,000 Leeloo challenge

January 8th, 2021, 04:01 AM

Hi All,

It's time to put my development to the test and see how I hold up both technically and psychologically with a funding test.

I use Motivewave with the order flow pack to scalp CL, NG and UB seeking 5 ticks with a 1:1 reward ratio. My analysis focuses on the footprint with 5 minute bars, TPO at 30 minutes and a heatmap also at 5 minutes, in a nutshell the strategy:

1. Looks for a break of either a range in the current day or a key area from the previous day ie VPOC, VAH/VAL and H/L or low volume nodes.

2. If there is increased momentum/volume that breaks the range/tests the key area then I am looking to trade either a failure of that break or a retest and then continuation of the break. If there is no significant change in volume on the break then there is no trade.

3. Trade entry is executed only when an "access point" is clearly defined around the break area on the footprint, ie a significant amount of volume over 3 or so prices, an imbalance at the same location, a large area of low volume traded (2-5 prices) or out of balance trading before/around the break. Eg at the top of a range I would expect to see more selling than buying (and vice versa) so if buying activity increases significantly at the top then this can be an early indication of a trade setting up (in this circumstance it is permittable to enter the trade here and not wait for the retest).

4. If an access point is created as outlined in point 3 and there is no out of balance trade then I wait for the breakout to return to the access point; if it passes through the access point then it's traded as a failed breakout a tick beneath/above the access point block of prices or a breakout if it returns to this zone and then continues in the direction of the break. In this instance when prices return to the zone an entry is placed a tock above/below the top of the access point zone. Naturally if there is no retest and no out of balance trade and we move straight into a trend then there is no trade and I suppress my sense of FOMO. The stop is tight either on the other side of the access point or above/below the candle.

I will trade this as a scalping strategy during the challenge to avoid the dreaded trailing drawdown but if I get funded it will be deployed as a mixed strategy with a scalping component with runners.

Without doubt for me the biggest challenge will be mental, it can be a struggle to not over trade as I have a desire to always be in the market - I have to keep making myself focus on identifying the access point and not trading without one, it's funny though how in the heat of the moment I can quickly con myself into "seeing" an almost access point. The second challenge will be responding to losing trades and the strong urge to revenge trade. I will focus on this again by forcing myself to id the access point. I am hoping this journal will force me to be accountable.

Thanks
Adam

January 8th, 2021, 08:41 PM

I don't normally look at UB in the ETH session as the volume isn't there and generally CL has enough going on to keep me occupied but there was a good trade set up my Friday evening/early Friday morning US time. Hopefully the annotations on the screenshot make sense.

UB 080120

January 8th, 2021, 09:02 PM

Failed break example from the UB RTH session last night, executed with a runner you would have picked up almost 50 ticks at $31.25 per contract exiting at what appeared to be a fairly obvious bottom give the number of times it tried to get through.
UB 080120 Failed Break

January 8th, 2021, 09:26 PM

This NG trade from RTH session 08 Jan 20 shows an extended wait time for price to come back and test an access point along with a potential "out of balance volume" short entry.

NG 080120 Extended Wait

SBtrader82 · February 18th, 2021, 01:31 PM

moorookaman

Hi All,

It's time to put my development to the test and see how I hold up both technically and psychologically with a funding test.

I use Motivewave with the order flow pack to scalp CL, NG and UB seeking 5 ticks with a 1:1 reward ratio. My analysis focuses on the footprint with 5 minute bars, TPO at 30 minutes and a heatmap also at 5 minutes, in a nutshell the strategy:

1. Looks for a break of either a range in the current day or a key area from the previous day ie VPOC, VAH/VAL and H/L or low volume nodes.

2. If there is increased momentum/volume that breaks the range/tests the key area then I am looking to trade either a failure of that break or a retest and then continuation of the break. If there is no significant change in volume on the break then there is no trade.

3. Trade entry is executed only when an "access point" is clearly defined around the break area on the footprint, ie a significant amount of volume over 3 or so prices, an imbalance at the same location, a large area of low volume traded (2-5 prices) or out of balance trading before/around the break. Eg at the top of a range I would expect to see more selling than buying (and vice versa) so if buying activity increases significantly at the top then this can be an early indication of a trade setting up (in this circumstance it is permittable to enter the trade here and not wait for the retest).

4. If an access point is created as outlined in point 3 and there is no out of balance trade then I wait for the breakout to return to the access point; if it passes through the access point then it's traded as a failed breakout a tick beneath/above the access point block of prices or a breakout if it returns to this zone and then continues in the direction of the break. In this instance when prices return to the zone an entry is placed a tock above/below the top of the access point zone. Naturally if there is no retest and no out of balance trade and we move straight into a trend then there is no trade and I suppress my sense of FOMO. The stop is tight either on the other side of the access point or above/below the candle.

I will trade this as a scalping strategy during the challenge to avoid the dreaded trailing drawdown but if I get funded it will be deployed as a mixed strategy with a scalping component with runners.

Without doubt for me the biggest challenge will be mental, it can be a struggle to not over trade as I have a desire to always be in the market - I have to keep making myself focus on identifying the access point and not trading without one, it's funny though how in the heat of the moment I can quickly con myself into "seeing" an almost access point. The second challenge will be responding to losing trades and the strong urge to revenge trade. I will focus on this again by forcing myself to id the access point. I am hoping this journal will force me to be accountable.

Thanks
Adam

@moorookaman great job in starting a journal, it looks as though you have a very clear strategy in mind and this will surely help. If I can give you an advice, I would aim for a slightly higher risk-reward. To me all strategies are "legit" but not all strategies are equally robust.
If you have 10 losers in a row with a 1:1 Risk Reward you will need 10 winners to recover from the drawdown, whereas with a 3:1 risk reward you would be out of the drawdown in just 3 winners.
Just my 2 cents

March 6th, 2022, 04:24 PM

No more updates??? What happened to this journal???

$50,000 Leeloo challenge

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$50,000 Leeloo challenge