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I haven't completed my jigsaw training yet, and these charts are certainly related.
In my experience so far, the market is moving too fast to effectively use the 5 min bars and the POCs except for maybe using them for a good stop level.
This is why you have only seen me post the daily volume delta candle up to this point.
I am far from being able to give effective rules for a new 5-min volume delta system, LOL.
I see from a glance and I would rate myself on native American animal tracking status when comes to seeing charts.. obese that after bar range expansion and then a PC yellow dot on a wick it leads to a reversal. Maybe not immediately but solid enough to 1put a trade on..if u get one today after a big range bar and it's on a wick let me know and I'll take the trade live. I like it. Maybe look back a few days and see if it looks like if after large bars and a yellow dot on a wick if I'm the mkt doesnt turn after that and without much distance against you.
You dont need training you should just look for patterns..like oh there's a ton of volume at that price during that bar perhaps they will extend back into it to run close stops..the sky is the limit
$64 on one micro is not too bad. I still console myself with the idea that it will soon be $640 on one E-mini.
But I know I am not there. Yesterday I tried the E-mini again, and I really sucked. I still think it will take some time.
Speaking of psychology, what is really interesting to me today... I would have put on larger size, but I kept thinking that the market was going to break out to new all time highs. Either that or tank dramatically because we have not yet broken out to new all time highs. LOL
Yes, the market is a mess that the FED has completely and utterly ruined with easy money policies. We have really gone nowhere for more than two months now!
But if I had to bet, I would bet on the bulls. I am doing much better about considering the bullish case.
On this topic, a friend of mine who trades 50+ ES contracts per trade told me yesterday,
"Why do you think almost no one makes big money shorting? Not to say they can't drive it there, but it is much harder than going UP. The market was made to go up. Always remember that, always. Or get killed. Can someone with a HUGE account short for 10 to 20 points? Yes, of course, but the bounce will be freaky fast, and that is the trade I want. The big money is made on longs man, not shorts. Longs make big money. Shorts do make money, but it is scared money, always scared money."
Okay, so what do I do with this info? Here is someone who has made over $50k in one day trading the ES telling me to consider longs much more often - to seriously trade the long side preferentially.
And I have done the opposite for 15 years - preferentially.
As I mentioned recently - I am up to 50% longs from a 20% previous number. I will try to move this to 60% longs as of now. Let's see where I am in a couple weeks.
I can see all the long trades I missed going back over the past year. I would have been extremely wealthy had I traded long over the past year.
Will the market always go up? No. Could we enter a bear market that goes on for two to three years? Yep. Will I blindly just go long? NOPE. But I will be less hesitant to try longs.
No matter what, I will trade what I see. Right here, right now.
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How to enter longs? I have this nasty habit on longs of entering at the highs, and then immediately triggering a pullback that hits my stop. Of course the price then reverses completely within 3 seconds of the stop and goes on to exceed my sucky entry-- and goes on to my original target. So, I must wait for pullbacks.
The irony is that I absolutely enter correctly on shorts by waiting for pops in a downtrend (or flat market). So what is my problem???? Working on it....
(15 min ES chart with 5-day hollow gram volume profile, and yesterday's ETH VP also plotted, with OHLC)
Here is the volume profile for the past 5 days and my levels for today.
IF we break below the 5-Day Value Area High at 4233, then we could easily reach the 5-day POC at 4228.50, and even have a good shot at the 5-day VAL at 4218.
But unless the 4233 area is broken, we are in breakout long mode.
Notice that we did a perfect RTM trade on the daily and weekly. We came back to the Point of Control on both timeframes. I am up $60 so far today on micros on shorts, expecting a pullback to the POCs of Friday and last week (which we just got).
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(7 tick range bar ES, with OBV and VWAP std dev bands + horizontal S & R lines)
The market usually moves both ways. 11 am ET, we are getting a relief rally.
What was my signal to get out of my bearish postions?
A. A break above the -1SD vwap band
B. The OBV showing a pretty strong bullish divergence.
But it was made during the ETH (extended trading hours) session. And new highs are usually made during the RTH session. But today is not looking so good for another new high (at 4235 right now).
On the other hand, the FOMC meeting ends tomorrow with an announcement at 11:00 ET. Will the fed begin some kind of tapering? If so, this market may be 10% lower by tomorrow night. Why the big drop this morning? I think it is overdone.
Unless we had an (unlikely) leak from the FOMC meeting, I think we will stay in a tight range today, and finish the day near the POC or VWAP, currently around 4244. I think wise traders are going to be careful going into the meeting tomorrow.
The FED has lost SO MUCH credibility around the world be denying inflation and continuing to inflate assets to the point of hilarity, drunken stupidity, and fraud.
While I think we will stay range-bound today, the FIB structure is painting a different story:
We just broke the 61.8% and 66% retracements of yesterday's lows to the overnight highs. This is very bearish. The 66% is my final Line in the Sand (LIS) for expectations of a resumption of the trend (bullish in this case).
Let's see how it plays out over the next 24 to 30 hours.
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The equities markets are SO RIGGED, that I have started to look at something a little more pure in its price action, responding (a bit more) to true supply and demand and value: oil.
Great news that the Micro CL is coming out very soon. But who knows when AMP Futures will allow its customers to trade it? Micro Bitcoin has been out a long time, and AMP is still on the sidelines because of the volatility.
I have made about $150 so far on CL today. I thought my trading method would work with most assets, and today proved this to be correct.
HOWEVER, this journal is about making a living with Micros (at least at the beginning, which is now), and this is good, because being in an asset with $10/tick really pushed me psychologically this morning. I am not really ready yet. "Successful, but not ready yet." Hmmm.
Sometimes I think I should just pull out all the stops (no pun intended) and really crank up the contract size when I have a highly probable trade. Why is my account still below $15k? I want to be at $20k by July 31. I know how to trade (and I know how NOT to trade). Sometimes I wonder if I am limiting myself unnecessarily. Like I have a governor on my throttle.
I think we all have a "set-point" where we feel we "deserve" to be profit-wise. Well, it is time for me to crank it up!
Capital Preservation is #1, but Making Profits is a close #2. This is not a hobby. I need something to show for my efforts.
This incessant equities bull run has confused my tiny trading brain, but I am adapting. And I know the moment I am fully adapted it will change again - because this is what markets do - but I honestly thought I'd be at $20k by this time (June 15). Instead, it feels like I have just been hanging on.
I think I will start looking at Micro Currency Index Futures as well as Micro CL. The full contracts (on all instruments) are just too big for me right now. I have admitted it publicly. It's okay. I can do this prudently, and I will find markets that make more sense to me. The four (micro) equity indices are my vehicles of choice, but I am not wed to them. I want something that has both buyers AND sellers. I want something that resembles a normal market. I may end up staying with equities only, but the CL today got my blood pumping (good thing) a bit more than normal.
I will also look at Micro Gold.
Here is my total so far today:
One of the things I loved about trading FX when I did, was the correlative nature. And as I look at trading other instruments, I am reminded about this great correlation tool on Oanda:
It includes metals, energies, and equities as well. The big red dots represent strong correlation, and the big blue dots represent strong inverse correlation. It really is a great tool while discovering new relationships. Just remember that some of the relationships change over time.
How to use it? Click on the instrument you are interested in, and then scroll up or down to see how all the other instruments are correlated to that instrument. In the example below, I clicked on the S&P.
The common denominator in most of these assets is, you guessed it, the US dollar. So if you watch the US dollar and know how each responds to the "risk on" vs "risk off" sentiment, then you will be right much of the time.
