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For what it's worth, method is not the most important thing. A bad method will lose you money easier than a good one will, but both profitable and unprofitable traders will often use the same "method," but not have the same results. This is an important thing one can learn from reading different trading journals, where the same "method" will often lead to very different outcomes.
Execution matters, loss control matters, risk control matters, not going crazy matters, not doing one thing when you're supposed to do another thing matters. The perfectly normal human reactions to profit and loss matter a lot, and can sink you. The fact that the market changes so sometimes one method is great, and another time is consistently a loser matters.
The uncertainty of the market matters, always, far more than anything else, and everything else is our attempt to deal with it.
This does not come down to any actionable advice . It's just an observation that what you do, and how you do it, is more important than what you "follow" in the sense of a method.
And of course, you do need a method, and you need to execute it correctly. But still, how "you" do it is more important than "it" is. Within reason, of course.
Your progress is going well and I hope it continues and gets better. You do a lot of method jumping, I've noticed, but this can be OK if you are getting better at the "you" side of things too.
Good luck, man.
Bob.
When one door closes, another opens.
-- Cervantes, Don Quixote
I always tell people something similar, that they fall into 1 of 4 categories:
1. Bad strategy, Poor psychology/execution etc. = You will lose
2. Bad strategy, Good psychology/execution etc. = You will lose
3. Good strategy, Poor psychology/execution etc. = You will lose
4. Good strategy, Good psychology/execution etc. = You will win (unless you get unlucky)
In nearly 10 years on this site, I can safely tell you that most people fall into category 1. They will never be successful at trading.
Some think the answer is jumping to category 2. These are the people who work on psychology, emotional control, journaling. They spend most of their time working on these things, but very little on finding a strategy. They seem to think that the strategy part is easy. Not good.
Of course, some people think creating a good strategy is the way to go. Assuming they even create a good strategy (most people think backtesting is the key, and while it is important, most have no clue how to develop a strategy properly), when the time comes to trade it, they fall apart.
The only traders with a long term chance are those who commit to category 4. But that is HARD - both the strategy development part, and the execution part. 2 totally different set of skills to master. I know plenty of traders who had good strategies, but could not translate that into trading profits. They never jumped from 3 to 4.
Your journal has been around a year @michaelroth, and I think you have made progress. I think you know you need to get to category 4. But you are stuck in between 1 & 2 - which is a whole lot better than most, but obviously not where you need to be.
This past year you've have spent more time on the psychology/execution side, at least how I see it. On the strategy side, you have jumped from idea to idea to idea - I've never seen a properly tested strategy in your journal.
My advice: Focus on testing, developing and ultimately finding a good strategy. Right now, don't worry about flushing your money away to sim trade with a "prop" firm - there will be a time for that later.
Once you have that strategy, then worry about the execution/psychology (which is super important, don't get me wrong).
I haven't had as much time as I would have liked to have lately to work on my trading, but the time I have had seems to be somewhat productive. After further review I reworked my charts, attempting to better understand the market conditions. What I am currently trading feels better than anything else I have tried. It's more or less an adaptation of my previous chart, the difference being that I've changed some timeframes to tick charts. This has allowed for me to incorporate volume into my analysis. To get a clearer overview of the market, I'm looking at the daily and a 10k tick chart. These are both primarily formatted in Zombie pack 9.
It's not all that different from before, but by moving to a tick chart seems to have cut out an element of noise for me. Orders must be aggregated for the chart to print candles. The byproduct of this is I don't get a lot of useless candles, this in turn makes for better levels, and when the price does move, for me it's easier to tell what phase the market is in. Where there is weakness or indecision, I see chaotic formation and excessive wicking, but where there is aggression, the formations are far more linear in appearance and obeys trading conventions like LL/HH's, MA's pullbacks and reversals. My trigger chart is a 1k tick chart and is set up in the same manner as the other two charts.
The strategy thus is to look at the left-hand monitor to gauge the market sentiment, direction and phase, and then use that context to find suitable trades on the right-hand trigger chart. Today's example had me enter the market at the NY open with buyer's trying, but overall, the charts were super bearish, initially I tried to buy (even though in my gut I knew not to. Bad Mike!), got chopped up, lost a little money, but then got turned the right way and traded well.
There was still a lot of meat left on the bone when I left the market today, but I had traded well- I felt full, and I think that this is going to be part of my strategy and psychology. I always come to the market hungry, but unless I trade well, I won't be able to eat. But if I trade well, it's good to eat my fill and be satisfied, because gluttony is bad. Something like that. I also think that I can trade well- and lose well too. Today I managed to do both. A good loss is one where it keeps me in the game long enough to find those good trade that make up for those losses and then some. Finally, I'm just not going to trade anymore when I'm scared. It's one thing to be unsure of the direction, or what the market is doing, and another to fear it. If I'm at the point of fear, I'm done until I can get my wits about me.
I have the flu today, but I was still able to trade for a short time. 3 trades today, 2 winners and one loser.
These are the ideal stats, but they are winning, and I'll take what I can get. It's much the same story over the long haul-
I'm still working through a few things, but I'm pretty sure that I've now got what I need to be profitable. It's taken me a little over a year and a half.
I traded for a short time this morning. In 2 trades with 2 contracts a piece I was able to hit my daily profit goal of $1000.00.
Days like today have become the norm and not the exception. I don't expect to win all the time. The current paradigm that I am trading under is win a grand or more or lose a grand. This is how this looks over the course of the last month.
The strategy that I am using is a based off @icedfrosty 's zombie pack 9/tick hunter. I trade it on 1k/10k and daily charts. On 2 monitors it looks like this.
Left monitor, the over-all picture
Right monitor, the trigger chart
Basically, what I am doing is trading where I see strength in one side or the other. I'm primarily determining that strength by looking at the over-all picture and seeing who is in control, and what the structure looks like. I then see how that fits in with what's happening on the 1k chart. If I like what I see, I typically enter a trade with 1 contract. If the trade looks like it is going my way, I add a second contract, and immediately set my take profit using tick hunter. From that point I am carefully monitoring my trade, doing my best to leave well enough alone and let the trade hit the take profit. I will move to break even as soon as I can. I would rather break-even if I start feeling unsure about the trade. Also, I will end a trade if price looks 'topped-out'. I lock in profits when feel unsure. There's always another trade.
It seems to be working. Next week I'll once again trading my Apex account. I'm feeling pretty good about it.
This is my second reset on the Apex challenge. This time I am taking it slow. I don't know if I'll ever master trading, but if I don't, it won't be because I quit. Right now, I am less than a $1000.00 from passing the first part of the challenge. This time it's taken me 2 weeks to get here. A lot of that time was spent working my primary job. On top of that, I'm moving. We've been in this house a long time, and there is a lot of stuff that has to be moved. So, for all of that, to have 'made' an extra $2000.00 on top of everything else fine by me, but in the future, I am hoping I can do better.
As I look at the trade performance, I am surprised to see that I have made that many trade in this time period. It didn't feel like that many trades. The reason for this is that I usually enter the market with 2 contracts. It's kind of becoming my thing. Right now, what I am looking for in any trade I make is a strong move by the participants that carries the price at least 25 points. When I think that the NQ is going to do this, I go in with 2 contracts, a stop loss at 40 ticks and a take profit of 100. Then I try to hold it. When the trade works, its usually pretty quick, and that's how I know it's working. If it wallows around for a bit, I try to get out with as little damage as possible. I stop trading for the day when I'm wrong.
Risk management is core to what I am working on. These numbers, 2 contracts, 40 and 100 ticks, -$400 and +$1000, are purposeful. The other side of it, charting and execution, for me, has always been a work in progress. Right now, I'm feeling pretty good with what I am running. Currently I am looking at the market on 3 charts: a daily, and a 10k and 1k tick charts. All these charts are set up with the same indicators, an EMA, a swing, and a gaussian MA that paints the bars how I like them. Last is the daily OLHC just on the tick charts. This is what it all looks like-
The Daily chart. The MA here I consider my long-term trend.
The 10k chart is my day-to-day chart. The MA here is trend for the day
The 1k chart. What I actually trade off. The MA here is the short-term trend
The basic set-up is a trend trade that scalps out the 25 points around key areas swings or OLHC. Thats about all I have to say about that. Maybe if I get a bit farther down the road I'll elaborate, but right now I have a ton of stuff to do and little time.
Oh yes clearing out 35 years of stuff and moving into our 33 year old 25 foot long airstream. Good times for sure! Don't forget the two cats!
Why are you performing when you have no time? Because that big brain doesn't have time to get in the way. "Mack" at PATS.Com makes that clear in his occasional soap box rants. Makes very good sense to me also, not that knowing why makes it any easier to do it. Human brain is a pattern recognition machine. You have to do enough trades, what ever your rules are, to force those patterns down into muscle memory like pro athlete. Recognize and react. Congrates, you are getting there.
Today I passed the 50k Apex funded trader evaluation. It took 3 months and 3 tries. In doing so, I have left SIM for good. As of today, I consider myself to be a beginner trader. It took me year and a half to get here. Looking back, what got me here was persistence. There are near infinite ways to make money in the market. I found by trying long enough and hard enough, I was able to become profitable. I now have an appetite for risk, but only in that it is sated by reward.
. It's just an observation that what you do, and how you do it, is more important than what you "follow" in the sense of a method.
