I have looked at several time frames. I usually have a 233 tick chart, a 610(trade chart for TF), 6765 tick chart and Daily up on 3 screens. I usually focus on a time frame that gives me 100 bars in a days session. I think this gives me the time to analyze the situation and not impulse order.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on futures io?
I focused a lot this weekend on exits It would have actually done me good today had I listened. I took 4 trades today. All shorts. Missed a long early. After the second trade I noticed we were in a little range. So my third trade I sold towards the top. Problem is I didn't buy at the bottom. Held it and it hit my stop.
Stats for today
4 actual trades(-8,-8,-7,-5) = -28- 4(commissions) = -32
Trade 1 - We had LH pattern so I tried a short at 755.3. I knew it needed to turn right away otherwise it was going to push through the LH pattern. I saw the stochastic indy turn up and was +1, but didn't listen. Stop hit -8.
Missed trade - should have taken that long signal right after stop was hit.
Trade 2 - Shorted again at 756.0. My chart told me stop should be a 756.4. I thought to myself I can't do a 4 tick stop. Placed it at 8 ticks. It was hit and 4 was right.
Trade 3 - OK now my longer term stochastic lines are flat and close together. We should be in a possible range. Saw the DT and place a sell order a the back on the trigger lines. Stop behind DT. We moved down and formed a DB. Came back up past my entry but I did not get out yet. Had no exit criteria yet. Stochastic turned up so now I had something against the trade. Next bar needed to go down. It did but came right back up. The trade was not in my favor now so I could have moved my stop. I let it ride out -7.
Trade 4 - This was a gift. I saw the push down and wanted to make sure it wasn't going to go because I was done trading . Stop hit -5.
Notes about today - I didn't get to see if I could hold to a good profit today as I was on the wrong side all day. Still like the research I did to help with exits. Going to put it to test the next couple of days. Actually not worried about the losses today. I want to focus on the exits in the coming weeks. Still have some work to do, but it will come.
Billy
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Stats for today
3 actual trades(-10,+6,+5) = +1- 2(commissions) = -1
I played around with my normal setup on a 5 minute chart and 1 minute entry charts. Just comparing. I didn't save the template so no chart. Back to normal tomorrow. I am going to keep the 5 minute chart on the side monitor for now.
The following user says Thank You to kylinbyl for this post: