I remember this from before, the pdf here from the LBR Group explains it more fully.

Holy Grail I think LBR310 is not a leading indicator. I feel this indicator is used to find some pattern. According to LBRgroup's lecture, it can be used in the first cross buy pattern. Please check the attached files for that pattern.

Hello @ vegasfoster,

I would quess he is using a 3,10,16 MACD setting.

Rick

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I'm sure that this is amateur hour for the more experienced traders here. My only goal here is to use this method as a crutch until I can see what's happening without it. You know, trading without indicators, etc.
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That's right, nice slide deck.

So, yeah, the basic strategy, as I mentioned in my first post, is certainly not new. I am not trading the divergences and the other setups, I just want to keep it simple.

Also, I'm not only looking at the first cross, I'll take any valid signal.

This is by no means the best way to make money. I just want to see if I can stick with one thing for two weeks. I'll probably do better than I would if I were hopping around trying a bunch of other things. (more about those in another post).

I caution you on that point. There seems to be the idea among some, that trading without indicators is the ultimate goal. That as you learn to trade, you 'graduate' when you can trade without indicators, or that somehow you are more of a trader if you trade price action, without indicators.

The purpose of this journal, like so many others, is to keep myself accountable. I encourage all constructive criticism and welcome suggestions. Let me be clear: I am relatively new to futures trading, thus the need for this.

About me:

Dabbled in trading for the last couple of years, mostly creating mechanical strategies that traded leveraged ETF's (FAS, FAZ, TNA, etc.). Chagrined by the ridiculous PDT rules, I discovered futures. And, as the mechanical strategy that I used to trade mainly focused on TNA, I was delighted to learn about the Russell Mini. Let's face it: the daytrading leverage available on this thing is ridiculous. Far more than should be used, frankly.

I'm a data analyst by trade, and the original mechanical strategy that I created (for which I thought I was a genius) was a kind of breakout strategy wherein I went back over several months of minute TNA data and determined optimal parameters for a buy, stop loss, and move to breakeven. I would optimize these each week, then see how it did on the following week. I figured this out really, by instinct, only later learning the proper terminology for what I was doing.

At the time, I had to intuit just about everything. When you don't know what you're doing you end up pretty much figuring out all the stuff that others have discovered before you. When I found Pardo's book, it was helpful as it more or less confirmed everything I had figured out the hard way.

Still, I came to believe that my mechanical strategy, interesting though it is, was, frankly, too risky, and I went looking for something else.

Over time, I've tested and borrowed just about a million things. I don't use tradestation or Ninjatrader, so most of what I do is manual or excel.

So why the 3 10 MACD and this journal?

Well, the original version of the setups are on trading naked, so I'm not doing anything new here. And LBR has bee touting the 3 10 for eons.

And I'm at a point where, I think, I have too many ideas and not enough discipline to stick with anything. I keep looking for the next shinier pebble, when all the while, the one in my hand was already good enough.

This old strategy was recommended by someone to serve as a kind of "training wheels" to better learn price action trading. Yes, I have read the Anek thread on that other site, but I struggled with it. I think that something like this is good for me now. I mostly just wanted to pick ONE thing, and stick with it for a while.

The nice thing about this strategy is that it basically provides a "Price Action for Dummies" approach.

1. There needs to be a trend
2. There needs to be some kind of pullback
3. There needs to be a continuation of the trend
4. Stop loss is set where one would be wrong about the trade and is usually reasonable

As for exiting with a profit, I'm still not sure. I've struggled with this one in my attempts to be a (partly) discretionary trader. It seems when I hold out for an extended target, my breakeven stop is hit after a perfectly good profit was already on the table. On the other hand, when I take, say, a point, the price continues to move a good bit further.

The only thing I've tried to do recently is look at a longer term chart's ATR to get an idea what might be reasonable. For example, since I trade a 2 minute chart (yeah, I've tried volume, range and tick charts) I will often take a glance at the 10 minute and see what the ATR is at. If it's well below a point, then a point is probably a good target. If it's a point and a half or so, then I may hold out for two.

As per Mike's suggestion, I will update this journal each day for at least two weeks and ONLY trade these setups and not dilly-dally around with any of my other stuff just to see what happens.

As it is, these setups, which are as old as the hills, don't provide any sexy 20 point days, I think you're doing well if you can average a couple of points a day. But, as Al Brooks says, (and I'm being tongue-in-cheek here): "If you can get just a point a day with 100 contracts, then you can make, like, two million a year!!!"

In my next post, I'll attach a chart of today's trades.

I caution you on that point. There seems to be the idea among some, that trading without indicators is the ultimate goal. That as you learn to trade, you 'graduate' when you can trade without indicators, or that somehow you are more of a trader if you trade price action, without indicators.

You need to view trading as finding a profitable 'methodology'. For some that methodology may be trading pure price action, for others that may be using just 1 indicator, for yet others it may be using 23.57 indicators when the moon is half full. As long as that methodology has proven itself historically, mathematically, and most of all profitably, don't give it up. When you start reading the various threads on this forum, you will find that the more profitable traders are mostly indicator traders.

An indicator setup that makes you money is not a 'crutch' as you mentioned, it is a profitabale methodology. Don't give up something that makes you money, for something that will give you prestige instead.

The perception i had was more of a friendly message: pay attention not to invest too much of your time with indicators but rather more on learning how to interpret market structure and where volume on a chart is more likely to kick in. Most beginners first learn to chase signals without understanding anything about the market structure developing in front of them. Those who trade with a minimum of indicators will tell you they do it to simplify their decision process. At least, that's how i see it. The ultimate objective is certainly not to trade without indicators but to make money, i don't know where you got that impression. On the other hand, those who can trade without indicators are more willing to share their knowledge than those whose trading cosmology is based on indicators only. They are more secretive.