Welcome to NexusFi: the best trading community on the planet, with over 150,000 members Sign Up Now for Free
Genuine reviews from real traders, not fake reviews from stealth vendors
Quality education from leading professional traders
We are a friendly, helpful, and positive community
We do not tolerate rude behavior, trolling, or vendors advertising in posts
We are here to help, just let us know what you need
You'll need to register in order to view the content of the threads and start contributing to our community. It's free for basic access, or support us by becoming an Elite Member -- see if you qualify for a discount below.
-- Big Mike, Site Administrator
(If you already have an account, login at the top of the page)
I day trade order flow on the ES. what should I trade instead or alongside?
Im not biased, I actually want to know.
what are the Pros and Cons of metals, bonds, commodities and currency futures?
a bit more info: my trades range from 10 minutes to 5ish hours at the max. I always scale, my net profit is 10 points a contract(mostly because thats my target), although i do hit 20+ with one of my running contracts after ive secured profit once or twice a week, and winning days usually have 2 to 3 successful 10+ point trades a day. losing days aren't necessarily rare, but i set my max loss as 25 points in a day, hitting that maybe once every 2 weeks. i trade a max of 3 contracts at a time, any more than that and my psychology and strategy go downhill hard.
ive taken a bit of an interest in CL, and have been exploring commodity futures like zc, zs, and zw. bonds seem interesting but they dont seem to move much unless in the overnight. gold looks like it goes hard, both trending and ranging. currencies i dont know much about.
anyone experienced with any of these care to shed light?
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
I understand the purpose of this post is to find another instrument to trade. The only suggestion I would have is to probably choose one that is not positively correlated to the ES 1:1 - so for example- do not also trade NQ or YM at the same time. Bonds are a safer bet if you are not looking for much volatility.
I do have to ask though- with such wild success on the ES, why would you even look elsewhere? Why risk distracting from such stellar performance?
If you are worried about the exposure of having more lots on a trade from a psychological perspective- well, you would have an ES position on, and exposure in another market as well... so at the end of the day- you are still exposed... but now with the added drag of having to split your concentration.
Honestly, if you are raking in 10pts day-in-day-out on the ES, and often 20-30pts, with limited 25pts losses every other week... All you need to do is scale to 6-9 lots in a trading year to bring home a seven-figure income.
Well, you can probably answer your questions in less than a day of comparing different instruments in different timeframes. Their distinct characteristics will stand out very plainly. Then you can see if they are the kinds of things you want to trade. Perhaps you'll want something very different from ES, perhaps similar. It should not take long to get an accurate impression, after which you could just watch the ones that look good to you for a while.
As a start: bonds are slow and boring. You might like this, but you may not. You will have a lot of time on your hands to trade ES, since nothing much will be happening with bonds.
On the other hand, CL is fast, more than furious, and deadly quick in its reversals. You might like this too. Or perhaps you would prefer Russian roulette, which is similar (I am exposing my own reaction here, obviously ).
NQ is fully as scary as CL, just more so. YM is pretty similar to ES but a little more lively. Gold does "go hard," and currencies I don't know anything about. But if you just watch for a bit, you will quickly get what you need to know, as with all the others.
I do also agree with these two points that Dan made:
A lot of money is made by traders who focus on one thing. Traders often report problems relating to distractions and split attention when trading several. But it's your call.
Bob.
When one door closes, another opens.
-- Cervantes, Don Quixote
this is extremely helpful, thank you. i tend to set up my trades so that they take a while and once im scaled in, i set stops and take profits, and let it run. the main reason i was hoping to find something else is because my entries are abysmal. i would like something that is completely different in the hopes that i can improve on that.
i havent had a whole lot of interest in ym prior, but you say its similar and also more lively; perhaps without changing anything on my end too much i can switch and maybe learn something? food for thought, this is appreciated
Depending on your method- what might be best is to load up a chart of a day you like that your strategy worked well on.
Take that chart, and then put it side-by-side with other products that were suggested here. Look at what might work well with your current method/strategy. Did other products move in a way on that same day that might work with your current method?
Or perhaps, if your method does not work on ES on certain days- does it work on one of these other products on such days?
If you can see that your strategy might be easily adaptable to a new market, fantastic! If not... you might want to consider if it is worth the burden of trying to find a different strategy or modifying your current one to work for that new market.
As has been mentioned here- if you need to be doing two things at once- it could become more taxing on both your brain and your account. I would imagine more so if it is not the same method you are applying to both.
But everyone is different, and Futures has something to offer virtually everyone's trading appetite- and there are successful traders that have watched and traded a plethora of markets.
You mentioned that your entries are not that great... Take advantage of all this forum has to offer. We have some very smart people here that have been around the block a few times and could give you a hand in trouble shooting if you are comfortable with it. That might be all it takes, before venturing out into the abyss of products and methods. The most important thing i've learned- 'if it ain't broke'.... you know the saying.
I understand you're daytrading and not position trading but this may apply. If you're considering exposure in other commodities such as Grains or Metals you should always have a reason; a known catalyst, seasonal patterns, etc and not just trade for the sake of trading. Commodities in general tend to have longer and bigger moves and also can do nothing for a long time. ES does have the best liquidity however, and is probably the best instrument for daytrading in my opinion. The key is Learning the Animal and doing your homework.
Broker: Interactive Brokers & Taiwan local brokers & AMP Futures
Trading: Stocks, Commodity & Index Futures
Posts: 117 since Jan 2017
Thanks Given: 135
Thanks Received: 100
Yes, I have day trading experience with GC, ZN/ZB, ZS, 6A/6J/6E/6B.
But I need to say my conclusion first, in currently market situation, ES is better than above instruments, because its "volatility" and liquidity.
GC usually have widely day range(I had experienced average 20 points day range of ES), so day trade GC is a feasible choice, and slippage within 3 ticks.
It is more common for GC to reach new daily high after it created new daily low, and vice versa. And when it is trending, it really very trending.
ZN/ZB is not suit for day trading imo, because they move slowly and little intraday, they are better for swing trade if you trade them outright.
I know some traders only trade ZS, but I think GC is better than ZS because its volatility and liquidity.
Currencies move faster and have wider day range than bonds, and they are more tamer than GC, so if you are not comfortable price spike of GC, then currencies are better than GC.
Broker: Interactive Brokers & Taiwan local brokers & AMP Futures
Trading: Stocks, Commodity & Index Futures
Posts: 117 since Jan 2017
Thanks Given: 135
Thanks Received: 100
Yes, you are right, however they are not suitable for day trading since their day range are not wider compare to others instruments.
But if you define day trading narrowly as scalp, then it is suitable for scalp because bonds have more liquidity and tick values are bigger than others.