Steve46 In response to your earlier post I am posting a chart. I'm missing a day, however, I have taken the last 4 days, worked out the range for the first 2 hours for each day, then divided the sum by 4 to get the average. Time consuming but good excercise, helps to register the numbers in one's head. Please all, only constructive comments invited. PS - Sorry folks my data is not refreshing the numbers are incorrect.
Steve46 In response to your earlier post I posted ym 60 minutes chart but there was some data missing so I deleted it. Here are my figures taken for the last 5 days, showing the range from 8:30 to 10:30 each day. I then divided the sum by 5 to get the average. Time consuming but good excercise, it helps to register the numbers in one's head. Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri open 10953 10899 10887 10888 10936 high 10963 10914 10934 10914 10956 low 10929 10867 10873 10878 10932 Range: 34 47 61 36 34 Total = 212/5 = 43 points I understand what you are trying to convey, your suggestions are much appreciated. Please all, only constructive comments invited.
Seven Toby Crabel made opening range breakouts famous in his now infamous book "Daytrading with Short Term Price Patterns". An excellent read if you can buy a copy on ebay for less then $1000 if you can find it but I'm sure there may be some kind folk in here that could get you one in pdf form. The point is many traders have developed excellent strategies based around these principles but I never really found them to be anymore useful or useless then pivots or fibs. Every tool has it's usefulness but only in the right context.
So what is the "right context" here? I am sure we are all interested. Perhaps you could provide an example? Maybe post a chart? I am always glad to learn something new. Steve
Sorry I'm not up to speed on the particulars of this thread but if your asking me about when opening range breakouts are contextual and when they are not that simply a matter of observation every day. As an example: Friday's Price Action: http://charts.dacharts.com/2005-12-27/SSP94.png In this example the opening range (60 min) could have been useful to me because once it came back inside, I would have been in a convergence trading mode all day (Selling tops and Buying bottoms) On the other hand Todays Opening Range http://charts.dacharts.com/2005-12-27/SSP97.png Could have been useful to me because even if I missed the initial selloff I could use the FACT that there was NO retest of the Opening Range Breakout as a clear indication that the market had a high probability of closing at it's lows of the day and in todays case I had a 10838 target for any signs of weakness coming into the week. BUT My point is, I could put up Weekly Fib numbers or Daily Pivots and drawn the exact same conclusions only they may have been more or less convincing and added or subtracted from my observations thus influencing more or less, my position direction and size. This is what I mean when I say I will use every tool in it's best context.
OK, well theres one point I dont get. Once price moves back into the original range (like you said). How do you decide what is a top (so you can sell), and what is a bottom (so you can buy)....Maybe your answer is in the "Convergence" mode you mentioned. I don't see anything that shows convergence on your chart. Steve
Finally something interesting. I think you do around 200k a year or so. Do you trade on the floor? The best market makers, what do they usually pull. I believe you are a market maker for options. Do you think $5k-10k a day is averaged for market making? Lets go through some numbers. Whats average for market making. I'm hoping to top a market makers wage in the future so I'd like to know how much and what kind of statistics do they operate in. Here are my thoughts: on a 1% down day , A good trader should do about 5-10k net 5000-8000 shares, beta of stock 2x , so 2% minimum on a chop day , a trader should do around 2-3k net 5000-8000 shares, beta of stock 2x, so around 1% Average out with some non trading days we end up with around 7 chop days 2-3k net 3 1% days 8.5k avg 10 real trading days the other 10 is empty. $17k $24k $41k a month while not great, I guess its a start. I believe 5-10k net days are done with 5000-8000 lot shares. Discuss.
Hi Steve, I do not want to be the one who says this outright - but.... You are providing priceless information for free - no joke, the discipline and knowledge you have takes years to understand... please don't expect the readers of this thread to take it seriously. You have to understand that CW and others here have a psychological need to fulfill their own inadequacies with money. That is the basis behind trading - a psychological need to become "insert whatever works here" with the money. Sorry. I've been drinking. But honestly people, this isn't rocket science... we are talking about discipline... thats it .... really.
Thank you Mike" for the kind words. I think what you are discovering, is that there are folks here who like to type, like to read their words in print, but do not have a lot of substance to offer. I am not here to try to prevent people from speaking. Its not my place. I would encourage you and others to think carefully about the words you read. Also I encourage you to use the search function to do some research. You could for instance, search on my handle and get a long list of references, many of which were of help to me in the past, some of which might be helpful to you now. I am always glad to answer any follow up questions you might have. Best of luck Steve