Another goal could be to increase you maximum "authorized" day loss, as soon as you don't have more than 1 max loss per week and and your weekly profits are twice your weekly losses. And lastly, if you don't break even every month, you should stop the bleeding, paper trade and learn more.
I disagee with profit limit, when your hot your hot. I kinda disagree with loss limit, good idea cause stupid day, but I've been down like $1000 recently and pulled it all back by sticking at it, long enough to catch a nice trend move.
No. That path is littered with dead bodies. No different than the fabulous and magical win rate metric... 90% win rate... 9 profitable trades wiped out by 1 loser.
This topic is an old one and always seems to stir up some controversy. At the highest level of trading it doesn't really make sense to have a profit target, but if you're not yet at the highest level of trading I think it can make sense. I wouldn't choose an arbitrary $$$ though, but a modest profit target based on what your market offers on average. An alternative is to use a trailing drawdown on realized profits. For example stop trading after giving back 50 % of profits.
Great topic, profit targets aren't as important as a daily loss limit. If I'm down 500 I quit for the day. If I'm up 800-1k I quit if I then lose 200 or so, those are my goals. Big fckin tip: progressive downsizing when you're trending red, upsize when trending green. When active daytrading, eg 10+ trades/day Example: trade #1 100 shares gets stopped out, you reduce share size to 80 on trade #2 etc Chart patterns: good goal is 50-70% of average daily range
For a limit sell order, a point just below the next line of resistance is a good target. Or just below an even dollar or even dime amount. Up 3x the initial stop distance is good. Me, if I am day trading I let it run until it looks spent. Sometimes I don't use a limit sell order. Sometimes a stop loss order and I move it up so it is always about halfway between middle and lower bollinger band lines. Sometimes I trail the price with a stop that is down by the height of the tallest candle of the last 4 or whatever. I NEVER give up half my profit without a darn good reason to risk it. Early in the trade, of course, I will give it the room it needs even if it means I might stop out at a calculated loss.
Oh I misunderstood the question. I pretty much agree with Ken. The daily loss limit and total risk limit are important as well as the per trade risk limit. The maximum profit I will accept in a day? Oh no, it simply would not be gentlemanly to accept more than an even 1.00% profit in a day, now would it? One mustn't live like a savage, after all, ncest pas? ROTFLMAO! No profit target for me. I want to make all I can make in the hours I have allotted for trading. Trading all day? Trading just until noon? Trading only the first hour or hour and a half? Having too much money in the kitty is not much of a handicap, but being exhausted or distracted can be.
True. No stopping once you are having a great day Until you start taking more stops than wins in a day. There's nothing more frustrating than to be up $1100 at noon then overtrade and give it all back by 4