No one can make up your mind for you... even if you get the best advice from the best trader on ET. Why not just trade the market.. and find out what works... for YOU!? Find out what your more in sync with! Just because I (maybe) can trade NQ better... maybe you can do ES like a champ. Or vice versa. Also... the word "do you think" should be taken out of your trading vocabulary. It's to close to "hope". Gotta get rid of vague notions, and move in step with your own voice. Change that statement to a 'thought'... and then act on it with conviction tempered by discpline . Iceman
Wouldn't the biggest difference between the NQ and ES futures be the spread? For NQ it's normally 0.5 and for ES it's 0.25. If you're working with market orders, percentage wise you'll lose twice as much on the spread with the NQ eminis compared to the ES eminis.
1 NQ pt = $20 1 ES pt = $50, so for 0.5 and 0.25 it is $10 and $12.5, respectively. Of course, if your targets are the same for both NQ and ES you would lose more percentagewise, but it makes no sense to use identical targets for them. NQ can easily be used for bigger targets because of greater daily ranges in NDX than in SP500. In fact, it should be if you want to avoid the problem you mentioned.
abenyukh- start watching the Nq. My stop suggestion would be to consider a 6pt. stop I trade the Nq daily and seldom find myself getting stopped out at that limit. However, when I do get stopped I usually let it go to 6.5, if right at or a trendline of S/R is near. Interesting also to note from my exp. trading Nq is: my latest MAE/MFE statistical backtesting analysis of Nq has my losers with a MFE of 0 to 1.5 and my winners with a MAE of 1-2.5 I used to trade Es daily, and I can say that even trading with a solid system we'd get whipsawed out more often. all the best either way- momo
here's why the NQ is different than the ES. The ES tracks the SPX. The SPX is an index of stocks from two fundamentally different groups. New Economy stocks (nasdaq) and old economy stocks (dow). These two groups are often going in opposite direction because right now people consider the Dow Jones to be a safer place for their money than the Nasdaq. When they are adventurous they play tech. The point is that the DOW and Nasdaq often go in opposite directions. So when they do, the SPX ranges and chops. This makes it more less trendy. The NQ tracks the NDX or the Nasdaq 100 index. The stocks in this index are all related, "new economy", tech stocks. There fore when tech goes up they all go up, when tech goes down they go down. So the ES is like trading a filtered or hedged NQ. A better alternative IMO to the ES is the YM (dow mini) as it trends better than ES since it follows one group of related stocks, and thus isn't pulled in two directions as often as ES. When deciding which one to do, take into account volume, spread, and volatility. Obviously ES is the least volatile of the three due to the fact that it's underlying stocks often go in opposite directions. YM has a wider spread and less volume than the other two. But it has it's advantages. NQ being my preferred has adequate volume for intraday trading, tight spreads, and lots of volatility. Take your pick.
Maximum Adverse Excursion / Maximum Favorable Excursion in the simpliest of terms, my losers typically go 0 to 1.5 pts. in my favor(MFE), before turning and going against me to ultimately become a loser. conversely, my winners typically go only 1 to 2.5 pts. against me (MAE), before ultimately becoming winners. -momo
Don't kid yourself, it takes a larger size account to trade NQ than ES. A very smart trader figured out that if it takes $10,000 to trade ES, then it'll take $25,000 to trade NQ. In other words if you only have the ten grand, stay with ES. That's trading 1 lots.
main reason: I'm trading a system. secondary reason: Its not mine. rules are rules. However, the system designer has determined that 6pts. is the optimal stop for trading Nq. My own observations further that rule. Of course, one needs to put the stop loss into each individuals context of trading. However, in trading my own account, I do feel that tweaking that aspect could provide me with smaller losses. However, the problem then reverts back to the discretion of the trader to determine whether this is a loser or is simply a trade taking more time to develop. Therein, of course lies the issue. I feel that I need more time to make more in depth tech. analysis of the specific setups, T.O.D., L/S dominance... etc.. Any of your thoughts on this will be appreciated. cheers- momo