Just pulled up my charts again to see that the gap open got filled on the close. Guess I should have stayed on a little longer, but I really needed a quick nap. Trading is easy, preparing for it is exhausting. Good luck traders, See that attached chart Lefty
Remember reading somewhere that prices retrace back to the gap opening price in 65% of cases. If that's true , then fading the gap opening should prove to be profitable. I haven't tested or traded this strategy, though
Actually 80%, 65% is intraday I believe. However, look at 6-7-05, would you have faded the open?!? I think you need to assess the strength of the gap before "fading." The fade on 6-7-05 was the afternoon session. Lefty's comments are very much worth reading with regard to market structure. Good Luck, D.
Gaps are just like anything else in the market. Extremely tricky. There are statistics all over the place but turning them into cash is no simple matter.
Hello Folks: Don't have a lot of time today, so I want to make a quick comment and then go. first, I ignore claims that are public knowledge as to gaps. The only way to obtain usable information is to do your own homework. Learn to use Excel or some testing software and do your own studies for the market you trade. As for this mornings open, the obvious points are 1. Volatility has compressed as one might expect periodically. This is summer season. You can expect this. 2. The opening gap was closed. 3. In a low vol environment, retail traders often have nowhere to go, so they bleed their accounts down or leave the arena completely. Think about what you will do to adapt during the next few months. 4. If intraday trading is not working for you, switch to another time frame, another market, or another strategy. As an example, there are many profitable commodity traders who move seasonally from index trading to one of the other commodity types. I have an appointment so I will not be in my office today. Good luck folks, Lefty
Thought I mentioned that I don't fade gap openings. The ones who are good at it will obviously know to pick the least-risk point for entry while trying to fade a gap opening. That's where experience would come into play. Besides, there's always something called a stop-loss which keeps one from damaging one's account too much, in case things go wrong. BTW, Lefty's trading and his contribution to ET is terrific. No doubt about that at all.
Hey folks: Back from my appointments and wanted to offer a chart and some comments. I want to point out that I did not trade today, so I don't claim to have caught any setups. Its easy to see what you should have done in retrospect. Looking at my chart you will see that there was volatility compression this AM. This is normal for the summer season. Knowing this I would have made some adjustments to my opening gap strategy (which I can talk about later). What I want to emphasize is that you have to adjust and you have to keep your head in the game. You can see what happened when the lunch hour (NY) ended and the first team got back on the field. They marked the market down. As I have said previously, you can scan left and find "advance notice" for failure points. If you find them, you can either enter early with a tight stop, or wait and try to get on board when you see a pullback. I favor early entry. Hope this is of help to you. Lefty