Im sick and tired of these FAKE gurus spouting off crap like " i stared at charts harder than you so Im successful". Or i work harder than the rest so im successful. Moronic!!!! It's truly dangerous for noobs to read this nonsense so i started a F the fake gurus thread with real advice from proven real traders. Join me if you dare sheeple. http://www.elitetrader.com/et/index.php?threads/f-the-fake-guru-thread-this-is-real-advice.295037/
You could show new/naive traders exact blueprints on successful trades and they'll still not make money because the method and execution aren't even what's primarily holding them back at that point.
You are referring to the "failed failures"/BOPB illustrations? Anyway I remembered BH describing his ORB strategy here on ET and there were people asking if it was wise for him to do so. He replied it was to his advantage that a lot a people was aware of the setup he's using. Maybe it's not because it will affect the efficacy of the setup but rather increase the liquidity or/and volatility of the subsequent move. Are you referring to advanced setups or advanced trade management? I'm asking because you hardly post setups for trading chop/range although you have a thread that talks about recognising chop/range.
I would say 98% of traders should use hard stops cause they have longer outlook and generally trend traders, trend traders have to usually risk more than counter-trend if they using current pivots for support/resistance, also the most of newbies have to use as they don't have a clue on how to trade and didn't back test enough. Those who scalp 100-200 plus times a day don't use stops, don't see the point-once you get in-watching the Dome and tick charts, they have mental stops. And as age catches up to all of us, just don't see the point as ES is so watered down compared to the 80s, I mean I have to trade 10 ES lots for same bang of the 1980s, and it costs more to lose since it trades in quarters-what a fricking scam by the exchanges and all the dough they collect, and made it so easy for sheep to open accounts, LOL No, it don't always happen, if losing $1,000 bucks cause of a fat finger trader and either you had a stop or no stop is going to hurt you badly, you are under capitalized and trading too many lots, but very little discuss this. It is all risky, everyone forecasts their trade will work based on the past or other, you can't change flip of a coin odds long term and every second after you get in can increase or decrease odds of trade working out, BUT depends if your education enough to know what to do or not. And when I have posted trades I gave stops so if anyone got after when trades went against original entry then would know where I start bailing, sometimes to just have to look out for the sheep. Those who have stayed here the longest understand Price and generally understand what the price should do based on a ton of prior study, not learned in a weekend or even a year. They understand concepts in their own words than make sense to them. I am firm believer that no one can be taught how to trade, it is left to one learning to learn and then study till they believe in the back testing, then breath the rules of how they wrote their Trading Plan. Mentors can show direction of what works for them and don't show all the crap they have already tested that didn't work or didn't work well enough. I have always told "kids"-before you ask me a question also have a solution, even if it is wrong-they have started to think of possibilities. That's what forums were created to exchange ideas and very seldom now does this happen. Too much fluff. Time for coffee.
This whole stuff about sharing ideas.... and whether its right or wrong... Most people don't have what it takes to daytrade. For example... I stopped daytrading a while ago but did so today because by chance I happened to see a too good to pass up trade in gold, and took it. Then started watching oil later on. I saw things looked bearish in structure and what looked like a bear flag forming after hard move down. So tried shorting that breakdown, but was stopped out on deep retrace. Then it broke down again so re-shorted it. I only traded 1 lot and it sounds easy in hindsight to describe..... but to pretend that doing this day after day with some size on is anything less than nerve-wracking is crazy! It is intense! Who would want to do that for a living? Not many I am sure! Probably the danger in sharing too much is more in attracting too much attention to certain price areas. When something becomes obvious to many people all of those people are going to try different stuff at that general area. Since most are over-leveraged they are always jumping in and out of positions so I suppose it could create noise/static. Or perhaps could result in stuff happening faster as more and more people try and jump on a signal. Think of times when you saw price at a trend line and then blasts through it in a big 1-minute bar. You can forget any BOPB on that unless maybe you are trading a 10 second chart...... it happened too fast. So that is probably the danger in my best guess........ the pattern getting messier or happening faster rather than the pattern disappearing.
...daytrading with some size on is "nerve-wracking", indeed Your reply reminded me of the movie Trading Places...in the end...when the Duke brothers lost everything because of a huge leveraged bet relying on faulty inside information.
Sure is... just was reminding of that today because hadn't done it in so long.... For me... I can cope with trading on longer time horizons.... but something about daytrading just raises my blood pressure too much. Mr Duke on the stretcher teaches a lesson.... not worth risking your health over money.... That's why I joke about Nodoji postings of razor sharp cash extractors, daily cash machines, etc. I'm like.... is this for real??? LOL
how much money do I (a new futures trader) need to save up and use for each ES futures contract I want to trade as safely as possible with leverage?
Impossible to answer. Minimum daily margin used to be $500 per contract. A contract is currently valued around $100k @$50 per point.