Well I guess i'm not a complete beginner in the sense that I've been reading trading books and forums and watching videos and watching the market and testing ideas for a good year or so. But I'm still the apprentice looking to learn from those who are able to actually do this in REAL TIME. (I've had a few PM's telling me that what i'm attempting to do is simply NOT possible and that it's a cruel dream that is peddled by vendors and brokers) Hopefully they're wrong, but I must admit that the evidence of genuine scuccesfull retail traders using retail trading tools is thin on teh ground! I'm very open in this thread to hear from experts who disprove the theory, and in particular any input on my trades and general advice etc! PS - As mentioend, a very good day, but I can see I would given about 1/3 of profits back if I hadn't have stopped for the day. (This is often the case: Quit whilst you're ahead each day)
I've been following your journal and found it odd that you thought you were so bad at this because your 2+ weeks of great trades does show some consistency. Of course if you're not sure of what you're doing, if you're not following your rules and just winging it then this could get you in trouble, but it seems that so far you are making great trades. This last point that you make though is interesting. If a trade sets up that your trading plan tells you to take, when you don't, you're technically not trading your plan. If it turns out that you would have lost money as you say now, and you're glad you didn't take the trade, then aren't you developing the idea that you can't trust your own plan? I mean if you have solid filters for why those trades aren't taken, then this is fine. But if the trades weren't taken just because you didn't want to give back your profits, then won't this be a problem down the road in reference to what you think of your plan? Now I'm not successful at this at all so its not like I'm trying to give advice, but it does seem to me that based on what I read from the experts here, your job is to just take the trades that you should based on your plan. Once you start second guessing, even if it turns out well that day or that week, you will eventually run into trouble. (of course your trading plan might just be backtested to work during the first 2 hours of the day or so, in which case it would be fine to then stop because perhaps your trading plan hasn't been tested for all market conditions)
Yes, I agree with that, KP. And yes, I've avoided taking trades simply because i've had a good day, and I know it isn't logical. However, I guess one could argue (that after testing) for whatever reason, maybe my setups stops working as well after a particular time of teh day. Maybe coming into the afternoon session. It's something I guess i'll monitor. If stats shows that a huge percentage of my losses come in a certain time period, it would make sense to not trade those times, I guess. (Even though I doubt i'd ever understand WHY this would be teh case.)
I think that if your stats show this to be the case and tell you to stop trading... how could anyone argue with this! My personal feeling is that when volume dries down like in the middle of the day, the algos are doing a higher percentage of the trading. Yes they are programmed by humans, but they have all their stats at the ready, which many human traders don't have. So in the first hour when there is a higher percentage of human traders, I assume its easier to take advantage of their fear and greed, or rather, their fear and greed accounts for the bigger price swings, and later in the day, you're trading more against a machine.