it used to be 3 out of 20 were trend days,they were recognizable by a flat line in (on a down day)uvol and a constant rise in dvol,if you are a fader or a contrarian ,these days will kill u,if u follow the trend ,u just hang on and move your stops all day. Until u have more time in vested in es,i would not trade the last 45 minutes,and if u make enough on most days by that time,never trade the last 45 minutes
When markets start off so weak, difficult to keep shorting.. Could not recover the first trades later as I kept expecting a bounce which happened on schedule last hour. Nothing can excuse losing on a 35 point day... -5 points.
Errors today: Chased Moved stop (first trade) Married to what's in my head, rather than screen. Takes me waaaaay too long to switch hats.. Also accepting nearly any price as a possibility.. A dream environment for a competent day trader. I have a long way to go. Today I missed memo about short roast party. I was the main course. done for day.. - 7.5
Interesting close,... To think I tried to throw my Mouse across the room earlier but unfortunately it is not wireless..
I started out using ES as sort of hedge against my stock positions. When the trend would go against my stock positions, I'd jump in and buy a contract, ride it for a few points and get out. It was working quite well, but I got seduced by the gains. I made a couple of lucky guesses and went positive on the year with some big moves in ES. Then I decided to trade ES exclusively....only one contract at a time, OCO bracket orders with conservative stops and targets. looking for reversals and pullbacks. I assumed I'd go two steps forward and one step back on average, perhaps clearing a couple hundred a day. That seemed pretty reasonable to me. That was about the time things started going to shit. I'm being nickeled and dimed to death getting stopped out. I stop trading for a couple of days, watch, and paper trade testing out indicators, trend lines, patterns, strategies, etc. After several successful tests of the setups and strategy with paper profits, I go live...and get stopped out for small loses. For instance...yesterday I saw three setups, all of which would have resulted in a few points of profit for me had I been trading them. The setup repeated a 4th time and I took it. Stopped out for a loss with ES eventually hitting my target. The setup repeated a 5th time and I took it with a slightly larger stop. It appeared the first trade failed because my stop was a little too tight. It retraced almost 78%, stopped me out for a slightly bigger loss, but the trend was shot at that point. It was a good stop, FWIW. I quit trading and returned to watching. A 6th setup resulted in a paper profit, of course. Pretty disheartening and hard to explain how I lost money on short positions when the market was down significantly. So today I start out watching. Trend up started. Saw a 50% retracement of a local swing low / swing high. Market internals strong. Target of -23.6% retracement reached and exceeded for at least a 4 point gain on paper. The same setup repeats a little later. Market internals just a tad weaker than the first time but breadth was 8:1. Unfortunately the swing high turned out to be the intraday high. I took the trade and get stopped out as it retraced more than 78.6% . If I had known the market was rolling over I might have seen the short setup based on the same criteria that would have netted me 10 points or so. At least I didn't get caught in the meat grinder that fired up at 3:30 eastern. I'm keeping a journal and looking for clues. It appears that you may only get one 50% retracement on the upward moves we're seeing right now. I was watching Time and Sales and saw orders of 1000 and 2000 contracts flash by right before the close. That's $50K and $100K per point. Some very serious coin was in play at the close. ES has become my new psycho mistress, it seems. I'm not sure she's worth the aggravation but I haven't given up on her yet. I feel like I'm on the verge of a revelation and will get it all put together at some point....probably deluded.
Bradj, ES I have likened to the Mafia. It is essentially the market we currently have though. The violence of the movements I watch and sometimes think "people make money on this"? Makes me think of devising ways to swing trade ES on a 15 min or hourly. Possible but I think a deep account required as stops will have to be a lot looser. THE most challenging aspect for me (besides my mental ones) is the risk of buying AT trendlines or price levels and run the risk of stop out or wait for the actual reversal which is sometimes so fast the risk of stop out increases. So difficult to determine when a reversal is good or not.
It is really maddening when you superimpose nothing but a couple of moving averages on a day in which you've been gallantly fighting the tape for 2-3 points, using trend lines, Fibs, candlestick patterns, Stochastics, voodoo, etc. And you see that if you had used simple fast/slow MA crosses as entries and exits and been willing to accept a lot more risk [like 10 points] you could have made out like a bandit. I could probably afford to do that on 1-3 contracts but I just can't do it mentally. My biggest single day loss was the result of a attempt at that strategy with 2 contracts and no stops. At four points down, I lost my nerve, guaranteeing a loss. Probably just as well it didn't work as it might have established a precedent that could lead to a rapid blow out [ in contrast to the very slow burn I'm currently experiencing] My goal is to stay alive long enough to figure it out...or come to the conclusion that I just don't have the disposition for it.
Ha! That is an "outcome" and accepting that may ironically improve our chances at succeeding.. I sometimes fantasize of trading a 4 or 5 period moving average alone and turn the vibrating price bars off. (Like David Carradine in Kung-Fu.. "close your eyes so you can see").. They mesmerize and confuse and that IS part of the plan. I really think trades using a small contract size allowing looser stops at key price point for swing trades is the way to go.
Have you noticed what happens between 3 and 4 AM eastern time on most nights? I'm assuming that is when the European markets open. It seems to be a very risky time period for overnight ES positions. I've held overnight a couple of times...didn't sleep worth a damn, either.