ES vs NQ vs YM

Which do you prefer for daytrading and why?

 

NQ. ES tends to be choppy due to all the algos battling it out and my platform doesn't support YM at the moment.

 

Perhaps a better question would be which of these instruments provides you with the range and volatility you require but also the safety that enables you to relax and trade in an objective and rational manner?

If you have no idea, characterize them, and any other instrument in which you're interested. If you have no idea how to characterize an instrument, learn.

 

ES and NQ are about the same with respect to those parameters, and I'd imagine that YM is too.

 

ES and NQ are completely different in my experience. The ranges on NQ are much different then ES.

YM does have good swings, not as much as NQ, but better then YM in my opinion.

 

In terms of # ticks or % change?

 

well I could be wrong...I just pulled up YM and ES charts for yesterday and analyzed them, and counted the ticks..., and translated the dollar value. and they look about the same I guess. It depends on that u are comfortable trading

 

Traded Big S&P500 back in 80s/ES currently, can do size, has same personality all these years, Herky/jerky. NQ is different, more forgiving to me as far as if I get in wrong or need to get out, it has a little less follow though during chop, but takes off in fast market conditions, cancel targets.....Mini Dow is strange market to me, but has some of the deepest retracements of all the Indexes, very reoccurring patterns though. I risk less trading the Dow but so are the targets. The Russell for me is the only index where I risk less than the targets and it trades similar to NQ. But overall I am a Scalper, so I view the Indexes much differently than trend trader.

But what matters most, which of the three can you trade, they all have different personalities.

 

did you trade in sp500 pit?

 

There could be any reason why a trader chooses ES, NQ, YM, EMD or TF.

1) They backtested their trade strategy on them all and decided to trade the one that outperforms the others via the method backtested.

2) They selected one instead of the others because their buddies are trading it even though it may not be the trading instrument their strategy performs the best with.

3) They selected one instead of the others because an online stranger recommended it to them even though it may not be the trading instrument their strategy performs the best with.

4) They selected one instead of the others because their broker offers cheaper margins than the others.

From the above possibilities, common sense will be to take the route of 1) if the primary goal is to be a profitable trader.