Fast, I'll email you my account details later, so you can transfer me 1/2 of your trading account, and put the other 1/2 into real estate. As a thank you, I'll kick you where the sun don't shine, and promise you in a years' time it'll hurt less than it would have if you kept trading. I'm dead serious. You know Fast, a good local friend asked me recently: "If you had one secret to success, one thing that you think measures the success of a trader - And put this into one sentence - What would it be?" I said: "Oh, that's easy! A trader's success is determined by the amount of money it costs him to find out if he's wrong." Think about the value of this. You probably don't realize this yet, but it's the ultimate secret to successful trading. I trade the DAX. It takes me 3-4T to find out if I'm wrong. On the ES, it takes me 2-3T. You guys in the chatroom, trimdax, Fast, lsu, cj, TM, jas, you witnessed me just how many times? - Today, on both DAX and ES, on several trades, I posted all the larger trades live, and pulled 26pts on DAX, and over 10pts on ES, just because I used small stops. When I use a 2T stop, I can go for only 4T on ES, and still have an R:R ratio of 2:1. You saw me do it the day before, and the day before that and the day before that. Good traders keep their stops small. Excellent traders keep their stops tiny. The best trader I know by far is Mark. Why? Because on a small trade similar to mine it takes him 1T (DAX) to find out if he's wrong. He also makes 3X as much money, because he keeps 3X as much. Matter of fact, he only averages a net of about EUR 4 per contract (or less). But he does over 20,000 contracts/month. You do the maths. I don't care what all the smart-asses on ET now say about this being "too small" or "noise will take you out" and rubbish like that. Let them flame and troll me and lose money. Most of them have no idea even what they're doing, they don't know what I know. I play the highs and lows, watch the cumulative, 'know' where the orders sit and where the stops sit. I have my foot in the door before the crowd starts bolting and cascading stop chains, because I use tiny stops. I pull more than 99% of them, and I can do and have done this on DAX, ES, HSI, any index or stock in the world, any day. I am fully convinced that the better a trader is, the smaller his stops. Mark is a 3X better trader than me. On the flipside, he's done this 3X longer than me. But if you focus on this, namely graduating to smaller and smaller stops, then you will get there, too. And see, you've already got a goal to go for now, knowing this you'll be way ahead of most people. It's not rocket science. It's simple maths. Remember what I explained to you a few pages ago about keeping your costs down being the secret to success? Why should that be any different in trading? Remember, our business overheads in trading are the lowest in the world. Our overheads aren't shopfronts, displays, rent, or tools. Our overheads are only trading losses. They're our expense of doing business. The lower your overheads, the larger your profit margin. It's the law of business. The law of business also states that during "flat times" of no business (no income) the businesses with the highest overheads will be weeded out first. In business, not income, but superior control of overheads is what separates the wheat from the chaff. In trading, the control of overheads is known by the term "stops". And just like in the other businesses I don't make much in trading because I'm a prodigy. I make much because I give back little of what I make. Keep your targets "large" but realistic, and your stops small. Once you have a profit, never give it back. I can have $hit-loads of losers, and still come out ahead. It's total a no-brainer. Now reconsider your position on stops. Assuming you have a hitrate of 50%, you want to have at least an R:R ratio of 2:1 in a day trade. Why put on a trade with less expectancy? So if you want to use 4pt stops (as you said) on ES, then you you're expecting at least an 8pt target. That's currently about 80% of daily range on ES. You think you can pull 80% of the H/L range out of a day trade? What, like buy 10% above the bottom and sell 10% below the top? Mate, you have a kind of genius that I don't possess. Using stops that are 40% of daily range on a day trade is what people from pikersville do. Think about this. Sit down, do the work, figure out ways to reduce the size of your stops. The more of it you do, the better, and the faster you'll do well. The pro's you're playing with are well prepared. And there's no "public" on the futures, like in stocks. On futures, there's only pro's. If you don't put in as much work as them - or more for that matter, then you won't get anywhere but to an empty account. Promise. Promise, that you will fail, unless you're superiorly prepared. If you think you can trade the ES shooting from your hip, you will be wheeled, tarred and feathered. If you want to trade this, or any other futures index in the world, you need to do this: - Get a complete trading plan. Work it out. What's your goal? Money management rules? Daily, weekly loss limits? - Get a complete set of global rules. At least 10 iron rules to live by. - Advanced rulesets specializing on whatever your strategy is (before you have one, don't even consider trading) - Complete daily logging procedure. Record, screenshot, evaluate every trade throughout the day. I could whine about it since I'm a scalper doing boat-loads of RT, but I don't, I still do it. You couldn't possibly whine, since you do only a handful of trades, anway. Print the charts, and draw the buys & sells into it. Read the ET chat log with Mark Oryhon on that, he explained how he forces his prop traders every day to mark every trade on printed charts. Analyze every trade, one by one. Every day. Learn. - Do it all, do it diligently, and be honest with yourself. Avoid betraying yourself. Use stops. - If you do not have the time to do all this - Swing trade or don't trade at all, just watch. Simulator trading is fine, too. Don't day trade futures live until you are on top of at least the things I've just mentioned, or you'll become a problem trader. Anybody who wants to tell you otherwise, is a fool. Period. - Read Trading in the Zone, and take it in, 100%. It has all the keys. And this is not meant in a malicious way at all, but rather to help. In fact, I wonder what makes me crazy enough to give all this information away here for free, I'm onlyl writing this up for you, so you can really get ahead. There's more value in this single post than you'll find in any trading book or course you'll ever buy. Understanding this is all you need. And then I won't need to wish you "good luck", either. P.S: And don't tell me AMT trades without stops. It's his style, and unless you can replicate it at least in a sim, don't even try. There might be people who play without stops. There are also people who sleep with Bangkog hookers and don't wear a helmet. P.P.S: This is not a solicitation to scalp. It doesn't matter which timeframe you do this, it applies anywhere. But whatever trade you enter, just keep your ratios high, that's all that counts. It doesn't matter which timeframe you do this, it applies anywhere. But whatever trade you enter, just keep your ratios high, that's all that counts.
Don't worry about it anymore, we all have losing times. The only important thing about mistakes is to never do them twice. If you accept and follow the outlines described in the big post just compiled, I think you'll be able to do just fine. Best, -S
It wasn't really the one sentence. It was to the whole situation. I think I've made it as short as possible outlining what's important. You do it better.
Well, you see just how much it helped him today, selling the bottom and closing at the top. I don't like watching other traders going through tortures like that. If I can help, I will. If you don't like it, go away.