not sure,how profitable it can be(applying some TA on charts of market stats) but at least one thing is certain on that picture-while SP sitting at same level where it was in April-new highs are definitely lower...so there is some pretty obvious divergence)
The ES has been stuck to 1400 like a bad diarrhea on a cheap tissue. It's called painting the tape. Someone is trying to hold the turd up long enough to change market sentiment and bring in new suckers to sell to higher. ES 1450 is still in the cards, I'm waiting with a put position for flush down to 1380 to get rid of weak longs and trap in short sellers to help this top heavy turd of a market to make it to 1450.
Actually I trade the Dow30 stocks on weekly bar charts(almost always either long or sold short), so although most of my posts have been day trading in nature, I started out and have always maintained a long term approach. 80% of what I have accumulated thru the years have been made through long term. But let's face it, checking for signals over the weekend on weeklies don't take long and I had to do something during the day to occupy myself, so I went into day trading long ago. But starting today, I will only oversee folks that trade for me and day trade last 35 minutes of ES day session. I am starting to put together ideas for stock/option trading that I never had enough time to do before. It is funny, the real money of trading has always been in long term, but many that start out do the hardest thing in the world in day trading. Either way, I am short most Dow stocks, and a great way for me to start out new direction in my life. I have always applied TA to other indicators, been doing it since 80's and has worked very nice for me to start taking profits on longer term trades. Nothing works all the time though, but when I see a chart on anything, I start drawing trendlines, LOL.
I got long in March of 2009 in S&P500 futures and reversed in May 2011, went back long in Sept 2011 took some profits as Dec 2011 and remainder out at breakeven, then had losses cause markets usually whipsaw at turning points in mid trend for going back up, most investors hold through these times whereas swing traders get to cursing, but finally got back on right side of long. I went short big S&P500 8/21/2012 as my rules say it has to be new contract highs, took profit on half and today was lucky to get out at breakeven on futures. When I trade futures long term, must be at or very near contracts highs/lows using options to hedge. In stocks I use different approach of seeking divergences on monthly, weekly, daily and 60 minutes, each has a rating system of when you put on the trade. I trade stocks based on their merit off the weekly charts but only take signals based on overall S&P500 weekly signals for trend, don't see any reason to buck overall trend on Dow30 stocks. Most stocks I have gotten out with breakeven or few little losses, this week, UGH! So I have been able to stay in some trades up to approx two years. Especially the ones that pay dividends, I am most likely to keep if I got in low enough even though I will get a sell short signal, depending on volatility of the stock, will sell call options and or buy puts long term.
what I meant was trading only from one side short term. So since Aug you have only been trading from the short side? correct? The reason I ask is because back when I was trading ES I wish in retrospect I had picked one side and only traded that side, based on some kind of longer term chart pattern or indicator or fundamentals. I was just wondering if that is how you do it.
In stocks since Aug 21, I was only taking "new" sell short signals in stocks and no "new" long signals. So between Aug 21 and today, because of time limits, so many stocks got out at breakeven stops, others got out with small losses today and a couple I am still short as stops were not hit. I wanted to simplify my stock trading without giving up on too much lost opportunity profits of not taking both long/short, so in last few months have changed and backtesting shows me I am not going to lose out much. Volume on these new highs, to me, are not telling me it should continue, but that is part of system rules and not what I think, as that is normally wrong, LOL. On the todays' close, I went short again on big S&P500 futures for a long term position and hedged. I developed long ago "zones" for all Commodity markets and when either price or indicators reaches these zones, only then I can take trades always going counter trend. If S&P500 moves off the highs in either distance or time, only then can I resume looking for shorts in stocks, only way I can resume buy signals is if S&P500 goes beyond all time highs.
ok thanks, now I understand why you say traders should learn long term first and then move down to shorter time frames