Morning sstheo, I follow the same guidelines as well. Trade 2 hours or until profit target is reached. Go do other stuff.
2 hours, UK morning trading UK100, 2 hours, 30mins after US open, then 90mins before 30mins before close, break it up into slots, hit the gym got for a walk between. Normally, with something on Netflix streaming to keep the boredom down and stop stupid trades.
I have been trading abbreviated sessions since the June contracts .... 6:30-10/10:30 PST. But I simultaneously deployed a personal progress tool of an increase to "normal" trade size. In my case, I make and keep more now, trading less hours. "Lunchtime" has always been a hurry-up-and-wait-to-take-the-trade time segment for me, and the last hour/hour and half, historically is when I tend to give back. IMO, based on the OPs numbers that he has posted, he is smart to curtail his hours and not trade any size, while he makes needed adjustments to his methodologies.
Dear sstheo, that is really impressive ! I am also a scalper, but in the FDAX and the DAX MINI. The comission is there in the relation smaller. But nervertheless absout 15 % of my profit goes for fees and comissions. I think that is a "normal" rate for scalping. I also try to avoid loosing days. What I do not understand. It seems you are quite sucessfull. also in the past. Why do you trade with such a small size ? You could earn more and "save time" if you start with an amount to trade the ES from the beginning ? As I also trade via AMP and also via MC, I would appreciate if you can tell me, how you bring the cumulative delta as a line to the chart ??
He's building a profit base, ie above account opening, then he can risk the profit base if it goes up all great if not, back to small and building a profit base, that way reducing the risk to the principal amount.
Hey scalpi, nice to have you here again Our styles are pretty similar, and what sstheo is doing here is very close to our work. To all the perma doubters here, I cannot tell you if sstheo is real or how long he will last, but I can tell you that there are many traders out there that do exactly this high frequency, very shortterm scalping in futures with good success. His numbers (number of trades, trade duration...) are similar to mine, but I dont aim for 2% a day. More something like 0.2%. But of course, if you are just starting your trading carreer, and need to build your account up quickly, you can and need to be a bit more aggressive. I never ever did a backtest. I have days on which commissions eat up 80% of my profits. But I dont care. At the end of the day/ week/ month, all that matters is if you make money with what you are doing. I would really like to make something like a live trading morning for some of you guys. Like a conference video, showing the screens of 3 traders, for example sstheo, scalpi and me, to show you guys how we work, in realtime. Maybe one of you guys/ girls here has an idea how this could be done, technically. sstheo keep up the good work, I like this journal. Wish you all a nice evening CALLumbus
(I will private message you about CDelta on Multicharts.) I could trade the ES or NQ or YM or RTY right now, but I have chosen not too. I want to take this account to $1M, and I DON'T have the "trading muscles" to even trade 3 mini's right now. LOL. I traded 1 or 2 a few weeks ago and choked. But, assuming continued success, if you follow a 2% per day table (see below) out for a few weeks, you will see that I will be trading the mini's very soon. I am trading a max of the equivalent of 1 micro for each $1000. So at 10k I can do one mini or 10 micros. At 15k I can do 15 micros or 1 mini and 5 micros. At 20k I can do 2 mini's. The whole purpose is to grow in a controlled fashion - like doing 1 more pushup each day so you can get to 100 pushups within 3 months. See the 2% column on days 27 and 62 below. Assuming I am on schedule, the ride could get wild! I think the interest in my journal is multi-faceted. Besides the (1) crazy inverted R:R ratio (2) profitability despite the lopsided commission on the micros, and (3) the insane $1M goal, follower want to (4) see if I can do what I say and not choke with each additional contract. There is no doubt that everyone here wants to earn a million dollars (or pounds, or whatever). All traders - and 3rd graders too - can easily identify a trend, but the lack of discipline in the form of following one's trading rules and money management rules usually topples even the best of us traders. I am going to try to stay upright this time.
I think the skepticism can be summed up in that he's dependent on maintaining a very high win rate to stay profitable. Especially as he compounds and adds contracts. If he's not compounding - he can easily take a few bad days and still be well ahead. That said - it's certainly possible and I sincerely hope sstheo will achieve his goals. I talked to a guy who do something similar in that he's depending on a high win rate. He had less than 5 losing days per year over the last two years. His daily profits are relatively small, but he does it on huge size. One full stop would set him back a week, though, as his profits/losses are strongly inversed. That would be very interesting. If you check out @hilmy83's journal he's shared some livestreams of his trading sessions. Haven't had the time to actually look at them, though.