Al lot depends on your timing and the circumstance at time of trade First, 2-4 ticks as a stop? that's less than typical wiggle on most anything. You should be running Time of Sales, with VOLUME color coded red/green/yellow. The speed of the tape will clue you into if you can move your shares in the current market at a specific time. Use momentum and direct ECNs to load or unload. Depends on what part of the move you're trying to buy or sell. Its easy to buy size at established resistance, typically lots of sellers there. If you try and sell there ....get in line, other wise step inside and try and sell the momentum ticks before testing that resistance line. The opposite is true at the bottom of the move with selling at support, its easy, since there's usually plenty of net buyers or shorts covering, here again, use momentum step in above support to cover or buy for the bounce. Get out clean with out any skid marks or odd lots left. Pay special attention to larger than normal blocks above the ask or below the bid in these sup/res areas or after excessive buying or selling pressure...have these color coded pink/ blue on time of sales window. This is all basic stuff...Do you need a Mentor? No one at the firm can help you? Hmmm makes me really question that 2-4tick stop.
1) I push away from the table to clear my head and emotions. 2) I practice trade a bit till I have a few wins and confidence returns. 3) I make sure that I have no thought about winning it "back" like a gambler ... but just clear focus per trade ... one at a time. 4) If it is a system style trade system ... I review what went wrong very thoroughly. 5) If it is a multiple order system that does not allow for "one trade at a time" clarity adjustments ... then after I have identified why it doesn't work ... I write that new rule or awareness down ... or if auto ... begin making the coding adjustment or rule change. I lost 45K once ... just because I had to run off and take a crap. Worst day was about -400K ... because I did everything wrong and refused to stop trading. Fortunately at the time it wasn't a lot of money so I didn't go into "Trading Shock" ... jumped right back in and did what I normally do.
Sorry ... but that is a recipe for disaster and is a Gambler Mindset. Not for experienced traders. Creating a negative debt reference gets you more of the same.
Hi Jeff, Thank you for response. Yes, 2-4 ticks stop loss Yes, I am watching the tape before entering trade. The problem is that our office is a new one. opened 3 months ago. Believe it or not, we have no a single experienced trader at the office. The one who probably has some experience is office manager's assistant. Although because I see him trading same 100 shares I doubt he is a real deal. Our daily limit is $20. Originally we had 11-12 guys. All newbies. 5 were constantly losing. some lost at least $800-1000 in 2-3 months , probably way more as I noticed some were running loss at $50-70 on 100 shares.....They just could not cut that loss. Ok, they are gone, which is good. I see that daily P/Ln looks much better as office at least is not losing money. I was losing money first 2 weeks but last 2 started gradually trading that loss back. in 7 days only 1 day lost. Before, I had gross positiove but net negative on some days cause of fees., Now I understand what I should do. Started trading live 4 weeks ago. Had not had this losing day, would have probably moved to 300 shares. what a shame. I gotta make it next week. I asked that more experienced assistant about say trading Ford with 10-20K position. He told me should not be problem, but I am most worried about liquidity. This is why I asked question. I am working on my strategies and although we are not allowed to trade first 15 minutes, i see a lot of potential there. It was interesting to read your comments. i need to read them few more times as I am not familiar yet with stocks trading jargon.
http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showt...64965&perpage=6&highlight=sh&pagenumber=11996 lost 30 points on a 30 lot es,max pain on position build is about 40k,it only hits once a year ,if that,don't expect it to happen but it does ,rarely, anyway ..., if you except a max loss, when it gets there , take it, ...u can always get back in ,more often than not, at a better price..... About half of trading is losing, you never get short at the exact top or long ,exact bottom, ...so almost every trade you put on , ... starts as a loser ,...so even if you dont close it out right there,,...you took a loss,... as the market moved ,you may have gotten it back with profit.... I don't think of losses as losses...,the year is just one big collage of trades.... and the end result is a net profit. ...If the you lost that at the track, ..you will never see it again. ...I f you lose it here,you can always get it back,...that can only happen if you respect a predetermined loss first,... and that predetermined loss is exceptable in relationship to your acct ...before you enter the trade.
Shiko I have started trading prop and i was up like 1 day $142 2 day $122 3 day $ 47 4 day $-110 5 day $-60 Even 100 lot shares can increase your losses I was trading 100 lot and the past 2 days the market has been weird and we have ended losing on all are shorts. So let see how next week goes Good luck