Back when I trading YM, my min target was 20. Just remember it is far easier to increase size than to increase points and if you run out of liquidity, switch to ES.
what about trading the ES emini? How many points do you try to earn on that one? Not ticks, but points per contract. Per day. I'm happy if I can get 2 points per contract per day.
I think I'll try that method. It sounds better than mine. Though I've often gained 40 pts or more a day, I've often lost 40 pts or more a day. When I first started, I was going for 10 pts a day, and did even worse. Trading a percentage (5% max) of your NAV is probably the most prudent. BTW, around 9:20-9:30am CST seems to be a good time to enter YM. If YM is bearish, it's usually at its highest around this time. Also, it appears that around 2pm CST, YM has hit its peak if it is bearish.
============== Rtrader ; Actually was thinking of that when i first read the question; a repeating pattern of #20. As far as ''easier to increase size[more contracts] than increase points''; thats in the context Volentte has traded , what over 9 or 19 years, and authored about 900 page journal Murray TT
I think the OP's question is a very good one. After all, if you don't know your average daily gain, how can you plan for your future? If you knpw that you make X pts a day, you might don't have to worry about a 5X loss, because you know you can make it back in 5 days. Also average daily gain is a good measure to compare different traders or strategies. When I evaluate my strategies, that is one of the basic value that I use for comparison.... Ricky! Keep in mind that with CONSISTENT returns of 10 YM points per day you can pyramid yourself up into riches, once you start to increase size...
Volente 00...This makes sense...easier to grow increase size than points...well said, I haven't really looked at the ES, I will watch it as well. glenjohnson..I don't trade the ES, I have heard from others that it is very choppy, where the YM is less so...and I am having some success on the YM so leary of jumping around from product to product...but will begin to watch it. cscott...interesting observation,,,I wait for the 9:30 open, but will watch the premarket. thanks! pekelo...thanks thats what I hope to do...stay consistent and increase size....but I've only been implementing this strategy for about 7 weeks..so I want to stick with one contract...not sure what the magic number of weeks/months will be before increaseing size, but I'm working on it.
Quote from ElectricSavant: This is all wrong. Try to concentrate on your method. Rickytrader, ES is right about this. Its interesting to hear what other people get trading your chosen contract but its answering a question about maximum potential but not the one that is most likely to help you build your business plan or improve your trading. You don't know how they get those points. Or are they telling the truth. Or do they achieve 40 on a good day and -40 on a bad day with more bad than good days? Or is it in any way related to what you do? The value might be there if someone (who you trust, and this is not a place where I'd trust many) is getting a lot more per day than you do and this perhaps indicates to you that your method is weak. But its not the basis for a business plan. I trade with 6 other traders and we all use different strategies, sufficiently different that I might be long while my friend is short and both might profit from the trade. And we have dramatically different numbers of trades per day and win rates and points per contract - but in the end these are not the important things. If you're trying to judge what you can get or what you should try to achieve then a method that might be more effective is to look at the amount that your method makes with 20/20 hindsight each day. This sum can give you a basis for a business plan (lets say that in real time you can only currently achieve 50% of the points that your method achieves when perfectly executed). The sum also gives you the basis for realistic improvement goals - lets say your baseline is 50% of the achievable points then next weeks goal is to reach 53% by the end of the week ... and so on towards some realistic percentage of perfect. So your business plan could be built on the base line with a best case based on assumptions about your ability to improve. Similarly your trade by trade performance could be based on 3 scores, one for entry, one for the correct worst case stop, and one for trade exit management. Then your day by day performance can be measured by how many trades get a bad/good/excellent in each category and by what percentage of perfect points you achieve. Thats a sound basis for patting yourself on the back and for measuring your improvement. When you plateau out in improvement the money is then adjusted by increasing scale as needed. A big enough rave --- I just think that a new traders chances of success will be dramatically affected by what they focus on and that focusing on your method is much more important than focusing on the money. Best of luck.
How many points can a person make off a market(s) in one day? Well, i presume you can count? I also presume you can do the simple task of breathing,...yeh? You've got to be switched on in this game. What you have got to do now, is fit yourself in (what you know and how much money you have). Comprehend? Can you answer your own question? Nobody else can!