I started this journal with a hope. My hope is to become more disciplined and to strictly follow my money management rule. Background: I started day-trading Asia index futures (K200, SGXNK, STW, SPI, HSI) Aug 2006 and did about 1K trades since then. My overall results were mixed. I consistently lost money on trading K200, about broke-even on SGXNK and STW, made a little bit on SPI, and did well on HSI. I started with 45K Cnd$. My equity was at low about 32K in Feb 2007, was at peak about 67K in Oct. 2007 and is 55K now. I got several big hits, relative to my account, last year. Each of them cost me about10K. After the latest hit at the beginning of Nov. 2007, I decided to take a break. I haven¡¦t put a single trade until today. Method: I haven¡¦t found a systematical enter and exit setup yet. In other word, I am unable to computerize my setup. So I discretionary enter and exit my trade based on my observation on charts and price action. I use a kind of stop limit order to protect my trading capital. Rules: 1. I trade one contract of HSI. If my daily profit exceeds 500 points (very rarely), I¡¦ll trade 2 contracts that day. (One point of HSI equals 50 HK$ and round trip commission is 1.2 point). 2. Stop trading if my daily loses exceeds 150 point. My lose in some cases may be bigger than 150 points since a stop limit order may not get me out of a bad trade. I¡¦ll try hard to limit my daily loses under 250 points. Goal: 1. 40% net profit by the end of 2008, 2. Constraint my maximum drawdown to under 25%. I¡¦ll focus more on limiting my drawdown rather than my profit target. Your comments/advice on my trading side are more welcomed than on my English side. I apologize for my poor English skill in advance.
This will be great to follow. I have just been doing a lot of research and trying to develop/fine tune my trading strategy for Asian Futures. I think developing a strict method and idea would help reduce your draw-downs and keep you disciplined. What has motivated you in your trades that posted profit(success)... maybe you can start from there. Are you using IB as both a broker and your data feed? Good luck in trading and I will be keeping posted on this one. PS. I am located in Los Angeles, California and the Asian Market is a great time frame for me after work. ICE
It seems you are trading from Canada, What broker do you use for all these products to trade. I guess, it is IB and if not would you please mind to share. I was trading HSI and SGXNK during the 2006-2007 year, and was doing great by making $500 everyday, but made a big mistake and got kicked out. Now just trading eminis in morning. I used IB for asian markets. Thanks for sharing
CHACHA420, What data feed did you find most reliable when you were trading Asian Futures? What there any particular trading style/method that you found worked for you on the HSI contract? This Thread is highly overdue. Good Trading
ET99 I did see that thread earlier... Was sad to see that it has been at a stale mate for a few months. Some good info there as well
I use IB as both my broker and data feed and trade from western Canada. HSI gapped down about 800, which was consistent with my guess based on last Friday's US market close. It chopped in a narrow range about 300 points all the morning. Yesterday's Trades: 2008-01-07 10:33:41: B (1) at 26764.0, 2008-01-07 10:45:57: S (1) at 26806.0, P/L = 40.8 2008-01-07 10:48:28: B (1) at 26834.0, 2008-01-07 11:15:38: S (1) at 26853.0, P/L = 17.8 2008-01-07 11:15:50: B (1) at 26847.0, 2008-01-07 11:34:40: S (1) at 26848.0, P/L = -0.2 Note: I second guessed my feeling and should got out when I didn't feel good on this trade. I turned a winning trade to a losing one. 2008-01-07 11:34:42: S (1) at 26860.0, 2008-01-07 11:43:42: B (1) at 26784.0, P/L = 74.8 Total P/L = 133.2, P/L Per Trade = 33.3, Total Commission = 4.8 PS: B (1) at 26764.0 = Buy 1 contract at 26764; S (1) at 26806.0 = Sell 1 contract at 26806
Hi, will you be posting some charts to make it more interesting? I trade the Nikkei Mini sometimes, and usually watch the HSI Mini to kill the boredom from Nikkei I don't know about the main HSI, but the Mini HSI has about 7 cumulative contracts on each side, and it's wild, wild west. Good luck with your trading, I'm rooting for you Schaefer
I use plain 5 minutes chart and daily chart without any indicator. I'll post charts when I make a big mistake or trade very well. HSI gapped up a little bit. I prepared to enter long if it would retrace back near the yesterday's close. It didn't in the first hour and I missed its early advance. I entered twice on long side later and exited with a little profit. I feel HSI was weak, but I didn't have confidence to pull my trigger on short side. Trades: 2008-01-08 10:13:29: B (1) at 27555.0, 2008-01-08 10:24:32: S (1) at 27568.0, P/L = 11.8 2008-01-08 11:13:29: B (1) at 27617.0, 2008-01-08 11:33:01: S (1) at 27672.0, P/L = 53.8 Total P/L = 65.6, P/L Per Trade = 32.8, Total Commission = 2.4