I've read through this thread and here's my 2c. I think your "mentor" is full of it and doesn't sound like a real mentor where you've mentioned you don't know his address so it sounds like an online type of communication only. Even a decent vendor course would have gone over with you far more than what you've mentioned over 3.5 years. If your account was close to the PDT threshold of 25k , then your 1800 & 1600 loss days are still over the recommended 2-5% daily loss limit. Btw, have you considered trading ES futures like your mentor does? As your style sounds like daytrading and trading ES futures with a discount futures broker may be easier to manage than worrying bout the PDT rules. You may also need to work on your trade management. Just because you're trading stocks, doesn't mean it should be ok to hold on to it past a reasonable stop point for a daytrading entry hoping for reversal from heat even past overnight. Anyway I suggest a partial break. Go back to part-time or at least stay in sim only for another six months and keeping a journal of how well you simmed the real trading. Can't think of anything else, so good luck.
Ok, so you have an idea of where it's going wrong. Make a rule to never exit until it hits your stop, and work on keeping it.
And one day you will realize you no longer need your day job, quit, trade full time and never look back. Eagerly wait for you on the other side. Best wishes.
I didn't bother to read the entire thread, but IMO, your problem - and you're in company with most others - is that you don't respect or understand how much effort is needed to make it in this game. You mention taking a week or two off and papertrade to get back in the zone. Delusional, IMO. It's more likely that you should take a year or two off to build a system and a plan and then start to carefully trade it. Trading isn't or shouldn't be about having three big losses in a row and hoping you'll making it up by a big winner on the fourth. That's just an attempt at controlled gambling. It's not about being in the zone either. You need to understand how the market moves in a wide variety of conditions and you need to be able to processs this information in real time with moving prices. If you're seeing something for the first time in your life and trying to process it intuitively or based on 'what you think' will happen - forget about it.
If you don't know what is causing your results you would better stop and take a step back, analyze why you are getting the results you are getting. That is better than continue to throw money at it.
What he said...... maybe trade end of day with small size. Day trading is a nightmare and does not mean you will make more, usually quite the opposite I find. Deposit money in the account every week and make longer term trades with less commission and higher profit targets, f#ck the “zone’ there is no zone!
Yes it is. I suggest he get a trade analyzer to see where his problem lies. If he has low MFE, that means his entries suck. If he has high MAE, then his exits suck. These are very important metrics for the day trader....as well as percent profitability. If you are below 45% profitable, just hang up your existing breakout strategy and come up with a new one. Stop setting is also uber important....too tight and you'll be shaken out of trades. Too loose and your average loss per trade will zoom.
Here are my stats since June 11th, 2018 (My first-day full time) Most these stats are a 100-200 share size I switched to 300-500 December 21st. My reason for switching was that I would no longer have to make a dollar + per trade and could be satisfied with smaller wins like 30 cents per share. Winning Days: 116 (73%) Losing Days: 43 (27%) Total Gained: 18,634.68 Total Loss: -18,104 Total commissions: -3215.77 Avg Daily Gain Green Days: $160.64 Avg Daily Loss Red Days: -$421.04 Total Trades: 844, wins 537 (63.6%) losses 303 (35.9%) Total Number of Trades Green Days: 468, wins 347 (74.1%), losses 119 (25.4%) Scratch trades 2 Avg Volume: 1480 Avg Daily Gain: $160.64 AvgWin: $73.40 Avg loss: -$57.43 Avg MFE: $68.06 Avg MAE: -$47.66 Total Number of Trades Red Days: 367, wins 190 (50.5%), losses 184 (48.9%) Scratch trades 2 Avg Volume: 4496 Avg Daily loss: $421.04 Avg Win: $60.36 Avg Loss: -$160.72 Avg MFE: $57.59 Avg MAE: -$109.43 Max consecutive wins: 19 over 5 days Max consecutive losses: 6 over in one day Longest green streak: 20 days It's clear that my issue is overtrading and letting losses go too far. My red days have such high volume because they generally start with a decent size loss of $600-1800 by 10:30 from some mistake or poor loss management. (i.e. Not closing a trade at my stop and closing 50cents to $1 above my planned exit, adding to a loser that spikes against me fast to get a "better" price believing its just a squeeze and refusing to close till in the money) Then I get nervous and start to scalp trades because I don't want to lose anymore but I also don't want to have a red day. Very rarely will I surpass my initial loss from the morning and I generally end up cutting my losses in half if not more. Sometimes I don't show up focused or in the zone and I've even considered taking some of my big losing days off but with this being my only source of income at the moment taking any day off feels like the wrong thing to do.
These are my stats since December 21 since I increased my average volume Winning Days: 21 (65.6%) Losing Days: 11 (34.4%) Total Gained: 6232.36 Total Loss: -6223.91 Total commissions: -861.61 Platform fees: -92 Avg Daily Gain Green Days: $296.78 Avg Daily Loss Red Days: -$565.81 Total Trades: 179, wins 124 (69.3%) losses 54 (30.2%) Total Number of Trades Green Days: 75, wins 66 (88%), losses 8 (10.7%) Scratch trades 1 Avg Volume: 1464 Avg Daily Gain: $296.78 AvgWin: $102.91 Avg loss: -$69.98 Avg MFE: $112.83 Avg MAE: -$76.63 Total Number of Trades Red Days: 104, wins 58 (55.8%), losses 46 (44.2%) Scratch trades 0 Avg Volume: 5150 Avg Daily loss: $565.81 Avg Win: $76.98 Avg Loss: -$232.37 Avg MFE: $81.87 Avg MAE: -$152.91