Brother Candletrader! "Slow and steady wins the race" - Wow! And that from The Man who risks more than all of his buddies on his trades and fully accepts 20% draw-downs as a by-product of his style! Just surprised, no offense here! Good point about money mgmt. Don't flush your commonsense and MM principles down the toilet when stepping up size. Each time you add, you want to be more conscious about what you're doing, not less. Not taking this serious enough leads straight to hell. By the way, very nice link to the Aesop's Fable illustrations, brother candle - Loved the animations, watched them 3 times LOL! Have a fine Trading Day, ~The Scientist P.S: You never replied to my last post to you on the "Mental Ceilings" thread. I assume that means you concur?
I only partially agree. Sure, if you're trying to get in late on a breakout, this may apply. However, I personally prefer using limit or limit-chase and limit-trail orders. If you want to be able to pick up "discounts", as you can often exploit when scalping, you cannot do that getting in at market. Market-orders, to me, are only a last resort - And one that I often don't take. I like to know where I'm getting filled. If you're getting filled only when the market's going against you, you may be in the wrong kind of play, or use the wrong kind of limit in context. If you're microtrading or even day trading, you may be able to afford using mkt orders, but in scalping, this isn't always a smart move. The big players don't necessarily use mkt orders, either. This is all about futures, namely NQ and ES. If I'm scalping stocks, this isn't just at hand, but 100% crucial. You can't scalp stocks at market prices. You really need to play the game here that I just described. But on the other hand, there are a lot more "dumb" players and accidental orders, institutional orders etc there, too. So it kind of makes it easier. You see it's all relative. If you're resorting to mkt orders because your limit or limit-chase orders aren't effective enough, you could use an advanced scalping platform that automates multiple order entry / re-entry. Just an idea. ~Scientist
To NQ traders, how has the NQ been holding up as far as trading opportunities, and average range with this summer's range contraction?
Daily range is still between 20 and 30 points, average about 2% of price level. It has also been trending more than ES... Best Natalie
The ES and NQ are quite liquid. A market order will be filled at the current best price or 1 level away, if you are a bit late.. The only time you get a worse fill is if you are CHASING a fast market. In that case , timing is the problem , not the order type. The 'discount' of buying the bid, selling the offer, is not so easy to achieve, as it requires exact timing. Otherwise, the 'bid' you just bought is the offer 1 second later anyway.
Haven't traded NQ, but looking into it. What is the value of a one point move in NQ per contract? Thanks.
For NQ's: $20 per point (1.0). $10 per half point tick (0.5) Buy NQ's at 1350 and sell it at 1355, you have made $100 per contract, minus commissions. For completeness, the ES's are worth $50 per point (1.0) and $12.50 per quarter point ticks (0.25 pts). -Eric
Thanks. I am no great wiz at math, but a five point move in NQ yields $100, and the same move in ES yields $250. Plus, NQ has a greater spread. So even considering the difference in the levels of the two indexes - NQ will typically make a greater point move - the clear advantage still seems to be with ES when considering profit as a result of a given percentage move. Or, am I missing something here?