Why not go look at a dozen instances of that double top setup and see if the results look interesting to you? Count them all, there's a way to deal with the urge to only take some of them. Let's just see first whether you or anyone else here is inclined to generate stats on a dozen instances of this setup - with written pre-defined entry, stop, and target levels already printed out for you to make it simple as pouring piss out of a boot with the instructions on the heel, lol. Double Top and Bottom https://www.elitetrader.com/et/thre...t-right-here-baby.335635/page-18#post-5309309
I'm just getting back into trading and found a way that suits me, and surprisingly I hardly ever have bad trades. I'm scalping with 100 shares using the index patterns I see in Medved platform and using heavy weighted tech stocks in the Nasdaq, like AMD. I'm just finding it so simple to make at least $150.00 a day profit and my trades on a 1 minute chart might last seconds or a few minutes, but almost always come out with some profit. I practiced this for months on the ToS simulator and now find in real world trading that the muscle memory and confidence I gained with the simulator has allowed me to find the same positive results with real trading. I know this is simplistic, basic, low risk and small minded.. but coming out green every day is what I need now for supplemental income. I'm actually astounded at how easy it is. Without Medved Trader however, and using the active trader part of ToS to enter and exit according to profit shown at the time, the system I'm using would be impossible to replicate I think. I also use OBV and a few other indicators, S & R lines as well as MA's for judgement, but it is the way the indexes are shown in MT and how they move that allow me to know ahead of time which way those next candles are going to pump.. or not. Or go down. And I scalp accordingly. Out of 40 or more trades a day I have maybe 5 or so bad ones where I just get out right away with very little risk involved. I use market orders too. No stops, no time for placing them when doing this, just have to close the trade quickly and move on. There are more opportunities for trading this way as well, rather than waiting for big moves and planning and setting up in the way I used to try to trade.
Did you just start seeing how easy it is this past week, or are have you been seeing it for the past 6 months?
Like I said, I've been practicing this system for months, learning and refining and have been baby stepping into the real market, but finding my success rate is equal to the same on the simulator. I was around back when QT was the platform I learned on and Trader X's group gave us the first heat map.. I was lucky to be part of that group when just learning about trading. So, I've tried a lot of methods and that's why I'm so surprised how easy this is for me now.
The important part is to use high volume and weighted stocks on the indexes and that seems to be the most important part of leading the way to tell what is going to happen to the candles. But it is the way MT shows these indexes that is what shows me the way the stock will likely go for the short term.
Trading is the easiest of all. Click mouse button, lose money. Your poll should have asked whether profitable trading is easy. Therefore, my answer was your third option. To be a profitable trader, you must learn how to follow the big bucks, study market psychology, eventually you will either find a way or keep losing and give up. GL!
I also use the VIX for confirmation as well as a leading indicator of which way the market is going to move with the indexes.
I think we have to be honest with ourselves and find what system works for our individual personality types. I like coming out green and accumulating small profits into a nice daily profit total and hate the stress of putting so much on the line with risk ratios. Quick in and out and let it all total up. But before commission free trading became available, this system would have been impossible without a higher risk/reward method.