Backtesting would prove that holding onto losing trades (leveraged futures in your case) would eventually end with account wipeout. I just proved you wrong. If you don’t study history, you simply wouldn’t have any edge, all you would have is hope.
That has not happened for 13 years, if you leave yourself enough buffer. This is why I say that backtesting cannot prove the future. It can only guide you.
IMHO from a basic daytrading pov, the market is rigged. With countless ways of using the market and its derivatives for trading, backtesting has its place, but there is no back testing possible when scalping because daily action on a minute timeframe is discretionary. Millions of shares purchased on NIO by some "guy", on Jul 14, keeping the price exactly where he wanted it for hours. Pushes NIO up on the 15th, same happened on AMZN, "guy" purchasing millions of shares Thurs, keeping the price exactly where he wanted it / manipulates stock on Friday, AMZN climbs all day, he finishes at HOD at the end of day, holding the action as he dumps the remaining millions of shares, one would call that "relative strength". Happens all the time with loads of stocks. Sudden violent drops, algros programmed on a 4D chess level. It is hard. Scalping with discipline and smaller shares at least gives flexibility that's needed on a day to day basis depending on how the market is acting.
Sir, you are holding onto long ES contract based on what exactly? Surely you glanced at a chart for the last 100 years and noticed stock market historically always eventually recovered, therefore your long is based at least on a very basic backtest. But that is not trading.
If you were in there during the day and watching level 2 to see it, their climb the next day against the peer stocks etc. We saw it, we watched. We had to deal with it. Here is a discussion about it:
Look at the raw data on NIO on Tuesday and you will see what I'm talking about.. Also AMZN on Thursday. NIO was outrageous though. I was trading NIO on July 12 when this guy was buying. When the climb up all day on NIO happened on the 13th, I was so fed up with NIO I refused to play.. I did trade AMZN on Friday though and took advantage of the climb up and end of day highs.
This is cute but no manipulating is implied. It's simply people trading. Edit I should add that when huge buy volume comes in it could be a directional bet or a hedge. It's up to you as a trader to decide. And just remember we are trying to take money from the big guys who don't always make their intentions clear. So not manipulating but definitely a data point you can be aware of as a trader.