don, first of all, thanks for giving me some tips. i know some people here like to give you a hard time, but i consider you to have a lot of trading wisdom. as for your business, a business tries to make money. i don't know why people complain that you run a business. this is america. they'd probably love to be in your shoes. also, the "(an alias)" in my signature is only in good nature. it's obvious i am not really gordon gekko. hehe anyway, back to trading. you gave me a lot of good advice. information overload is absolutely my problem. i just have way too many ideas. i think i do need to clear my head. i'd like to ask you a few questions: 1) what is to envelope your stocks (your #3)? i don't think you were talking about the enveloping of oo orders.. i understand that. how do you envelope other trades? 2) how do you find moc imbalances? 3) this is a big one for me. do you typically enter and exit all your shares at once? or do you scale in/out? what do most of your profitable traders do? keep in mind i've been trading for 3 years and never scaled in/out of one trade and here i am 3 years later still struggling. do you think scaling is an important aspect to trading? or do you enter with all 2000 shares and exit with all 2000 shares? thanks
That's because Gann, Williams, Douglas, et. al. are not the sole source for a precise way to make money from trading. They each found a style that worked well for them, given their style of trading. It is probably a natural action to find some logical and concise "system" that will guarantee that you will make money. There is no guarantee you will make money from trading. That is part of the risk you take in playing the game. The market gives you a plethora of instruments in which to be creative. You can buy options, sell spreads, straddles, strangles, etc -- you can trade futures, EFTs, individual stocks, etc. Find a unique way to use all the available instruments in your favor and do whatever you can to make it successful. If you were going to paint a picture, would you read a book written by Picasso on how to paint? Then, after you read that, would you read another by Monet? How about Gogh, Renoir, etc? If you were looking for the holy grail in producing a work of art, no wonder your brain would be raddled after all of that -- you'd be trying to paint abstract impressionalism using surrealism strokes -- you wouldn't be "in the zone" as Douglas suggests. So, stop learning how to try and paint from 500 artists and develop your own style. Call it the Gordonistic movement. The market presents you with endless opportunities to make and lose money -- try to maximize the opportunities while limiting the losses. Hope you start trading soon.
OK, here goes.1. We "envelope" our primary stocks constantly all day so we can take advantage of trade -throughs (price drops or up ticks), on the "prints." 2. MOC imbalances are disseminated at 3:40 (NY time) and again at 3:50, showing the buy or sell numbers. Dow Jones news, or RediPlus will show these numbers. 3. We generally take everything we want at once, and get out the same way. Newer people may "scale out" but never "scale in" (never "dollar cost average" or anything like that because that equates to "adding to a loser" - which we never do). Hope this helps... Don
I'm with ElCubano on this one: I can whip up a profitable system that "keeps it simple" but requires a huge amount of capitol (for drawn down). Also requires robotic discipline to withstand the draw-down. Winning is easy, but who can REALLY stomach large losses financially and emotionally. Once I had a break-down like Gordon is having. When I asked myself "what do I really want out of trading," my honest answer was not just money. I wanted to make consistent money (not many consecutive losses) with tight stops, with a small account, with minimal market exposure... totally unrealistic. Sure, technically it is possible to turn 5K in 100K. But not likely. Next time I get this urge I'll buy a lottery ticket. (how many lotto tickets can I get for one round trip commission...?) I have accepted that I must employ much more capitol and patience (I like the word patience, it's nicer than discipline.) And my trading has reflected this. Good luck Gordon!
I cannot think of any method that will not put you into a profit position. One trader here "simply" uses an always in approach and goes long on the 15 minute chart when the 15 minute MACD crosses up and short when it crosses down. He has carefully selected his stocks and currently trades 5 of them. I backtested a number of different stox and many many are net losers over time when traded this way. But there were some that were net winners...good size profits too. That is fairly simple I think. The drawdown can be big however. However, this method, ALWAYS put you into a significant profit position at some time during the trade. ALWAYS! And that is because the MACD is an excellent trend-following method. The benefit of the 15 minute is that it is short enought to capture smaller trends, but long enough for those trends to be worthwhile. If one combines this one simple method with simple S/R charting then you have an excellent, reliable, and profitable method. The S/R I am talking about is "simply" confined to the very local S/R of the range in which you are currently trading. Perhaps even a 10 day ATR might be good. One must accept that there will be losers with every method, regardless. Shorter time frames lead to smaller profits and more trading. Every method has its limits. Accept them or discard the system. Don't get bogged down with all the administrative stuff. Ask yourself one and only one question... does the method I am looking at put me in a profitable position large enough to make it worthwhile? Work backwards... start by definging the size profit you want to achieve...realistically. I trade the daily chart so it is reasonable to expect 5-15 points or better. Do you want to hold overnites? If yes then trade the 30 minute or longer. If no then shorter time frames are for you. Are you looking for nickels and dimes then 1-2-3 minute charts are for your. If you want .50 to 2.00 then 5-10-15 are for you. Simple enough. Now what method out of the bazillion methods puts you in a position to capture the size move you want. It doesn't need to be exotic. Stochastic is a great range trader. MACD is a great trend follower. Both can get you in at the beginning of the move. The Stochastic will get you out quicker than the MACD. You are really overworking it GG. It is not "easy", but it is not the alphabet soup you are making it out to be.
Hey... you talking shit about me Aphie??? OH... the dead Gann... sorry... my bad. This thread is once again, funny. I think this kind of thread happens all the time. One guy says, we need edge. Then one guy starts, no we need inner self. Then one guy comes in philosophical. Then the we go back to the technical edge, and they say yes we need edge but you need to find your own style. To find your own style, you need to know yourself. But then even if you find yourself, you need the knowledge to start off with. Knowledge is useless, it just mixes you up. That's because books are useless, experience is best. Oh, you should trade without prior knowledge? Well, you do need the edge. But... back to start. Now let's think how we can actually break this cycle...