kserra's emini trades

Discussion in 'Journals' started by kserra, Nov 3, 2003.

  1. kserra

    kserra

    Well unfortunately I am having the same problem as you Kap, what I have noticed is that the exit at 1:1 stop ratio seems to work the best, however the problem is that if you are constantly exiting at this magic number your profits are going to be greatly diminished because you will never pick up the homerun profits that are occasionally being yielded. I have considered trading multiple contracts and exiting the first when this profit target is gotten then moving the stop on the second to breakeven, however I am not sure how comfortable I would be trading multiple contracts not only as a newbie futures trader but considering my overall capitalization.

    Anyways on to todays trades

    I once again missed most of the morning because of some things I had to do, but was able to take two trades in the afternoon

    Trade #1: Long @ 1051.5, Cover @ 1052, +.5
    11:15: The signal showed up as a crossover so I took the trade after it traded 1 tick higher, and set my initial stop to 1050.25. The trade went in my direction for a while then faced some resistance around the 1052 area, around 11:30 the crossover also occured on the 5 minute chart, as of 11:31 my profit target of 1052.75 was hit, so I moved my stop to breakeven. From there price chopped around for a while, once again I got sort of nervous so I trailed the stop a lot closer, eventually I ended up getting out at 1052 for a .5 gain on the trade. This trade was just ok I had a lot of chances to get out at better prices than this and once again I let my emotions influence my trading.

    Trade #2: Short @ 1052.5, Cover @ 1052.25, +.25
    12:16 the trade was signaled, the trade had a very tight stop due to the small range of the previous bar, stop was at 1053. I feel that on these types of trades where the stop is so tight, I should open up the stop a little more, because otherwise I can get easily taken out by the whipsaw. After the trade had hit my profit target of .5 I just decided to get out and rethink the trade. This trade was good because I knew I had made a mistake and needed to get out so I did, but it was bad because I got into the trade in the first place with the wrong goals in mind.

    Anyways today was just a mediocre day I suppose. I am considering moving on to the 5 minute charts which will give me larger profit targets and less chop. I really need to work on my exits because I am allowing too much discretion to come into my trades here. Anyone have any ideas ?

    Profit/Loss for the day : +.75

    Overall Profit/Loss: +2.00
     
    #11     Nov 4, 2003
  2. blb078

    blb078

    i think once you move to a longer time frame you make more, it will take out the wipsaws, i sometimes use a similar strategy w/2 ma crossing over, and i use a 5 & 15 min chart, take a look at your strategy on a 15 min for today, you can see were you cou have let your trades run a little more, you might only get 2 or 3 trades a day w/ a 15 min, but they will be bigger profits.
     
    #12     Nov 4, 2003
  3. kserra

    kserra

    Here are the trades for the day, I will also post the 5 minute for comparison's sake without the trades listed. I am considering taking my signals from the 3 minute (better entry) and then using watching and using the 5 minute for confirmation.
     
    #13     Nov 4, 2003
  4. kserra

    kserra

    no trades listed
     
    #14     Nov 4, 2003
  5. kserra

    kserra

    So after reviewing several different time frames I am going to try using the 3 minute chart for the entry point (as some moves are sometimes not confimed till later on the five minute) and then use the 5 minute as my stop point, thus widening my stop and creating larger profit targets without sacrificing the 1:1 reward to risk scenario. If there is no confirmation of the entry on the 5 minute chart within two bars of the 3 minute signal the trade should be gotten out of, however if the 5 minute chart signals before the 3 minute than the signal on the 5 minute should be taken.
     
    #15     Nov 4, 2003
  6. blb078

    blb078

     
    #16     Nov 4, 2003
  7. kserra

    kserra

    2 trades for today, both turned out really well, was able to exceed my profit target by a reasonable amount on one and by a little on the other.

    Trade #1: 7:15 Short @ 1050.25 , Cover @ 1047.5, +2.75
    Stop @ 1052.75. This trade went along for the theme of today which seemed to be real quick easy spikes. This trade was taken on the 5 minute (which I think I am going to switch to full time now) and setup perfectly. Once my profit target was reached I was anxious to take it so I just out of the trade. In ways I am happy with the fact that I was able to take the target and get out with a nice profit, but I was also disappointed. The trend continued on without me resulting in me leaving quite a bit of money on the table ( a potential 4 more points) , unfortunately I was not able to discern a retracement which is what this last bar was from a new trend and was just happy to get out of the trade.

    Trade #2: 12:25 Long @1048.00, Cover @ 1051.75, 3.75
    stop @ 1047. This trade was taken on the 5 minute chart as well. I like this trade a lot better I was much more patient here I saw the fib retracement coupled with a high ADX reading and noticed that the chart was having no trouble holding support around the 1050 area so I decided to stay in it worked out for me and I decided to get out around yesterday's close which was a level the market had trouble with all day. I liked this trade because I was able to sit on my hands and let the profits run, however because I was using indicators I do not usually use this is bad, I am considering using the indicators in my system so that these types of discretionary decisions do not come into play.

    Profit/Loss for the day : +6.5

    Overall Profit/Loss: +8.5

    Decent trading however I need to stop changing the system, I think I am going to include ADX to help me identify trends, fib retracements for knowing where to set my stops when the pullback comes and finally only trade from the 5 minute chart, this will keep my trade frequency down as well as keep my profit targets larger.
     
    #17     Nov 5, 2003
  8. KISS METHOD IS BEST....ALWAYS TRY TO IMPROVE YOUR SYSTEM.... NUMEROUS SYSTEMS WILL WORK WELL....YOURS IS BASIC...BASIC IS BEST...ADD TOO MUCH STUFF TO WATCH AND EMOTIONS TAKE AWAY THE PROFIT...U NEED A LONGER TERM INDICATOR TO WATCH AS TRENDLINE ....3 INDICATORS WORK BETTER....WEIGHTED IS GOOD..U R HALFWAY THERE TO FINDING ALL THE RIGHT NUMBERS.....STOPS WITH YOUR SYSTEM SHOULD BE 3 TO 4....UR STOP SETTINGS ARE ALMOST PERFECT...........POINTS ARE HARD TO CAPTURE....MORE CONTRACTS ARE EASY TO ACQUIRE...THERE ARE OTHER NUMBERS THAT ARE MAGIC.....CHANGING SYSTEM AFTER MUCH BACKTESTING IS GOOD...SOMETIMES...EMOTION AND MONEY MANAGEMENT R 2 GREATEST ENEMIES...NO EXTERNAL INFORMATION....NONE....NO PIVOT POINTS, NO SUPPORT AND RESISTANCE, BUY LOW AND SELL HIGH CLOSE TO YOUR CROSSING AND TRADE WHAT IS HAPPENING ON THE SCREEN.....IF INDICATORS R 45 DEGEES OR GREATER....WITH YOUR SYSTEM U CAN ANTICIPATE THE TURN AND ENTER EARLY WITH MINMUM RISK... JUST A LITTLE EMOTIONAL RELEASE....THANK YOU
     
    #18     Nov 5, 2003
  9. kserra

    kserra

    No trades today spent most of the day doing other things along with some revision into the system.

    I played around with a few indicators and found that the ADX lags too much to be an accurate indicator as to the momentum. I found that simply watching the angle of the MAs is the best way to determine the momentum coupled with fibonacci retracements. So I am thinking something along the lines of watching the slope and then once my intial profit target has been obtained to move the stop to breakeven if the slope is great enough to do so. I will then continue to trail the stop until some sort of resistance is reached, at that point it depends on several things as to how I will take profits. If the moving averages continue to move up at the same rate they were moving before then it is likely that the trend will continue, therefore a stop one tick below the fib retracement of 38.2% will be placed, and profits will be allowed to run. If the moving averages begin to turn it is a sign that this resistance is significant and the trade should be exited as soon as possible. Attached is a chart with the trades that would have been taken today, all of this is hindsight, but it will demonstrate how the trades should be managed.
     
    #19     Nov 6, 2003
  10. Kap

    Kap

    The slope is a derivative of the time period, but i'm hinking you know that already.

    I must thank Sqwaukbox for an amazing long punt despite sentiment. I will be ordering a porsche cayenne on monday :)

    Regards<

    Kap
     
    #20     Nov 6, 2003