Hi gurucandidate, thanks for your insight. I completely agree on what you said about target selection and hanging on to winners. To me it clearly is one of the weak points of my trading. I agree that target selection has to be done on a case by case basis and factors such as the identificaton of trend or range days are important (among many others). Good trading to you, LL
LL, I looked at your chart and commented on how my style of trading would have played that move in YM, now I don't know what the internals did or the overall picture of everything (what time frame that was when it happened etc...) and I wasn't playin the market today...if you liked my style or have any questions/comments lemme know, and I hope its beneficial, I am not tryin to sound like I have a perfect method or anything, just givin my insight and attemptin to be somewhat helpful
dubs07, thanks for posting the edited chart. The way you lowered the stop seems like a very useful strategy which I will try to integrate into my trading. The retracement you marked "1" would have been a perfect entry. The reason why I entered the trade earlier was that I was afraid to "miss the train". Don't worry, I really appreciate your comments and help. LL
Again I focused on selecting only high probability trades with a favorable risk/reward ratio. Therefore I took only 2 trades today. Trade management remains my biggest weakness. I am satisfied with both trade entries. Both trades were far in the green after only a few minutes. The main problem was again related to targets and stops. Trade 1 (long) was up 17 points at its maximum. I trailed the stop from my standard -15 points to -8 points. This new stop was slightly below a previous double bottom. Then the Dow came tumbling down and I got stopped out at -8 points. What had happened? DOUBLE TOP !!! Trade 2 (short) was a perfect entry and was closed (after only 73 seconds!) for a profit of 13 points. The Dow fell a further 35 points in the following minutes. What does this tell me? I stayed in the first trade too long and exited the second trade too soon. With better trade management this could have been a good day (example: closing the first trade +15 instead of -8 would have made a huge difference). Trade 1: -8 Trade 2: +13 Day: +5 Week: +20 Month: -25
oh and LL, what time frame do you normally trade in? like the 15 minute, 5 minute, 2 minute 1 minute... knowin this I think I can help you with entries and exits...
Hi dubs07, When trading I generally use the 1 minute chart. When looking for setups or trying to understand the "bigger picture" I also look at the 5 and 15 minute charts. Thanks for taking the time to comment on yesterday's charts. I will have a look at the edited charts after the close today. Good trading to you, LL