I once had a three month stretch without a losing day. I thought that I was a god. The ex wife thought otherwise. So now I'm the devil with a good winning streak!
I don't think that a three month stretch makes one a consistent trader but all that's really important is that if one does that, one is happy with the result whether the gain was $1,000 or $100,000. All you have to do is perform adequately ... unless you're in bed.
You've been trading 4 years huh. Take a coin and flip it 48 times. You're bound to land heads 3 consecutive times sometimes. My mom has been swing trading for 3 months too. She's up 100% with no leverage. Can she trade? Hell no.
Have you ever seen the overnight swings in ES? You best have a big account that will allow a lot of room for stop placement without hurting your account. At least 20 pts.
Cash do not let these âhatersâ get you down (such as MAV88 ,saliva, spindr0). They donât like the fact you are improving your trading and starting to make good money now.
Well, in all reality, last year was a swing trader's dream market too. Just about all market periods allow viable swing trade action regardless. It's more of a mindset than technical nuts & bolts. FX markets offer +200 pip to +400 pip moves in the major pairs several times per month on average. A retail trader only needs to catch one of those, that's it. The ES offers +20pt and NQ +50pt swing moves couple times to several times per week, week after week thru all market conditions. The key to consistently successful swing trading is patience for the right setups. Above all else, targeting the first pullback following direction change is the high-odds setup for all markets in all conditions, period. Also, swing traders take advantage of gaps in their favor, whereas pure day traders usually miss out on gap moves overnight. Most gaps occur in the middle of swing = trend moves, very seldom at the turns. Gaps that happen at the turns tend to fill as pullbacks. Lastly, swing traders can trade spreads (pairs) without stops or great concern for blow-out losses. Long NQ / Short ES off expected lows can position for huge gains in an uptrend with hedged loss potential. Opposite is true in a downtrend... NQ tends to overshoot ES both ways. Short front-month commodities and long the same market's back-month contracts takes advantage of frothy peaks and troughs. When grains went insane last year, shorting the front and buying the back of beans, corn, wheat hedged = muted further upside risk to shorts while holding positions in the overheated front-month contract. Same was true for crude oil, natty gas, copper, etc. I'm a day-trader and no plans to cease that any time soon. But I have made the decision to add swing trades in FX and either directional or spread swing trades in commodities, too. Just like the prop guys who run several different strategies, a swing trader can monitor numerous positions off 15min to 60min charts with ease. Spread trades have the bonus of lowest margin requirements of all and least downside risk of loss. Not eliminated, but greatest controlled... hence the lowest margins required. A small-account trader would probably have best possible chance for success either spreading grain complex futures or mini-size FX contracts. Spreading soybeans with expected directional bias against corn as the hedge or GBPUSD with expected direction against EURUSD are two pairs that profit from more dynamic symbol when right, greatly limit net loss when wrong versus outright longs or shorts. * Swing trading ain't free money... but it sure beats micro-scalping the ES for $3.50 per contract profits on averaged turn, imo.
also swing traders can trade any stock, low volume to the big movers with ease and not worry about the crazy volatility on an intraday basis. Thats why so many day traders only trade NYSE stocks. Day trading is more pychological too, more than any type of trading because your trying to read the specialist, and other market players. Swing trading is more like: 1. wait for setup 2. take trade 3. set stops 4. lean back in your chair and watch your trade make money 5. Adjust stops, targets as needed.
Wrong! I'm not a hater. I certainly do not disparage successful swingers. What I cannot stand are the closed-minded bleepers who have only four years under their belt but think they're smart enough to make tall statement like "Make no mistake...Swing Trading is where its at..." because they happened to be profitable for only the last three months. Some people have been trading five times as much and they consistently make money on a daily basis. But you know what? You wouldn't see us day laborers bash on our fellow swingers with a crap like "oh, swing trading is so damn inferior to day trading!" Not too long ago before all this financial mess reared its ugly head, I had to put up with the same idiotic BS from the students of the buy-and-hold-till-you-drop-dead school. Well, ya don't need me to believe what happened to them. They've dropped dead. The moral is you shouldn't say crap that will come back to haunt you later.
Hey Saliva, Maybe take you off the hate hate hate list.:eek: But you do miss the point Cash is making. Instead of watching the markets all day trying to catch a few ticks here or there the âswingersâ are holding for a longer timeframe to catch points. Cash looks at certain points of both methods and is trying to decide which method is best. With Cashâs limited trading capital and slower trading platform (relative to other faster platforms) the âswingersâ strategy works best for him. YES -------you and others BASH him about his trading style. No --------you and others do not point out where he might be right or wrong.