sideshow and op i would check out mrci.com great website, free two wk trial. Only 400 a yr after that. just google and read eread read read. On a side note who in this forum is "self taught"
also on side note is anybody else selling premo on the spooz? Jesus I picked up 25 points on 1050 puts, that aint bad!!
You must plan your futures trades. I plan my trades either being a scalp, or a multi day/ longer term trade. If the scalp goes against me, I cut losses. For scalping, I don't believe the position I'm taking will be part of the larger trend, just move favorably for minutes or seconds. For multi day/ multi week trades, you need to be well capitalized. You honestly need 50k+ min to trade EMINIS longer term. You don't want a single bad trade or series to result in huge draw downs. That is how I manage risk.
trade the market, not the money. one factor that may assist is to pay attention to average true range for your preferred time frame, and if that number is greater than $400 when you convert the range to dollars, you'll need to be patient and wait for a more accomodative setup for that risk limit.
I appreciate everyone's input here and everything everyone has said has given me something to think about. I have greatly reduced my trading and gone back to a lot of "watching". Of course, i think that's wise given the current climate anyway. One big issue, I think, is the risk to reward ratio that I just wasn't clear enough on. I'm looking at that much more carefully now. As a result I'm doing very little right now, but I've stopped the bleeding. Good luck to everyone this week and in the weeks and months ahead. It's going to be a bumpy ride, but hopefully it will be uphill.
Lesson learned over time... Take profits... You don't go broke taking profits... add time factor to your risk / reward equation.
yes...spread trading would greatly reduce both your risk and the amount of capital put forward. Recently there was a NICE spread on Dec/March cotton, and just yesterday I sold the Dec/Feb lean hog spread...hoping it works as nice too. Margin requirements also much lower...it took me 425 per spread on the cotton one, 935 on the hogs....so return vs. margin is better than outright positions at times...and the risk is much lower.
I've started playing with spread trades a little bit in my sim account. Don't have my arms around it yet and have alot to learn. I'm spending a lot of time reading/watching about the broader market and trying to figure out what the heck's going on and where we're headed.
If your still counter trading... hedge and play the otherside too. Strangle the runaway risk with otm options, 10+ strikes outs. You should be able to absorb 3 strikes draw down and exit flat at no loss. If your counters exit you get all the profits plus the options.