" But I still maintain that the way the funding companies are set up, all new traders should STAY AWAY from them in the early stages of their trading careers, " And the crux of the matter is that exactly is the target market for these companies. Hence many raise an eybrow on the business model based on hamster wheel...aspect But greed in us says I can afford 200-300 to loose just to try my hand at it .. so what is wrong in this.. but when thousands think like that who benefits? not the individual but the business. If one has to test his her skills why not have same strict rules on a demo + add some slippage and test yourselves Those who ae already very good go with perhaps First loss type of funding without any of this "Test" BS
The current advertiser in this section of ET is E2Trade. They have a two month program. I have not tried it, but the two months out the gate seems like they have things set up with the bigger picture in mind. I agree that all of us think "I am the exception" and we jump in. Who doesn't want the ability to trade "15 contracts" for example? The demo idea is good, but I think the micros now fill this void - with the added benefit of having real money on the line.
Negative. You are lost on the scale of the problem. Remember, the minis and micros move exactly the same. Your concerns about slippage (mentioned earlier IIRC) are unwarranted. How many times do I have to bang on about this... MNQ and NQ are exactly the same thing. (And the others of course, like YM and MYM). The only difference is size and scale. They are separate instruments, but they are both exactly equal.
Overnight, I am lost about what you are referring to - "the scale of the problem." Please explain again. I think we are actually closer to agreeing than you think, but first check these out: Below is the YM on 8/28 at 9:02 am NY time. Time and sales confirms that the high on this candle is 749. Please verify. Below is the MYM on 8/28 at 9:02 am NY time. Time and sales confirms that the high on this candle is 747. Please verify. There are many such examples. I have seen the biggest disparities at market openings. And I thought I have seen the spread during normal trading hours often to be 2 ticks for the MNQ and MYM vs the normal 1 tick for the NQ and YM. I will have to double check now that you are banging on the table about it! These micros are new, but the volume is already very high. I don't doubt that they will become exactly equal in movement, but for now MY OBSERVATION is that they are not yet exact. But even if they are exact, one of my points is that I CAN'T SCALP THE MICROS because the RT fees are TWICE that of their E-mini big brothers ($.80 for 1/10 vs $4.00 for full). So I am using this opportunity to learn how to take bigger tick-sized trades by holding on in trends longer than I have in the past. (And using a 40 tick emergency stop vs my old 30 tick max stop for NQ and YM.) My micro account is over $1000 now, and relatively speaking this is like a $10,000 E-mini account. With $10,000 I might have tried to trade 3 or 4 E-mini contracts. But I now see by going through this exercise that 2 should be my max E-mini trade size IF I ever actually get to $10,000. Please write back, because I want to understand what you are saying. Thanks.
If a futures contract notional value is bigger than my liquidity I will not trade it. This is it. Emicros are great as I can finally trade equity indexes along with micro gold. I would suggest forgetting about micro futures if account is below $20,000. A good business plan can be built around this.
As a discretionary trader, this is a tough question for me to answer. Are you talking about my favorite setups? But if you are asking for a crystalization of my methodology, I would say I am A well-trained momentum scalper looking at the fast chart An intermediate market delta trader looking at the intermediate chart A beginning volume profile trader looking at the bigger picture. On all time frames I use fixed S & R levels, moving averages, and trend lines. And I try to watch the market speedometer as represented by the internals Vix, DJIUp/Dn, NYSE Tick, and Trin. For many years, my overarching trading philosophy has mainly been that of "reversion to the mean." Seeing that most moves reverse, I have looked to fade most directional moves. I have been the King of the Contrarians! And it has worked very well for me - except when it hasn't. As you know, sometimes the market just goes and goes and goes. Up until recently I have failed miserably when strong trends set in. And by "miserably," I mean the nuclear account-killing variety of miserable! It was John Maynard Keynes who said "The market can stay irrational long than you can stay solvent." He must have been looking at my account when he made that astute observation. Only recently have I begun to open my mind enough to fix this huge deficit in my trading ability. With the generous help of some excellent traders in a chat room I actually started for OneUp's funded traders (long story - another post- no longer affiliated with OneUp), I have finally had the epiphany needed to help me stop fighting these account-killing moves and actually go with the trends. I have watched in disbelief over and over again as these guys have been buying the highs on bull days and selling the lows on bear days. And they call their targets way in advance. I will call these trades "Expansion Seeking Value." (I will do several posts about this value seeking methodology in the future.) In this new light, I am happy to report that just two weeks ago I finally forced myself to suppress my uber-contrarian thinking, and I actually took a long at the high of the day (HOD). It felt like I was back in 5th grade at that pool party where I was the very last one in my class to have the courage to dive off the diving board head first. (I survived the dive.) The trade was stressful but I came out the other side with a profit! Yahoo! I have tried it several more times since then when the conditions have appeared. I think the mental barrier is finally broken. I now need hundreds of these "expansion" trades under my belt before I can call them my own. I will give more specifics on each "time frame" I use in another post (time frame is in quotes because I mainly use range bars). Time to Labor around my house on this Labor Day! No trading today because the markets will be thin and dangerous.
Please clarify. Did you mean forget about micros below $20k or forget abot the regular E-minis below $20k?
Average true range (20 days, SMA) on ES futures is 58 (Volatility). Twice that is 116 (my stop loss; if I buy at 2900 I exit at 2900-116=2784). Multiply that by $5 (MICRO E-MINI S&P 500 multiplier) is $580. That is ~3% of a $20.000 account. I wish my unit of risk was 1.5% but I would require $40.000 account for that.
Sorry to interrupt. But if there are new traders here please print the quote out below (I did). Remember to correctly trade you ALSO need a belt with these suspenders, by setting a daily loss limit with your broker for one of those real bad days or at least a hedge to lighten up the exposure. Folks! this is leverage and the Micros can can indeed cause you to start off with less cash compared to the Emini to correctly get the yield on it that you desire. But it is still a lot of cash for the Micros. I myself am using just $6,500.00 in my future Journal (I am waiting for funding) which is really pushing it. I will be trading one Micro for a long time and if I have an edge maybe next year I will be closer to "not gambling". When gambling in Blackjack you need to play Blackjack correctly or you can choose to play Roulette and put it all on red. ES Have you voted? Is trading Gambling or not .."What say You" Vote here.