Hey not even sure how to start this off but I began trading BTC since Dec 2019. I mainly trade BTC perpetual swaps and a leveraged negative correlated BEARUSDT token. I have been learning how to track my performance in excel, I'm still pretty basic at it mainly tracking my cumulative returns and total equity growth. Surprisingly I have been growing steady. But my issue is even though i have been growing I don't know my edge and why i have been growing. It seems to me too good to be true and I don't know how to improve my results. I feel like im waiting for an inevitable huge loss for the past 5 months. I will describe my trading method please tell me if there is any flaws you see or things i can improve or if really have an edge. I won't get into market conditions in terms of average price action in a range % or average volatile price % movements. BTC/BEAR move in negative correlated price action to each other. Usually nowadays the market has huge pumps or dumps followed by a ranging market. I usually trade in the 5 min and overview on 4hr, 1 day. both portfolios for BTC/BEAR are equal in terms of equity balance I charted out levels of importance on the 4hr and 5mins, creating a ranged space on 5min in between the pumps or dumps. I day trade both BTC/BEAR in these ranges. I have only have 1 indicator coupled with the charted levels that is Liquidation longs and shorts. Displays in millions in barchart format the liquidation levels. When large liquidations occur in the 5min range i take the opposite position. The flaw for me is the breakouts can kill the micro profits made range trading on the 5 min. So average up or down. I trade with small amount of capital for the 5 min ranges then with huge breakouts coupled with massive liquidations (average lately 20-40mill liquidated) I top up on the position i took by adding 3x more e.g trade with 100$ in range, breakout top up 300$ on the high of new range and huge liquid event now im back near the top of new range if breaks out again top up 600$ vice versa until i gain average range %. The mentality for me is that i dont know truly where the market will go so i range trade until it breaks out average out my price and continue to trade i exit at a healthy profit (average 1-3% depend market conditions) and reset to 100$ and range until a new breakout occurs. I havent lost a single trade doing this yet but i don't understand why i havent felt any lose and just average small gains accumulated through my 5 months. I know the flaw is needing to top up more and higher risk as i add more equity so i always make sure to be liquid in my set up now i can be wrong 3-5 times in a row with huge spikes and still gain a profit in the range. I feel lonely to be honest nobody i know is interested in trading and my friends seem bored when i even talk about it as it doesnt really click with them. I'd really like to meet real experienced traders and be friends and discuss. I don't know if im doing it right or what i should be fixing or if i even have an edge. I found this place online seems better than reddit.
So you are coming here to ask strangers for free advice and mentoring. you are your best psychiatrist or mentor or coach because only you know yourself the best. I don't what you trade or your background, age or who you are. so any advice may not apply to your particular situation or stage you are in this activity. or game. When I first started in this game more than 18 years ago, I spent $400 in investment books and they didn't help in my trading or investing. and even paid $100 for a trading spreadsheet. And most of avoid people who are not 'positive traders' I assume you are not a positive trader? statistically , at least 80% of retail traders and investor are negative in the long run. Can you believe 1999 was 21 years ago? and nasdaq was 5000 nasdaq is at 9000 so twenty years ,it's is only 100% return? and many of the stocks in the nasdaq 100 is no longer in the index or replaced. think about it. so the macro market return is just barely beating inflation for long term investors of the index funds. this is reason 50% of portfolio is in bonds and T-bills that pay some cash returns. Rules: never average down no more than 70% leverage stops on all trade maximum 3% loss per trade no afterhours position if loss Enter your last 100 trades and you will get your expectancy. It's a free spreadsheet. I made it myself for myself http://www.marketcentral.ca/expectancy/traderecord.xlsx
thank you for the reply, i appreciate the excel file and i will take a look at it. I appreciate the advice about the marco picture, i agree i don't trade marco. Thanks again
Yes we give out advices freely here on ET, just that since they are free you know what they are worth. As for OP asking advice, I think not. OP was kind enough to share his winning method. He was just wondering why making money trading BTC was so easy? My advice to OP: keep doing what you are doing, keep making money until you stop making money just make sure you keep taking money off the table. In the meant time as @high-performance suggested, read up on the fundamentals of your instrument to see why you are so profitable. You have a problem everyone on ET including me loves to have. I make a living trading options. I thought it was my skills that sustained me all these years. I finally realized this year I shouldn't confuse the bull market with my skills. Welcome to ET and good luck.
So you had never hit a situation where you ran out of funds to double/triple up? What will you do in that situation, HODL?
Liked reading your response, That's why i asked this Q because its so hard to find free data on performance, None of the free sites support my Broker for them and near impossible for me to put the data in manually myself. So Thats why i wrote onto to here I'd like to discuss about performance measures. And BTC isn't easy but no financial instrument is (sadly haha). I just started in Dec and im a student so im broke but i trade in relevance to my account size while topping up. My problem is scaling, i can earn consistantly in measures of 11% total equity on average with home runs when scaled to on average 85% Te. but those 85% scaled up trades are rare. So on average my total equity grows 2-3% per month. So scaling is an issue. and i know thats somehow tied to my performance thats where i need guidance. Ill keep the money off the table part in mind. BTC also has options but i never trade i read into options trading its basic fundamentals i found not bad to learn but with no $ for programs that show such insightful data and my risk tolerance i gave up quickly. Hope you reasses the environment in these times and find your balance, thanks for your response.
That's my concern and why i need to become more precise in my performance tracking. I said enough about my method I came here looking for management advice haha. but short summary i dividied my equity in a way i can withstand 3-4 spikes if my equity is at 100%, leverage 3-5x (liquidation price is still 33-20% away so im safe. Rarely do i need to leverage but my highest so far is 2x. If that fails i bring my trading pairs equity from BEARUSD and other smaller accounts to lower down my leverage as far as possible and get out with a eased loss. But i never got that far (yet). haha i do hodl for BNB and MCO im a big believer in digital service tokens, isnt that what crypto is all about bringing in as many people as possible but these positions last max 2 days usually.
@high-performance is absolutely right on this. If you don't know where you are, how can you go where you want to go? Precise tracking will tell you if you really have an edge or just lucky like me. It will also allow you to practice risk management, e.g. practice Kelly.
No kidding. For us retails it is very very very hard to make a living trading. Furthermore we often overestimated our skills and underestimated how luck/probability played a big part in our successes. 2020 is a rude awakening for some of us genius traders. And we thought 2018 year end was tough.