All TA, at its fundamental level, is pattern recognition IMO. The devil is in the details of how you recognize and act on those patterns. Whether one uses a checklist (as you do) or there is a gut-feel element ("I have seen this pattern before, and the result was wonderful/very bad.") depends on, I think, the personality type of the trader. That is, does it fit your belief system? (Mark Douglas?, someone else?) BWDIK.
Mr. Bob, I would offer that there is another paradigm, what might be roughly described as a dynamical model. Not a physical model, for the markets are not physical and are not constrained by the dynamic and causal limitations of physicality, but a quantitative model of price and volume behavior. An empirically based model with no theoretical underpinnings. Just "this happens, then that happens, then this other thing occurs," facilitating the next event in an endless progression. Constrained enough to be predictable for short durations only. Causal only in the loosest sense. But this is Tonbo-Tohbo's thread, and I bid you adieu, with apologies for the excursion.
Great week NoD ... congratulations! I was curious (once again ) ... were your B/E stops from yesterday generally quickly hit, or were they "re-set" stops after price moved a certain amount in your favor then came back to nick you out? If the former, I'm interested in what you saw that spooked you out quickly (and smartly). Pointing back to Thursday's trade, what happened to the 5-pt stops all of a sudden?? (I realize stops are tailored to each trade, but nothing close?) Interestingly, yesterday I had 2 trades very similar to your 1st 2: 1) shorted 13.25 in the 1st bar, after the initial upsurge quickly reversed (out after 4 ticks, don't remember why); and 2) got back in short on the 3rd bar, then like a jackass held through the shakeout (was prepared to scale around 20-21.00) but jumped off only a few ticks back in the green after re-considering the earlier strength and upside surprise on employment. Kudos to you for grabbing handles as opposed to (my noob-like) ticks. I did manage to get long (multi-entry) in the LOD bar, but was fully expecting a test of 5-day lows so I didn't hang on as long as I should've. Closed up shop after that, comfortable with the week's profits.
I'm doing my best to trade pure pattern recognition, because I still allow myself to form opinions based on news and fundamentals which keeps me out of excellent trades because I form an opinion such as "ANF is the most overvalued clothing retailer and should drop back into the $20's", which kept me trading it always to the short side and missing the nice long moves whenever the shorts were getting squeezed. I use overbought/oversold conditions to guide my belief in overall direction (daily chart) and my entries and exits intraday.
Thanks, tomahawk. That 5 pt stop trade I did was based on previous action near highs. It was a "woman's intuition" trade I was quite surprised when it showed so much additional strength and came so close to my stop, but that was the price I was willing to pay to avoid trying to time perfectly a highly likely pullback of several pts. I gave some thought to that trade and how, had the wider stop been hit, chances are price would've then turned in my favor quickly without me, setting a very poor tone for the day. So yesterday I decided to be more conservative. My b/e trades started with 3 pt stops, then moved to b/e after moves in my favor. I'm pretty sure I had $70-$110 profit showing on all of them at some point before they reversed to stop me out. This was the frustrating part. I saw the profit and wanted to grab it, yet also wanted to be in the trade in case it moved further. 2 cars would've resolved that issue.
Gabfly1 Registered: Nov 2009 Posts: 55 12-05-09 11:50 AM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Quote from bighog: ...Ok, second lets say we booked some small or decent profits, we are feeling good but know full well there are MORE. The question arises then................do we want to go for more but risk what we have and lose that GOOD feeling? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This looks like a job for scaling out. ................................................... You are totally and completly wrong. It is about reentering another trade for fear of giving back profits ALREADY BOOKED. Do yourself a big favor and do not take a single line out of context and use it to stroke your own ego. PS: i come to this thread in hoping to help Nod, not debate what others think. I know what i have done for 25 or so years and do not need debate from rookies.
Probably similar to what kept me in trade #2 on Friday (minus the "women's intuition" part). Actually, the Thursday and Friday opening setups/outcomes were fairly similar. Thanks for the answer. Good for you on the disciplne in not taking the quick ticks AND in honoring your B/E stops (training yourself for bigger gains in the future).
25 years. How wonderful for you and your own ego. You referred to courage ( actually, "COURAGE") in your earlier post to which I had responded. Courage is a wonderful thing, and I think it suits heroes very well on their path to glory. The star can shine very bright if not necessarily for very long. Conversely, predators typically don't like too much excitement and seldom put too much of their own skin on the line as they catch their daily fast food. They are not known so much for their courage as they are for their survival. Please tap into your glorious 25 years and answer me this: What is wrong with scaling out? Why is all-or-nothing better in an environment of uncertainty?