I've thought about this ever since my CANSLIM days back in the 90s, and it seems to me -- since some people pick up on it easily and even retire after a year or so and some never get it at all -- that it all comes down to fear. If you're afraid of being wrong and you're afraid of losing money, then even an automated strategy isn't going to work for you. I do have some exercises to help assuage or even eliminate fear, but many beginners are simply paralyzed by it, and that is not something that can be solved on a message board. My advice to those who just can't get over it is to find something else to do. Otherwise the end result will be no different than that of any addiction.
One is learning how to scratch, but you saw how little to no good that does unless and until the trader has characterized his market, collected his metrics, and written his plan. These have to be done. They can't be skipped by choosing a different bar interval or plotting MAs or using Ichimoku clouds.
I'm just looking for clarity for my own sake here, so please do not take me for a critic. Wasn't a premise of the SLA threads that this work had largely been done for the trader in the very first post of the SLA? When you say a trader must have "characterized his market, collected his metrics," it sounds unnecessarily complicated to me given the simplicity of the trading plan you posted several times with just three charts, which as I understand them, instruct one to 1) identify the trend, 2) identify where price is in relation to the trend, 3) use intraday trend line breaks to signal possible entry, enter on retrace of break, trail stop at 50% from last swing point. For example, this chart you posted seems very clear to me. Am I wrong in thinking that your three charts constitute a visual representation of a viable trading plan?
Yes. However, if the trader is afraid to take the trade, or to stay in it if and when he's entered it, then he pretty much has to start over in order to trust whatever he comes up with. Something like four thousand people have read the SLA/AMT pdf I put together. I have no idea how many are successful with it.
So the SLA threads essentially provide and demonstrate a tested trading plan that has been developed as a result of your grunt work. However, if due to fear of loss, or the inability to trust the plan, or both, the trader is unable to trade the plan successfully, that would necessitate that the individual go "back to the drawing board" on his own in order to come up with something he can trust because it is based on his own observations, not yours. Do I understand you correctly? I have seen numerous SLA journals opened here at ET. I've not read any of them beyond a few posts. Are there any you would consider as having demonstrated success with the method?
There are five journals begun by me, trying to make it simpler and simpler with each new journal. Altogether they amount to around 5000 posts and, no, I wouldn't recommend that anybody drag themselves through that. There are also several journals begun by people who thought the SLA seemed like a good idea but had little to no success with it. They are working on variations that I really don't understand, so I don't comment on their work. Those who get it get it fairly quickly. One guy got it in about eight months and retired in thirteen. But then he wasn't afraid to lose nor was he afraid of being wrong. Others post charts without ever having participated before or having asked for any help -- at least from me -- and their charts illustrate the approach perfectly. Again, the central difference, other than minimum intelligence, is fear, or rather fearlessness. So if an individual can't find success with it, he may borrow some ideas from it and try to create something of his own, but that has nothing to do with me. If he can't make it work due to his fears, there's little I can do about that since this is a trading strategy, not therapy. And, again, if he prefers to create something of his own, whether using the SLA as its basis or not, he does yes have to start over with observing. I should also point out, given the discussion of "proofs" that is ongoing elsewhere, that the interested trader can determine for himself in a week whether or not there's anything to this. If his results are promising, then he ought to give it more time. If he's not happy with it, then he can move on to something else without having lost anything other than a week.
I come in peace. I hope you don't think I am in any way angling for proof of anything from you or anyone else. I could not care any less than I do about your trading or anyone else's (the internet is a strange place where anonymous strangers make demands upon other anonymous strangers that they would blush to make upon their best friends). My interest is simply that I myself trade similarly to the way you outline in your SLA journals. It is simple, straightforward, and easily understood (one would assume, anyway). And to be frank, I cannot understand the ire that you and your journals have provoked amongst people who I suspect are sane in their real lives but look rather unhinged as far as their internet personae go. I guess some people get enjoyment from putting others down, or by placing doubt in the minds of those who might otherwise be helped.
I don't think you're angling for proof of anything, but, if you've been following along, you've run across the same old same old. It gets tiresome. If you're trading in much the same way and finding success with it, that's good. May that success continue.
DB, looking back at the 2009 Trend channel, price ignored the oversold level and broke out of the channel at point A. Do you now move the upper limit of the trend channel to the last high made around 4110 or does the original channel remain and you consider all action above the channel to be overbought_ Also, do you consider the upper limit as potential support zone? as with ordinary S&R Levels?