Do anyone of you know if there are any key differences between TF and the ES?? Not in terms of margin or liquidity, but in terms of maybe trending ability? or volatility? Any reasons why you prefer trading TF over ES?? Thanks
No expert, but TF has a broader daily range, more intraday volatility and a smaller tick size than ES. If your method or approach can trade either/or ~equally well and you're not moving truckloads, then TF is the better market.
ic.. thanks.. if my approach is more of a breakout, and trending approach, i suppose TF would offer more bang for my buck??
The devil is in the details. You can speak to a dozen different people and each will give you a different precondition, definition and confirmation of a breakout. So you will have to test your own against both markets, together with your protective exits, and judge for yourself.
For breakouts TF is better than ES, although the indices as a group are tough to breakout trade IMO. btw, TF can be a lot of trouble for the undisciplined, so be careful.
The price action difference are strongly shown when you compare their charts side by side during high volatility conditions and during low volatility conditions via live continuous streaming data...not via hindsight charts. Yes but you need to be faster in locking in those Emini TF profits in comparison to Emini ES. Regardless, just use your brokers simulator or place 1 contract real money trades in both...you'll be able to quickly answer any question you may have about the differences between the price action of Emini TF and Emini ES or any other trading instrument. You can also backtest your trade strategy on both to determine which one would have been more profitable...determining which one has the better bang for the buck as you mentioned. Thus, some strategies (especially volatility based methods) are more suitable for Emini TF than Emini ES...vice versa for other types of strategies. Mark
TF trends better and ES chops harder, but TF is very unforgiving while ES allows you to be more sloppy.
i traded TF before & switch to ES bout half yr ago, mainly because suffering slippage when i tried to upsize which was a problem i never thought before after trading TF for 2 yrs. for sure, TF range is larger than ES, you can easily grab 20-40ticks in a move while ES may only moves 10++ ticks. i guess its a tradeoff between range & liquidity. anyway, after few months, i feel more comfortable with ES as its easier for me to pinpoint an entry with 2-3 ticks risk than TF which i hardly get/'see' an entry opp with risk < 8 ticks. so if i risk 8-10ticks to grab 15-40ticks in TF before, i can risk 2-3ticks to grab 6-15ticks in ES. but yes, the difficulty level is higher, what to do, there's more pro in ES.
go here and check out the daily range of the TF!!!...last 2 days...this is the BEHOMOTH of Index trading...even more than the DAX perhaps... http://www.mypivots.com/dailynotes