Definitely disagree with first sentence. Definitely agree with second sentence. I guess it depends on one's definition of scalper. I know guys who scalp ES for 2 ticks ( to me that seems impossible). I know guys who consider 2 handles a scalp (to me seems very viable).
One tick in ES is 0.25 cents which represents $12.5, one point in ES is 4 ticks. Is this correct? What is one handle?
I didnt say its impossible but most traders fail to scalp futures in a consistent manner, that is a fact.
a handle is the next big number. During a slow day it might be just one full point, on a larger scale, sitting here on a 19 handle (1920), a bear might be looking for that 18 handle (1899) and a bull could be looking for a 20 handle (2000 ob (or better)). But in the context it was used, yes, about one full point. It's just slang, you won't find it on the CME website.
Hey just saw this. One point =4 ticks=one handle = $50.00 Handle was a term that all of my old buddies from the SP pit used to use......
Again...it depends on your definition of a scalp. I know some big ES traders that scalp for 2-3 points and make a lot of money. With the liquidity in the ES one can make a fortune trading like this if they have a good strategy. Scalping for a 1-2 ticks to me sounds like a VERY tough game, unless you have a gigantic win%. How do you know it's a fact? What do you base this on ? I am not being a wiseass, just curious when people say that a trading strategy doesn't work and they say "that's a fact".
Know people in the business with access to tons of broker data and we have used it to parse and do data mining of our own. Take my word, most people suck in this business, and when it comes to index future trading, the results are even more catastrophic.
Couple years ago I knew a guy who sim traded on something other than Ninja or one of better sim software's. I told him you simple don't get filled on 100 lot first touch and often takes me 200-300 touches to get out at same price of my entire order and his response was I had a bad broker, but that's untrue. I tried to tell him to switch to better software several times, and that his 90% method was going to crash and burn. He went live and he refused to start at one lots and was wiped out in two weeks of $15,000. Never heard from him again. People believe what they want to believe. People who don't back test well enough are fools(I was one long ago) and people lie to themselves each day that if next door neighbor can do this, he can. Concentrating leads to rapid decline of proper thought processes and will cause stress which in turn weakens focus and loss of memory. To trade 200 times a day and still do well is like threading a needle on the moon from Earth. I never seen anyone do it for more than couple hours, it is eye to hand draining of energy. It is best IMO to have a Goal and work up to handful of hundred contracts and quit, walk away, enjoy. A $200 Goal per contract times 253 days of trading times 20 lot and you are million dollar trader.
I hear ya man. I don't have access to that kind of data. I talk to a handful of traders that have been doing it for a long time. Some of them are ES traders and do very very well. That being said they aren't scalpers that do 100 trades a day. They pick a spot and do very large size. But maybe 1-2 trades a day. Sitting there staring at an ES Dom can lead people to do a gazillion trades. I could see how a lot of people just get chopped up to death.
Great post, especially 2nd part. I have been on desks with guys who literally do that 200 trades a day thing. Threading a needle from the moon to earth seems a lot easier. At the end of the day they are emotionally shot and after costs down money. One guy at a firm I was with in 2002 traded YM's . He literally would traded from bell to bell. He must have done 200-300 trades a day. Was insane. The guy was out of his mind. Saw him destroy a few keyboards when he got clobbered. The firm loved him because he did a ton of commission. At the end of the day after costs he made squat. Another guy at the firm who went on to become probably one of the best futures traders on the planet would do the opposite. He would sit and wait for spots and do huge size. Put himself in spots where he had a big edge and pull the trigger. Maybe do like 2-3 trades a day. People sometimes don't realize that the less you trade can lead to huge money.