I was wondering how many trades do you guys average per day when scalping futures? how many ticks per trade on winners/lossers?
===================== eUS trader; Probably call what i do more intraday swing trading with charts; below 50, even when ES is below 50 dma like it is now. Usually get more than $50.00 US dollars[4 ticks,ES] but will take 4 ticks occasionaly, especially when ES emini is in a mini sideways trend. How about yourself????. When I did trade ER2 [Eurex -US contract equivelent also ]; would NOT try for small targets , too noisy , for me anyway.
Well Im just learning how to scalp at the NQ {I like the 5$ tick much better than the 12.5$ ticks at ES} been at it for a week, I got to +$100 today for the first time. Most of the day I go taking 1-3 ticks, same on winners and lossers. But I hit a few 6-8 tickers... I usually cut my profits around 30-40$ on the big winners, but some times I reenter the position right away and get 2 or 3 of those in a row, or I can hit one long and one short right after each other, but I´ve only gotten a few of those so far. Im doing around about 50 trades per hour, but I usually cant trade for the whole session as I have to attend other matters in the office... I do my trading mostly to research new trading styles in order to teach em to the other guys in the firm. I got interested in scalping after one guy started making constant money scalping NYSE. Other guys started to ask me how to do it... so I watch him for some time learned the basic idea and then started to do the same, initially on QQQ and a few days ago in NQ. Today for the first time I traded without level 2. Just watching the tape... I found that it was a lot less stressing, it made it easier to feel the flow of the market.
Interesting thread as I am seriously debating no longer attempting to scalp ER2, YM, and EMD atleast not for 4-5 ticks because the sheer noise requires that I run an unbalanced stop loss of anywhere from 8 ticks to as many as 16-20 ticks. So to answer you question, depending on the set up I am employing, I am working on a new one, anywhere from 4-10 ticks reward.
well yeah, and Im trying to increase that number to at least 2 trades per minute. Is gonna take me sometime but that´s my goal.
OK. Since you are obviously a real scalper in the true sense of the term, I'd like to ask... 1) Do you use charts? If so tick charts I presume? My guess is you use price action only, no charts. 2) What execution platform do you use? While Im not a scalper, I do scalp trades daily. But the platforms I've used wouldn't be appropriate for that pace of trading. 3) Do you use a DOM interface? I'd imagine you populate desired price levels on both sides and wait for execution? I can't imagine you wait for price or other types of setups... you'd have no time to spot them and then execute. Thanks, Osorico
I have found that a profit target smaller than 10 ticks on the NQ or YM is too small and it will cost you a fortune in commissions. I started super scalping in the beginning and won a fair percentage of the time, but my commissions were more that my profits by comparison. I realized I need to slow it down and develop a system with a 2-1 r/r minimum and a 10 (tick) stop. My commissions are now half of what they were then , and my profits have double by comparison. I am not attempting to dissuade you from your choice, but merely giving my perspective as it seems you are starting like I did 2 years ago.. Monaco Edit: (tick) on NQ & YM P.S. 1 point (handle) ES is equal to (roughly) 10 YM (ticks)
I dont consider myself a scalper just yet... but Im trying to become one. I´ve been using charts, one minute, but I look at them less and less every day... today I only open them for about an hour... Im using swift´s platform. I trade prop. I do have a level two but Im more inclined to using time and sales, reading the tape... lvl 2 has too much bs. As for commisions, they are a problem. But im only paying $0.14 excecution per trade, no matter how many contracts/shares. I also have very cheap clearing, since there´s no SEC fees on CME then I only worry about gateway fees. With this cost structure I can scalp for very few ticks and still come out possitive at the end of the day.