I don't understand how you miss all these signals if they were going to be profitable? If I noticed I missed any signals that were going to be profitable yesterday, I definately wouldn't be missing any today.. I don't think I Ever missed a signal though unless I wasn't looking at the computer screen. A signal to me is like a message from god "Money has arrived, please take" How can you possiblly miss this?
Dan, The move from 1min to 5min seems to be a transition most people make. I loved 1min initially because there were some many signals and it felt safer to have too many rather than too few. But then you realise the risk/reward stinks unless you can truly scalp efficiently and you gravitate to quality rewards over quantity. Cheers
Coolweb, You are right of course. But I'm an atheist so the messages are not as clear for me as for you No seriously I know I need to act decisively, but I was doing ok 2-3 weeks ago so what has changed. I may just need to take a step back and get some confidence & timing back before moving forward again. Cheers
jessop, why are you treating yourself this way? does it have something to do with your quick success in other fields? trading is different you know... of course the market has to offer a lot on some days - but to believe you can have it all EVERY day is not so good i think. why don't you try and only trade the first two hours for example? these are the best hours anyway on most days. your results so far are pretty good - you made money almost every day - so you have some good reasons to pat yourself on the back i'd say. talking about the "missed" signals - take it step by step. even more if you say that you have some work to do beside trading. if you move on like this you will see progress - no doubt. good luck!
Hi Gerry, Sometimes it is a case of you canât see the wood for the treesâ¦...your post is spot onâ¦â¦...Iâm focusing on the negative rather than the positive. Iâve decided that the journal has served its purpose and the self flagellation is now getting counter productive. However, the posts from a few of the guys last night along the same lines got me thinking about why Iâve retreated back into fearful trading again. I think that by taking the new IT contract, my subconscious is questioning my commitment and concluding that Iâm just comfortable to be a hobby trader. This mindset has crept up on me and now its time to take this seriously again because I want to trade for a living. So Iâve decided the journal ends tonight and I will start a new ER2 Traders thread for limited eod comments & banter only, without the âwhy didnât I take all 99 signals perfectlyâ moaning. Thanks for the feedback.
Hi coolweb, I know lots of traders that miss trade signals while staring at their computer screen for any of the following reasons: * Their charting program is setup in a way its not efficient for their trade methodology making it difficult to see the signals as they occur in realtime. * They haven't determine what are the precursors sort'uv speak that would alert them that there's a good chance a trade signal could soon appear... Precursors = Hints * Not being focused at the right time when most of their trade signals do appear... Example...if most of your signals appear between 0945am - 1100am est... It's not a good time to be posting messages at ET, making breakfast, looking at charts that you don't trade nor to be doing anything that's a distraction. The key is to know that time zone window when your trade signals tend to appear. * Still learning the strategy and therefore will have difficulty in seeing the signals as the occur. * Not mentally prepared to trade or mentally exhausted (good night rest usually fixes this). Any of the above reasons is why backtesting results (hindsight analysis) will never give a trader good insight into what the results of their realtime/real money trading will be when comparing actual numbers... The only thing backtesting can do is tell a trader if there's an edge. Real trading will determine if you have the ability to exploit that edge or determine how much the edge will produce in profits. Sorry about the backtesting plug-in but there's someone (not you) in this thread that's having difficulty in understanding why their real money trading doesn't add up to the results of their backtesting results and its getting them down a little bit... They think there's something wrong with their strategy when in reality it's one of the reasons I stated above. NihabaAshi
Well time to call it quits in turns of journal writing. I need to concentrate on the basics and not flogging myself over every missed signal. Going back to 5mins today felt good and it resulted in a few nice entries: S1-S3 â at work S4 â nice entry and exit S5 â nice entry â wanted to enter in 20:20 bar - exit a little too early (a few points left on the table) See blotter for details⦠Many thanks for all those posters who have made the journal certainly rewarding from my end. I will still be posting on a ER2 Traders thread elsewhere with any fellow ER2 groupies. I'll start something this week and see if there is any interest. Cheers Jessop
I like nihas post, Espically the hints parts, I totally agree, actually I believe you explained it to me before Now I usually know ahead of time (a day) when its best time to act, and when its time to do nothing, Need to know to make money!