Hello: I have been looking at your chart, and I have read your first post. You say the right things. Unfortunately, at this point in your career, you lack discipline, patience and good judgement. You can obtain these things, but to do so you may need to take a step backward. In my estimation this is a good time for you to paper trade. Unlike the many "pretend" traders who post here you might benefit from pretending to trade IF you keep your focus and you know WHY you are doing it. In this instance, I think you need to papertrade (and keep good records) so that you can learn 1. To wait patiently for your signal to trade (to control your emotions) 2. To put on the postion 3. To wait patiently for your signal to exit 4. To evaluate your results Based on what I read, if you continue to act as you have, you will eventually blow up your account. I probably won't be checking back with you, but you can read some of my posts and make your own mind up, using the search function at the top of the home page. I wish you well. Steve
Steve, Thanks for the feedback. I agree with your general assessment. I also totally agree that Sim trading is vital to get a trading method finetuned to the market. In the process of developing the method over 9 months I sim traded extensively and had reasonable success. I was as cocky as anything when I went live in May, trading 1 or 2 contracts. I have had 1-2 day periods when I go back to sim trading to get some confidence back. But the psychological differences between sim trading and having real $$$ on the line are huge. I have strict & tightish stop losses - but its taking all signals and letting them run that is the real challenge I'm working on. So I feel less worried about ever blowing my account out - than endless zigzagging of the equity curve +/- a couple of $G. The frustation is that there is soooooo much opportunity.....I've been trying to complete the M.Douglas 20 trade exercise for a few months now. Anyway enough rambling....thanks Steve
Well maybe the public humiliation approach is workingâ¦.a much better day relative to recent âsignal takingâ performances Signals as per chart below: S1 â Taken at 14:37 - nice entry and pretty good exit using signal S2 â Still in S1 trade S3 â Took the signal at 15:17 â watched oil price and wimped out break even and then watched it go 2 pts+ - exit signal was at 15:42 S4 â Not taken â oil price watching again - waiting for signal and oil movement to align â stupid, just take signals period S5 â Taken the signal at 16:54 â stopped out on low at 17:02 S6 â Not taken â donât usually hold through news & wimped out S7 â Not taken â had a breakout bias â my signal was really defined by the oil price bounce of $64 â but at least I didnât watch QM this time S8 â Taken the signal at 20:01 â ok entry â exit on failure to break certain data levels â good decision â but didnât have a reversal signal Signals 5 out of 8 taken (inc S2) â Iâve never taken more than 50% of my signals â obviously the exits are still pretty poor â¦â¦. but there are so many points on offer I just have to be patient with myselfâ¦.and stop watching the QM chart
Sure TF S1 was 1.5pts S3 was b/e S5 was -0.8pts S8 was 0.3pts 1pt profit....and about 7 left on the table
Not my best day â a good news / bad news kind of day - entries pretty ok / exits total cock S1 (S) â Not taken â no real excuse S2 (L) â Nice entry on signal âat 15:08 (676.1) â exited 0.2 pts later rather than wait for exit signal 677.50 S3 (L) â Took the signal at 15:24 (676.9) â nice entry again â however, I donât normally through news (esp oil news) because it is usually a coin toss play â this time it went my way â but I was out b/e S4 (S) â Another nice entry at 15:40 (678.1) â this time I was freaked out by the NQ/YM continuing to tick up â oil price dropped and 1.5pt later my exit signal â I actually came out -0.1 pts - LOL S5 (L) â Not taken â not in good mood at this stage S6 (S) â Not taken â still in cooling off period â signals being triggered by oil gyrations around $64 S7 (L) â Not taken â still in cooling off period - signals being triggered by oil gyrations around $64 S8 (S) â nice entry at 18:20 (678.30) â was holding for my 676.2 target â almost exited at 677.50 as support held â walked away from desk for 4 mins so no temptation to watch oil price â then came back and watched it attempt $64 again â good exit at 677.30 on an exit signal (shock horror) â then it went on to hit my target S9 (S) â entry at 19:47 (676.8) â held for 4 minutes â saw resistance and b****y exited b/e â should have at least held for a test of 676.20 â 2+ b****y pts on that table S10 (L) â signal at 20:26 â but still in cooling off after the S9 exit â rally to close on vapours it looks like to me Entries - 5 out of 10 - not to shabby for me % wise Exits â worse than p**s poor â maybe I should just use a trailing stop and walk away from desk â but thatâs the cowardâs way out !! Signals â only thing keeping me sane Points today +1.1pts (not inc comms) Onwards and upwardsâ¦..as they say in football at least Iâm getting into the positions to scoreâ¦â¦â¦
Why don't you just take all of your signals? Isn't tht what you want to do? If so, I don't think documenting your excuses here will help to anything other than reinforce the bad habit of not taking your signals.
You are right of course - but going from 10-20% to 50% in three days is progress for me. There are no acceptable excuses - point taken. Thanks