Anyone who offers education to the public... fee based or FREE of charge needs to post a CFTC disclaimer by CFTC law. Unless every person who accesses every bit of information on ny site was able to fill trades exactly to the tick with no variance, it is considered hypothetical by CFTC ruling. So that's that part. As for this year's or any other year's "performance", no one in this industry does that. Not the guys who purportedly made millions in 2008 - 2009 scalping ES, not the guys making prophetic market calls in the ES Journal here or anyone in between. When the fee-based vendors and the market-call, paper-trade message board crowd all dare to post their cumulative results, I'll step right into that line. Meanwhile, if the other guy called out or even you yourself wish to post up here for a week, month or whatever, I'm good with that too. We can begin with yesterday, or start today, or whatever works for you. Let me know where & when your real-time trades blotter is posted and mine will follow suit, with no mistaking it for anything other than real-trade proof results
There is a question here that probably has no specific answer: How does your 58% W/L ratio mathematically influence your per trade risk? .. (in your case, 4.7%). You could run into 4 losing trades first out of 10 before 6 in a row.. or... 8 losing trades (which your risk may not allow) before 12 wins in a row. The real question may be how many consecutive losing trades is possible..?
Interesting thread. The usual breadth of responses, as is to be expected at ET. I hardly ever chime in these days but leverage is a worthwhile topic so I thought I'd add my tupence worth. To my mind, and many others that also play this game professionally, there is only one instance when leverage should be really ramped up. That is when a prolonged, high momentum, unidirectional move is underway. If you have the skill and experience to be able to read these moves then pyramiding positions is valid. Those with the skills required to use this technique will be capable of accurately identifying the correct entry locations for each new position. These occur at the support levels (if an upwards move) or resistance levels (if a downwards move) which are created by the move as it progresses. The one proviso to using this technique is that you MUST ensure your stop are adjusted frequently to tuck up tightly behind these support/resistance levels as they are formed. If you can read the end of the move coming then you can exit cleanly and reverse bias. However, if you fail to read the end of the move then you can be in trouble. The reaction is almost always violent as there are a sea of exit orders just waiting to cascade. You need to make sure that your order is near the front of that execution queue. Yes, you are going to get slipped but by managing your stops carefully you will keep the slippage to a minimum, and the slippage will be insignificant compared to the profits yielded by pyramiding. If used correctly, when these moves unfold, this technique is capable to generating the vast majority of your week's take home.
Thanks for the reply Rashid, its pretty straight forward. I allow $2400.00 capital to trade 1 contract, that gives me about $1780.00 (16 losing trades) of drawdown liquidity available before I can no longer trade 1 contract. on the strength of past results I doubt I will ever be getting anywhere near that. The largest drawdown I have had up to now is $234.00. The reason I use $2400.00 as my per contract number is to take away the mental worry of drawdown. Interesting to hear the 8 losses in a row comment, and a good question, takes me back to when I was totally confused with everything. If your method of trading is likely to give you 8 losses in a row, then it is best to completely review your method because you are just gambling / hoping that you are picking winners. When I enter a trade I enter it knowing that the odds are in my favor 6 out of 10 times because thats my method. When you have a method that you are confident with you will know what I mean. I dont know how you guys take profit out of your accounts, but I simply rake off anything in excess of the $2400.00 per contract at the end of the day, I plot that into my journal. If it is below $2400.00 at the end of the session I dont rake off, and I cannot rake off until the day ends up above $2400.00 again. That was always something that bugged me as a novice, how and when I take my pay for my work
Second day to greatness!. Took profits too soon on the second trade. Bad. Shooting for 3 points per week minimum to accomplish plan. May trade mornings only, will add afternoons if necessary...
Third day to greatness was almost a disaster. Two internet disconnects cost me one catastrophic loss of 4 points, and a lost trade at least of another 3 points. Had to resort to working late and doubling position size to 200 SPY to recover. Trades aren't representative, but I'll keep the net gain of 4.3 points. Obviously I will need some serious redundancy before I get to 333 contracts... Oh yeah: D'Alembert... word of the day...
Lucky first week to greatness ends with a +$123 day, trading 200 SPY size, scalper's volatility has increased. A paradise or a hell hole. I will update weekly from now on. I need internet connection redundancy. Where is Blotto?.