How many of you take a absolute stop. What I mean is you take the full amount of your stop no matter what. I find that about half of my loss would be winners if I gave it my full stoploss. Many times I get shaken out of a position just to watch it move into positive territory. My personal stop is 20 cents, today I took a loss at 12 cents, just to watch it reverse and move up 45 cents. Its seems better to take the additional 8 cents loss "or what ever" and have half of those positions move your way. Lose 8 more cents once, gain 15 cents next time. Any thoughts welcome. White
For me it depends on what my stop is based on. For my "system trading" I use a stop based on the volatility of the stock (usually about 1% of the stock price) and I have found that it is better if I just stick to it. I too have lost more than saved by getting "shaken out" by the wiggles (especially on the Nasdaq stocks). Lately however, I have also been trading listed stocks in a discretionary manner (tape reading and simple charts), and I have saved much more than I would have gained by getting out early, before the ultimate stop. In that type of trading, once I enter a postion, and the stock does not do what I expect or something happens on the tape to let me believe that I'm going in the wrong direction - I'm out. In the last week and a half, of the 15 trades in which I got out early (with an avg loss of 4 cents), 13 would have hit my stop loss point, and only 2 reversed and did what I originally thought they would do. DeeMan
This is something you have got to learn to overcome, i.e. hindsight. There will be countless times where you get out and the market reverses. There is absolutely no way around it. Whether you are descretionary about getting out or adhere ridgidly to every stop the number of times you will be wrong is not going to change. You must train yourself not to regret and move on. Otherwise it will drive you bananas. My 2 cents.
Why use a set stop amount ? Why not use prior pivot highs & lows on the time frame your working on ?......if your working on a 5 min chart, use a support or resistance rather than 20 cents,,,this way you dont get stopped out as much if your system is successful....chris
In my case, I mostly trade stocks under $60 and keep a tighter stop. My stop avg. is around 25 cents but the max. wiggle room I allow is 35 cents and only if the market and the stock are at the lod and consolidating. As the stock moves, I trail it and tighten it at major break points like whole numbers, pivot pts, etc... If I see the pace drop off I either tighten more or get out. One more thing, I notice that a lot of times prices move in 20 cent intervals. That's why I have a preference for 25 cent stops instead of 20 cent stops. .... just my way
You need to decide on the stoploss based on the trade. Using the same 20c each time is not good. For instance, if your getting into a trade and you see that so far today it has moved up $3.00 with five 35c retracements on the way up it would be foolish to set your stoploss at 20c. You'd want to set it at 35-40c (trailing). The number of shares, if you wanted to risk $50 on the trade would be $50 / 0.35 = 143. 1. Look at the chart. 2. Determine the stoploss. 3. Calculate the number of shares.
Mr White;Before entering a written stop ,in, trading notebook, look for {s,r} on NYSE or mostly nas candlecharts..... Read a lot.then look for [s,r] ,MOVING AVERAGE RIBBONS [MAR} stop,written in trade notebook,read a lot at night.................................................................................................EVEN WHEN I ENTER A FIVE ..5..MINUTE CANDLE TRYING, TO TURN IT INTO.....15MINUTES OR 50 OR 51 DAYS......................................GLANCED AT 50 OR 51 OR 200DAY MAR EVEN BEFORE ENTERING A 5 MINUTE CANDLECHART...................................cnbc, bloomberg forgot to mention all the nyse.nas above the 50 or 51....I like to trade smaller if i hear Argentina, CNBC,Bloomberg news......LIKE TO TRUST THRU CANDLECHARTS,LOT OF READING TO PROVE IF OUR EDUCATED GUESS ON THE CHRISTMAS ,HANUKKAH RALLY SHOWS UP ON THE CANDLECHARTS...GOOD,COMPLEX QUESTION......
murray t turtle, whoever you are (hmmm...), you're not making a whole lot of sense. I think you have something useful to say, but I can't fathom it.
LOL Magna. >I like to trade smaller if i hear Argentina When I hear Argentina I prefer not to trade at all. JB