Bhardy....I've read and reread most of the stuff that this guy Lucias is saying & the fact is that it's a bunch of jibberish. You're clearly new to trading. Listen or don't. The best things that you can do at this stage of your career are: listen to the traders in your office that make money annoy the traders in your office [within reason] with questions concerning why they made the trades that they made (winners & losers) be very observant trade 100 share lots until you figure out what you're doing keep a trading journal or keep notes on why you take the trades that you take & why you exit those trades -- take note of what happens after you exit learn from the profitable traders around you and eventually you will find a style that works for you -- if indicators work for you, then use them -- as you know indicators are lagging indicators but sometimes they can provide a sort of confirmation post-entry of a trade be aware of your psychology and do everything you can to protect it -- don't take unnecessary destabilizing losses that may cause your psyche irreparable damage -- lose often and lose small -- figure out why you lost (was it a bad entry? why did you enter? why did you exit? what was happening when you entered/exited? were you worried you would lose when the price really was only going sideways? etc...) analyze your winners and losers post-market everyday (plot your entries/exits on a chart &/or download a free screen recorder to record your trades in real time so that you can go back post-market and watch level I&II, the prints, and the Open Book) I don't know your office's dynamics...but if you can avoid it -- do not become a hermit and become afraid to share your losers with established traders...they expect you to lose at this point in your career. Ask them what they think about some of your trades. Ask them what they would do (if anything at all?) if they saw the same setup that you saw before initiating your trade. More than anything else -- cut your losers...riding your winners takes more time to master. But you can learn to cut winners now. Do it. I've been down the road that you're on. My first 2 months of trading, I had my own beliefs and I fervently tried to implement them...albeit at my own peril. All the while, my mentor was knocking down $2k here...and $4k there. I wasted 2 months not listening to him and instead trying to prove how intelligent I was. It took me 2 months to pay attention and learn how to trade. Once you learn how to trade, you'll then be able to pursue alternative strategies if you like. But learn how to do one thing well before moving on to an alternative strategy...otherwise you'll end up being one of those guys that comes up with a new idea every other day and never sticks with one thing long enough to actually figure it out and give it time to work. Good luck.
Real irrational exuberance? How much is the S&P 500 up over the last 2 years? How much was it down the previous year? Bull markets are only easy to trade in hindsight.. just gibberish.
Hint 1- You need atleast 2500-3000 hours of practice to develop a neural circuit in your brain to start trading. Hint 2: You are following MACD. Another trader is using SMA. Another one is using Fib. There are millions of individual traders using millions of different trading system and methods. But what everyone do 'collectively gets reflected on price'. Think about it-Add all actions of traders and that gets reflected in price. Trading is 100% mass/crowd psychology. To become a master trader, put 3000 hours in understanding crowd psychology by seeing previous patterns.
Thanks kingfisher. I recognize this. "The movement of a stock is nothing more than then an aggregated representation of 30 % personal opinion and speculation, and 70% the result of some sophisticated quant analysis given by the 70% of trades that are now completed through algorithmic trading." - Me "Think about it-Add all actions of traders and that gets reflected in price." - You. We're essentially saying the same thing. "Hint 2: You are following MACD. Another trader is using SMA. Another one is using Fib." What are the most popular methods of technical analysis?
The problem with TA is each and every trader is using different TA on a different TF. TA does not help you to 'read the markets correctly'. I dont use any TA.
If you think this is irrational exuberance, then you may not personally know any traders that traded during the real golden age of trading. If you don't know when that was, then do a search on ET or pull up a NAS chart covering the last 20 years...you should be able to figure it out. I didn't trade during that golden age....I was in middle school & high school. I didn't know anything about the market. If you think this slow melt up is anything remotely comparable to the period that I'm referencing then.....I'm speechless. If you think this is run up is irrational -- buy the VXX and short SPY. At some point you'll be right...but you'll probably be broke before you're right.
Bhardy, I think I get the point of your post now. You want us to agree that trading the MACD is how we do it. Well, you wanted to hear it... you're right! How did you discover the MACD edge? Yes, you are clearly on right track with $2.50 profit. What else do you want to hear? Yes, you need to be more disciplined. Why oh why did you hold onto that loser instead of cutting it? Yes! MACD is my super secret indicator. I use MACD and a 5 day moving average. Please don't tell anyone. Like you, I just plopped the MACD down and took every cross before even watching the market and by golly roger it made me a fortune. But I had to learn to be disciplined with it and that is the hard part. MACD+5 Day moving average = My Lethal Combination ---------- Bhardy, I recognize real fast you have a metallic nature. The metallic personality is near impossible to train. Metallic personality means I'd have to beat, drill, completely break you down basically -- what I've already stated into your head and you'd resist me and at last moment you'd take credit for my expertise. You are very stubborn. It would be difficult/impossible for me to train you.