Thanks for your post 40D. When you say that at some point I may discover certain patterns of behavior that repeat.... can you be specific about how this would be illustrated? It certainly wouldn't be the way two or three 1 minute bars look beside each other, would it? It would more than likely be those buying and selling waves and where the turns happens, and this I cannot see on a 1 minute chart when looking for it at the end of the day, correct? For everyone's benefit I do not plan to post the results of my trading for quite a while, perhaps never again if I don't become successful, or perhaps I won't even be trading, but I'd really like to finish off with a proper explanation of what can be seen on the 1 minute chart and if this is good enough. In your opinion, if I'm not there to see the right tick in the price scale move up and down in real time (or I just can't remember what I saw), then is a 5 sec chart in review later if used to analyze the action at the end of the day not much better to squeeze out this repeating pattern of behavior than just using a 1 minute chart if I'm making sure to focus on doing this only at important levels that have proved to be major turning points in the past?
Again, deaf. As I said long ago, there are games being played here that I have occasionally played because I thought that my posts might benefit someone who's following along but isn't necessarily keeping a journal or who is at the time only curious. But at some point, even he who understands games risks becoming an enabler, which is the chief reason why I stopped working with hobbyists (one doesn't always know ahead of time). The chief game is "Why Don't You, Yes But" (WDYYB), though there are also elements of "Alcoholic". Some players have begun to slip into "I'm Only Trying to Help You". Needless to say, these are all pointless exercises. Put at its simplest, kp has no interest whatsoever in becoming a winning trader. If he were, he would have developed a trading plan a year ago. But he didn't want to. Still doesn't. So all the "keep at it" cheerleading serves only to exacerbate and perpetuate the problem. One can understand why at least a few of those who've tried to help here may end up feeling like chumps since they are in all important aspects ignored. But if nothing else it should be clear that trading failures are not the result of conspiracies of one sort or another but of a refusal to take all of this seriously. And if the subject has no interest in taking his trading seriously, then why should anyone else do so?
I do not mean to speak for DbPhoenix, and this is merely imo, but KP, the quicker you jump to conclusions, the better for you. Read my post. You have been at this nearly a year. You have good people who have all given you the same advice. You just refuse to listen. Last post. Promise.
I didn't see this post before I promised "last post," but this really has to be it. Only you can determine if that is good enough. Is it good enough for you. Can you find something there to trade? What this all comes down, KP, is that you fail to understand the central role and responsibility you have for your own success. Read KDAASFG's post again. There is no external technical road map apart from what you yourself come up with to help you make decisions. Read Douglas's The Disciplined Trader for a better explanation of this than I can give. You are the answer to all of your problems. Here comes the open in a few minutes, so I really am done now.
One more day of analysis posted to my journal and then its hibernation mode. I've got a lot of shit to say but since I wasn't trading, I've got time. FIRST CHART So first we had that huge rise up overnight. I saw it in real time, and when we broke 4172, there was huge penetration and I think a great buying op. We spiked at 93.75. When I woke up, I saw the poke above... here is the 5 min chart. That spike above happens at 0610 on my chart... so lets see what is going on there. In the 5 sec chart... you see the spike, but there is no wave to entice buying after the initial spike up. It drops right down... and sure the spike down below the pink line recovers above the line, but there certainly is no follow through. Now I don't plan to trade during the overnight session like this and the price action is very thin... but since I got the 5 sec chart, I'm using it to study. I should also point out that price hit 97, and although I don't have these lines drawn on this 5 min chart, on the hourly chart the level of 97 is quite pronounced. SECOND CHART Now lets move to today to the hourly chart which shows what I'm watching. Below A we have what is our ON high, which actually matches up well with the low from 3 days ago. This is at 4197 and is incredibly close to that other level I have at 4200, both of which I will be watching. I am expecting price to go up... but lets see what happens. THIRD CHART Next is my 1 minute chart. I outline a swing point at B that I will go into detail about on the 5 sec. Below I also have a support level, but I'm still unsure how to exactly draw these. On the one hand I have a line that captures where most of the trades reversed, but the spike down is about 2 points lower... but I will just make sure to keep my eyes on both if we head down that way. FOURTH CHART This one is the 5 sec and if anyone cringes that this is where most of my analysis happens... I only want to use this at the open and at important levels! The idea is that it won't matter so much what's going on between the levels... I just want to trade from one level to the next unless price makes a serious turn at only half way or something like this. B - This is where that swing point on the 1 minute lines up. Now this is such a minor point... and most of the important levels have to be taken from 5 minute and hourly charts, but it is interesting enough that price was turned away here at the open, just two ticks below. C - Because of this, I think a short is justifiable here. I would have to be nimble, but at least for me, the reaction is there, the RET, the wave. D - Things are fine until price spikes up to here... but there isn't a reason to sell yet because I want to see where the wave/reaction/RET falls. E - We come down to here, essentially forming a double bottom, just above that area I already marked as support. Hmmm... F - If I'm nimble enough, I would say to go long above that bar, so roughly here. G - Interestingly enough, if I'm just watching the 1 min chart, there is a reason to go long here, at 4190, and this is where it falls on the 5 sec chart. But by just watching the 5 sec chart, I see a reason to be long at 87 or 87.50. H - We turn down from where the OH is at 93.75, just below it, drop below that R line, so this is a bit unfortunate, but if my long was entered at F, I'm still not in trouble. I - This is a bit of a worry because I have a little RET here for a short that happens below the R line (this isn't a major level though so I need to be careful seeing too much in this 5 sec chart and focus on the rejection that already happened at the bottom). I'd have to keep an eye on my 1 minute chart to guide me a bit here... who knows if I could in real time as the swing low which happens to be at E isn't penetrated, but I just want to point this out as a potential problem in what I'm looking at right now. J - By here though, I've got a higher low, and if I'm still holding the long, then I'm good, and if I did get into that short at "I", I need to get out and switch. K - Here we are flirting with the OH, but even though we penetrate a bit and bounce off a bit, there is no RET below this, if anything, we still have HH's and HL's. L - Here we have a bounce from this 97 level, but there is no follow through below. M - Another bounce, and yet another higher low. N - Now that we have cleared this level, and there is a tiny test down, perhaps this is good enough for a buy... but its not exactly a wave. P - Here is the first down wave, and if price should happen to penetrate this again, then it might be time to exit. But this should only be the case if its because price bounced off an important level. Once price has taken off like this, switching to the 1 minute is prudent. These 5 sec charts I only want to be looking at when we are at important levels. As it so happens, price came down to this exact level a couple of minutes after this chart ends here and turned precisely here. I wouldn't sell just because price poked below this level, I would wait for that reaction, for the RET below. So what I'm saying is that if price pokes below a swing point on the 1 minute chart, I will look at what's happening at this poke and if the selling wave crests below the point (ie. where the support line would be drawn) and drops further down then its a reason to get out. But if the crest comes back up above the low of the 1 minute which would be above the support line, then its still good. (Oppps... I just realized I don't have the level of 4200 marked on the 5 sec chart. As you can see though, at 4200, there is no reason to worry about selling, and point P is even price price stops its little down wave... so buying about there is justified, or adding to the contracts once we see that buyers aren't rejecting this level of 4200 which was support before and might have been resistance now.) And that's enough for now... I'm off to hibernate. Shame no trades were taken... I blame everyone else!
The 5 second is too fast for me, but I got in on the 1 min chart around 92. Some days those 1 min retracements happen at the right time. Today was good for that, but on the days where it shoots up without retracement, I wish that I could be braver at the open like when price reversed at the level you have at 84. As far as I can see there is no perfect entry or exit, just a compromise on the risk v reward equation. I'd say a few weeks of comparing the 5 sec with the 1 min and hourly charts should give you some ideas on how useful it is for trading.
Hey Bon.... 92 seems a bit high based on where my RET is on my 1 min chart. The high on that lowest bar is 89.25... so 90.25 would have been the entry for me based on an entry from a 1 min chart. Perhaps there was a bit of hesitation on your part? Dare I say brave has nothing to do with it. If its in the plan to buy above a micro double bottom on the 5 sec chart since that support level is right below then this is why the trade is put on... not from being brave (This is the right thing to say but it clearly doesn't reflect what I have done up till now). If price penetrated this level, I would wait to see what happens at that penetration before getting out for a loss. I haven't worked out where the exact entry would be though... perhaps I would have needed to clear that swing high at D first... but I do like the extra information I'm getting from these 5 second charts. I was delighted with my analysis last night where I put my trades on the 5 sec chart and could see so clearly how stupid most of them were, and how an exit much sooner was prudent. Trading it in real time will be another challenge, but at least I understand now what was going on there and where I shouldn't have been trading.
Hesitation is my middle name. I waited for the next retracement on the 1 min, which got me in at 92. I didn't like the 5 or 6 point stop loss on the 1 min chart, so I based the stop on a low from the 15 second chart. It never went below the entry price so that was fine. Now I've just got to learn to manage the trades right to the top of the trend, rather than setting target prices. That's my homework for this week, month, year, however long it takes.
Hesitation is a killer. I found that I am really good at trading with my emotions, but I just have to take the opposite trade of what I intend if I wanted to make a profit (LOL) I can't tell you how good I was at seeing a down move.. very quick... then thinking and waiting.. and when I couldn't take it anymore I would short.... at the very bottom tick before price came all the way back up! I am really good at using my feelings to catch tops and bottoms you know. (and they say its really hard to do... as if!)LOL I am throwing up a chart as I'm trying to understand what you are doing.. but perhaps our charts don't match up. The first RET, first green arrow, with an entry 1 point above gets you in at 90.25... and this one you said you skipped. The next RET that I see, the next green arrow, gets you in at 93.25. But perhaps you also used a RET on the 15 sec chart for entry like you said you used for the stop? (Its great to talk about someone else's trades for a change .... I don't mind posting as long as its not about my work!)