Din't read your journal. Anways, interesting equity curve. I had a very similar looking equity curve in 2009 Q4 to 2010 Q2, when I started trading futures. Shows I had no edge then and you have no edge now. From your equity curve, it seems you are losing money on at least 70% of days. Over the last 2 months, it seems you haven't really traded since equity curve is kind of flat. Good Job! When you don't know how to trade profitably, the smart thing to do is to stop trading. I didn't do it and lost all my capital when I started out. My advice - do tons of statistical analysis and test ideas on a platform like tradestation/multicharts. You will discover a lot of things about the markets and you will figure out something with time. GL.
Did some day trading today. Woke up @ 11 am, so I missed a good trade. I got chopped up in the range. I read the market incorrectly... and broke some of my rules. Last year it was 2.554, this year so far its 83.8 It's a bad joke....... Thanks GMST but that's what I'm doing as you noticed. I am testing things and still attempting to trade at the same time. I am trading small till I can find something that works for me.
This really helped my own trading, going through this phase. It changed me from wanting to buy things that were oversold to wanting to buy breakouts with as much strength as possible. Instead of "Buy Value" it became "Buy Velocity".
Mid year (approx) note to self: Up until recently (for most of my equity curve since I've kept records) I didn't have such a defined edge to trade. I believed that because the market was seemingly random, I could make money using semi-random entry. This proved somewhat worthwhile, and I learned how valueable stop losses can be. I took on long term positions which meant increasing my stop loss size. Low probability trades started adding up and have taken another $14,000 from my pockets this year. I hadn't had such a drawdown for roughly 7 or 8 months, coming out near break even trading in the way described above mostly last year and partly this year. The past couple of weeks that I day traded where I had a defined edge that was profitable over even just a small sample size would have made me money if I was able to take all the trades I could have in the forward tests and stuck to the plan. So far, I have done neither. I botched trades on my edge yesterday. Again, if I had taken the trades that I had previously defined 100% in backtesting, I would have come out ahead. I back test my edge and know that others that have been trading for many years use similar tactics and make a living trading. My backtests for the edges come out profitable. The problem for me simply lies in translating that into a forward test. Yesterday, I tried to cut corners with my entries. I took 1 long that was preemptive and didn't have 'pullback exhaustion' confirmation. I took 1 short that was against the 'trend' as I have it defined. I felt emotionless... but recognized how badly I messed up!
Quotes from Pit Bull: "Never gamble for large amounts. Earn my money through hard work and not hope for the easy killing for there is no such thing." "Never gamble for very much money while on vacation. If one must indulge, make it for small stakes and if the self-discipline is lacking, don't bring very much money. In fact, only take as much as you can afford to lose, which is indeed very little." "Playing for large stakes at the casinos or the horses is absurd. Small wagers for the sport is the only answer." "To be a winner, you have to be willing to toe the line and pull the trigger." "Preparation pays. It's essential to know more than the other players in the game." "Dare to dream. It's not where you are, it's where you're going that counts." "Don't beat yourself; if you've got a plan that's working, stick to it." "Good gamblers keep their bets in balance. You have to have a life beyond brokers and bookies." "Nothing can beat knowing what's going to happen before it happens, except when it doesn't." "Keep your priorities straight." "Show me a great trader and I'll show you someone who understands gambling." "Divorce ego from the game." "Manage your money" "Every trader faces it. Only the winners know how to handle it. The dreaded losing streak rears its head every so often and attacks every great trader. It eats away at your judgment; it saps your confidence. Sometimes, it can take you so low that you think you'll never get out. You're sure that something has gone wrong, that you've lost your touch, that you'll never be a winner again. When you're in the middle of it, you think it's never going to end, but mostly, your judgment and rhythm are off and what you have to do is stop and regain your composure. The best way to end a losing streak is to cut your losses and divorce your ego from the game. I learned this lesson many years ago at the crap tables in Vegas. The old cliche says "never send good money after bad," and it's true. You have to manage your resources and not lose too much of your stake. Many people when they're losing increase their bets; they double up hoping to win it all back on one roll of the dice. That strategy can be devastating. The best way to stop a losing streak is to STOP! STOP THE LOSSES, STOP THE BLEEDING. Take time off and let your intellect take charge of your emotions; the market will be there when you return." "Going for the knockout had made me a loser for nine years." "First, according to Mark, to be a successful trader you have to have a complete commitment to trading and do it full-time. Trading must be addressed as a profession, because if you do not treat it as such, those who do will separate you from your money very quickly. Mark Cook watches the market all day long, from the opening bell to the closing bell, and keeps a diary that sometimes has more than forty entries a day. If he doesn't do this, his profits suffer. "There is no shortcut in trading, the market will quickly find out if you are lazy." Second, he says, fit your trading habits to your personality. If you are an emotional person, admit that you are emotional and structure your trading habits to make your emotions a positive influence, not a negative one. If you are greedy, or if you are fearful, that will affect your decision making, and if you don't recognize your dominant emotion, your decisions will be wrong. Mark tends to be fearful, and whenever he is most fearful, recognizing that emotion helps him decide to go long arid buy. "Whenever my fears become overwhelming, my discipline tells me to buy, and discipline must win out, or you are doomed to failure." "Being able to honor your stops is what separates the top dogs from the mongrels on Wall Street." Third, says Mark, planning is the objective part of trading. Start with the worst-case scenario and work from there. You will never be more objective than before you execute a trade. Once you are in a trade, emotions take over, so your plan must be in place beforehand. Know when you are wrong and admit it. "Get out, retreat, and live to fight another day; these are cowardly approaches, but they will keep you from the trader's obituary." I think that Mark's analysis is as good as anybody's." "The markets are no place to be trying to impress people. The only way to impress anybody is to stay on your toes, be consistent, and trade within your means"
I. Break the Pressure Before It Breaks You II. Nobody Ever Lay on Their Deathbed Wishing They'd Worked Harder III. Keep your balance "I've learned through the years that after a good run of profits in the markets, it's very important to take a few days off as a reward." "Of course, we're serious," I said. "Life is serious. You know, you either win or lose, and winning is much better than losing. After you win, you can pay a therapist to get fixed up." "The reason a lot of people do not recognize opportunity is because it usually goes around wearing overalls looking like hard work." âThomas A. Edison "By nature, I'm a gambler with a good feel for numbers, and, as I've mentioned before, Amherst taught me how to think, Columbia Business School taught me what to think about, the Marine Corps taught me how to perform under fire, and Audrey taught me the importance of money management. These are the five blocks that must serve as the foundation for constructing a trading methodology." "I've said it before, and I'm going to say it again, because it cannot be overemphasized: the most important change in my trading career occurred when I learned to DIVORCE MY EGO FROM THE TRADE."
Still here, just sitting on the sidelines. I'll be dead before I label myself a failed trader btw. I've had a couple revelations of late, and am going to put them here as it is the most appropriate place: 1. I should and really (a trader) only needs to focus on trading one pattern in one market successfully. I am choosing to focus on index futures as they are the most enticing to me (I also always want to be able to relate to Martin Schwartz by saying, "I smacked the S&Ps for $25K, yesterday, and today it's $50k so far"). Also, I find the other large markets (Currencies, Crude, Bonds and Gold) are often correllated so there is no point in trading more than one, not to mention some of the best moves in these markets are occuring outside of our stock market session. Later, I'll work on developing a second method for range trading because the one I've been tracking is trend following based. 2. I have cut out everything besides basic TA in my trading plan. From my tests, I've concluded placing trades based on a couple of MA based oscillators in certain conditions yeilds plenty of opportunity. This pattern is described by Mark Douglas, Martin Schwartz, Linda Rasche, and DonKEE from here, so no need to really discuss it. 3. I have a little over a month of trading data that I've collected. This is around 50 trades for ES and TF. I have documented proof that this pattern presents an edge on many time frames, markets and at least since the 90s (and probably since before then). My tests show that the TF is more profitable than the ES for this time frame. My goal will be to work my way up to just 5 contracts. This would have returned around ~$25k in July alone. Win rate is around 60%, with reward many times the risk (a fundamental of trend following). There is some judgment that I am attempting to define still when it comes to the entry and exit. My biggest concern is recognizing when the market is in trend mode vs consolidation (early Aug). When I get home, I will post some charts as a visual reminder to myself. I plan on going live as soon as I start having days off to trade. For those worried about my financial situation, I'm sitting on around $25k of dispensable income at the moment @ ~$10k (-58%) from $24k YTD
I posted a thread about this already, but I want to record it here for myself: A comment made by lescor recently led me to discover something that I believe will help me achieve success. That is the tracking of relative volatilities. Basically, I have come to the conclusion that trading the most volatile contracts is best. For example, the RLM 20 day average volatility is around 20%, which is > ES, YM and NQ. No wonder trading a trend following edge is most profitable using RLM. Not to mention with natural gas' 20 day avg vol around 50%, one could have caught some huge intraday trends trading it. Therefore, volatility is correllated to price ternd. So, I am beginning to track relative instrument volatilities. I will still focus on trading one insturment during the day, but likely focus on which ever one is most volatile, and has enough liquidity to formulate a tick/contract based chart. After all the literature I've read, I don't remember ever seeing much about tracking volatility. So it's something that the majority aren't doing, hint, hint!
Recent revelations: Further study of charts has proven how fundamental using multiple time frames is. I know several full time traders that use multiple time frames and wait for allignment before placing trades. There are many reasons for this. Even though one time frame includes price action of another time frame, it is easier for a trader to spot vital information about the trend and price action if they are using multiple time frames. The two main points for me are: 1). the price pattern that is developed, and 2). whether the market is likely in trend or range mode. Because the market's action is always changing in time and magnitude, using more than one time frame is like using multiple nets to catch fish. One of your nets will snag a fish while the others remain empty. Generally, the validity of a signal is greatly enchanced when two or more nets catch fish. The other important point is identifying what type of activity the market is dsplaying. For a trend following methodology, I think it is a must to stay out of the market when price units have bullish and bearish legs of equal length. Trendlines or support and resistance are good enough for determining where a new trend should start/resume. Taking the 1st and 2nd pullbacks in new 'trends' is logically where a trader has the best potential of winning (has the highest reward/risk ratio).
Tomorrow I am going to have the ability to day trade... I got a 94 on my PT test so I'm fit to fight and earned the day off. I did my homework for tomorrow yesterday: I have a tested 'edge.' It shows very profitable results, under the right conditions. I have written down exact criteria for entering a trade. If one step is not met under entry criteria, there is no trade entered. Methodology: 1st & 2nd pullback/trend resumption trades ONLY. I will watch 3 charts showing different time frames (500, 1500, 3000 contract charts). They all have the same 3 indicators on them, all price based and coded by myself in easylangauge: 1). dots at pivots (S/R) 2). moving average line 3). LBR's 3-10-16 MACD. I look for specific conditions to appear on 2 or more of the charts. Basically the MACD describes the price pattern I'm looking for and pinpoints entry bars, and the MA and S/R pionts help determine if the trend is stale or not. For me, I have found that having a way to objectify what I am looking for is necessary at this point. Otherwise it's difficult spotting the highest probability gambles. Lets see how it goes. The biggest trick is going to be trading by exception and recognizing ranging markets. I'll toss some size around depending on my mood/feel. @ ~$10k (-58%) from $24k YTD