Lets see here. So you made 300% return in stocks. Move to futures and are losing your ass. So remind me again, why are you trading futures and not stocks ? (PS: Your stock trading was probably luck)
Thanks for your comments. The reason I started trading futures was for the leverage and to learn something new. I guess I figured trading was trading and my performance would cross over. I made the switch to futures since I started trading full time after being laid off from work at the end of march. I was making close to six figures... about $140K including benefits so I foolishly figured I should start making as much right away while trading full time. The stock run may have been luck. I did about 300 total trades both long and short over about 20 different stocks so if it was it was pretty damn good luck. Hopefully the market has a little more 2 way trading and I can get back into a rhythm. I know that one of these days "normal" trading will resume. I just hope I'm around to make money off of it.
Sorry about your job, are you planning to look for a new one? You must have some skills to be making that salary, so it represents a significant opportunity cost to yourself to trade (unprofitably) in lieu of working. Additionally, by putting pressure on yourself to replicate your previous income from trading, you're seriously impeding your ability to trade profitably. Were you swing trading equities or daytrading equities? Making the leap from two different time periods (swing vs intra) requires a lot of adjustment of your strategies.
sim trade or not this is typical thinking of beginner, you probl saw 3 down bars and tried to get on as fast as you can. What you fail to notice was on the third down bar it didn't break the prev low, you better off wait for it to break the prev low before shorting. So now you shorted, if you notice the prev significant high then you should wait until it breaks that high by couple of ticks before you exit. that was more than 3 hours, you had plenty of time to look back and see the prev double bottom became support then it's time to get out.
You haven't answered the question that befuddles me. If you were doing so well with equities, why are you trading futures? Most people would kill for 50% a year, and you tripled your account in a matter of months with stocks, amazing. My advice, take your real money and go back to equities, start trading futures with a demo account.
I think the lay off was a blessing. I basically blew my severance pay in one month of trading though!! Yeah I have other opportunities. I know often times day trading is a last resort but when I was hot I figured I had a chance to make real money. I was hitting about 70% of my trades with a 2:1 risk reward ratio. Under normal conditions I really enjoy trading. Right now I feel like the market is out to get me. My stops have been the highest/lowest Tick of a move about 6 times in the past week. It was funny at first... now its getting less funny. It may be better to get a job in a finance or I banking. I've always loved the stock market. I had been doing project management and network engineering for the past 5 years since college. My degree is in business-econ from ucla with a minor in computer programming so I really am putting a good degree to waste doing this. To answer you question about day/swing trading I swing traded for about 4 months until my account got to 25K then day traded. My swing trades were 1-3 days. I made my first 13K swing trading over 4 months and the last 12K day trading over 2 months.