I also trade for example es based on technical setups, but per some mentoring with other traders, we normally don't take setups during news events since the event itself can cause a gap in the price. So I am not suggesting you trade based on news, but to be aware of news events for the stocks that you trade since maybe it can help you avoid taking the loss in the 1st place or at least knowing how great this news is for BIDU, will give you stronger motivation to not ignore stops.
Hi Robert, Sorry to hear about your trades with BIDU. I know what you mean about not able to cut losses with the wide spread--especially if you didn't anticipated that. The spread really cuts into your profit and worsen your loss. It essentially neutralize the volatility in price. I found that small things like spread could make or break a strategy. So, I am getting away from large spread (by trading longer time frame). I also learned that if a particular instrument/stock is not acting the way I anticipated, I should get out of the trade and trade other instrument/stock. It make sense in a way, because when I enter a trade, it's because the price is telling me that it will go down. Price also gotten others to enter into the same trade as well (we are really robots that act and react the same when it comes to greed and fear). If price goes up after the other traders and I enter the short, then I know price tricked me. I will exit and find some other opportunities. Anyway, you probably know this, but it's good to revisit this concept once in awhile, because it will help us out mentally in cutting our loss. Keep up with those good conservative trades! I am looking forward to see more of those $1000+/day in your journal! PA
You never tried a hard stop?? Some here have questioned hard stops but I have said SOONER OR LATER the "event" will happen. A catastrophic stop is a MUST DO or trading will never be successful long term... http://books.google.com/books?id=09...v=onepage&q="27 million" dollar lunch&f=false
Also trying to repair a bad trade is a trigger for disaster. You take a trade, set stop and just watch. If price moves to half way for target, move stop to BE. Haha - I was told this so many times but I still violate this rule. And once a while get caught in elephant's poop situation. Why do I not put STOP, because price moves to my stop (or may be few cents lower) and hit me and turn back big... It happens few time and then I start ignoring the basic rule; no stop, no trade! Still trying to find a good way of forcing this discipline. May be hard protective stop (that is 5-10 cents below your real stop) and an alert at your stop-point that you should respect always. How do you trade and manage your stops? How often your stops get hunted by MM?
I think the markets try to train you to remove your stop.. Better to learn over time where to put it rather than remove it.. OR adjust you entries so your given fixed stop can survive. A fading system needs a very different stop from a breakout system.. Robert sorry to soil your thread..
I was tempted with Ilmn too but it won't hit a wall unit it gets to about 41.80 or so. The other reason I passed was because it is 18% short and it is a Biotech. It also was up on news. Also it is border line in price. Robert, you might want to look into selling calls on these fades of yours.
I wasnât able to get much today I came in with a much different attitude today and tried out the sim trade that IB offers so that I could test the other trading features instead of just using booktrader. It was worth doing but its difficult using both live and sim trading at least for me. First trade of the day was with WYN which went ok. I came back with another signal and then gave much of it back, + 52 OMX was a trade I became very aggressive with adding as it went my way. I kept lowering the stop and sure enough it came back to stop me out. Had it kept going it would have been a very big gain. + 3 MOS was not well traded at all. it was getting close to the final bell and I had a small unrealized gain and instead of just waiting it out with the possible loss in the trade I closed out with the small gain. It did whipsaw around quite a bit but it never actually gave a cover signal. Sure enough into the close it fell and I gave up a nice gain. One other thing of note was that the 10 min WW signal that I shorted with went against me but at the same time the 60 min gave off a short and so did the 30 min. even MAR was my loser for the day. First I stopped out with my short (that could have had a much better entry) thenI was stopped out in my long although the long was a net gain. Even if I was not stopped out the best it could do was 12 cents higher so I didnât miss out on much. â 39 +17 -3520 Month
i don't use stops..ever! Well.. my account has a max loss breaking point where it will offset everything if a certain level is touched. This is a feature on IB. People say I'm crazy or lying abou tnot using stops but that is how i control my size... no stops.. means i am constantly thinking and monitoring and thinking about what ifs... whereas with a stop.. it is a set and froget it mentality.. which will lead to ruin and lots and lots of trades and fees. KEEP doing what you are doing! Averaging losers... intra day this works better than anything to get you profitable, yo just have to know ahead of time what your maximum exposure will be in dollars and do as many shares as you like.. just remember leverage is double edged. A trader has to be able to take some heat.. geez.. most guys on here that actually trade are using stops that are so small in range that they are going to constantly get stopped out in real live trading. I used to do this. No stops and averaging losers and winners and scaling out incrementally on winenrs is what makes me a winner! Robert, I loka tyour stuff every once in awhile and it always seems to me that you are almost always taking bigger losers than winners!!! I keep track of all my trades.. intra day and day trades.. i know my exact expectation.. of winners and losers based on a cents per share basis.. as well as combined .. i also take the median of all these stats. You need to hold longer on winners and sell earlier on losers. Remember if you add to yor position whether it is a winner or loser then you must take into account the added leverage. YOU Need a hard dollar stop out point! not a cents based one!! This oway you can increase size with no worries!! Risking $ 2000 per trade..if long 1 share = 2000 dollar drop 100 shares= 20 dollar drop 1000 shares= 2 dollar drop 10,000 shares= 20 cent drop 100,000 shares= 2 cent drop. it really is this simple.. and stick to it.. then you will not get over your head with leverage and other bullshit.. most people use a hard stop and which is stupid.. if you believe in your forecast for the day then stick with your plan.. and by doing that you must add to winners and losers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
p.s. you said you were going to use IB's platform to practice stop losses.. silly idea.. you need to be able to be disciplined for real.. DO NOT USE A Demo. If you have to use a demo!! Then do this! best advice i ever had was get a stack of hundreds or tens or ones on your desk... put an envelope on the desk and everytime you do not use a stop or do not follow a certain behavior then put money in the envelope.. once the envelope is full go give it to your favorite charity.. after a few hundrede bucks lost i think you will get the picture.. it will be a lot less than 6500.... Sometimes you also need to just know when you are wrong and admit it.. yes you ahve had some success but in no way or form would you ever make it with other peopel money you are volatile as hell.. stop swinging for the fences unless you really know for sure what the hell is going to happen... somewher on here i posted a baberuth ability for soem traders and this can and is one of the main reason tradrs are successful.. same with poker players.. Pro poker players nibble and nibble away on the table.. waiting to hi thte grand slam.. they have to play and not spend too much to stay in the game ... then when the opportunity arises they go all in or take massive bets.. why.....??????????? Because they know the other players.. they know themselves.. they know the risk... !!!!!!!!!!!! geeez.. know the risk The babe ruth ability is why you see so many different people making huge sums of money in different areas.. when the timing is right and they know what they are doing then they POUNCE! Oh and EARTH TO ROBERT W.. the news does matter you are a fool to not think so!!!!!!!!! it sets the tone for bidu due to google maybe gettign out of China.. that is huge for bidu... .. duh! Stick tot rading what you now and what you have had success with in the past.. good luck... apparently you need it. hopefully you will get lucky and put out a big trade and have it finally go in yor favor.. you constantly have small lsoers then a huge loser whihc wipes out even more than yor winners.. if you cannot reign in this risky behavior then you better focus on a 3 year law degree plan and put trading on the back burner.. it's not for everyone.