Agreed live in the now.. "if you have one foot in the past, and another in the future, your pissing all over the present."
Both. You are up 2.2% relative to what you had at the beginning of the day. But you lost 5.8% off your equity high. Your position at the top of the market that day, was identical to that of someone who just had come into the office, was totally flat, and then decided to buy on the same size as you. If someone came in flat, bought the high of the day, then lost 5.8%, you'd call that a loss, wouldn't you? So your position, which was identical, is also a loss. Pretty simple really. Any time you have on a position that has open profits or losses, your position is *identical* to someone who has been totally flat, and now suddenly puts on the same position as you. Your entry & exit rules should be identical regardless of whether you are buying now, or bought 6 months ago and are sitting on a gigantic profit (or loss). Anything else is completely irrational.
If someone offers you a coin flip with a payout of $2 for heads and a $1 loss for tails, would you stop taking that bet just because you "hit your target" and then tails came up once?
Your profit on the day is measured from what you have at the start of the day compared to what you have at to the close. It is not measured from your intraday equity high to your equity on the close. That's the difference between a net losing day, and a day where you had some intraday drawdowns but still finished ahead.
Or be down -$120 like I was today... keep reading the markets wrong and everytime I went long the market dropped and everytime I went short the market went up... oh well next week will be better...
People should monitor their own account balances not compete to be the biggest winner at IB or any other brokerage for that matter. Trading merely to measure yourself against others is the absolute wrong focus and will lead to trading mistakes of greed and ego when you happen to be near the top of the list or are trying to get there. In all honesty, what does it matter how you are doing compared to others at IB since other accounts at IB is completely irrelevant.