How do you get in an ES position? How do you get out of it? Trough market, limit or stop orders? So far, I have been getting in and out of an ES position via limit orders, bid and offers. Sometimes, trailing stops got triggered and so I got out of a position via a stop order. Now, I'm thinking about using stops to play break-outs and other high probability chart formations and I'd like to have some feedback from traders familiar using stops.
Depends, on breakouts, I use market orders. For setups, limit. I find it gives me a mental/psychological edge in the way of confidence if Iâm not immediately in the hole because of the spread. I find that I have a higher success ratio that way and lower one on breakouts. Mental stops.
My trades currently involve.....knowing my target and knowing my stop. I trade the ES and no problem with entering in those orders after entry. My size (under 100 contracts) and the nature of the electronic market does not cause me to worry about my orders being taken out because they are entered. My entries according to my statistical set up are triggered by getting filled use a bracket type trade....1 step(tick) under/over current bid/offer. I get filled more often than not when my set up alerts me. I currently have 1 set up and testing 5 others. Does anybody want to share a Pivot strategy for small intraday scalps, besides S/R which is commonnly used in Pivot points systems.......do you have a twist to this that I could explore? Michael B.
I know this is the only way to guarantee you are 100% in for the entire amount, but I hate giving up that spread every time. I use a strategy that ladders in my trade over the course of a couple minutes. For example, if I want to buy 30 contracts, and the price is 950.0 - 950.25, I would bid for 3 contracts at 950.0, and 3 again at 949.75, and 3 again at 949.5, etc. Then I would wait for someone to take out those bids. Of course the danger is it runs the other way, but the instant a tick moves against me, I immediately place a bid for 3 contracts at the new bid level. What always seems to happen is that I get taken out 3 contracts at a time as the price bouces back and forth. And I adjust accordingly, placing more bids at the new bid levels, cancelling bids if it ran too far against me, etc. Eventually, I have all 30 contracts that I wanted. And I have the satisfaction of knowing that I didn't have to pay the spread. Some trades you end up paying a little more than you would have if you just bought the market, but sometimes you end up paying less, and it seems to even out in the end. This entry/exit system seems to work well for my trading style, wher I am holding a trade anywhere from 20 minutes to a couple days. But I don't think it would work for someone who only holds a trade for a minute of two. You would need much faster entries and exits. I am curious - does anyone else enter trades like I do? (i.e. entering and exiting trades a little bit at a time, constantly making small offers at the bid price, until you have all the contracts you wanted)
but stops are preferred for clearly defined setups and when you have enough time to place the stop order. Otherwise market orders.