Thank you dead dog. As someone(me) who has been struggling with this exact moment of the trade, this was a helpfule thought. I lost out today because I was waiting for that extra $50 and risked the other $200, and by days end had gave it all back. Next time I am taking it when this mindset hits.
Days when the market just trends one direction people feel bad for getting out too early. But how often does it do that? Not that often. I think we all get used to having to execute alot of trades going both directions when the market is chopping around. It has been chopping around alot the past 2weeks so a trending day like yesterday/today comes unexpected. Which brings me to answer the thread title question, worse to give back all your profit. I have had days that have trended like today where I was long half the move, then short the 2nd half of the move expecting retracement. So I scale out most of the time to avoid the urge to go short or long depending on the trend. Seems once you get out too early on the move you don't want to jump back in with the trend, so you go against the trend possibly giving back all profit.
You know that the moment you take it it will run up to and past your target. Kind of like playing "DEAL or NO DEAL". Take the deal or wait for one more bar to close.
I know it will. still learning "traders psychology". I am a Work in progress. this year I am even from the lack of banking profits. Someday I will learn my lesson. Damn little greedy monster in me. Fortunately I dont do this for a living, just supplement for the time being
Don't lie to yourself. You don't understand whether the market will continue or reverse. This is why you are unable to make the correct decision. The psychological aspect has nothing to do with it. If you knew what would happen but let your emotions interfere with your judgement, it would be a different story, but it sounds like you are simply guessing. You are not overcoming any problem by doing this. What you are doing is selling profitable positions at a worse average price, and still getting screwed at full size when you take a loss. You are satisfying an emotional need to take some profits off the table. What is this moving stops to breakeven nonsense? If you know price is coming back to your entry then you make the decision to hold or sell depending on what it will do after that. If you are nimble enough to sell and buy it back 10 cents lower, great. If not, hold through it. Where the market is going next has nothing to do with where you got in. Break even exists in your head and nowhere else. How many times have you been stopped at break even only for the market to continue in the direction you had traded? The average prices of large groups of traders matter. Yours does not. It should not factor into your decision making process whatsoever. As for whether you should enter, hold, or exit - needs to be based on what you understand the market will do next. No substitute for knowledge. That is a very limited way to think. There are many traders who can "see into the future" and who are able to take the whole move. If you cannot yet do this, you damage your potential by refusing to aspire to such proficiency. I agree with the rest of your comments however. Exactly! -- This really is a horrible thread to read through. The blind leading the blind. All this pain and fear, negative language, and the old textbook cliches. Even the question posed is negative - what is worse, one market error or another. Does it matter? They all come from the same place and all affect your bottom line. Everyone here who tries to trade should have clearly defined criteria for entering and exiting trades. This should be based on an understanding of how the market works. With these tools, it should be simple to trade correctly. If you do not get the results you expect it is because your understanding is crap or you can't follow your rules. Either way, back to the drawing board and improve. There is no "missing out" on a move if you don't understand how to get in on it. How can you miss a trade? If it is part of your setup and you saw it form in real time and didn't take it then you didn't "miss" it, you lost your balls. If you didnt' understand it, then you didn't miss it either. If you weren't giving the market your full attention at the time then you also didn't miss anything. Equally there is no "missing out" when you let a profit come back to breakeven. It was never really a profit because you didn't call the market right and didn't understand enough to manage the trade correctly. Therefore you did not earn the profit because you didn't understand the condition. Even expert traders will occaisionally get surprised by a counter move developing and give back quite a bit of unrealised profits. Of course there is no reason to beat yourself up for this - if you understood it would reverse, you would have been out at a better price. It is only "missing out" if you do not learn from your mistake. Next topic for discussion... which is worse: thumb screws or the rack?
Crude oil, natural gas, and stock index futures. Not sure how this fits in to the discussion though. Why do you ask?
You place your order and price runs 20 or more ticks without your order getting filled. Then you may feel it's too much risk to chase entry and you wait for a pullback in the trend and it just runs like crazy without you. It does happen. Happens to me at least once a week.
NoD and others, Don't reply to nonsense. It's better to ignore these self-proclaimed gurus with their after-the-fact judgments.
You didn't miss that trade. You did not understand the market condition well enough to trade it. Big difference. If you are not yet skilled enough to get in on those sorts of trades then they aren't there for you, and you shouldn't feel that you are missing anything. As your skills improve you will find youself "missing" less. How aggressive you are with your orders is a function of your dealing skills and the prevailing market conditions. Sometimes you need to pay up, other times it is better to wait for a fill at a better price. Being too ambitious with your orders isn't missing a trade - it is understanding the market condition well enough to pick direction, but not well enough to decide how to time your entry. If you don't understand enough about a particular condition to take an entry (and get filled) then the trade was never there for you as you lack the understanding. There is no "missing" a trade even when you understand yet fail to pull the trigger - that isn't missing it, that is choosing not to take it, but for reasons not related to the market behaviour. What people call a missed trade is one of: - lack of understanding - failure to pull the trigger - not concentrating on the task at hand (ie noticing the entry late)