I still struggle with taking trades too early as well. Once I realized that there are trades during the day in which the entry is never retested, I vowed to work towards only taking those trades (if I could ID them correctly of course )
Hi, Tlow! you are way toooo hard on yourself! I guess you are a very competitive person in life and you must be a perfectionist! Those are great qualities! You are doing a great job now! you did way better than me! Just a few thoughts from me. I know you are live trading, Sim trading doesn't seem like real to you. Please set up a Maxi. losing % rule for yourself to go back in SIM to practice. Then come back to live trading. I had "the more I learn, the more confusion I got" moment in July too. Now I am still struggling, but it's getting a little better. Especially when looking at multiple time frames. What happened to us is very normal, just practice and practice.Your chart is so clean which is great! Read PA bar by bar on 5 and 2 min. I overwhelmed myself by adding all the indicators when I first started! Lately I have been thinking the other side of the traders(my enemy) a lot. what they are doing when translating PA. Then I react. I started to feel the importance of "know your enemy" in trading.(I had a very hard time understanding it) Oh, another thought is to try only trade one or two set ups while in live account to start out. Make them as an ATM machine! You will find it's already a lot of work to trade only one set up. Seems easy to do, but there are varieties of just that one set up. And read the context of the market to take that trade takes experience to build! No need to blame yourself not to pick up the gap play and trade on the news! keep up the good work!
So no trades today...woke up a bit late today and I had a really hard time focusing during the initial market open. In hindsight, i wished I had been more alert to the break down through 1096.00 level at around 6:55...but wasn't really focused or paying a whole lot of attention...making coffee I think The only other trades I wanted to take was to go short at the upper range of the channel that had been created at 9:10( entry about 1096.00-.25, stop at 1097.00, target 1093.00) and 11:20...chose not to take the 9:10 for some reason, maybe because I knew it was range bound. I think I am going to start taking these trades...I have to be spot on the entry with a tight stop to make the trade work...think I could still get a 3:1 R:R pretty easily when some of these midday channels develop, just cant be screwing around and need to make sure the trade is set-up properly. The last trade at 11:20 I wish I could've taken, but I had to be out of the house at 11:30 for the rest of RTH, so I couldn't watch the trade. Oh well...even though I didn't trade today and missed out on some winners. Im glad I didn't try to force anything and get anxious or squeeze a trade in before I had to leave for the day. Boring day...but good discipline is always good for the psyche
Only 1 trade per my rules today as well, so not much going on. Ironically it was a long at 10:42 that eventually rolled over and died. The shorts didn't line up for me and the longs didn't pan for more than a +1 stop out. On to tomorrow!
bigsnack, On days like today especially is why I like looking at the higher tick and/or timeframe charts...less noise...food for thought
Errr...more ToS issues...for some reason, it transfer money out of my account on a repeat basis instead of a one time basis...I was planning on moving some money around...so now, I can't trade nor can I transfer it to IB...The money is stuck in cyberspace somewhere for the next day or two. really really annoying. So now there isn't enough capital in the account to cover the margin on the ES...eerrrrr...Not the worst day for this to happen because I have to leave for a couple hours in the middle of the trading day, but still really annoying. Especially b/c I would be in a winning trade right now ...boo ToS. one more reason to move.
Well, finally got some money back into my account after ToS screwed me up a bit this week. But on the postive side, I've taken some time to organize my funds a bit..think Im finally going to consolidate some accounts after all this happened. Anyway, on to the trading...finally got at least part of a trading day in. This week was good for this to happen because I had a bunch of family/personal commitments to take care of. Trade 1: 7:29- Long 1103.50 Stop 1101.00 Target 1107.00 7:34- Move Stop to B/E 7:41- Stopped out at B/E at 1103.50 +0.00 pts Since there wasn't very much action I didn't take the first breakout above the 1103.25 area. It came back for a retest and that is when I started to set the trade up on paper, and once it start to make the turn back up took some action to go long. The momentum/action was pretty weak today so I didn't think there would be any major runners but I thought the 1107.00 mark, where previous resistance held up would be a legit target. After it made the move up a bit, I moved the stop to B/E and was really torn on whether or not I should've done it.Since 1103.25 was acting as major support, I wrote down that maybe I should've moved the stop to around 1102.50 where the previous HL was. i thought for sure since it held the 1103.25 range it would take off with out me. Well, my stop placement turned out to be the right call because it went south after that. Still not comfortable with moving stops, how far to move, etc...need more practice/screen time with that. Trade 2: 8:17- Short 1102.75 Stop 1105.00 Target 1099.00 8:54- Move stop to B/E 9:05- Buy to cover at 1100.25 +2.50 pts After the move up, formed a bit of a double top and had some downward momentum so I decided to take it short on the breakout below the center point. I was a bit slow on the trigger, so I wish I got filled at 1103.00..but not terrible. Target was 1100-1099 area...thought the 1100 area would be a hard mental point for the market to break so I watch the momentum closely around this area. I'm pretty happy with how I managed this trade...I got a little antsy when it started bouncing around the 1100.00 area and didn't go anywhere. If I had a bit more patience, I probably could've squeezed another 0.50 pts out of it, but Im not complaining. Also, the TRIN trend didn't really change on this downward moved, so that gave me more confidence in my decision to exit. Trade 3: 9:50- Long 1102.00 Stop 1100.00 Target HOD of 1105.00 9:52- Sell to close at 1102.25 +0.25 pts Trade looked like it could make a run back up after the sloppy double bottom formation and then the minor pullback. I took the trade long after the little pullback when it started to move back up. I knew I had to do some family stuff, but I thought I had more time...guess not...had to leave. So I just exited...too bad, would've been a nice winner. I thought about putting a tighter stop and limit order to sell but Im glad I didn't. I really don't like leaving trades open if I can't watch them. Now that Im doing my chart, the bars dont quite line up with my order times. Hmmm kinda weird. Whatever...stupid ToS. Also, note the yellow bar on top is the long term trend line from the top in April till now...we've been hovering around that line for the past couple of sessions. Anyway, Im going to stop complaining about ToS...gonna move the money at some point...probably the end of the month when things settle down and money isn't floating around in cyberspace. But, overall, I think a really good trading day. Very happy with how I handled everything and happy with my calls to enter and exit the market. Give myself a B for the day (well, half-day really) Total Trades: 3 Winners: 2 Losers:0 B/E:1 Total Points: +2.75 Avg. Win: 93.75 Avg. Loss: 0 Total Win: 67% Total Profits: $137.50
Kind of a weird day for me...I had a Dr's appt in the morning and a lunch meeting in the afternoon so I wanted to try and get some trades in...Not too sure if I forced it a bit or would've done it the same. Overall not too bad...give myself a B with an asterisk. Trade 1: 8:43- Short 1115.50 Stop 1118.00 Target 1110.50 9:29- Buy to cover 1111.75 via Iphone :O +3.75 pts Ok so, first of all, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do about this trade...saw the trade set-up and I took it but I new I had to leave...so I put in my stop and also put in a buy to cover limit order since I would be driving and sitting in an office. I can check and buy/sell via the Iphone but I was a bit anxious doing it. I guess from last week I got tired of missing trades/not taking trades b/c of appts, family stuff, etc. How do you full time guys handle normal life stuff like Dr's appts/family/lunches/etc? Anyway, back to the trade, a nice H&S formation as well as some double top looking stuff starting forming up. Per Volente's Rules, I was hesistant/not looking for any long trades since it was such a big gap up overnight. But since the TRIN was fairly bullish, if I was going short, I wanted pretty good confimation. The PA had a nice move down but I waited and wanted some more confirmation on the 5m bar. I've started watching the 20EMA per NoDoji for a guide/extra confirmation and seems to be working nicely. Thanks NoD I haven't been watching it that long, but it seems like a magnet once the PA starts moving towards that 20EMA. So I was very happy with my entry but again I had to leave for the Dr. Really didn't want to get out of the trade and in the end I just barely missed my target...bummer. I think if I was sitting in front of the computer I could've gotten another 0.50 pts or so, but in the end, not too bad, b/c I was able to exit while sitting in the waiting room via my Iphone. Little weird...didn't like doing that. Further, I've been looking into taking breakouts vs. waiting for pullbacks and have come to the conclusion that if your entry is pretty good and you give your stop the appropriate wiggle room then you shouldn't worry about waiting for a pullback...any opinions? Just seems that if you are right with the trend then I shouldn't have to worry about a waiting for the pullback...if Im wrong Im going to be stopped out anyway. Im of course of assuming a fairly calm market in terms of volatility, ie no 10pt moves on the 5m bars or something crazy. Trade 2: 11:41- Short 1114.00 Stop 1115.50 Target 1111.50 12:11- Buy to cover 1113.75 +0.25 pts With this trade, the PA was fairly calm, kinda like its been the past couple weeks in the middle of the day. I wanted to try and start taking some of these trades to get some more experience with dealing with the slow moving action and making the correct call. I realize I needed to be spot on in terms on entry/stop/etc. So, a double top at the bottom of a little downtrend started forming up. But could've also formed a W bottom at that point so I was a little hesitant. Im not terribly mad at myself for taking the trade, but I did make some mistakes. I feel I should've either entered a bit earlier or not gone in at all. The other mistake I think I made was not being more disiple with my entry, should've shorted at the 1114.50 level to make the R:R more appropriate for this type of trade. In the end, I exited b/c I had to leave for my lunch appt. and I had no problem doing it because there was almost no movement and the trade wasn't looking very strong. Total Trades: 2 Winners: 2 Losers:0 B/E:0 Total Points: +4.00 Avg. Win: $100.00 Avg. Loss: 0 Total Win: 100% Total Profits: $200.00