bootstrap

well i have read all the posts int his thread and there were hints to the answer, but i didn't see it. maybe my eyes are just tired. but the simple answer to why so many indicators and little strategies is........ indicators are basically just math trying to emulate the market. strategies are personal and based on your observations after putting in the screen time.

the secret to making it in this game is to find your sweet spot. some guys can scalp and think long term is boring, some are long term and see scalping as gambling, and then there are the swing traders who think everyone else is nutts. i have been trading with the same bunch of guys for almost 10 years now. We all started out trading differently, but have all slowly migrated to the same style. We are all long term day traders. we may be in a trade a matter of minutes or months, it just all depends. i guess what i am trying to say is that your trading zone should be whatever you are comfortable with. true, it does take a bigger bank roll to trade long term. IMO short-term trading should be used to generate income and long term to generate wealth. the style should be based on the ultimate goal.

I wasn't gonna do an introduction, but thought maybe I should. I have been at this trading biz since the early 1990's. I blew out two accounts before I got it right. I started out with the manual from the Cowboy out west, and as much as I hate to say it the way I trade now has its roots in that simple incomplete manual. I have a core portfolio of index funds that are managed using a contrarian strategy, and swing trade the currencies. I do not use any indicators on the swing trades. I only use P&F charts and price pivots. See you in the pits....

for those that are still curious the opening range is a short term average of the range of the first pivot price. not to be confused with pivot points. And while the strategy can be used for longer time frames it was designed for day/swing trading using intraday data.