jonbig04

Actually I find that many of my setups happen in the PM. I just set my alerts like I do during the day. If they go off at night, I wake up and place the trade, and hopefully go back to sleep with my targets set. I really don't have a set time of day when I trade, its just when ever my setups occur and alerts chime. Come to think of it, the last trade I took woke me up with the "target filled" sound, then I went back to sleep lol Thats just me though.

oops! Thanks BF haha, Yes I meant "sell stop".

Agreed. Globex highs and lows are no joke, and I no longer skip these hours. Granted, I have no life. At any rate these levels also are often significant during RTH too.

Sorry for not updating this journal. I really have no excuse. I didn't get to trade for the first few weeks of september, so I guess I just got into the habit of not updating. I've also been working on something I wanted to get right before I shared it. Anyways I will try to get it back on track. things are progressing much the same. Made a few noob trades, few BE's, and a few large wins, same ole stuff. EXCEPT: For anyone following along in the journal you know that me trying to make my "test 1 " trades more effective has been a common refrain. For me, a test one is just a first test of a level in that day or a few days. So I guess it's not a first test at all, but usually its been a while since price has tested it or price has broken out above it and I'm playing the flip of it. For example, say price has found R 3 times at 1,000, then break above it with force to, say, 1010. I then wait for a potential retrace back down to 1000 before buying it. The funny thing about test one trades is that you are almost always counter trend in relation to the trend of that day. It's somewhat counter intuitive in that way. Anyways the hardest part about these trades is the damn entries. I was always getting stopped to the tick, or missing fill by a few ticks, or getting stopped out BE. I was stuck in the age old price risk vs information risk dilemma and could see no way out. I would like to point out that even with those problems, if one simply holds onto their winners, test 1 plays are easily profitable over time. So here's what I've been doing. Thalestrader helped me out with this too. I couldn't simply wait for more confirmation because then I just get crappy fill and I'll get stopped even when the trade works. I also couldn't just enter more aggressively because then it would be falling knife city. There is/was no silver bullet. I just have to use the PA around the time of entry to gain an edge over the price risk/ info risk dilemma. So, once again thanks to thales, here's what I've began doing: (This is all on a 5 sec chart so the HH's or LL's are micro.) I wait for price to get near my level (FWIW I have alerts set up a few points away. Until then I'm usually not paying that much attention) then I wait for a nice volume spike. This activity lets me know that something important may be about to happen. Very often I find that price, before heading the other way, reaches its highest or lowest point on a volume spike. Many times there are a few spikes though. Once that happens, I wait. Assume I'm looking for a short. I have found that many times price doesn't just get rejected and peace out the other way immediately, rather it stalls for a few minutes. I wait to see if price is going to retake the high made by that spike. If it does, thats OK, but I'm more suspicious now. As of now I'm willing to let it happen once, but if price makes 2 higher highs I just let it go and stay away. But ideally price just consolidates below that spike for 5-20 min. I then note the micro range that has been created by this consolidation and place a sell limit below it, with my stop a stock above the high created by the spike. Price dicks around for a little while, then begins it's decent, stopping me in with a protected stop. Or it jets off the other way and I avoid the stop. My stop is protected because I've seen more information to show me where R is (maybe even to the tick) and that its for real so less falling knives, but price also has to break out of the consolidation range in my direction for me to get fill. So ideally I'm getting the best of both worlds. Of course this strat isn't perfect. I'll still get stopped to the tick. I'll still buy falling knives, but it's made my entries less arbitrary and more dynamic and PA based. I sill have kinks to work out, like the size of the range and the size of my stop. But I believe I have a good starting point and should be able to nail some more of those test 1 trades. I've only been using this for a week. I've used it on 2 trades. One I took a stop, but it allowed me to get a much better entry and if the market had kept going my way it would have worked, when if I had been using my old strat I would have been stopped out immediately. The next time I used it I was able to catch a monster that I wouldn't have otherwise been able to catch. So far so good. But only time will tell if I can make this work more effectively. It's a start!

Been journal slack. Market has been in new territory for me so I decided to give some time to develop some PA I could go off of.

No levels, no trades. Wish this thing would PB so I could trade

No levels, no trades. As I was writing that ES spiked up to 1070. DAMN! Wish this thing would PB so I could trade

Bah, losers.:haha: ............

Feelin' some adversity this month. Gotta step it up!

lol today was so stupid. No trades, same game plan for tomorrow. Come on market lets MOVE!

Some possible price paths...I wish... lol :rofl:

Sorry, my data didn't update for some reason, thanks for pointing that out! still working on the other ninja problem, and obviously I didn't re-enter the short. I was out for -0.5 ES.

I'm working with ninja to get this problem fixed so I don't keep wasting money by re-entering.

Damn, that WAS depressing lol. Frankly I'm not in trading to make 'average' money. I'm not in it to wax poetic about the complexities of the market. I'm not even in it for a long term career. I'm in it for as much money as possible, as fast as possible. Period. But we all have our reasons and goals. We all have different personalities.

I agree for the most part. My point was just that the obstacles trading presents are simply different than that of other endeavors-which can make them difficult to anticipate if you aren't prepared for them. Example below. I would also take it a step beyond saying people "don't like" to lose money or be wrong. IMO they have been programmed to stay away from anything that will put them in a position to experience either because in almost all other areas of life it is a sign that something is going terribly wrong. Whereas in trading, its natural.

I don't know about the stats, but there is something that sets trading apart from most professions. IMO traders, as a normal part of every day trading, are confronted with two situations which most people do everything they can to avoid: being wrong and losing money. Most people can't handle either one, let alone both on an almost daily basis (depending on your style of course). I agree that trading presents challenges that are beatable like any other field, but the challenges it presents are completely unlike the vast majority of other professions out there and require a completely different set of skills to overcome. Often, the tendencies that we have developed from birth, the tendencies that will help us get through a career like being an attorney or a real estate agent do not apply to trading. Trading may not be harder, but it is different. In a broad way you can compare trading to say, getting a law degree. Both require time, dedication, and hard work. But thats pretty much where the similarities end. Getting a degree really only requires time and effort. You go to the class, do what you're told, and after X amount of time the degree is in your hands. You can spend the same amount of time reading trading books and listening to "gurus" and get no where. Trading presents us with unlimited opportunities daily. The path to success is no where near as clearly defined as something like a law degree. I agree that making trading a big deal in our minds isn't helpful, and too many people do it. It is beatable just like anything else, but IMO it is different than other things and has to be approached differently. The things that make trading difficult aren't the same as the things that make getting a law degree difficult. So, they both present their respective challenges, but the challenges a trader has to deal with are very different from that of most other fields.

http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=13219&stc=1&d=1252042057

This is kind of annoying, but I guess mechanical malfunctions are a part of trading. This is the only time this has happened to me in the past year so I guess I can't be too upset...but still. Oh, I didn't play the break down because last nights action had me unsure of where S was. Although we once again witnessed the power of the DT breakout.

I'm not one of those people who think you need a lot of capital to trade, depending on your max draw down and how disciplined you are, I think $2,000 is plenty. Below that though and even I think you are pushing it. No matter what your style I think $2,000 per contracts is pretty barebones as far as a trading account goes. To each his own, my only advice is that with that small of an account you better have a very solid system and be very disciplined. Thats just my opinion. A lot of brokers require $2,000 to open an account, but they don't require $2,000 to be maintained in the account. Of course I don't know why on earth anyone would just have the minimum margin in their account. One tick in the red and you would probably be liquidated, and at the every least not be able to trade anymore when 1 loss is taken. That sounds like a recipe for disaster to me. My advice is save up the $2k. Ninja is not free when you start to trade real money. It's only free while your sim. They do have some options available including one that allows you to pay around $200 every 3 months or so. I don't want to sound preachy, but be careful. Trading is zero sum, you're trying to take my and many other peoples money and most people don't want to give it away easily. Be sure you are prepared. Good luck.

Good point Thales. A while back I picked a few levels my closing by eyes and putting my finger on the screen. Wherever it landed I drew a line. It's amazing how price tested it from each side etc. It makes sense though really. Every price point is being watched by someone. Price rising above any level is bullish, but how bullish? When my arbitrary lines were broken it wasn't very meaningful because there weren't very many people watching or protecting that level. Therefor price breaking the arbitrary level doesn't give us near as much information as if price broke a major level that many people were watching (major s/r).

Not much choice really. I run windows on a separate monitor so I can do everything else in OSX.

Thanks. It means a lot that maybe, just maybe, this log will make someone's trading journey just a little bit easier. :beer:

The same thing has been happening to me! I thought it was just my internet connection (current one stinks), but for the past 2 weeks or so I've only been able to log in a few times. It just initializes forever. Like I said, I didn't mention it because I figured it was just my connection.