jonbig04

Interesting thread. Im happy to say I learn from a veteran trader everyday. To say my trading has improved would be an understatement. I don't pay a dime. Its a rare thing I'm sure, but their are traders out there who make boatloads in the market and want nothing but to help others along.

Thanks Tara. I have a good teacher

You mentioned you have a system. You then mentioned you have a problem overtrading, exiting early etc. Doesn't your system's rules stipulate when you have to enter and exit? If so do you find yourself blatantly breaking those rules? By the way I am fully convinced now that trading is 80% mental. You really only need a slight edge, with the ability to leverage that edge as much as possible by exercising complete discipline.

Oops for some reason these stats didnt make it in: Largest win 36 Largest loss -4

No trading today I'm working out a discrepancy in my rules, I put together some stats for the month though. Monthly sum up. (trading 3 contracts, point are an average of the 3) Week 1 (10/27-10/31) +34 Week 2 (11/3-11/7) +29.25 Week 3 (11/10-11/14) +15 Week 4 (11/17-11/21) +26 Total points for the month 104 Weekly Average 26 Total trades 33 Accuracy 30% In looking back over the past month, I know I could have been more points if I was more flexible. If my trading wasnt so structured and rule based. But thats cool. Because I can honestly say my performance will be consistent, sim or cash. And thats the point of all this anyways.

Crazy day! Man was I pissed. Today tested every bit of my discipline. First was a short...didnt even come close, was stopped quickly. -3 -3 -3 Next, another short in the same area. -3 -3 -3 lol Then the frustrating bit: I shorted 1108.5. price then proceeded to stop me out by a few points (to HOD) then dumped. Bad entry cost be 36 AVG points. Bitch. As mad as I am/was that hasn't happened in 3 or 4 weeks. Besides that time, every time I;ve been stopped it was bc I was dead wrong about trend. Missed it. So I can safely say my entries have improved which is cool. -3 -3 -3 Then I tried to short. Price had been busting and bending all day long, so I decided to be patient. I saw some nice vol, but it was a few points from the level and I wanted the actual level at least, plus my rules say it has to be within a point. Well this time it didnt bend or touch and that cost me. Missed it again. Hopefully, I thought I can get in later. Placed the trade, missed fill by literally 1 tick. Price went own quite a bit. Missed it again. But then price came back up, I shorted and got a great entry and it was a good trade which bailed me out of all my above shittyness. I sold for EOD. +15, +27, +30.25 +15 for the day

lol! oops!, my chart is in a different time zone, meant to say 11:10EST (im on MST)...now where is that flux capacitor....

lol he knows, now he must be eliminated. Nothing secret at all, just S&R. Just following the request of my teacher.

Im not really supposed to post charts up of my trading. However yesterday I began trying short at 10:30EST and finally shorted at 9:10EST. If you notice my stops are static, 3 NQ points. The R/R on that trade was sweet, around 1:10, risked 3 to make 30, but of course thats just 1 good trade. Douglas FTW!

Bought the first iphone the day it came out. Couldnt live without it.

Good day today. Got suckered into a stupid long in the AM. Looked like support, of course it didnt come anywhere near it and I got stopped -3 -3 -3 Then I tried to short that same area, but couldnt get in. Then i tried to short lower. Didnt get in. Finally got a short in at 1145ish. Got in a little too early, but didnt get stopped. I exited the last car earlier for reasons I will explain. +15, +36, +35.5 I had a pivot marked at 1108. It held nicely as support and I still had one car left. My rules say I can't simply hope that S breaks when its already been tested. If it has been tested successfully, I have to enter. I wanted to hold the short just because everything seamed bearish, but thats not a good enough reason. As per my rules I sold my last car at +35 or so, and reversed. I was quickly stopped and couldnt get a short back in. Did this cost me points? Yes. It cost me the stop and another 5AVG points or so (15 on the car). Thing is, I don't care. Daily points are not my priority. My first priority is a set of rules with positive expectancy over time. What good are sim points if you dont know for complete certain that you cant replicate the results with cash? Of course I will try to hone my rules to extract as much money as possible, but never breaking them is whats important. I know I harp on this a lot, but I keep hearing about this cash demon. Screw a cash demon. I wont have one, because try to eliminate all ambiguity from my trading. I can say with honestly that my results over the past few weeks, whether you think they are shitty, decent, or good would be exactly ,or very near, the same as if I were trading 20 cars. Why? Because I follow my rules, thats it. I dont make good decisions, or bad ones. I follow my rules. The time will come one day when I can read PA like a book and maintain discipline like some already do-thats the holy grail. I can't wait for that day, but right now I know that if I dont have rigid structure and complete rules based discipline, I cant be sure my performance will be the same when I go cash. And if I cant be sure my performance will be the same in cash, wtf am I even doing? My first goal is to make a living from trading an to do that just a few consistent points with discipline is all thats required. Once I reach that I will aim for more. Step by step. Anyways that trade cost me: -2.5, -2.5- 2.5 +23.5 AVG for the day.

Oops, just realized I forgot to post my log for yesterday. Abysmal day anyway. Got stopped on all trades and missed the big move. Can't say I was very happy about it. -9 for the day.

NQ was what the people I trade with were trading at the time, and the leverage is less than ES. Both stupid reasons really. Now everyone is trading ES because apparently its a little more...respectful of PA rules. I stuck to NQ because I wanted the challenge of having to account for what makes NQ a little tougher sometimes. I'm still learning so might as well learn on the tough stuff. I'm sure I will make the switch to ES at some point though. I use quite a few charts, long term, shorter term, short term, right down to the 1 second chart. I dont take volume into account most of the time.

Choppy day today. Hated it. Tried a long early in the morning. I clicked the buy button accidentally, and then closed it before making the actual trade. Oops. Didn't work anyways. 1st trade -3 -3 -3 accident -.25, -.25, -.25 Then a short that failed. Didnt like making this trade, but it somehow conformed to my rules. Stupid. -3 -3 -3 Missed the boat on the long after that. Went long a little later, go first target, rest stopped +15, -3, -3 Chopped for the rest of the day. Stayed out. -3.25AVG for the day.

Exactly! There are no good days or bad days, you either follow your rules or you don't. Follow them when they work, follow them when they don't work. JUST FOLLOW THEM. Eventually you will have a set of rules that show positive expectancy. When you do, you have arrived! All you have to do is follow your rules, increase size and repeat.

Quick correction. Yesterday was -3 not -6.

Holy crap! Today was wild! Man if I would have had this OR strategy earlier in the week that would have been awesome. Anyways first trade was a short at R, got to +11 or so then came back and stopped me. Thats cool though, got my new OR rules. First trade -3 -3 -3 Then 1 minute later I reversed. got my first target of 24 watched the other 2 cars go to +30, just shy of target 2. It was a major R point though. Since I dont yet have an exit strategy I watched those 2 +30's turn into -3's. Man that STILL burns. +24, -3, -3 Reversed right after that and sold at EOD, which cost me 20 points lol. Oh its worth mentioning that this trade went to +14.75, 1 tick from target 1 then came all the way back to -1, then back down to these results. Ahh a good entrance saves my ass yet again. +15, +29, +29. +27 for the day. Should have been more Today was an up day yea, but man I lost a lot of points due to my exits not being PA based. Thats cool though. They will stay this way for now. Also, I mentioned before, If i had been trading these new rules all week the results would be very different. However I was negative coming into today so Im glad to see today dug me out of that hole and then some. +15 for the week, horrible for how great of a week it was, but its cool. Whew just made the bottom of my 15-20 goal. lol. I cant wait until next week to have a full week of my new rules!

Crazy stuff. Im just a piker, but I think equilibrium is reached in that price action is the most direct representation we have of supply and demand which is fueled by the immutable fear and greed of human beings. Thats why we can make living trading using PA. IMHO.

Man. Whatever happened to Keep It Simple Stupid (KISS)?

Never has my entire computer been so close to being thrown out of the window as it was today. I may get shit for this but i don't care today I had bad ******* luck. I swear I did.. There may not be such a thing but damn if I dont beg to differ. There are some areas that need to be addressed, but I still feel like SOMETHING should have worked. I placed arrows on the chart by all the trades I tried to take but missed. First things first price bounced nicely off of R. It came down and completely owned S my signal to look for shorts. When price came back up to S now flipped to R I tried an entry, shorted, and got owned. Ok, no big deal. Price then proceeded back up to 1773 and bounced off enough for me to consider it R again. It retraced a bit (tough to tell from chart though since it was so soon after) and I started looking for shorts. The thing was all over the place, almost to the point where I consider it broken R, but not quite...so I was still looking for shorts. I couldn't get in. I've said to myself before, in past journals, get a precise entry and be patient...if you miss the move you miss it. Well I missed it (had I not missed it this would have gone all the way to my +54 target). Piece of shit NQ. All was not lost though because I have my shiny new OR strategy. oddly, price bounced of R and I went short there but was quickly stopped, no big deal, but then price owned R with lots of vol. I was stopped out but its was Ok because I learned that price was far weaker than I expected. After R ownage I was looking for a short. Price tanked a but and I thought it was gone for good but then it came back up ti within 2 ticks of R. I'm DESPERATELY looking for a short here, but I can't get confluence on the 1 sec. WTF? There is ALWAYS confluence on the one sec. Price popped back up to R same story...I can't get a good entry..WTF? Of course price dropped and additonal 50 points shortly after. Damnit. I'm still pissed. Then in some crazy move price rallied all the way back to R, I shorted, hit the +15 target and was stopped on the rest. Bastard. The price owned R and didnt give me a chance for a long. My pivot was my last line of defense. If it owns the previous R, surely it will give me an entrance there. Well it owned the previous R and proceeded up 25 points or so. By this time I was so frustrated I wanted to strangle myself, NQ, George Bush, Hank Paulson, Pauly Shore, my mom, EVERYBODY. I ran out to grab a sub. The subway is literally just below my window. The line was a little longer than usual and it took my 20 minutes instead of the usual 10. Piece of shit NQ came back down, to R flipped S where I was looking for a long earlier, touched it and then went all the way back up another 35 points! While I went to get a sub. NQ you bastard! I hate you! A lot of this is my frustration talking of course. Its my dumbass fault that I went to get a sub lol. And its was MY system being exploited. Myself only to blame, not NQ (that bitch). It was just odd today, Im fine with my wrong trades, its just I was trying 3 different times to short this morning and the 1 sec chart was so weird. Its never burnt me before...I dont use it that much for confirmation as I do just to get a better entry. Its frustrating when you are so close so many times to making huge trades and you come up short just by a little, but I guess thats better than not trying to short at all. That coupled with the fact that Im down a lot this week when there have been a lot of great days. All I can do is hope tomorrow is a better day. I really dont want to ruin my +30 weeks streak, but Im afraid thats what is going to happen. It is worth noting that if I had traded with these new rules earlier in the week I would be up by well over 30, but thats not the case. My rules rely on me making 1-3 good trades during the week, and then taking a bunch of small losses. Thats fine, accuracy is over rated and pointless, but when I miss the big trades Im kind of screwed. Anyways I'll be checking over everything with a microscope tonight. -6 for the day

Here's the deal. I FINALLY have an OR strategy worked out. I've backtested it with great results. Without getting too much into it, the vast majority of my other trades still took place that includes losses and wins. I take a few more losses with the OR, but man does it pay off RR style. Im pretty stoked to have it figured out and I hope it reflects in my trading. It should. I used a lot of october and some september. I also backtested the last few days. Lets just say that instead of ending today -3, I would have almost maxed out all targets. Same story yesterday. There have been some great days this week and my rules havent allowed me to take advantage of those days. They do now. It also helps with the main problem of my other rule set which is basically that I was only allowed to enter in MAJOR areas, and the past few days I have been kind of SOL. With less volatility those areas arent reached as much. Anyways I;m pretty stoked to have it complete and it appears to work well. I hope it works as well live. Im -9 for the week right now. Obviously I have some ground to make up.

Got owned. I couldnt figure much out today, just took my signals. Kind of a weird ass day. Ended up -6 for the day having too 2 stops. Sucks. Oh well. Hopefully we will have a clean day tomorrow!

Yes, exactly.

Almost have an OR strategy worked out. Honestly it's not a new strategy like I thought it would be, just gives me a little more to work with throughout the day. I will probably get a few more entrances a week with it. I wont have it ready by tomorrow, weds for sure though.

Market didn't feel like being nice to me today. Just decided to give me all these great signals, with no entry. I tried to get a short in as hard as I could around 10:25 and 2EST, but my rules didn't allow me to enter. I almost entered anyway, but I didnt. would have made a lot of points, but rules are more important than a few daily points. Sucks. Oh well, tomorrow is a new day. Hopefully the market will give me more to work with