Soultrader

I dont think its incorrect. John Murphy has taught me alot of things as well. But I do think those levels should be considered as levels to look for besides your main analysis. For example, I use pivots, previous days high/low, open gaps, and market profile. However, I do still look at pyschological levels of 14700, 14800, 1900, etc... (anything ending with 00) Try identifying more levels that other traders may be watching. If only a small percentage of traders are watching your support level, there is a chance it will not hold. Since I do not trade stocks, it would be difficult to recommend any trading methodology for you. But you should definitely look into various techniques that are used to derive support and resistance levels. My old mentor used moving average clusters and used it very effectively trading the ETF's. Some traders use fibonacci clusters. But they are also aware of other levels apart from their main methodology like the pyschological levels of 1/2 dollar, etc...

Pivot points are simple support and resistance points derived mathematically. They originated from floor traders who trade based on these numbers. The reason why floor traders use them is because they do not have the luxury to trade with monitors and look at every technical indicator in the world. They trade strictly on price and order flow. I don't believe there is any secrets in trading unless you have developed a super system guaranteed to win. If trading discretionary, like I do, there are no secrets. What I do is nothing fancy. A trader can tell his methods to another trader; but if the trader does not know how to use it correctly he will not profit from it. There are many methods you can use to obtain support and resistance points. Some use fibonacci levels, fibonacci clusters, moving averages, Gann analysis, etc... I am sure your friends methodology is nothing new. He is just good at applying the methodology into this analysis and trading. Also.. make sure you never follow anyone's advice blindly. No man on this planet can predict where stock XYZ will be trading in the future. If he claims he can predict prices, he is lying. He can easily go long and reverse as soon as he senses danger. However, unless you are with him 24/7 watching his trades, there is a good chance you will hear new information about his position after the markets have moved against you. By the way, what methods do you use to obtain support and resistance? Are they working for you?

This is great Antonio. Just the way I want it I did notice one error... the midpoint between S2 & S3; R2 & R3, and the S2, R3 seems to be calculated incorrectly? Could you check to see if there is an error in the formula? All the other pivots seem to be correct. Thank you

Amen. I completely agree with you Follow The Trend. Once a traders is able to interpret the langauge of the market, he is on the right track. Charts definitely tell me everything I need to know about the markets. Technicals tend to lead fundamentals.

Thank you Antonio, I have to admit, I am loving this I do want to request two minor additions if that is okay. 1. I would like the option of plotting my pivots in solid lines and the midpoints in dotted. 2. I also want a different set of colors for the weekly and monthly pivots apart from the daily pivots. 3. Also is it possible to enable the midpoint for the daily pivots but to disable them for the weekly and monthly? (or perhaps I can duplicate the .eld with a different name and use it seperately for the weekly and monthly?) You should see me smiling right now Great work!

Very nice analysis also Antonio Those two levels will be ultra key to watch tomorrow. Especially the high volume node at 11660 - 11670; it is also in line with the high from 9/13 and 9/19. I will most likely look for a short opportunity in this area if market internals confirm it. It could be a good opportunity for a solid +30 points.

Hi ant, Here is the formula for the pivots: R3 = R2 + RANGE (same as: PP + RANGE * 2) R2 = PP + RANGE R1 = (2 * PP) - LOW PP = (HIGH + LOW + CLOSE) / 3 S1 = (2 * PP) - HIGH S2 = PP - RANGE S3 = S2 - RANGE (same as: PP - RANGE * 2) Range = High - Low The midpoints are simply the distance between each pivot. I use the same formula for the weekly and monthly pivots. Is there anyway to duplicate the indicator three times so I can use it seperately for daily, weekly, and monthly? Also is it possible to enable or disable the midpoints? Including the midpoints... the daily pivots would give me 13 lines. The weekly and monthly without the midpoints would give me 7 each making it 14 in total. Thank you

Some trading rooms are useless in my opinion. It is also hard to find the right mentor that fits your style of trading. If you want to pursue with short-term trading, I recommend reading tons of books on it. There are plenty of useless books out in the market but there a few that are priceless. First thing you should do is to pick a methodology that suits you and develop it. Build a trading style and work on designing your trading setups. I don't use fundamentals in my intraday trading unless there is significant news that can cause the markets to gap in either direction. Specialize in the group of stocks you plan to trade. Learn the personality of it. Finding a metholodogy and gaining your own trading style can require alot of work and research. You also need to look inside yourself to fully understand what fits you and what doesnt. From my understanding you trade stocks based on fundamental news? This is good for longer term investment but learn day trading strategies and you will be surprised how effective it can be by combining both methods.

Interested in hearing about scalp methods using market profile as well. Does he trade mainly when price is within value? How does he switch his strategy when price trades outside of value? Thanks.

OMG yes! I would love to have a pivot point indicator for Tradestation. I am looking for an indicator where I can simply input the close, high, and low and will plot the pivots accordingly. I also want the ability to delete individual horizontal lines manually (since I may choose to keep or delete midpoints) and ability to select the colors for the lines (color & dotted or solid). It would be great to have for daily, weekly, and monthly pivots. I dont use midpoints for the weekly and the monthly. Am I asking for too much? PS: Here's the link the to trading class I mentioned before, Bestrades Mentoring Group. The website might be still under contruction. The class is approx $300-$320 per month. I know they just recently moved and launched it back into hotcomm so I am not sure how many people are part of it. I will try to find out more info.

Maybe the software you are looking for is Medved Quote Tracker? Here is the homepage: Medved QuoteTracker Short term intraday trading requires a well designed game plan. You mentioned you trade anything with insider buying pressure... is this for investment purposes? Trading is a totally different game from investment. Your "true calling" or break through will come as long as you keep building your trading style and method. A buddy of mine told me this when I was 22, which literally changed my approach to life. He said, "In order to make money, you need to be an expert in one thing." Good luck.

Are we ready for a pullback? The daily charts indicate a market slowing down and perhaps pulling back to the 20 ema at 11525. As long as prices can sustain the trend, this pullback will be healthy. Taking a look at the market profile charts, we went from 4 days of equal or higher value placement. The last 2 trading sessions have created a lower value placement. Today's late afternoon rally should not be mistaken for a bullish move. We ended up developing a lower value and this indicates weakness. From an intraday perspective, this information can be helpful as I will consider looking for setups on the shortside until the markets test the 20ema. Take a look at the charts.

Hi Chris, Welcome aboard. Glad you like the site. Regarding pivot points, try doing a search in this forum. Most of my posts are based on pivots and market profile and you should find numerous charts, videos, and threads based on it. Here is a link for the formulas: http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/derivatives/35-pivot-point-formulas.html?highlight=pivot+points I would assume most data vendors offer floor trader pivots as a tool in their indicators. If you are looking for a good pivot point tool for Tradestation, pm me. I know of a great commercial indicator but costs around $230. I plot the pivots by hand manually. I keep an excel spreadsheet with all my daily data and have a table setup just for pivots. All I do is plot the close, high, and low and gives me all the values.

There is the stock indicator called floor trader pivots that come with the platform. However, its not the best tool to use. You can also find a variety of pivot point indicators at the TS support forum. I did custom make one before but due to the lack of programming skills it wasnt all that ideal to use. Do you already use Tradestation? If you do, check with the easylanguage indicator forum. There are plenty posted there.

I think anyone interested in a venture would like to hear more information about it. Or else it seems like fraud to me.

I became interested in pyschology and NLP a few years back. I read variety of trading pyschology books but this book is considered one of my favorites among them. Alot of good insights in this book that deals with the mindset of a trader. Alot of it has to do with reprogramming your mind and changing your belief system. In order to fully appreciate the benefits on this book, one must already have a trading strategy or system. This will help you add the missing pieces in your trading: pyschology. Although learning the mechanics of trading can take some time, trading is mainly pyschology. Understanding how other traders think and self understanding is the key to success. I highly recommend it for traders in all stages. A must read for any serious short term trader.

The left hemisphere of our brain controls the right side of the body and is analytically oriented. This is the side we use to analyze the markets. Attempting to trade with only the left hemisphere gives you a very narrow vision of the financial markets. Focusing on only technical indicators and science to reason the markets is a left hemisphere view of trading. The right hemisphere controls our left side of the body and is responsible for our inituitive, creative, and artistic side. The right hemisphere is known as the emotional side of our brain and is used to process vast amounts of information. Trading on only the right hemisphere of our brain equals emotional trading. However, this side is necessary to develop self understanding. A trader needs a balance of both the right and left hemisphere of our brain. Overnight preparation should be done with the left hemisphere while the right hemisphere should be used in the line of fire. Here are a few examples of right and left dominant types taken from Balance Your Brain Hemispheres - The IPN Left Dominant Type: argues logically and always has an answer for everything is future oriented never has time and races towards a heart attack any body awareness is foreign ignores any physical symptoms is nervous, restless, hectic, wound up, sometimes euphoric but learns quickly under direction to improve the condition has a tendency towards hypochondria doesn't know what to do with inner visions and feelings The left dominant type likes to be in leadership roles and high management positions. They are task oriented, result oriented, like to work with a list of things to be done. In order to be happy, they need success and recognition, but also order and structure. They have a very rigid vision of their own identity and their goals. problem solving approach: the left dominant type solves problems logically, analytically, step by step. Prefers numbers and facts in a logical sequence. Is interested in technology, finances and accounting, learns from dealing with facts. Easy to be hypnotized. Right Dominant Type: talks in feelings, but often in the negative is past oriented tries all kinds of therapies and abandons them again nothing satisfies, is depressive, moody, emotionally unstable and feels sorry for her/him-self is self-descructive, always expects the worst slow learner to improve inner and physical conditions, often frustrating to others many people of this type are very charismatic and extroverted they search for fun activities, like painting, making music, work in the garden, being creative. They think of many things simultaneously, start many activities, need a lot of space. Have a high ability to express themselves, are communicative, often spiritual and inventive, inspire others with their ideas and also get easily inspired by others, are wordy and suggestive. as a child are difficult to educate, because they often have difficulties to distinguish between right and wrong. Under duress, they lack a sense of self-identity, are incapable to seperate feelings from ideas. It is easy to get into a panic and react with helplessness and little self-control. Under constant stress, obesity and hedonism are a problem. Often they believe in destiny and coincidence, without human intervention. When they have a chronic or life threatening illness, tend to be fatalistic. solves problems intuitively, with a sense for the whole. Is open for new ideas and developments, learns from action and observation. I am curious to know the various excersises that can help one develop a good balance of both. Some people tend to use one side more than the other. One method I learned about a year ago to improve the right hemisphere is to write down market insights and thoughts on a daily basis. This allows your creativity to grow. If anyone else knows of methods to help balance the two hemisphere's please share it with us.

Couple rules you need to understand when shorting though. In the stock market, you can only short on an uptick. This rule does not apply in the futures markets. If you ask your broker, they will give you a list of shortable stocks. It all depends on the inventory of your broker.

Technical indicators such as stochastics and the RSI can be applied to confirm pivot point setups. When price reaches a pivot point, look for candlestick patterns such as doji's, shooting stars, harami's and engulfing patterns. This can add further confirmation to a pivot point setup. If you trade with indicators, you can look for bullish and bearish convergence/divergence using the stochastics or RSI. I do no trade with indicators or watch for certain candlestick patterns, however, one powerful trading setup that I have noticed recently occurs when pivots cluster up with technical price patterns. For example, in a head-n-shoulders pattern, if the neckline is in line with a pivot point this can offer a high probability trading setup. When the breakout resistance level of an ascending triangle is in line with a pivot, this also offers a high probability trading opportunity. If you are currently trading with indicators only and want to learn to trade with pivots, plot the pivot points and see if your indicators offer clues when price reaches the pivots. The more confirmation you get from the markets, the higher the odds are for a successful trade.

There are two types of men in this world. One that falls and one that stands up after he falls. In NLP or Neuro-Linguistic Programming, there is no such things as failure. A failure is simply classified as a feedback and every feedback is a lesson to help you learn and improve. There are many hurdles a trader must overcome to become successful. A winning trader views each hurdle or setback as a step towards success. The losing trader on the other hand does not hold this belief. Ed Seykota said it best. Harsh but yet so true. Success only comes to those who want it badly. Nothing in this world should be done half-way. Losing traders refuse to take responsibility of their actions. They prefer to blame external factors for their mistakes and lossses. In NLP, in order for a feedback to become a lesson one must take full responsibility of his action. We All Start Off With A Dream I think men in general spend half their life dreaming. Without a dream, there is no thought. Without thoughts, there is no action. However, too many men spend their time talking and thinking. What is required is action. Losing traders think similarly. They are so used to thinking and not acting that when the opportunity knocks at their door, they are unable to answer it. Thinking traders usually turn to trading systems; tweaking every indicator they have to find the perfect signal. The problem is they spend too much time jumping from one system to another that they are never able to become good at one methodology. Thinking traders need to know the outcome before hand. This conflicts with their ability to trade. They tend to be perfectionists wanting to be right all the time. Trading is not about being right. It is about making money. Jumping The Gun How many men do you know that act before they think. A form of balance is needed when trading the markets. However, many new traders lack patience and discipline. They get too caught up emotionally in their ideas that they often do things just to regret rushing in at the end. These type of traders have a hard time following their trading plans. They may understand what it takes to trade successfully but their lack of discipline and self-understanding prevents them from doing so. They believe that eventually things will turn out alright. They often play on a tilt after a loss and will trade recklessly with their capital. Change Is Good Many people are too comfortable with their current situation that they dread change. It is common to see couples who are unhappy with each other remain in a relationship because they are too used to being together. Some people associate change with fear. This attitude does not help in trading. Learning is easier than unlearning. When something does not work, one needs to change what he is doing right away. A trader needs to be flexible and hold an open mind. Characteristics Of A Losing Trader 1. Undiscplined 2. No money management 3. Unprepared 4. Overtrading habits 5. Easily tilted 6. Does not trade with probabilities 7. Trades emotionally without controlling: greed, hope, fear, and euphoria 8. Does not have a trading plan and strategy

I use a 30 minute market profile chart, a daily chart to look for key support and resistance points, and a weekly chart to see the bigger trend. Im not a fan of 1,3,5 minute charts. I find the 233 TICK chart more useful to my style of trading.

There is a reason why stocks are that cheap. I did however invest in Aspen Exploration Corp., a natural gas exploration company in California. I bought the stock at $2.25, held onto it for a few months just to see it go absolutely nowhere. I eventually sold it at break even just to see it go fivefold to around $10 4 weeks later. I learned a big lesson with that stock. The stock is currently trading at $3.85.

I am actually not too familiar with what is available in Japan. I will ask some of my friends who work in investment firms that deal with real estate. I am aware that you can trade ADR's and ETF's that deal with Japanese stocks in the US. For example the MSCI iShares Japan, S&P ADR Index, and the iShares S&P/TOPIX 150 index can be traded in the US. The indexes represent stocks primarily traded on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

Hello Elizabeth. Welcome aboard! It looks like you are doing pretty well for yourself We look forward in your participation. Feel free to contact me anytime if you have any questions regarding the website.

Just wanted to post my workspace and go over the tools that I use everyday. I use a 233 TICK candlestick charrt. I find it easier to trade with and I do not like price bars being plotted in intervals of minutes. I use the PC ratio as a contrary tool. Whenever the PC ratio is high, this means there alot of traders are short. Therefore I will start looking for long setups. When the PC ratio is low, alot of traders are long and I will look for short setups. The TRIN helps me gauge market internals. The trend of the TRIN and the range of the TRIN is something I look for. The TICK is also a tool to judge market internals. However, I use this tool to time my entries along with the tape. A line on close TICK chart is a helpful tool to prevent you from chasing the markets. I use the TAPE for entries and exits. Whenever price reaches a key pivot level, I will read the tape and see if price will hold or fold. The premium helps me see when buy or sell program kicks in. The levels change daily and you need to adjust them manually each day. The numbers can be obtained at Program Trading, Fair Value, Index Arbitrage Values - indexArb.com. See the attachment for the pic: