TheNegotiator

I have a good idea () cma can ask what the terms are then submit them to the TL dictionary!

No worries. If you have something which you feel works or you can make work, stick with it and develop it.

No it wasn't. I was pointing it out because it was a nice example of what you mentioned in your Pre-Open Plans and Hypotheses thread. This was a PR trade I was talking about.

........and still it continues. So the Greek people are apparently so fed up of Europe that the neo nazi "golden dawn" party are actually gaining in their popularity. That kind of reminds me of something as does there party emblem:- golden dawn wiki Really though, what is this about? Money flowing to and remaining with the uber-rich minority. I say to Greece, completely default. The system is poor and you don't fit in with it. Being in Europe is meant to be beneficial. Just don't give in to ridiculous ideas of GD!! :helloooo:

Although there is a "level" at 41.75 and the 42.50 ETH low, I would actually like to see a test of 40.25 which is a prior balance vpoc. Below and it could fairly quickly slide to 25.50/26.00.

TST, while all this is very sound advice and although certainly not groundbreaking, it is useful to remind people of common sense so they may avoid becoming embroiled in the emotions associated with trading. However, I do disagree with point 4 and 5. Point 4 is pretty misleading I'm afraid. You do have the ability to maximise your chances of success, but not to make it certain. Nothing in life is certain except "death and taxes". Point 5 I also have to say I disagree with in part. "Understand that a scratch trader is a skilled trader." is again kinda misleading. I've seen enough new traders and trainees to realise this. Scratching trades avoids tick losses, but it accumulates commissions and prevents good trades from being profitable. This leads to emotional trading and is a negative influence for traders. IF a skilled trader scratches trades which in the majority prevent losses, then yes this is a skill. But for a noob to scratch, they have to have a good reason other than "I just felt like it was gonna go against me" :doh: Not good.

Market delta trial form .

I run Linnsoft IRT as do others on the E-mini thread. But it's exactly the same software as Market Delta just with a little less functionality. IRT doesn't currently support CQG data, but Market Delta does. MD also offer a 1 month free trial. So you could take the trial and use your CQG data. Just a thought for you to consider. Personally I really like IRT/MD (and am warming to Sierra), so imho it's well worth you taking a look. Setting the charts up is easy too as you can "share" chart definitions to import then alter as you please. We have an IRT forum here too if you want to ask questions etc.

So what about yesterday? We tested Monday's low and failed to retake it. We then pushed lower and lower, without finding any substanial buyers on our way to 42 area. This one is for what Josh mentioned in his Pre-Open Plans and Hypotheses thread. We didn't quite get to what we thought might be a good target/long reversal price @42.50 (to 41.75) and yet the market broke up and formed a balance before taking off to the upside. I'll show this in the chart for those who didn't see at the time. We then pushed up and up and actually made new highs. Yet somehow we still couldn't close inside Monday's range. What does the day tell us? Despite there being "excess" in the typical MP meaning of the word (45.50-43.75), the market felt to me like sellers just ran out of steam. The subsequent rally took time to establish and although it hasn't yet broken as such in RTH, it failed to really follow through despite having opportunity to do so. So sellers were there but couldn't push and push and buyers failed to follow through from the lowest prices we've seen in Regular Trading Hours for 2 months. Overnight so far, we have seen the market move lower overall. Depending on where we open, I'd want to see a test of at least the value at the low end of yesterday's range if not the low and that 42 area. As I am finishing up this post we've ironically just tested the 45.75. There you go. It'll be important to see what happens between now and RTH open and at what price we open.

You can read and read and read, but eventually you have to do. (not meant as a criticism, just pointing it out)

Josh, I'd like to make a few points for you to consider. 1)Preparation is to find potential market "pivots" in a non-classical trading way. If you try to do this in the midst of trading, your emotions will bias your objectivity and you'll end up tying yourself in knots. 2)What you see and context of how the day develops matters. Taking trades blindly at these market pivots will not be likely to lead you to trading excellence, just as only trading at these points will also not likely lead to success in the near-term- unless you have a gargantuan account or you are prepared to look at multiple markets every single day. 3)If you want to plan to take account of entries other than at these points, then you also have to plan for what to do if the market doesn't get there in your timeframe. See what the market does in terms of trading activity, then watch for price behaviour. Work out what would provide you with an acceptable entry location in these circumstances. 4)The best way I have heard to describe the two types of entries which you describe is this. Number 1 entry which you plan for is based on INFORMATION RISK. Number two entry which you are saying in this case you didn't take because the market didn't get to your pre-defined price, is based on PRICE RISK. Ideally, the best trade locations give opportunity to take IR and often provide great trades. When the market subsequently shows it has reacted, traders who want to take the trade but only if they get "confirmation", back the trade up. However, like in the scenario you presented about the trade that never got to the price you wanted, at this point you may have had an opportunity to take a PR trade. What I mean is you are risking that you are not in the ideal location because of what the market is showing you about its intentions by how it trades. You have been given information that the market is possibly starting to balance or even reverse but your entry price isn't ideal. The way to deal with this is position sizing. If the potential positive side of the trade is still worth taking, then you can normalize you risk by taking a smaller position. 5)You might plan to trade PR type trades differently. You may choose to take a much shorter term view and look for just a couple of points or so. 6)Nothing always works. Don't give up on a method or approach just because it doesn't work on any given day. If it creates problems consistently, maybe adjust it. If like was suggested in another post, there is conflict in your method then address that conflict. 7)Preparation and planning are vitally important imho. But your methodology must properly incorpate how you use your plan. If it doesn't, you'll miss decent trades and you'll take trades where you shouldn't.

I would defiantly say it's not I'm afraid. In fairness I have never taken the classes, but from what I hear, they are very expensive for what they are.

This is what bakrob was talking about:-

bakrob, why do you believe it's key resistance? (I'm not disagreeing btw)

1) If possible, it's better if you can attach the image an image filetype for posting 2) Is that CQG? Please tell me you don't have CQG IC? Unless you have specific uses for it I would highly recommend taking a look at linnsoft IRT or Market Delta or Sierrachart. Not that I think CQG is bad but it is very pricey and I personally find the others better for what I use them for. If you need more info, pm me or just message here. Either way is good. 3)Broadly I have the same areas although I tend to include the excess within the balance. I know why you are doing it like this though. 4)I prefer session gaps rather than range gaps normally. I am always aware of the range gap though especially when the close is not near by. I do count the open of 54.25 down to 51.75 on 3/8 as partially closed though so gap for me is 51.75- 47.50. In this case it probably doesn't matter too much though. 5)Yes building above the main Fri dist is useful, although often after a big move day you get a balance day. So I wouldn't necessarily pin too much on it initially. Whilst there are technical aspects at play to the move lower, news is being thrown into the mix now. European news could come out overnight and just wipeout whatever has happened over the last few days. We'll just have to see :missy:

Yeah, looks that way potentially. Although I think it's been a little odd so far. The lack follow through kinda had me suspecting if it fell back out of friday range and broke to new lows, there could be a flush at least.

couple of quick refs to note. 200IB is 52.50 and 127.2 is the on vpoc.(pretty much)

Agree, but also be careful if for whatever reason you aren't alligned with mkt. So far, we basically drove back into Friday and prior balance area. 1st major high vol development was 65(long term prof) and 66.50 on the balance prof. We initially rejected at 66.25 which tells me that there's a chance we aren't going to accept this previous value. The danger imo lies if we drop back below the open and make new lows. Of course the other option is short squeeze if we hold here.

Just one last thing to point out about the markers as perhaps this is a good example of how I see high volume as useful. If we get beyond these markers, we are looking for acceptable prices as to where 2-way trade can occur. This usually means looking at previous "value" or high volume areas. These can subsequently either 1- accepted or 2- rejected. The former tends to push through the high volume but ultimately develop new volume somewhere in the midst of the old high volume. The latter can of course go straight through as price is perceived to be fair further away or, it can reject at or around the high volume which can lead to a counter test in the retracement direction.

Anyway, some key nearby markers for today:-

If they were random, then they wouldn't be "setups" at all. Just click your mouse button and pray. But they're not. This makes me think of the phrase again about "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" and really it's at the heart of why concentrating purely on TA is wrong. Trading has many facets to it which must be seemlessly integrated into a coherent trading plan in order to achieve long term trading consistency. Ignore any parts and I think the plan becomes shaky.

The reason I make the point is that while it may well be useful for you to believe the next trade is 50/50, I know for a fact it does not sit well with many people to think like this. Personally I don't think it's right, but I absolutely understand what you are trying to achieve by believing this. Non-biased market execution. However, what sits well with me which has the same effect on my trading is that I know I don't know (which is a phrase you have used before ) the probability for any specific data point i.e. I don't know where in the probability distribution of historical occurrences the very next trade will fall. We both attend to our psychological requirements effectively the same way, I just wanted to explain so that others who might question such an important point could approach it from a slightly different angle. Anyway, to the current day!

Okay, my first take on weekend of european elections is that it shouldn't be positive for markets at all. Indeed, @PIMCO tweeted yesterday:- "Gross: #Greek elections in addition to #French should be watched closely. Fiscal #austerity as policy thrust may weaken." Sunday gbx trade saw a low of 42.50! But then what? On open, the DAX briefly looked lower but didn't find sellers. Really? Say again? No sellers huh? Does that mean RTH won't see selling to 'properly' test the lower levels for buyers or sellers? No. But the fact is we are much higher right now. So, either we can accept back into Friday's range and create a substantial 'Electronic Tail' or participants can view the retrace as a temporary misprice and hammer it in RTH. To take into account, we are nfp week +1 which I usually find a bit lame. Nothing as far as releases out really of any note although german factory orders was better than expected. There are a host of earnings out. It's a UK bank holiday. Lot's of other potential problems ongoing in europe. blah, blah, blah. Overall, news flow and volatility is potentially high because of weekend events and price movement. I don't know what will happen, but often when these types of scenarios present themselves, we either see big price movement (sometimes both ways) or nothing happens at all. I guess we'll see soon enough

Tom, I know (as I'm sure others do too) where this idea comes from of the next trade being 50/50 probability of outcomes. Although I agree whole-heartedly with the implications, I disagree entirely with the idea. The very next trade and I know to some this will be purely semantics, has very specific odds of being one outcome - in fact 100% odds. But the thing is we do not know all the factors which make up what is going to happen before the event (or even after), whereas afterwards a dataset can be analysed and probabilities artificially assigned. The truth is, when people talk about historical probabilities, they are really just talking about historical occurrences unless they truly understand the exact nature of why the market traded in such a way. This in my mind is why so many 'systems' fail. Think about a simple stat over the period of 2010. I haven't done this btw but if you said buy on rth open and sell on rth close then I'm sure the stat would be at the very least a favourable one. Yet try to carry that forward and without a deeper understanding of trend mechanics and fundamentally why one is occurring, a trader could have used this probability and lost a great amount of money. Just to be clear, I feel market statistics are a very useful part of trading and if used as a guide or a yardstick for market activity, they can really help in decision making. But ultimately, it is my point that we never really fully understand (well maybe some guys do) why something has previously occurred at specific points in time and so can't reasonably be expected to predict when these certain behaviours will recur. The next trade is not 50/50, but it may as well be because we don't know what the odds of the very next trade being a winner or a loser are.

Anyway, I'm off for the weekend now. I hope you all did well and have a great weekend!