TheNegotiator

Haha, I missed this one! To some, trading any product is too dangerous and that's true if you don't know what you are doing(and sometimes even when you do:crap:)

I use fibbos as point of reference most of the time josh, unless they line up with other things, I don't trade off them. There are some that work well alot of the time. For example, after a decent move, the 78.6% ret holds in ES many times(no stats- maybe we can do some). You don't have to use it and I wouldn't blame you for not. But there are people who can make money using MA's. So it's different strokes you know.

We also did the same on the other side with 11.75 vpoc tested. Today is low data and with stuff coming up next couple of days/next week, it is quite possible that we build some more today.

Thought I'd do a quick chart to show this Tom as it's often counter-intuitive. Of course we could still trade lower, but it shows that the market was trying to go higher given its higher value(and/or VPOC). Although I mentioned the 1408.00 area in the chart, looking at a 30min chart too I think 1410.00 area could have a role to play too and perhaps even override the 1408.00 importance. We'll see. Bear in mind we're a little way from open still so that could all change later on.

Yeah true, but from a trading perspective whether a top becomes temporary or not, it can offer an opportunity.

Possibly could be this Josh(although not sure why the proportion would be relatively higher on holiday days):-

If what you say is true, why would people execute more transactions in non-front month on holiday days? Is this not possibly to do with different order types that institutions use? I don't know so would have to dig a little to find out. Steve would know considering his institutional background. One thing that has irked me is I think they messed up the march/june roll as for 3/8 I have 350k traded on a 405m chart - that was roll thursday. I did try to fix it by redownloading(hoping they'd have sorted it) but it didnt work. Perhaps I will try it again later.

Clearly feeling was wrong this time, but then again you don't have to be right to profit.

Hmm, I'm starting to think that we might need a flush before higher prices are tested- even taking into account PHS at 10.

I know pending home sales is at 10, but are we still just in squeeze mode?

Well we've popped up on Bernanke comments pre-RTH after a move higher on momentum from Friday and its close. Opening here @1402.75 would be in the "naked" part of 3/19 range which wasn't a structurally nice day. Question is whether we'll just blast through it, fail to hold at nearby support and retest 94/95 or 92/92.50 before next decision, or hold support and auction higher. Here's a chart anyway:-

I think the idea of conscious and subconscious understanding of the market is a very useful one potentially. I like karoshiman's idea about taking trades with his gut too. Sometimes those can pay big. Just like how we try to allign ourselves with the market ebb and flow, alligning our conscious and subconscious at the same time is when things really can start to click. A simple suggestion maybe Tom is to consciously take account of this subconscious feeling when you are considering a trade. Just like price action around your entry, it could be used as a variable to decide whether or not to take the trade at all. You could even say, size your position differently based on this feeling. In thiss case it might have been that you note the feeling consciously then maybe trade half of your standard clip. Just an idea.

In realtime, I think it comes down to, in this case anyway, when the market breaks through a near reference point high or low then breaks back, alert levels should be elevated to amber. If it's a good breakout, then why has it come back? In this example from Friday, we moved to 81.50 then actually attempted to retest once (@82.75) before selling to 80.50. Then there are the subsequent rotations I mentioned in my chart before. If the selloff was to continue, it would really need to reverse from not too far from whatever the reference rotation magnitude projects. Actually, if you think about it even the extra 1 tick was a bit of an early warning. Why should it rotate by a larger number of ticks upwards than before the subsequent move had taken place if there was much further down to go? When you are looking for reversals from inside either the prior day's or recent balance range, it's not so different. The only thing is that you won't have that nice break-line as a delineation. But, often you have longer to think things through aswell, as what tends to create the greatest amount of competition(and so swift moves away) is a greater change in price. Like an elastic band if you will. I know it is hard to use this logic in realtime especially when you make a mistake then bias yourself. But for me, this is the best way to identify probable reversals. Put together with the profiles and delta, I think it's all you really need. The comment about products is just that the ES is not necessarily the kindest to traders who like to go with it when the market is potentially turning. Obvious others are products like 6E or even TF/YM/NQ. Perhaps even ZB. But ES is very nice too, so I don't want to sway you needlessly. It was just a thought

Tom, if you feel you are best at continuation trades, you need to figure out criteria of when to not take them just as when to take them. Since you are a human being and not a robot, the likelihood is you'll miss things sometimes, but you can always strive to be as good as you can. The rest is kind of the cost of making money from the continuation trades. Secondly and I must stress that this is something i would never dive right into, if you are a continuation trader, is ES the best market for you?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like the kinda of thing where you get onside then the market pulls back against you and your emotional self is screaming at you not to lose or at the market for not going straight to your exit. Having realistic expectations of the way the market might trade to get to where you are targeting is one point. The market always rolls back on itself as we all know, so it's important to get in at good "location" or with correct "position sizing" to give the trade the space it needs. Level of tolerance on pullbacks is important and needs to be accounted for. I have had problems with this before. Two things help imho. Just slapping my emotional self to remind me that what matters is the end result of a trade not what it currently is printing. Sure, if it's achieved 95% of my expectation I might take it off more quickly as the risk:reward is highest here. But if I'm onside and it hasn't violated my expectations, then I have to say to myself if I want to exit "then why did you get in anyway?". Second is scaling. It does take a good deal of pressure off and I know it's something others don't like. I think it's something you do already though. Agreed MM. But you should also want to be really good at losing without necessarily liking it(aka cutting losses at the appropriate point). Not being effective at taking a loss is one of the biggest if not the biggest challenge traders face imho. Yeah, I was going to point out marginal trades too. Those ones that you take in hope more than belief and your emotions go mental as soon as you see it tick against you. Usually momentum type trades when I take them and normally it's quickly obvious whether they'll work. If you're late at getting on the train, you have to accept the chance that you'll have to get off soon else face it turning around and reversing down the same direction it came from.

Before I say what I look at, I'd point out that I don't think there are any hard and fast rules for this as much of what we look has different implications depending on the day. That being said, I think it is possible to recognise earlier that the market has turned, but your bias has to be lifted to accept the possibility and act on it quicker. This comes back to how we react to something depending on the type of position we hold or whether we are mostly or entirely flat. Anyway. Levels, context, reaction, behaviour. (There's gotta be a good acronym there somewhere!) LEVELS There are big levels, small levels, minor pause levels, confluence levels. Lots of levels all over. It is important to work out where the big ones are in your prep work. Not just to trade there, but to interpret price action relative to them. E.g. Does the market end up reversing before or after a big level? This might show underlying bias(or not). CONTEXT Context is maybe a little broad here. I think that there are lots of things to take into account. E.g. Friday, I was thinking that 1- overall trend was up 2- overall trend was starting to struggle 3- market participants seemed to be after better prices to motivate them to buy. First level was not changing the direction for very long. 4- I didn't think OTF had been especially active in previous days. REACTION What does the market do when it got to the pre-identified possible reversal area? E.g. Friday sold pretty quick from the mentioned 1389.00 area and although it reversed from 84.75, it failed to take the open. Selling was decent as shown by cumulative delta. It left a tick of the singles @80.25 and clearly buying competition was strong when it moved quickly away and strong positive delta in the face of the negative delta. BEHAVIOUR What does the market do afterwards? Well point of reference for me is going to vary from trade to trade. In this case, it surged back through Thursday's low and long term low volume rejection at 1382.50. It then retested twice and held. Daltonesque view would then to be a test of the otherside of Thursday's range. Failed breaks can be extremely powerful. The trouble is as a discretionary trader who has a position against the reversal like Tom had on Friday, do you define something which says, "we have reversed" or do you just say "this should have gone already" and hit out? I think it should involve a little of both.

Steve, I do agree. Let me be clear to all that the points I make are not necessarily things I believe as UNIVERSAL TRUTHS. They are parts of the game which in pockets(large or small) do exist.There are plenty of people who are entirely different to this.

Wow, thanks FredPro! I would point out that this is a bit of an assumption that I might be in the "robot fan club". I'm not really massively interested but I know some do work. Not the $29.99/month flavour though. I think this falls very nicely within the "3- Vendor Selling Techniques." category no? I never said that all traders who are new, start because they want to make gazillions of $ just as I never said that all vendors bullshit. Trade what you see, not what you think. Lastly, If you had the choice to guarantee you would make millions by being lucky, you would be rich by choice. However, hoping to get lucky over being a good consistent trader does not qualify as rational.

Yeah this is a great one really. I know it's easy to fall into because all days are slightly different. But if you sit down and categorise your mistakes more broadly, I think that's a good start.

Well cash close and that all for me folks! I think everyone else took the afternoon off. Oh well. Hope you all had a good one today. Have a great weekend all.

I'm pressing it Tom, I'm pressing.... aww I think it broke. Do you think that means it'll only go up from now on? :rofl:

All hanging in there still? It was wasting my time again so I called time on the trade before. Might take a look at a quicky if we get a late break.

Seeing as though we all seem to enjoy a really good old rant, here's one for you to get stuck into. There are many forms of bs in this industry nearly everywhere you look. It's important to know what it looks like so you can avoid it, but also embrace the er, anti-bs. You know what I mean! Feel free to discuss the points, prove them wrong or add more to the list. 1- The Get Rich Quick Scheme. Oh dear. Not a good start really if you come into the business with the attitude that you want to make loads of money. Almost a sure-fire way to lose it all. Trade to trade well, not to make money. Money is a by-product of being a good trader. 2- The Magic Indicator. Next! Come on really? The point is that indicators are based on historical data and lag current activity. Yes there are lots to choose from in a plethora of multicoloured kaleidoscopic fantastical forms, but really at the end of it all still remains your biggest hurdle- you. 3- Vendor Selling Techniques. This includes baiting, false guarantees, poor rehashing of outdated tools and indicators. Blah, blah, blah. If someone said to you they'll teach you the secrets of alchemy for a couple of thousand bucks, what would you think? Go figure. 4- The Predictor We all do it at times. But some people live it. Predicting what the markets will do rather than what they might do. Seriously, do yourself a favour right now if you think it's possible to be right all the time- quit while your ahead. Because the market loves to teach these people a lesson! 5- Self-denial Self-denial is such a pile of crap in trading. It really stinks. There was a thread a while back by Ingot on this very topic. Get a grip. If you do things you know are bad, deal with them and take ownership of your business. Otherwise you only have yourself to blame. 6- Blanket pseudo psychology. Trader has problem. Trader talks to trading buddies, forum members, shrinks or even their broker(:doh:) for advice. Yeah well maybe you should do this, maybe you should do that. HEY WAKE UP! :helloooo: It's you. You live your life. You DO know what your problems are. 7- The Big Swinging Dick Perhaps the stinkiest pile of bs about is the BIG SWINGING DICK. This is the guy who tells(or lets people believe) everyone just how brilliant all of their trades are. Let me tell you right now. Guys who really are trading like this generally DON'T shout about it. They don't need to. I assure you. Ask the question, "is this actually for real?". and to all of this, all I have to say is:

Yesterday's high was 90.75 as was last 30mins low meaning we would prefer to stay above for the ol' "one time-framing" to persist(I know it took it by a couple of ticks on the rotation to 88.50 but like Tom suggested, that could have been orchestrated anyway). Coming up on the hour, could be an important point.

Apparently no mp or eco comments (i'd love to see what he had to say on our mp!)