forrestang

That's why on my charts, I always have the HLC of prior day, O of current day and the Globex H/L on there. I also used to go and find levels from a 100K CVB chart. I started to feel like I had too much information at that point and I felt like it was hampering my decision making process. Probably just too many levels? I've always tried reading S/R threads but seldom do I get the info that works for me about good levels. Maybe we need a thread in the candlestickcorner about S/R? I'd start it but I'm not knowledgeable enough to lead the discussion.

Argh I hate exits. I think all trades taken today were reasonable, but still down on the day. EXITS.....the hardest part about trading. First trade I let myself get taken out waaaaay too soon after having 3 points on the table for 2 tics. Second Trade I think was also a good one, just stopped. Third Trade, I think was also a sound trade as it was a WITH TREND Double Top Bear Flag, came within 1 tick of 2 point target. Note: All 3 trades were good for at least 1 point, which would have been a good day. Just the way it works out at times it seems.....no reason to be discouraged:crap:

That 'ii' could have been taken either direction. You got your scalp portion filled to the long side which came first. Then you could have considered that a failed breakout/long trap and gone to the short side. Either way worked. Some guys I'm trading with did both this am. I think the microTrenline trade was fine (although it really didn't break a TL, but it was a L1), there was momentum there so no reason to not expect follow through, what kept me always was I was hesitant to short into the Globex Low. But I think it was a decent L1 to take with strong momentum. You also missed the best trade of the day, which was the first bar, gap breakout trade. Forrest

ON another note not really related to trading, I have one of my buddies I've been studying the market with over the past year reading the book. He says, "I feel like i tested into a class I have no business being in." I thought that was funny :rofl:

Well, it's the damnest thing. I'm out of town so using my laptop. Which has a gig less memory, and a processor that's almost 1GHZ slower, and it runs the visualizer just fine. So, wtf?

It's awesome to see everybody pretty much picking out the same trades real-time and seeing similar market structure. Good trading Szubaark!

Not to brag, but when we were trading I did mention that we would have another leg up right before you entered you short there:rofl: Just had to mention it as I am usually wrong..... Forrest

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In an attempt to get more aggressive in the morning, took the early morning gap/breakout bar entry. May have prematurely ejaculated the exit? BUt that's the hard part. My software is giving me 1 tick late entries though so disregard that part.

I use Itunes while I trade for music. I like the hundreds of radio stations listed there for streaming and gives a nice selection. I also think the visualizer is calming...but not when it screws up the music. When this is running though, if you hit Ctrl-T and bring up the new visualizer it seriously kills resources and actually noticeably slows up the music. And my PC is not a power house, but it's not a punk either. Does anyone have this problem or is there just some software setting conflict with my machine? Forrest

One thing I had to do was stop listening to talk radio. It has been my fav for years. I usually listen to that in my car and at home....... But I think when I listen to and think about politicians it subconciously pisses me off. So I've been off of it for about a month and I think it has done me some good. I usually use Itunes and listen to either ambient music( Groove Salad), or something classical. I havent' tried to see what hip hop will do for me yet?

I used MC for about a year. I had indicator-itis though and was for some reason about finding the new and latest indicators. I don't think I had any real problems with MC. Other than the fact that i was using a TA data feed, and it gave me all types of problems in that arena. But MC for some reason always felt incomplete to me? Like it was an unfinished product. Just misses a lot of things....and it's not an all in one charting software. No T&S, can't trade on charts, options chain, adding symbols was cumbersome, just things like countdown timers (had to go out and find studies), the cumbersome add in replay feature....... blah blah blah. I dont know how much of this would have been resolved with a real data feed though? If I didn't have the thing on 24 hours, I would have gaps in my data. Would be nice if they offered like an EOD service or something. This last time I had an issue was the last draw for me. Although the support was always good IMO. Also, no shortcut keys.....I'm glad someone else mentioned that. Please people, put the damn short cut keys in there!!!!:helloooo:

I'm a bit confused at what you're pointing out? All the fbo's yielded @ least a scalper's profit. And 2 out of 3 on the top had two legs down for well more than a scalper's profit. The last one at the top of the range moved all the way down to the other side of the range in one leg . The first fbo on the bottom had two legs up to the other side of the range. The 2nd fbo on the bottom (also a failed Low2) moved all the way down through the bottom of the range and failed to break further......THEN moved up back to the top of the range. The last one would have been a funky entry as you'd have to have waited for the close of the bar as suggested. None of these entries would have hit a 2 point stop. You could have gotten stopped out many times by adjusted your stop beyond each bar, but with a 3 pt range, Brooks suggests givng your trade room to work if it hasn't moved at least 4 ticks. That last one missed by a tick, I don't think that was a bad trade? Definetely questionable, but not a horrible setup. It was a doji bar, but....it was at the top of the sideways range we'd been in all day. I wouldn't call this a strong bull day, I actually would ignore and disregard that strong trend early int he morning. This wasn't even a spike and channel bull where you get a strong move up and then at least an increasing channel, it was absolutely flat with no encouragement from the bulls.

This? http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/f46/various-indicators-squeeze-2fastmas-etc-3688.html

Today was an awesome day for learning. I feel as though I learned a ton from trading today. I actually wound up slightly in the red, but that was mainly due to stupidity. I knew what had to be done but got impatient into placing orders. The chart should be self explanatory. But there was strong reversal in the morning. Not sure how to catch these without some reversal pattern, at the very least a DBBF? Then into nice sideways action. When this happens, we want to fade the range. In particular we want to fine SMALL bars occuring near the extremes of the range. When we see a fbo of some sort, we can then relax and expect two legs toward the opposite side of the range which happened several times, as opposite traders who entered the fbo will now be trapped, and their covering will help our position. All other fades were generally quick scalps it would seem. On another note, on Wednesday, I will be in the "Pure_PA" chat room if anyone else is capable of dealing with the distractions of the chat room. Forrest

I am done with all the store bought, supposed trading systems I've purchased over the last two years!!! For sale first is Todd Kruegers Trader's code module 1 and 2 (actually this is the 2nd thing I've sold). I feel I have a handle on things, and am wanting to get rid of them as it makes me feel good. :rofl: I will have other things to sell eventually, once I get around to it. As some things are slightly subscription based, and I want to be able to sell them while giving all necessary permissions to the end user. Eventually they will all be up, so if you're interested in what else I have please ask. I don't have to sell these things, so if you're interested in my honest opinion please ask. Forrest

I once had someone with TS export data for me, although it was only one symbol. Funny this post is here, as I just had my hard drive fail on me, so I have lost all the cached data I've collected for the last 5 months (I purposefully built a PC I could leave on 24 hours so I would have up to date data). After this, I am ditching Multicharts and going back to Trade Navigator as at least they let me download all the data I want EOD with my TransAct data feed for real time data. This wouldn't be a problem for me if I forked over the cash for a good data provider obviously.:crap:

Thanks for sharing! I honestly didn't have such a good read on the day either. If you were looking to try to swing any position seems like you'd be in trouble. One had to be quick to take profits at prior resistance levels. Had trouble seeing second entries. Thieving bastards:angry: Morning started off with a good Bull Flag setup that would have yielded slightly more than a scalper's profit to pretty much fill the open gap to the tick before selling off. Next we had a move up to the Down Trend line, but the entry was guarded by BW, so not a great setup. Price then Broke the TL with ok momentum (making me think we'd have a good move up after the test), before coming back to form a HL. Not much follow through at all. Next we had a few hours of sideways price hovering around a flatlining EMA. We had an H2 out of it, but nobody is counting at this point and waiting for further price action. Finally we had a good move up, then a retracement that gave us a H1 followed by H2 at the EMA for entry, which IMO was the best trade of the day. You had to be quick to snatch profits at yesterday's high.

PC crashed, so I was on my backup. ...............................

I've been paying attention to 'ii' bars.....and if the I use the 'ii' as a signal bar, I've been trying to make sure it's at least a bar IN THE DIRECTION OF THE TRADE. So I don't consider most dojis as valid 'ii' bars.

Funny you mention it, that DTBF interested me, but those dojis I interpreted as BW and was a bit shy to enter. That circled area....there was definitely money there, but the expanded range of the bars with those large tails had me shy away. I actually was thinking of that second leg down between those bars and almost marked it as such but didn't for whatever reason. As for the High/Low Variants, do you normally consider an "up" bar that occurs in a bear as a leg? Or is that something we just do during fast moves when looking for legs? Do you know what I mean?

Bleh .....................................

I don't understand how volume can really be used on an intra-day basis. It seems like a lot find signals based on volume, but I'd venture to guess they could find the same signals based on nothing but price? Seeing as how volume and price occur simultaneously, volume is reflecting what "has happened already," I don't get it? It seems like a good trader that has traded price for years could apply MACD to their trading and it would still be profitable in a similar fashion that some may successfully apply volume?

Just my two cents since we're all learning here.... Things that have helped me, was to try to label each H/L 1 &2 etc that occurs on each chart. Then start adding things in there. When you see inside bars, label them as such "ii"...., throw in Double Bottom Bull Flags or Double Top Bear Flags, then the Pull back that occurs afterward. Eventually, the trading opportunities that occur will become more obvious. H1,L1s etc that occur are legs. But in viewing the big picture on the day, the legs in during a trend start to become obvious. Eventually, the problem will become deciding how to take profits, which is what I struggle with. At the end of the day, I also have been re-marking up charts. I do a remark of the ES contract, then I also do the NQ contract that provides a bit of subtlety to help a bit. Don't be afraid to construct Trend Lines to help make sense out of what the big picture is telling you. The book is great, but it's hard to read and not organized in the best manner. So it will take a bit of time to FULLY decipher. But in the meantime, real time throughout the day, continue to mark it up.....trying not to get too caught up in how correct you are labeling everything. There is wiggle room for interpretation of all the pullbacks. If all this is still too confusing, REALLY, just focus on labeling your H/Ls. Then focus on taking the H/L2s....which represent second entries (The 1st wave is usually for the newbs).....that occur NEAR the EMAs. Most importantly, concentrate on taking WITH TREND ENTRIES. Eventually you will branch out and find the other great opportunities throughout the day. Then start to add micro trend line breaks into the mix. Which most of times will represent H/L1s. Don't think about reversals initially. Pay attention to when they "might" occur. If anything maybe you use this to decide not to enter (For example in a BEAR, if you see 3 Tight Pushes down form a wedge, then a retest with reversal occuring, maybe hold of on prior with WITH TREND shorts temporarily). But as mentioned in the book, if you are spending too much time looking for reversals.....then you are probably not observing the trend, and are missing many of the MOST profitable trades that occur throughout the day. All the above is of course just observations I've made as I'm still learning with the rest of you.

Don't know how high it will go? But there goes the two-legged move both ways so far in AH.