brownsfan019

OAC - here's the thread that is dedicated to VBC analysis - http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/f34/volume-based-candles-and-how-to-1414.html

reav - you let me know if you have any issues at OEC and I'll see if I can help at all. No promises, but I think you'll be happy there. Good trading!

neu - it really comes down to how you trade. If trading stocks with the general trend is not working but trading the actual index is... well.... just trade the index then. I know that seems obvious, but sometimes we want to make things harder than they really are. We've all been there, trust me. As for trading the index, it's just a matter of deciding whether the ETF, Options or Futures work best for you. I would suggest narrowing in on one vehicle in the beginning.

Reav, Settle down brother, looks like TRex has gotten your panties in a bunch over there. :rofl: I'll promise you this - if there's a time when OEC drops the ball and lets me down, this place will be the first to know about it. I am obviously putting my stake in their corner and as long as they continue to earn it, I will continue to support their firm. But do not make any mistake about it - screw me over and I will become that pain that does not go away. I don't mess around when it comes to my biz. As for a duel... :fight: bring it on! :evil tongue:

I agree, but the last word I would consider using to describe OEC is complacency. Let me ask this - are you currently trading at OEC? If so, how has your personal experience there been? If not, then it's hard to offer an opinion of a firm that you have no experience with, correct?

I'll add my 2 cents after the previous couple posts - I'm not exactly sure how OEC operates for the retail trader trading small lots. This is not meant to be a shot or a look at me post, but I guess there are a couple sides to every story. I've dealt with a certain assigned rep to me from day one and having this personal connection who is 'in the know' at OEC obviously helps. I am writing this to provide that other side of the story and also to give you an idea of how things operate when you move up levels if you will. What's important to note is that when you get to the point of trading substantial contracts, things change than what you are accustomed to in the beginning. It's important to realize as you design your business plan that you want to reach this level. This is not an exclusive thing to OEC, but my experience thus far has been great since trading at OEC. This post will obviously make sense to those that are serious about their trading and are/plan to get to the level of requiring exceptional customer service. If you are reading this saying 'what business plan' or 'yeah right', please reserve your judgments for another thread.

You got it - it's all about how much risk you want to take and how aggressive you want to be. At the very least, I would wait for the current candle to close. You can then enter a market order based on that. Personally, I would like to see confirmation on the next candle - so the entry may be 'worse' than a market order, but I think you'll see plenty of times where this will 'save' you from a loser.

James, I see what you are saying. Here's my take on your chart: I assume your lines are pivot or some support levels. Working off those assumptions, here's what I see: 1) Nice spinning top as you annotated. 2) Hammer that failed. 3) Engulfing that worked well. 4) Hammer with small profit. 5) Spinning top. 6) Engulfing. 7) Shooting star. Now here's what I also see about exits - if you wait for a reversal, trade #1 and #3 provide some very nice profits. Trades #2, #5, #6, #7 while all are losses, they appear to be small, esp compared to the winners on #1 and #3. Trade #4 was a scratch for sake of discussion. As you can see, you could literally go 2 for 7 (28.5% win rate) and make money. If that doesn't get your attention, I don't know what will. That's the power of candles - they are very good at calling the major moves, it's simply a matter of being in the trade. There are plenty of trades that don't go as planned, but that's irrelevant if you can psychologically handle it. In other words, looking at today's trades for your chart, there was about 15-20 pts in profit on the trades that worked. The 'losers' were small, but even at 2 pts each, that's -8. End result was at least +7 pts assuming worse case scenarios and fills. I don't know about you, but a +7 day will work for me with 7 trades. Not too shabby in my opinion. PS Did you get my email?

Walter - just lurking here... So, at this point, how would you say this new setup is working? Initially you were very excited and I'm curious if that same fervor is continuing. Are you trading this live with real money and seeing success or is this still in the trial and error stage? Good trading! PS If you haven't stopped by the candlestick corner, I suggest you take a look when time permits. Awhile back I got a little irritated with you asking repeatedly about how I trade and there's quite a bit over in my little corner for anyone interested. It's amazing how complicated we can try to make things sometimes. The candlestick corner has enabled me to get back to the basics and I'm amazing myself.

I decided to take a peak at the DIA, which is a nice substitution to the YM if futures are not your thing. The same spinning top on the YM that occurred on the DIA with an entry of $132.30 approx. Current price = $134.30. Current gain = $2.00/share. To make the $850/contract, you would have needed to trade 425 shares of the DIA. 425 shares of DIA w/o margin = $56,227.50 of capital required. So, if anyone is wondering why trade futures, here you go - you could have either 1) traded ONE futures contract with as little as $2500 or 2) traded 425 shares of the DIA with $56k of capital required. Keep in mind that with that leverage that it can work against as quickly as it can make you money. For this trade - we are above 50 SMA, but with a shooting star type candle pattern. That's a concern. I would have liked to see a strong close above that SMA to feel good about this long. At the least, stops should be placed near the bottom of this shooting star and possibly consider a short if price trades through the low of that candle. We could see a channel type pattern going on here - bouncing back and forth. There's money to be made though, no doubt. :beer:

I guess it's just you and me Dog! Here's my analysis on the YM - http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/104/djia-candles-2275-5.html#post19144 The red spinning top @ support provided a nice profit. The ES did as well, but would have to run the #'s due to rollover. So far, candle pattern + support level = nice profit for a 3 day trade.

Here's a follow up observation - there's many theories out there of how to trade rollover day. But take a look at today - major bullish action. Why? Well, one idea could be that anyone long (like our trade here in the YM and ES) is that all the people that were long and needed to get long again, just bid this thing right up. It would be interesting to go back and research rollover days. There's only 4 per year, so the research could be pretty easy if you have the back data. I would just like to see what each of the rollover days looks like.

This might appear twice, so sorry if it does. I typed a response and though I hit submit, but I must not have. I am going to play devil's advocate here James - while range bound conditions can be hard to trade on the daily, I would argue that it's MUCH more difficult to trade range bound action intraday. Here's my reasoning - on the daily, you take ONE trade and either it works or it doesn't. On the intraday chart, you can take A LOT more than 1 trade and can take some heat depending on the conditions. In addition, I think the daily provides very clear s/r levels, SMA levels, etc. whereas on the daily these levels are not as strong in my opinion. Let me provide an example of our ongoing Dow discussion ... Here's our daily YM chart: #1 is our long we already discussed. Long at approx 13,220. #2 is a little tricky due to rollover today. So the chart is deceiving - it looks like there was a giant gap up and that's not the case. It's late, so if my math is wrong here, forgive me. Based on exiting our trade this morning due to rollover, here is what I see: Initial Entry of 13,220 on the U7 contract. We exit the U7 long this morning @ 9:30am EST @ 13,390. Profit from long = 170 pts = $850/contract (in trade 3 days). We then go over to the Z7 contract @ 9:30am and go long @ 13,490 if we want to maintain the long position into the new contract. Now, I am by no means a rollover expert and I honestly do not know the exact specifics here on how it works. I emailed my OEC rep to ask how OEC handles rollover day. I assume it's exit old contract and purchase new one simultaneously (or pretty close). Perhaps going into the new contract is not a good idea since the chart is different now. I'm not sure on that one. Even if we JUST exit our long in the 'tight, range bound' conditions, it netted +170 pts for 3 days of work (56 pts per day average). So, you tell me - which condition was easier to trade in hindsight? Was it easier to take our spinning top at a strong support level and ride it out for 3 days (or longer with rollover) or go into the intraday charts and trade? In hindsight, did you make 56 pts PER DAY over the last 3 days trading intraday? How about after commission costs? These are not meant to be mean questions, I am just trying to open that box of thinking you have to take a peak and see what else is out there... and very possible... This long was called in real-time, right here. Did I take it? Nope. :crap: I'm so caught up in the intraday trading that I just passed on a 170 pt EASY trade. It wasn't any easier than this in not so great trading conditions. Here's the ES chart as well:

ACATS is quick and easy. Much safer and easier than sending a check or money order. If done correctly cash should be there within days.

By the many shows on youtube and torrent sites, there's obviously ways to record a TV show onto your computer. The question I have is - HOW? Is there a fairly easy way to do this? I can get around my computer and electronics fine, but not sure where to start. Thanks!

Thank you sir, much appreciated.

Blu, I see, thanks for checking that out. If there's something you can put together, that would be appreciated and maybe others here could use it as well. I think I can visually see if the stop would need moved, so it could work. Thanks!

Update - this software - http://www.vso-software.fr/products/convert_x_to_dvd/ - is incredible for what I needed. I just put the file in make some text changes if I want and off it goes. No need for extra codecs and stuff like that, it's one simple and easy solution. Highly recommend (so far).

Note - I'm pretty sure that TradeStation has this on their forums... I cannot access them however since I use MultiCharts now. So, if anyone just happens to stumble across there and find maybe a post like this one... https://www.tradestation.com/Discussions/Topic.aspx?Topic_ID=24729 That would be great.

Thanks to nickm001 in this thread, he posted an useful PDF that talks about a few different exit strategies. One that grabbed my attention was called the "Chandelier Exit". It starts on page 19 of the PDF (I attached another copy to this post). Here's my take on this exit strategy - at the close of a candle in the direction of your trade, your stop is moved based on that close. Now, where and how much you move the stop is completely customizable in my opinion. The author of the PDF, Chuck Le Beau, uses ATR in his calculation. I personally am looking at using a certain distance in terms of ticks/points to use this strategy. Thus far the testing looks pretty good. Many times you will catch a GOOD part of a trending move and not so much in range bound action. The big question is what setting do you use to calculate the exit. That's a work in progress for me currently I have one question or favor though - if anyone has coding that can work with TradeStation that would replicate this, please post here. I am looking for a dot or something that when a candle closes and the high is higher than the previous candle's high, a dot or something is placed based on the threshold setting. Example: > Long the ES @ 1476. > Next candle's close is 1477.75. > Based on my chandelier setting, let's say 1 point (4 ticks), the trailing stop should be placed at 1476.75. > Next candle's close is 1477, so there is NO stop movement, stop holds at 76.75 and either the trade continues in your direction or you are out for a small gain. Anyways, if someone has that code for TradeStation or could even throw something together, I would appreciate it. I want to provide credit where credit is due. I initially found this article from nickm001's post, so thanks! The author of the article is Mr. Chuck Le Beau and his website is: http://www.traderclub.com/ Further info on his site regarding the chandelier exit - http://www.traderclub.com/discus/messages/107/477.html?FridayDecember319991048pm I am not endorsing Mr. Le Beau and/or his website, so please do your own due diligence. Stops - Different Strategies.pdf

Yes, we know - Roger changed the magical formula so his doesn't match TI identically. This way he can charge all the sheep the 5 grand that TI charged them as well. If it's 'different' then you just gotta have it!

You're right James - either this range bound area provides trades or it doesn't, depending on how you trade. Once it breaks, I think quite a few traders will become interested again.

Feel free to share wow - we've had plenty of threads around here on exit strategies.

So today provided yet another spinning top... #1 was the long from 2 days ago. #2 is today's green spinning top. You'll note that it's above the 200 SMA and below the 50. A nice sandwich going on here. At this point, we'd be looking for a short if this new spinning top confirmed. If it does, the previous long would be a scratch or pretty close to it. Not all trades will deliver handsome profits, but you can't win the game if you are not in it. It'd be nice if these patterns were a little farther apart, but perhaps that is telling us of the contracting price action going on currently. This coil will burst sooner or later and let's hope the candles put us on the right side of the trade.

Oh, I laughed. :o