brownsfan019

I am by no means a fundie guy (anymore at least) but it's interesting when you see things like that reported but we are being led to believe that things are fixed and better... It's amazing how things are reported when the market is up vs. when the market is down. If that report came out when the market was already down and went down more, it would be all over the news. I doubt we see too much made of it at this point.

Nice job BR! The CL can be your greatest friend when you get in sync w/ it. I got a nice trade there today as well and focusing on Russell and ZS rest of day.

If you are trying to sort out those that actually trade and those that don't, you might be a bit discouraged how many don't... Don't believe me? Ask them to start posting in our p/l thread. See what kind of reactions you get.

Frank - I still use the main trader window where your quotes, filled/active orders, etc. reside. I use that to check to make sure everything is ok. If someone wants to hide each little tick up and down on their dom, you can do it in OEC. Or you can leave it on there. Your choice, which is nice.

I think it's an idea that could work w/ brand new traders if you are willing to teach them. That's it. Even if we trade 'similar' styles, there still will be plenty of differences and could easily create even more distractions than just fixing the issue on your own.

I agree - all traders would have to be trading the EXACT same way for this to work. For anyone to even be slightly interested in this, you will need to detail your trading method(s) and explain them. Basically you will be looking for new people that want a system to grab onto and you will train them. Any profitable trader is not going to abandon their method for yours simply to join a chat room.

I posted this in the p/l thread, but OEC has a nice feature built-in where you can turn your p/l on or off for your DOMs. There's advantages and disadvantages to each, but here's how you do it: The biggest advantage of turning it off your DOM in my view is you will not be distracted by each tick up and down. Personally I'm a pro at hitting the 'flatten' button when staring @ the p/l move each tick and that can be detrimental. It brings emotions in and tosses the plan out the window. Try it out if you've never done it and see if you trade differently - good or bad.

Make sure to send a support ticket to OEC if you haven't. Let them know of what issues you are having.

11-5-09: +$535.63 Good day overall. Missed a nice oil short b/c I was concerned about preserving that I had here. That was dumb. :doh: I tried something today that I've done before - I turned off my p/l tracker on the DOM so that I could manage the trade w/o influence of seeing the $$$$ behind each trade and each tick move. Seemed to work a little better today as I salvaged the Russell as my first trade was a loser and the 2nd a winner, which covered the loser and then some. I know if I was watching that thing tick up and down I would have flattened as soon as I was even. If you're using OEC, here's how to turn off the p/l on your actual dom:

Not even sure I would qualify for part-time hours. Where's HR around here?

I think that's what some of us are trying to avoid. Eating just to eat, esp while trading, is a great way to pack on the pounds.

It's all I do but define 'full-time'... b/c I like to be done by Noon EST.

Cost to buy 1 contract Depends on your broker. If you are daytrading (out by 415pm EST) you can buy 1 contract for a small margin or 'deposit'. This can get as low as $500 (or lower). In other words, if you have $500 margins you can buy 1 contract per $500 in your account. This is called leverage b/c you are controlling something worth much more than $500. How much does 1 tick and 1 point translate to into dollars? Each tick varies based on the contract being traded. To get that info, go to the cme site and click where I''ve highlighted: Average contracts traded per day The easiest way is to pull up a chart and just look. If you need a demo, you can get 2 weeks free at Open ECry and then create a daily chart, add volume and done. You could also try using this on the CME site but I've never used it:

I only use the DOM to trade from. I have never liked trading from the charts. This would be easy to do on the DOM.

There's an example of F - that may not fit the definition of a perfect bearish signal, but it works for me. So we could be short @ 7.34 and I want to see how it reacts from 7.00-6.81. This isn't the best looking pattern to enter on, so if r/r reward impacts the decision making process, this one could be skipped over. Initial trade r/r Risk: .51 (7.85-7.34) Reward: .34-.53 So not the greatest trade in the world b/c we are looking at 1:1 at best initially. My idea for exiting trades was just trail behind the daily candles and let the market take it out. Day 2 trade r/r Risk: .34 (7.68-7.34) -- stop placed 1 tick above high Reward: .34-.53 Now that r/r is a little better. So if we find that trade usually move in our favor even just a bit, then we can improve the risk part of the trade. Day 3 trade r/r Risk: .10 (7.44-7.34) assuming the HOD has been put in as day 3 is today. Reward: .34-.53 Now the trade is providing at least 3x our risk and that is attractive. So even though an ugly entry candle, as long as price moves in our favor the next couple days after entering the trade, we can decrease the risk and keep the same profit goal. That's one advantage of using the daily charts as those highs and lows are important.

You can never assume you will get a fill when price touches your level, but it's much easier on the CL or ZS for example vs. the ES. Just look at the depth and see what you have to get through. I think that momentary pause happens on sim, but send a support ticket to OEC and let them know. The more that tell them there's issues, the more likely it will get addressed. I don't hesitate to send support tickets when there's an issue. They are working for you, so send a support ticket when there's a concern.

Sim trading has limitations and some are better than others. It also is a function of the market you are trading - the ES is one of the highest traded markets daily (volume), which means that there are big lines at each level and you cannot assume that if prices touches your level you will get a fill. It's a good assumption that you are at the back of the line and the only way you're going to advance is if that line is depleted and they have to move to a new line. Hopefully that makes sense.

I like that one. Never heard it before.

Dinero - couple things - 1) Don't get too excited about that ZS profit unless you plan to hold overnight. I was hoping it would fail on you so you learn a lesson. Do NOT let that profit fool you into thinking you can routinely hold the ZS overnight. I know how that profit looks, but keep in mind it could have been the same or more in negatives. 2) ES fills - if you are entering via limit orders, you should assume that price MUST trade through your level to get filled. Ex: if you are buying 1051.50 price will need to touch 1051.25 to assume you got filled. It doesn't have to touch it long, but it does need to touch it. On your sim trading, place your entry 1 tick above/below your ideal entry and that will mimic live trading. Same with exits. That's part of the issue I have with the ES - price must go against you 1 tick to get filled on your entry and price must go past your exit by 1 tick to get your exit filled. That's 2 ticks price must travel against you in order for your orders to ensure being filled.

11-4-09: -$250.00 Where to start... I about f'd this up as best as I could today. I'm not even sure how to explain. Suffice to say that the ZF bent me over and the ZS should have been a winner. Oh yeah, I exited GGC way before I should have. Only bright spot was GCL & Russell. Good news is that I'm working on a little indicator/plotting thing that should help w/ entries. That was the issue on the ZS - I saw the trade, needed my entry level and by the time I hit it, price said adios sucker. If that wasn't a blatant sell spot, I don't know what is. Since I hate chasing, I just couldn't get into it. That's a user error, not system issue. I bet the f'in monkey could have gotten in though. Everyone say hi to the trading monkey:

Now here's why I didn't want to post in the other thread b/c I could take things in a different direction... Personally, there's something that just gets under my skin about buying above a big high or selling below a big low. That's just not in my blood. So here's a spin on the idea - plot your H and L then look for a candle pattern with the HL or LH "Zone" and take the trade. Examples: And if you want to refine that zone even more, you could use basic fibs to give your possible trade zones. Basically the key is entering between the H & L. This is also where I think a background in candlesticks is very useful. In the examples, highlighted candles are bullish in nature to get long and bearish in nature to get short. Keep in mind my version of bullish or bearish may not be exactly what you've read in books, but basically I want to see some bullish activity to get long and bearish to get short. If it doesn't match a shape on a book or website, I could care less. Entry method is also key here, which I discuss here. At this point, I would feel comfortable entering on a buy stop above a high or sell stop below a low. The observant guys will say - isn't that just pullbacks? And I guess it is but it's a filtered pullback system. If you've traded or tried pullbacks before, the decision is always defining whether or not it's pulled back to your entry area or not. And how long is the pullback valid for? This at least gives you some general rules to use in that regard.

Here's a few forward looking charts. Let's see what we can find in real-time. All daily charts. GLD - TRIGGERED TODAY SPY - LOOKING FOR A LH TO BE PUT IN AND THEN WILL PUT BUY STOP ABOVE H

AAPL JUN09-JUL09 I wanted to try out a stock and found AAPL. I'm not sure how smooth this will work on daily charts with stocks due to the gaps. This particular timeframe on AAPL provided 3 trades - 2 winners, 1 loser. But with minimal gaps, it was doable. Some other stocks, even AAPL later, have such big gaps that if you do trade them you could get massive slippage on the entry or get skipped over on your entry price. I might just put together a collection of liquid ETFs and see how that looks for now. That will also help me focus on a small group b/c where do you even start w/ stocks? That's always been my issue w/ stock trading. We'll see.

:\ Ut oh... That could be trouble.

IWM revised: