MC's House of Mirrors

[MC 10]

I'll copy over the prior logs for my futures paper trading tomorrow perhaps.

Just wanted to get this thread open to reserve my spot in the TL cyberspace. :o

[Soultrader 12]

Hi mcichocki,

 

You should invest in real-time data. Timing is so important in this game that practicing with delayed data with give you alot of trouble when adjusting.

[brownsfan019 17]

MC - good idea to get some more charts and postings up! Are you planning to annotate chart and/or provide explanations of trade setups?

[MC 10]

Hi mcichocki,

 

You should invest in real-time data. Timing is so important in this game that practicing with delayed data with give you alot of trouble when adjusting.

 

I do have real time actually, I just use bigcharts.com to post cause it's free and I can glance at my picks EOD and see the auto updated chart.

I use stockcharts.com RT but they stopped letting you do auto updating embedded charts. Also only stockcharts members could see my charts if I linked them and I dunno who has it and who doesn't.

 

I dunno why anyone would bother trying to learn off delayed data if they are serious about learning the craft. Ya gotta pay the tuitions to learn how to really play this game. One wouldn't try to bake a cake without a set of baking tools and RT charts are just one of those must have tools.

 

What I use now is stockcharts.com RT for stocks and market internals.

Really sucks for internals cause it's refreshed every 15 seconds not tick by tick.

Then I use ninja for charting the YM, as that's what I'm paper trading with. (the ninja RT demo account)

 

I plan on moving to Tradestation when I go live on the YM. (In a week or 2)

Also from reading the MP section here at TL I think I'll keep ninja since it's free, feed it with Tradestation data and buy the TPOchart program for $250.

[MC 10]

MC - good idea to get some more charts and postings up! Are you planning to annotate chart and/or provide explanations of trade setups?

 

I used to annotate alot, I guess now I just see what I want in a stock and post it up. If you think members would like more background on why I picked the stock I could throw some info under the links.

[brownsfan019 17]

I used to annotate alot, I guess now I just see what I want in a stock and post it up. If you think members would like more background on why I picked the stock I could throw some info under the links.

 

In my experience here and on ET, if you want to stimulate discussion and such, then annotations and explanations are useful. If it's more for casual looking, don't worry about it.

[MC 10]

CBAK...Nice weekly volume traits, weekly RSI is looking good and weekly macd 12,26 has just crossed 0.

 

EGMI...Nice weekly volume traits, weekly RSI is looking good BUT weekly trix is kind of worrying me.

 

ONNN...In a weekly squeeze, decent weekly volume traits and macd just turned up still above 0. Also OBV breakout.

 

BCON...weekly bull flag with nice daily volume traits. Nice weekly rsi and long term macd is crossing above short term macd.

 

DLIA...Looks like a weekly reversal pattern with light resistance up to about $5.60. Weekly rsi is about to come out from oversold and weekly Slow stoch as well.

 

SONS...Looks like a weekly reversal pattern as well. Weekly rsi is about to come out from oversold and weekly Slow stoch as well. Weekly macd is curling up too.

 

EMC...I missed the breakout but it still has lots of room IMO. Nice weekly volume on it's range breakout. And hell they own VMware.

 

SGTL...This is the most iffy of the batch but its at the bottom of the channel. I spy weekly divergence but I wouldn't get greedy on a downtrending stock, take a pop and run.

[Soultrader 12]

What platform are you using?

[MC 10]

What platform are you using?

 

My broker for stocks is Choicetrade and I just use their website for order entry backed with charts from stockcharts.com.

I haven't traded a stock in several months though as I've been so focused on the futures.

 

I will be using Tradestation for futures and eventually for stocks as well when I get another $5k to open an equities account with them.

 

For the paper trading I'm using the Ninja trader with the zenfire 30 day trial demo. It's my 2nd time with that and I also used OEC for their 14 day trial demo.

I'm going on 3 months of YM paper trading using RT demos.

[Soultrader 12]

Thanks mcichocki. It appears like there is a bug in our system in which it displays the latest threads. Apparently the url's to your charts are expanding our column. Do you think you can save the chart and then use the attachment feature for now until I find a fix to this? Sorry about this.

[MC 10]

Thanks mcichocki. It appears like there is a bug in our system in which it displays the latest threads. Apparently the url's to your charts are expanding our column. Do you think you can save the chart and then use the attachment feature for now until I find a fix to this? Sorry about this.

 

NP, I pulled the charts for now and left the descriptions.

[waveslider 10]

MC, I noticed you use a lot of indicators. Do you have a favorite, and why?

[MC 10]

MC, I noticed you use a lot of indicators. Do you have a favorite, and why?

 

For futures the market internals and candles with bias on volume.

I'm still learning the tape reading slowly but surely.

 

I also like to watch rsi and macd because thats what most fairly new traders focus on and I like to know what the masses are looking at.

[MC 10]

VMC

Good volume and candle groupings...especially weekly...might bounce soon IMO.

 

PANL

In a weekly squeezer...I like the looks of it for a possible breakout.

 

WWAT

Lookin good though it does have some solid resistance ahead.

[MC 10]

How can you take 50% accuracy and lose $200 bucks?

Easy, just override your systems target and lock in early profit.

The point of a system is to let the winners run and cap the losers at your stop point fairly early. Then the winners on a 50% model should have a positive net expectancy which IS profitability. Discretionary traders will be outperformed by a mechanical trader 8/10+ times. Maybe not day in and day out, but long term things work out in favor of a non emotional trader. To trade on discretion means you are trading on interpretation which is emotion influenced if not emotion driven.

 

So I can either die a slow but sure death by trading emotions, which will kill my equity. Or the discretionary trader in me can die and that will lead me to profitability. From my tone you can tell which trader I want to die in me. :p

 

 

A few of the losses came from trading the pre-market and opening 10-15 minutes which I knew better but somehow got sucked in...won't happen again!

 

Some others were due to trading without pivot points and thus trying to go through the pivot instead of fading the pivot or using it as a profit taking point.

 

And DAMN the psyche is fragile at first!!! Due to this factor I missed many thousands of dollars in sound trade profit because my losses made me gunshy. :mad:

 

 

Prime example of WHY YOU LET WINNERS RUN!

This was todays trade. I had a mechanical exit, just saw weakness and some profit being at risk and pussed out. This means the next trade that goes against me eats into equity not profit money and gives me further drawdowns.

[waveslider 10]

I've done the same, over-ride the system and the profitability suffers. My opinion is that if the system works, use it and then you can play around when you are rich.

Discretion is more fun.

What are those cool colors you colored your candlesticks with. I didn't know you could color candlesticks with TS

[MC 10]

I've done the same, over-ride the system and the profitability suffers. My opinion is that if the system works, use it and then you can play around when you are rich.

Discretion is more fun.

What are those cool colors you colored your candlesticks with. I didn't know you could color candlesticks with TS

 

Discretion is fun, and like you said when I have more free money to play I'll do just that. Till then I need to get my head out of my a$$ and trade the plan.

 

That's a macd gradient. I believe its stock in Tradestation 8.3 actually.

 

My other favorite is the volume gradient I found here on TL. I disable the trend feature cause I like to see the candles true color...I love that indicator too.

[MC 10]

 

WOOOOHOO!!!

At this rate I'll be blown out in no time.

 

There's more indicators I won't give out but rest assured I took some good trades and managed to make the day VERY ugly.

 

The 1st trade was up 20+ points and I was trying to trade a system rule that in reality had me counter trend trading. That will be changed as of today.

 

The 2nd trade was a sound trade BUT the 1st trade got into my head and I sold before the real move. Part of the issue was Tradestation totals your daily P&L and I thought that single position was up the number I was seeing. Still not an excuse, cause I should have traded the trade not the profit.

 

The 3rd was my breaking point...I got mad I sold before the move on trade 2 and took a revenge trade. Then I proceeded to raise my stop because it "had" to dip soon. This set me back pretty badly and I am probably taking the rest of the week off because that SHOULD NOT have happened.

[waveslider 10]

Unable to display content. Adobe Flash is required.

 

leavitt brothers have some good insights from time to time. This ones on psychology, maybe you could use it?

[MC 10]

Unable to display content. Adobe Flash is required.

 

leavitt brothers have some good insights from time to time. This ones on psychology, maybe you could use it?

 

I'll check that out. Thanks.

I can use anything to get my head out of my a$$. LOL

 

I try to outsmart the signals...then of all things a revenge trade with no signal and moving the stop to hang myself even more.

 

Equity isn't bruised but my ego sure is.

[MC 10]

I'm really thinking of going the easier route and swing trading till I have my mind right.

Day trading on margin is hectic and I'm not sure I have enough experience to expect the discipline needed to make it yet. Then again how will I get that experience? I'm not giving it up just yet.

 

Side note...and I know what some are gonna say on this (that 401k should not be shifted), but I moved my 401k to stable value on 10/3 (blue arrow on chart) with the exception of my holdings on IM stock. Pretty damn close to the peak. I don't see the big money supporting the 14k levels (see the below chart again) and want to preserve my money. The funny part is "stable value" when related to the USD isn't really all that stable but I can't ask to be paid in Euro or Canadian loonies and my 401k international funds suck.

 

[MC 10]

 

I think in general there should be concern at least in the near term. At this point I would look at shorting any rally on modest volume to that red trend line.

 

Thoughts?

[MC 10]

Very exciting day for me...

 

I made a system over the weekend that is so simple yet so effective thusfar.

I'm paper trading it for several days here and will be posting results of the trial.

 

My issue stemmed from not having a true system and also not using 2 contracts, 1 scalper and 1 freebie runner. Once I know I've locked in $40 profit and trail my stops I'll become more systematic. And that's the whole point of this game IMO.

 

7 or 8 trades...only 1 was a double loser on both contracts.

There was one trade that was iffy, below is the net gain with and without that trade.

 

$760 if the questionable trade was taken.

$635 if I had passed that trade up.

 

Today was pretty a medium trend day, I should be able to do better on a heavy trend day.

[MC 10]

8 demo trades today---

+$90

+$430

+$40

+$115

+$40

+$40

-$130

+$340

 

+$965 net today on paper with the system.

+$1840 total in 4 days testing with 27 trades.

 

I'm going to finish the week on paper and see next week if it works live or if I can screw it up. :LOL:

 

I know I'm going to have to fudge around with the stops at some point, this is only 1 week of testing.

 

Also I hope nobody thinks I expect this result day in and day out. Systems need to be changed and evolve with market conditions. That plus I could have a full week of drawdowns, who knows. I don't consider this a proven net positive by any stretch of the imagination...Not yet anyhow.

[MC 10]