Reading Charts in Real Time

[subterfuge 10]

yeah...but seriously...where can i find the darvas box indicator??

i kid! i kid!

 

Here's an ES long i took today (at the green square)

Would that be a trade you'd take out of interest Thales?

 

.I am a consistently breakeven type trader (im ashamed to say after years of screentime)

However, a very good trader that I recently met tells me that if someone can be breakeven consistently for a decent amount of time, then they are potentially not far away from finally becoming profitable.

Ill let you know!

 

PS - dont feel you can only post ES trades here Thales. Even tho I dont have the money to trade stocks (which id love to do as i seem to be better at them than anything else, but the damn 25k PDT stops me), i like to see your stock trades aswell.

 

Cheers

[forrestang 10]

  forrestang said:

I didn't catch this one, a lot of new tv shows were on tonight, damn Fringe.

 

But the G/U seems to offer something every night.

 

First picture is the micro look, second is the macro in what seems to be obvious levels of support.

 

Second extension hit earlier this morning as shown by the black arrow. This was alsoo were price stopped coincidentally before retracing and continuing down, so this was a good piece of support here.

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

I also have attached a current view of the weekly GBPUSD.

 

A look at GBPUSD, closing at the lows of the week ... If a favorable short opportunity presents itself on the 15M, I will likely not be trading with profit targets, but will be playing for a drop below 1.6100.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[forrestang 10]

There was pretty much a breakout on all currencies a short time after the market opened

 

:helloooo:

[thalestrader 14]

Hi Folks,

 

Support and resistance on Yen futures (6J).

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

A look at GBPUSD, closing at the lows of the week ... If a favorable short opportunity presents itself on the 15M, I will likely not be trading with profit targets, but will be playing for a drop below 1.6100.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

 

GBPUSD held about 20 +/- ticks above the 9/01/2009 low (1.6111). Plan is to either sell a break of 1.6100; or, if an opportunity to short presents itself (at a time that I am able to act upon said opportunity), I will sell at a higher level, but rather than trade out at predetermined profit targets, I will simply trail the stop, anticipating a potential drop through 1.6100.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

Hi Folks,

 

Support and resistance on Yen futures (6J).

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

 

Hi Folks,

 

The last two days the Tokyo and London traders have had all the fun.

 

Here is the updated Yen futures. Price tapped three time before the breakout carried to next resistance level. A trade for me would be a breakout above the red horizontal line rather than the gray line where price is now.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

A trade for me would be a breakout above the red horizontal line rather than the gray line where price is now.

 

Hi Folks,

 

I have had two losing days in a row. I'll spare you the hearing (and me the telling) of the bloody details, but since I posted this Yen chart in the morning, I will postmortem the trade here.

 

As I said in my morning post, I would not buy a break of the 10980 level, but would wait for a break above 10992. At 7:30 EDT I placed a buy stop at 10993, and was filled on the break almost two hours later, which quickly reversed. My initial stop loss was 10940. I would have preferred 10930, but I do try to keep close to 1:1 or better, and there was a small consolidation that bottomed at 10941, so if I wanted to take the trade, that was the stop I had to use. Without that consolidation, no trade. My Profit target was 10146, so, as you can see, for 1:1, there was no room for a larger stop loss.

 

So, I was stopped in, and price immediately pulled back to 10965. I moved my stop to 10963 (if you wish to know why 10963 and not my usual -1 tick or 10964, you will see that the 6:15 EDT bar had a high print of 10964, so I wanted to be under that figure.

 

Price then resumed the rally, printed a new high, and again immediately pulled back. Not exactly bullish behavior, but as long as that 10965 held, price had a good probability of rallying for my profit target.

 

Price pulled back to, you guessed it, 10965, hammering out a double bottom pullback, and resumed the rally (or so I thought). Price stalled at the overnight high, and pulled back. And pulled back. And pulled back, stopping where? You guessed it ... price printed a low tick right at my stop. Often, especially with the Yen, I get "lucky" and though price prints my stop I do not get filled. Well, in keeping with my "luck" of the last two days, I had no such luck. -30 ticks.

 

As a consolation, price did resume its rally and struck my target at about 19:30 EDT.

 

I would rather not have lost, but I am actually very pleased to see the Yen rally to my target before violating my initial stop. It makes it possible to prevent myself from doubting myself on the next trade.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[forrestang 10]

  thalestrader said:

Hi Folks,

I have had two losing days in a row. I'll spare you the hearing (and me the telling) of the bloody details, but since I posted this Yen chart in the morning, I will postmortem the trade here.

 

Must be something in the air, I took a loss yesterday as well. Mine is worse as I didn't get a chance to adjust the stop to above the latest reaction high as the trade triggered AFTER I left my PC for the night. Details in the picture.

[taq 10]

Here is what I am looking in EURJPY

 

Bearish Gartley entered short at 135.05

 

Probable tgts i am looking at 131.50 & 130.35

 

Regards,

TAQ

[thalestrader 14]

Hi folks,

 

Here is the current 6E. This is not an ideal situation, but the buy stop would be 1.4793.

 

I will add a few annotations to the chart and post it in a subsequent post, but I wanted to get this posted before it triggers (and of course, it may not trigger at all).

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

Hi folks,

 

Here is the current 6E. This is not an ideal situation, but the buy stop would be 1.4793.

 

I will add a few annotations to the chart and post it in a subsequent post, but I wanted to get this posted before it triggers (and of course, it may not trigger at all).

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

 

The first chart shows how I determine a potential zone of support. As you can see, there is nothing fancy or mystical involved. Within that zone, I look for price to "find a figure," i.e., I prefer that within that zone, price "picks a tick" that becomes the proverbial line in the sand between prices likely declining or prices resuming the rally. I also look for price to move in clear, distinct, swings.

 

As I said, this is not an ideal situation in that price has not yet "found a figure" and price has been moving in choppy, overlapping swings as price is consolidating at the recent highs. I would also not be inclined to play a downside break while price is between 1.4756-1.4773.

 

The second chart basically lays out the manner in which I map out this particular type of trade. Again, this is not an ideal situation, largely because any trade here is still in the chop, and as such possesses much lower probability than it would have had if this same scenario had played out yesterday immediately following the rally into the 1.4822 high.

 

I will post more favorable situations as they occur, rather than going back in time and showing complyed trades taken under better conditions.

 

For this particular situation, the buy stop would be 1.4793, the stop loss would be 1.4763, and the profit targets would be a very anemic 1.4811 and a better 1.4838. The fact that the first profit target offers an 18 tick reward for having taken a 30 tick risk disqualifies this trade for me, and therefore I am not trading the 6E at this time. Also, any trade belwo 1.4764 would invalidate the long opportunity.

 

This is basically the very same kind of opportunity that I taught my daughter to look for this summer, and she did very well with it, primarily trading the EURJPY. She would identify zones or beds of S/R, look to see if price picked a tick, and then she would wait for price to move from a low to a high to a higher low, and she would buy the breakout to a higher high; or she would wait for price to pick a tick, and then she would trade a breakdown of that figure. Obviously this would be reversed when price is rallying into a zone or bed of resistance.

 

None of this is very complicated, and it is best learned by observation and doing.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

 

EDIT: I have been doing other trades and so it has taken quite a while to complete this post. During that time, I see that price has broken down, and the long would be off the table.

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

I would also not be inclined to play a downside break while price is between 1.4756-1.4773.

 

Price has declined to 1.4756 (1.4753 actual low at this point). I would here prefer to see a bounce/rally attempt and sell a break below that level. If the decline continues, then I would prefer to see price pullback toward this level, and then sell a break to new lows.

 

A break of 1.4753 has to continue quickly below 1.4747, or risk an immediate reversal. Profit target is 1.4722, entry 1.4752, and stop loss 1.4782. R/R works (barely).

 

Still, trade seems very uncertain and uncommitted, and I will stay the same way by standing down. I have had a good morning elsewhere, and I am going out to sit on y hands until after the market has a chance to react to the Fed Theater this afternoon.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

I would here prefer to see a bounce/rally attempt and sell a break below that level. If the decline continues, then I would prefer to see price pullback toward this level, and then sell a break to new lows.

 

These two charts do not represent predictions nor actual trades. These are simply two schematics that are meant to provide examples of the type of price action I look for around S/R and how I trade it.

 

The pulback.breakout is somehwhat easier in that I am looking for price action in and around a zone of S/R, whereas the simple breakout requires that price action find a figure near the edge of a S/R zone.

 

Also, for every rule a reader perceives in my posts, real or imagined, is subject to being broken, especially the imaginary ones.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[forrestang 10]

  thalestrader said:

....... She would identify zones or beds of S/R, look to see if price picked a tick, and then she would wait for price to move from a low to a high to a higher low, and she would buy the breakout to a higher high;

  thalestrader said:

or she would wait for price to pick a tick, and then she would trade a breakdown of that figure.

 

 

Thales,

Two quick questions:

1.) In the picture below, would you say that this is too loose to fit the criteria I quoted in the first quote, for price drawing a line in the sand if you will? I was just trying to find an example, not the best example. Would a long at either the 1st or 2nd green arrow make sense based on the quote above?

 

2.) I've been more so doing the thing mentioned in the 2nd quote more often than not. Is there a way you go about picking which way you plan to trade, i.e. shorting the breakdown that picked a figure or playing the continuation? In this second picture below, it may not be the best example but I am trying to find something real time.

 

Would you say that price has somewhat drawn a line in the sand to the downside along with that swing high to the far right from which I have drawn the red line. And either a BO above the green line at top or down the green line bottom make sense?

 

Again, this isn't the best example but looking for something showing the general 'swings' and how it might relate to reasonable direction.

[HAL9000 10]

FOMC after two beers on sim.

 

This might have nothing to do with reality,

but while I traded up too three contracts,

at the beginning I traded on hope or on impuls,

then I've watched my charts.

 

Well, its just sim, and my timing chart is attached.

 

Hal

 

 

[HAL9000 10]

LOL, two beers: wrong thread. Excuse me please.

 

Regards,

 

Hal

 

P.S.: 6B is still falling as I write this.

[thalestrader 14]

Hi Folks,

 

Update on the GBPUSD: My daughter and I are going to manage this potential position trade together in her micro account (I included a screenshot that should be familiar to FXCM traders). We had an order to sell short a small initial position at 1.6327, which was just filled within the last few minutes. This is a small "attack," and we will close the position with a small loss should price move against us.

 

Our main point of interest is still a break of 1.6100 with a special interest in a weekly close below that figure.

 

The plan will be to establish an initial core position and add to that position if the market does move favorably. If the market does not move favorably, we will cut our losses and look for other opportunities.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[thalestrader 14]

Hi Folks,

 

A last look at the Yen futures before bedtime. Three items of interest:

 

1) Look at where the decline halted from this afternoon's sell-off - prior support turned resistance turned support.

 

2) Note the price action following that low (Low-high-higher low) which triggered a long trade into resistance turned support turned resistance

 

3) Note price action subsequent to price reaching that resistance level. (High at resistance, - a pullback low - and as of this moment, a potential lower high).

 

For those interested in this sort of thing, it might be useful to compare these Yen charts to the 6E charts I posted earlier in post #339 of this thread.

 

 

Again, I am not making predictions (I am not among the initiates in the predictive arts), I am just making and taking notes.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

[taq 10]

Great charts thales

Here is my Updated EURJPY Chart

 

trail SL to 135.25 Shorted 135.05 t1 131.50 t2 130.05

 

RRR (Risk Reward Ratio) 20:355 , 500 time period 5-8 sessions not bad

[taq 10]

In GBPUSD case it looks like we are watching the same levels

 

if it close below 1.6100 it looks it can break its jan 09 low of 1.3512 within an year.

 

Regards,

TAQ

[Gabe2004 10]

I am not sure if this is the right place to post trades that have closed but I like this thread so I am posting it here.

If someone could suggest a better place, please let me know.

 

Gabe

[thalestrader 14]

  thalestrader said:

Update on the GBPUSD: My daughter and I are going to manage this potential position trade together in her micro account (I included a screenshot that should be familiar to FXCM traders). We had an order to sell short a small initial position at 1.6327, which was just filled within the last few minutes. This is a small "attack," and we will close the position with a small loss should price move against us.

 

Hi Folks,

 

Our first small skirmish ended with a -20 tick loss as price rallied soon after stopping us in, and etched a very nice Low-High-Higher low.

 

I also note on the recap chart that a very favorable entry presented itself last night in and around the Frankfurt open. I believe Gabe also noted in his post above that he thought that presented a favorable short entry. My daughter and I too were not awake to act on that opportunity.

 

We did set a sell stop below yesterday's low and we were stopped in to a short position during the London morning session at 1.6315. The position is still open, and we will risk a little more than our open trade equity to hold the position as an initial seed for what may or may not develop into a longer term short campaign against the British Pound (if Soros can do it, why not my little girl, after all?).

 

I have attached my preferred black and white showing a recap of last night's and this morning's price action, as well as a picture of our FXCM chart showing the open position and open p/l.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

Edited September 24, 2009 by thalestrader

[Gabe2004 10]

  thalestrader said:

Hi Folks,

 

Our first small skirmish ended with a -20 tick loss as price rallied soon after stopping us in, and etched a very nice Low-High-Higher low.

 

I also note on the recap chart that a very favorable entry presented itself last night in and around the Frankfurt open. I believe Gabe also noted in his post above that he thought that presented a favorable short entry. My daughter and I too were not awake to act on that opportunity.

 

We did set a sell stop below yesterday's low and we were stopped in to a short position during the London morning session at 1.6315. The position is still open, and we will risk a little more than our open trade equity to hold the position as an initial seed for what may or may not develop into a longer term short campaign against the British Pound (if Soros can do it, why not my little girl, after all?).

 

I have attached my preferred black and white showing a recap of last night's and this morning's price action, as well as a picture of our FXCM chart showing the open position and open p/l.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales

 

Good morning Thales and every one

 

What eas the significance of 1. 6315?

You wrote that it was the low of June 23ed but that would be too far to look back at in my oppinion.

 

Thanks

 

Gabe

 

PS on 2nd examination of the chart I think you meant Sept 23 . I could be wrong.....

[thalestrader 14]

  Gabe2004 said:

Good morning Thales and every one

 

What eas the significance of 1. 6315?

You wrote that it was the low of June 23ed but that would be too far to look back at in my oppinion.

 

Thanks

 

Gabe

 

PS on 2nd examination of the chart I think you meant Sept 23 . I could be wrong.....

 

 

Yes, September 23 12am-12am low (most charts run 5pm EDT - 5pm EDT. I have no idea what made me type June 23rd, and I will go back and edit the post.

 

Best Wishes,

 

Thales