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Fairly tight range today on the CL. About 100 tricks. CL is ussually 2 to 300. Last few seessions, support looks to be around 99.40.
I made a big mistake today.
I went long on a trade, then, reversed because I was ahead on the day. (another mistake thinking P&L instead of mindful trading) Well, got stopped out on both trades. All within 4 minutes.
The market giveth, and the market taketh away.
Broke a major rule. Do not trade for 15 minutes after a losing trade. (Unless it is overwhelmingly favourable) The first trade was just a wrong entry...happens.
The second trade was the mistake. It was a knee jerk move on my part, for which the is no excuse. Havent done that in some time. To be sure, I am disappointed in myself for commiting this grave error.
It trades 2 good trades to make up for 1 bad trade. Better to not make the bad trade.
Had 4 good trades today. A see saw day for me today, is the best way I can describe it.
+53 ticks, the error cost me 14, which is in reality 28 ticks. 14 for the error, the 14 to get back to BE.
If I am always aware of the 2 good trades for 1 bad, I think I would trade better.
OK, I see what you are saying. But this is what I would consider...Whats the risk? If your hard stop is 10 ticks, if the conditions are right, then 1 is the better trade. If you hit your targets on 1, total is 20+40+40 ticks = 100 ticks. if it moves 20, you still have 80 ticks. Of course, where to set the stops comes with experience and feel for the market on that particular day.
Hit your target on 2, its 50 ticks.
If its 10 and no more all day every day, its 2.
Booth trades are valid. The key is identifying when. Why not where both hats? Some long, some scalp.
If you can learn one way, you can learn another. But I do agree, that for your bread and butter, you have to dance with the one you brought.
I have this image in my mind of fishing for Walleye.
I like fishing for Walleye. When they are in the midst of a feeding, you can hawk them out of the water one after the other. But when they arent on the bite, you have to hunt around for them. Depending on the wind, and the temperate, and the underwater structure, they can be allusive.
They are one of the best freshwater fish to eat as well. They have a delicate taste, and they take on the flavour you spice them with very well.
And, very important, they are very easy to clean, with a minimum amount of smell. Very important, if you are the one doing the fish cleaning, and I usually am. Northerns are kinda slimy, and the smell is hard to get off your hands. Same with smallmouth bass.
Thinking about fishing cause its so cold here right now.
had a rough morning ....got puched around a bit.
-30 ticks...What can I say but I dont really want to talk about it.
Going to regroup, review my trades in detail and look forward to tommorrows session.
1. By not wanting to talk about it, I assume that you didn't follow your rules.
2. You need to closely examine what is keeping you from following rules. Is it being afraid to execute? Trading too big? Charts moving too fast? Confusion/conflicting info on charts? Lack of confidence? Lack of patience?
3. Once you identify all the areas where you are failing to follow your rules, then you need to come up with a specific plan to correct that behavior. That almost always does not involve changing the rules themselves, but changing the environment instead (environment being for instance the size you trade, or doing more forward testing to build up confidence, or reducing indicators to minimize confusion, or practicing patience by taking only 1 or 2 trades a day, etc).
I know you don't want to talk about it. I get it. But I disagree, and think you learn most from the experiences like this so it is very important to not just shove them aside.
But i am prepared to now. It wasnt the prettiest day, and I went against my own rules. This has to be the most difficult process in trading, following the rules that you, yourself made up. And holding yourself accountable.
Interestingly, I had 2 trades that worked out to perfection...but that was later in the session. Made a couple of mistakes on my entries by not following my rules but then I decided that it just wasnt my day.
There have been some trades every day where I had supreme confidence placing a trade, 2 maybe 3 if I am having a real good day....no hesistation at all. I knew the trades were going to work. Even tho I had a real good result on 2 trades, they didnt feel right.
Today, I was out of synch, if that makes sense. It has happenned before,and what I have done in the past is try a little relaxation mindfulness deep breathing excetera. That has always helped. Today I didnt do that. I had a couple of interruptions, and though they were small interruptions, I was irritated by them, and was still thinking of them when I resumed my trading.
I shut it down a little earlier than usual as a result. And I am resolved to do better tommorrow.
BTW Big Mike, thanks for the reminder. If you hadnt mentioned it, I likely wouldnt have written a post script to the day. The suggestions in 3 are of particular interest, as I could likely check off at least 2 of them as areas I need to improve on. Last few sessions I think my trading is a little too loose, and I need to tighten up some.
well, after yesterdays debacle, took a tranq, watched Iron Chef, had a brewski...and medidated on my wrong headedness.
today I was determined to do better.
Partial success, was on the right side of the rally on the cl from 8:30 to 9:30. Got my target hits 3 times in row...one after the other, for a total of 49 ticks. However, this begs a question. Are my targets too small? What is a realistic prercentage to capture of a move, while keeping a close eye on downside risk.To capture bigger moves, one has to be willing to use a wider stop. how wide is too wide? 1:1,1: 1.5, 1:2, 1:5?
After the daily high of 100.29, wasnt very efficient on the shorts, as I didnt expect a big breakdown of price.
+57 on the day, primarily from the large move from 9:00 am and peaked at 101.29. Had a flash that blew through my stop later in the session that blasted me for 22 ticks. Those program trades. Not happy when that happens. Hasnt happened for a while.
good job on the journal Vance.I didnt realize this journal was yours.Mike has some great advice.I would like to see some charts, because, if you review the week on saturday for example, its easy to see the good trades,...and the mistakes..Just my opinion.Also....do not beat yourself up!!!If this was easy, everyone would do it.Its very impressive, how quickly youve come this far(imo).I think that alot of traders think they will be profitable every trading day...the market doesnt work that way...It sounds to me like you are pretty honest with yourself, and youre method, executed correctly, will make $ each month................As far as changing targets?watch what happens if you do that tomorrow!Every day is different, so ,if youve been doing well, i wouldnt let one day influence that.********Also, is it me?, or has the cl changed a bit in the last 2 weeks?Every so often, the markets will do that.Good job today
Sat on my hands for most of the day, till after 10:30.
Really wasnt clear, as after the report, CL was in a tight range, and as we all know, tight range with lots of overlapping bars = baby dosnt get new shoes. At least, not today.
I was looking for a measued move off the 21 later in the morning, as I hung around in my office till past 12:30 today.
12:16 long, Was a bit of a risky trade, but I thought prices were due to breake out to the upside from 98.74. Why is it risky? In this case I thought there was a lot of congestion near the top of the range and when I say the momentum, I took the trade. ( of course, I drew the lines) Yes. know the targets ambitious, for sure, but I have a trailing stop. As it was, it pulled back and I got closed out.
+27 ticks today. Been a tough week so far, and its only Wednesday.
We all are businessmen. ( or women, but frankly , men outnumber women in trading at least 10 to 1) Trading is a business.
I have been giving a lot of thought to this lately, because, it occurred to me, that most traders are not experienced business people, or self employed. They ussually work for someone else, and not themselves. For someone to succeed as a trader/buisnessman, an individual needs to learn good buisness practices, and gain the experience that an independent buisnesssman learns from being in buisness. Trading is a very difficult endeavor, but juggle that with all the other assorted challenges of running a buisness, like rent, utilities, insurance, personal expenses, supporting dependents. And try doing that while the market is open...9 to 4. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
I truly have to admire ones who are successfully traders that have come from being an employee to running a trading business.
By comparison, taking trades is the easiest part of trading...Its coming to grips with the consequences of clicking the mouse that is hard.
Today I was much better than the last few sessions.
10 trades.
My mindset today was to protect first, so I wanted to be more rigourous with my entries, and more precise with my stops so as to let my winners run. Problem today tight range after the selloff of the last few sessions. So where is the support low?
Anyway, for me it was more about trading in the moment, and being more patient. Clicking the mouse with authoriy, without hestation after I have seen my entry and exit.
Finished up +44 on the day.
Got stopped out on stoped fully on 1 trade, tightened my stop on another after I was profitable, but got taken out by 1 tick on a pullback, that turned around and would have hit my target. That was annoying. I have it on the chart, areas of interest.