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You make some good points. Then you go and do something that the bullsh1tters do and dismess SMA and mechanical out of hand. I use SMA and 100% mechanical and they work fine for me.
If they work for you then don't change it. There are people who never use charts and do better than me.
I would not need charts, if someone told me before official words that Blue Star Airlines has won a lawsuit And yes, nobody has an idea how much money is made that way.
If you specialize in SMA, good.
You know what I meant. Walk into forex factory and look into systems. RSI crossing 0, moving averages crossed, enter. This is not how you trade and this is what I target.
To be honest, I don't even know what futures are. I know they are not open over night, but that's all.
I found what works for me and I don't think I will change that. I don't have patience, but I simply turn off my PC after I place the trade and that seems to work. Yesterday after I placed the EURUSD trade, I went jogging. Came back and take profit was not far away. Went to shower, came back, target hit, now looking for the next trade. It takes a lot to remove that fear of sitting and watching the position to go against you.
I trade with Oanda forex spot. Yeah, I must say, their platform crashes more often than not, but it works. My stops are far away from anyones jurisdiction (except Bernake's^^). Shame there is no photoshop or maya or final cut in forex, some sort of leading software.
Thanks for all these words. Who knows, maybe in 5 years I'll be the guy who opened that thread, broke and desperatly looking for help.
Took everyones Advice and decided to spend every waking minute burning my eyes reading, studing, implementing and finally practicing with Market Profile graphics. read everything I could about M.P. Analysis including a 6 part Course of study put out by CBOT back in the 80's about market profile, actually read it three times!!!!
Market profile uses statistical math and Standard deviation to get a deeper understanding of what is happening in the market between sellers and buyers. To show you if the market is trending or rotating, if it is reaching the final phase of an up or down move, etc... Something I find inpossible with candlesticks and technical indicators alone!
But market profile in not easy to understand and implement, especially since live markets don't always reflect a "perfect" bell curve model of distribution(textbook) however, it is the most advanced tool I have come across in my 5 year journey. And Reza's Market profile Boot-camp really gave me a deep understanding of the subject. My trading is turning around as a result of learning this very valuable skill.
I invite you to see my new thread called" Ten thousand in education finally paying off"
Trading, to me at least, is both art and science, heavy on the art. It is a lot like sailing. Knowledge of oceanography, meteorology, navigation are helpful and in some cases very necessary. You need charts, compasses, GPSs, rader and the like. Still, not ending up on the shoals comes down to making judgements based upon what you know, what you measure, what you see and then taking action based on these judgements. To sail successfully knowledge, judgment and motor skills are need in at least equal supply. Everyday is different. You can't rely solely on one instrument like radar. You have to look with your eyes, think with your head and steer with your hands. If your are in the fog, you have to be doubly careful--or stop until the fog lifts. Good, safe sailing comes from experience at the helm, not from the next, best gadget. Seamanship is an art supported by science.
So it is with trading. You need experience. You have to feel the market you are trading and the tools and indicators you are using. If it was as simple as being mechanical then everybody would be doing it and doing it successfully; evidence abounds that they are not. You will know you are on the right track when it feels right. I know many won't agree with me but this has been my experience. Things start to go right with you feel good about your trading approach, you have confidence in it and you expect your trades to work out. Mathematical positive expectancy is one thing. Mental positive expectancy is another and makes all the difference in the world.
You have to synthesize all of the information for yourself and trade yourself, your way. I can teach you to drive a race car, but I can't teach you to win races. You have to work that out for yourself. You have to have the skills and experience. You need a good car. Then, you have to want to win. You have to see yourself as a winner. Otherwise all that expensive training and experience will be for naught.
Everybody is different. Different markets, systems and approaches work for different personalities and temperaments. The trick is finding an approach to the market that you feel positive about, that you can and will execute properly and that one way or another is "yours." You can come up with your own from scratch or you can borrow from others and make it your own. Either way, it's your money, your approach and you have to own it. You have to win with it; nobody can do it for you now matter how much you pay them for their system.
For me it was, and is, scalping the ES though I hate to use the term scalping as it means different things to different people. These are my own personal criteria. I want to be in and out--less the a minute and I'm ecstatic, no more than a small number of minutes or I get fidgety. I don't have the psychological staying power to hold a position much longer. On good days I want to be done for the day early and move on to other things. On tougher days I want to have enough trading opportunities to recover from a loss and end up at break even or better. I'm paranoid. I want excellent liquidity so I feel like I can get out in a crisis and not be stuck holding a losing position any longer than necessary. Although I am not the most patient person I am willing to discipline myself to wait for my setups and not over trade--this is tough for me and I constantly work on it.
So, I set a modest goal per trade, 5 ticks on the ES, all in/all out. I manage the trade very closely. I am very aggressive about not taking losses. If the trade doesn't feel right I scratch the trade or better yet take a tick or two profit. I'm not proud--ticks is ticks as they say. I automate the target and stop management to keep myself as honest as possible and reduce the thinking and fiddling required during a trade. I practice so that pulling the trigger is muscle memory--automatic. I see a setup; I pull the trigger with as little "thinking" as possible--this takes constant drilling for me. I'm fortunate to be able trade with enough size that when I book my 5 ticks I'm done. I specialize in hitting singles and leave the home runs to the big bats. This fits my personality, my financial situation and my lifestyle. It works for me.
I think it is helpful for anyone to think about these kinds of criteria before getting bogged down in trading systems. See yourself at your trading desk. What does your day look like? Do you want to up early and be done in an hour because you have another job or things to do? Can you trade all day? Do you want study the market in the evening and place swing or position trades but not sit at the desk during market hours? Do you want to make fewer, bigger trades or do you want to be active and make more, smaller traders? How will these approaches affect your stop loss tolerance? What are you willing to risk per trade and how long can you psychologically tolerate that risk? How much would you like to make from a single trade? How much money do you need to make to be done for the day, week, month, year?
Know yourself. Then you can develop or buy a trading approach that has the best chance of working for you. You can't trade somebody else's trading plan. Trade YOUR plan.
Mike - I just saw that quite a few (9) people clicked "Thanks" for lsmith, but his/her counter was only showing "1 received". Does this get updated daily?
Just curious (and wanted to let you know in case something was amiss).