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Prior day saw choppy selling and the overnight saw a mild rebound from the bulls.
Today PA was a bit confusing, so I waited for a full 5 minute bar to judge volume and
to see what developed. Volume was at 5030, not bad.
After several failed breakouts a large 5 min bar broke to the downside. I missed a
good pullback entry due to nothing but fatigue and indecision. I entered at my
normal position of a break of SR, took what the market gave me easily and got
out. I was in no frame of mind to battle.
+9 ticks
My goals for the next few days are to simply pick the best trade I can, make a little
money and get out.
The prior day saw choppy selling, followed by the expected bullish bounce in the overnight.
I started the replay a bit earlier than normal since I saw a pretty good move pre-open
yesterday.
Another bullish move happened right at 730cdt again. These, I assume, are news related
but are very calm, compared to other markets.
I thought I would try something new and attempt a pre-open trade on the TF.
I just missed the correct entry which was the pull back trade because I started the replay
just at that instant. I was tempted to rewind and just take the trade I normally would take, but
I promised myself to never rewind and never run the recorder faster than normal speed.
This has to be as real as possible or it's not going to work for me.
I just plain froze on the great movement toward the breakout entry.(second entry point)
I finally entered on a pullback trade after a couple of failed breakdowns.
My target was the re-test of the previous swing high. I bailed early with the assured 5 ticks.
Well, I really hit the wall this week. The last couple of weeks in the studio have been full of long hours
and not much sleep. It's been difficult to concentrate on the trading in between sessions, so the last few
days I just put it on hold. I just finished the last session for the week and I am now FREE!!!.
I'm going to put my TF trading practice on hold for a bit, to hang with some of the CL traders to just
observe how these guys are reading PA and entering trades. I will then apply the knowledge gathered
to the TF trades. They move similarly, in a way.
Oil just has a bit more "juice" , shall we call it...
So, I get my life back tomorrow after being here in the studio since MONDAY!!! I personal record of being
away from home and stuck at the studio. I've been too exhausted every night to drive the hour long
journey home.
My wife is very understanding about these things, thank goodness.
Let's learn more about trading! Back on track tomorrow...
Well, finally out of the studio and back home. Quite tired, but fairly focused.
Most of the traders I am in communication with are trading the CL, so I ran some SIM trades
along with them to test out the waters. I am getting lonely in the TF.
It seemed like I was counter to every trade they were taking. When I was out, they were in
and vice versa!! lol ...made me wonder if I knew what the heck I was doing.
I think, generally, PB trades seem to be the popular method in CL.
I wanted to graduate to CL anyway. I may try a few weeks of CL after I conclude my TF testing and
see which one I prefer.
I over traded a bit here, but I seemed to read CL PA fairly well.
...wanted to get some live market time to get back in the swing of news releases and such.
now I need some sleep
PA was close enough to one of my hand drawn SR lines that I was comfortable with setting a
buy stop for a breakout trade.
I'm really trying to enter with more pullback trades, but this one seemed to be setting up my
old favorite.
Price broke through nicely, as it usually does, and hovered at the dreaded 9 tick level.
This will be my main battle when going back to live. Take the 9 ticks or hang on for the one
more tick that kicks in my trailing stop strategy. My finger was itching on the close button
while PA came back to BE twice. When it made a HH, it took off like a rocket, filling my 20 tick target, + 3
ticks of slippage.
+ 23 ticks
Profit Target met in 17 minutes.
This closes "Live" trading. Time to test some PB entries... I need some rules hammered out.
Prior day pushed higher after a siginificant PB from a morning push up.
Volume at the 835 bar, cdt was 3996 - a little low.
I actually placed these trades last night after the trade from the previous day. Perhaps not a good idea
(two replay days in a row)
I did a few things wrong....
1. I started this pretty late in the evening, so I was a bit tired
2. I was inpatient by not waiting for the chop to clear out
3. I kept trading in the same area of a stop out.
4. With the choppy PA, I should have been in full PB entry mode
5. Should not have been on the chop at all
Trade 1
I thought there was enough selling pressure to create a break out, but in the end PA was just to choppy
and indecisive to warrant this conclusion.
Prior day selling led to a bull run in the Globex session. More selling developed at 6am cdt
The sell off I was attempting to trade yesterday did eventually occur. I was just too impatient too wait.
Trade 1
A nice PB entry in a pre-market downtrend. It seemed to be a safe entry and I exited manually when
near the prior day low.
+11
Trade 2
Ah, yes. My old TF favorite. A break of an SR line at the open ,following steady pressure in the premarket.
I was tempted to exit after the first PB, but it seemed minimal, so I lowered my target to the next
SR line. I exited here as the PB appeared more violent.
+21 ticks
Up $308 and done for the day with profit target met with 35 minutes of screen time.
...which brings me to my present quandary. The TF seems to let you get your profits very early
in the session, which while looking good at face value, is not letting me learn the art of trading.
When I lose, I lose later in the morning, when I may need to read other PA and use other
entry / exit techniques.
So from today on I am changing the rules a bit.
1.) I will use all three trades each day, focusing on PB trades within a trend.
That way, I will have to have a bit more screen time
2.) I am doubling my profit target to $400 a day. (this being hit will negate rule one)
3.) I will exit trading after two losses in a row or a loss of $200.
I think this will help me in a few ways.
a.) I will get more live screen time
b.) My PT met days will offset my losing days, hopefully leaving me with my original goal of
$200 per day / $1000 a week accessible.
TF, 3-24, Thursday. Price at 812. Volume at 8:35 cdt 3671
The second day of selling turned into a big bull rally at 10am. Globex saw consolidation
initially followed by more buying at 3am
I have had some time off this week and I have been spending the mornings SIM trading oil with
AZ's Skype group. Possibly the worst week I could have chosen. The Price action was brutal and I
lost a fortune testing. But, I gathered the insight I was seeking on several different fronts.
So now I am back home with TF. To finish out the 2 month testing and then take it from there.
Trade 1
A break of support led to a full target hit of +22 ticks
Trade 2
A Winfrey set up developed at the same place as my break out
signal. How could I refuse. target hit. + 19 ticks
up $408 with my new daily profit target hit.
I still feel pretty good, so I think I will load up the Friday data and try to finish out week 7 of the test.
Prior day saw a nice bullish trend that continued into the overnight.
Some selling began at 6am.
Trade 1
Selling pressure was steady and I was ready for the classic TF opening breakout.
After waiting 30 seconds or so, to see if there was going to be any madness, I placed
a sell stop at the usual place.
Price filled the stop well but pulled back hard so I moved the stop up a bit to lock in some profits.
A good sense of PA, for it indeed would have come back for my BE +1
+7
Trade 2
The dreaded PB trade. I can't seem to get the hang of these damn things.
...a quick exit after price stall.
+6
Trade 3
A breakout of the reversal. I waited well for all the charts and ma's to agree.
+8
I added a cluster of charts to the setup. Nothing new with the scheme, just some more data
that I worked on looking at CL.
I also added an MACD that I am enjoying using as a filter .
My work space is complete for now. No more changes. This is the setup I will use when going live.
I have a few more charts with different time frames that I interchange as PA dictates, but they all
have the same setups.
Daily total + $208 ... half my profit target, but I feel good about a day of "small ball" played well.
Weekly total + $940.
I'm entering the last week of the TF test. No more changes. Time to get the game face on.