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Today I got up at 3 in the morning and didn't fall asleep until like 4:15. When my alarm rang at 5:37 I couldn't get up
I woke up because I had to go to the washroom and just couldn't fall back asleep
I need to figure something out to
I'm finding that I need to be in bed by 830 so I can sleep by 930 and get an 8 hr sleep, so at what time should I stop drinking water? 2 hrs before bed, 3? 4? I should check and start building my life around that
Market continues bull momentum until ~4840 zone, we reject it strongly on first contact, then after a pullback we move to it again, we chop around there for a bit only to reject it even stronger and trend bear for the rest of the day or until ~4800
Market opens up bear, we move to ~4800 and then reverse - we then look for resistance and ping pong between those areas
Market opens up bear to the 4800, we have a small pullback / chop around there and then we break down the 4800 and trend towards 4780
Market opens up strongly bull, we slow down and chop around the 4840 area absorbing some of the strong selling, we then break out of the 4840-4850 area and trend until ~4880
Low strength bear trend day - We don't beat 4830, we see pullback / chop around the 4800, we then break it and have a creeping bear market until end of day
Setups I'll take today
~4880
LF Short
You want to see strong exhaustion signs or at least decent reversal signs
Stop behind the 83 area is a must
Safe target is 4861, stretch target is 4856, 3rd target is to hold until the end of the day
~4840-4850
LF Long
You are taking a break-out setup here
Entry point and stop will be extremely difficult to get there
The only way you can take a pre b-out setup if the market has been absorbing contracts ~4840 area and we see signs of a rocket blast off
Target ~4867 safe, ~4874 stretch
You must be moving your stop consistently as the market can reverse at anytime, specially if we are into the afternoon session
~4840-4850
LF Short
You are primarily looking for strong reversal signs
Entry and stop will be very difficult here as the area is 13 pts so it's way too big to capture all with your risk parameters
Try your best to get as good of an entry as possible
If you just aren't comfortable picking a top for this setup then just let the price drop and take it as it's trending down. Won't be ideal entry but if the trend down is strong enough it should be good enough
IF no OTF players then aim for 4821 target, if we see some OTF activity then aim for at least 4812, and as low as 4806
There's some strong potential here, but don't let greed get to you
~4835
LF Short
If we get this very fast, then you need to see some very strong signs of a reversal
Super strong exhaustion signs might work as well, though make sure to think about context
Stop behind 4840 is ideal
Target 4821 is safe, 4813 is stretch, 4806 is super stretch, guarantee 12 pts of profit before going for 3rd target though
Watch the 4825-4820 area for a possible reversal or a sign that you entered into a pullback
Be prepared to pass up on this trade, as it's close to the 4840 area and we might see some chop between here and ~4840
~4825 (ON High)
LF Short
You are most likely going to pass up taking any setup here, apart from the first hour or so of the open
You might be tempted to take a long position, but we could honestly see a reversal / strong pullback at 4830,4835,4840-4850. So it's a riskier setup than others
Stop behind 4830 is ideal
Aim 4812 is safe, stretch is 4804, super stretch is 4892 and only take if we break through the 4800 area fast
~4800
LF Long
You are looking for either OTF stepping in to stop the trend, or a lack of OTF sellers coming in to drive the price down. Under normal conditions this area could very likely hold on its own
Engage deliberate thinking in all trades - even if it means passing a setup because you didn't think fast enough in time, that's ok
Do not get greedy with your trades - specially if it looks like we will have a low range day. Don't 'hope' that we will hit a target, read the market and react
Stick to your trade management rules
4 RTH trades maximum per day - But please don't "look" for setups, watch the first 30 minutes closely and then set your alarms on NinjaTrader and walk away. Go fix your other computer or something
Cheers!
Yesterday's excellence is today's standard and tomorrow's mediocrity
Not the greatest day today, I wasn't in synch with the market today and I felt like I got caught with my pants down.
I overreacted and thankfully I didn't end up down as much as I could have. 3 trades taken today.
First trade taken
What to say about this trade. I set myself into a 'bear' mode, and I just waited for a decent area to take the trade. I want to say this was intuitive but it wasn't, it was deliberate. However, I just made the wrong decision and was forcing my bearish sentiment into the market.
Trade grade - Ok
It may or may not have been part of the plan
Some signs were there, but it felt like a 51/49 gamble
Decent (but not good) target and/or stop
Second trade taken So the news is talking about Trump's tax policies and how that's great for business
The market is going up
The RTH profile reminds me of a trend day
And i think O.M.G... I didn't even consider the possibility of a trend day
So I adapt and take a long position. The setup itself wasn't bad, as there was no indication we were going to reverse anytime soon, but it wasn't in my plan.
I also got unlucky with where I entered, the like 30 second pullback stopped me out.
Trade grade - Bad
Not in plan
Third trade taken So I feel confident about the setup, I feel confident that I'm adapting to the situation and we are likely to have a bull trend day, so I take the setup again as I feel that I just got a bad entry point on my last trade.
Trade grade - Bad
Not in plan
Psychology goals for the day
0 FOMO trades- Passed
0 Emotional trades- Passed
Engage deliberate thinking in all trades - even if it means passing a setup because you didn't think fast enough in time, that's ok- Passed
Do not get greedy with your trades - specially if it looks like we will have a low range day. Don't 'hope' that we will hit a target, read the market and react- Failed, I think I got a bit greedy with my last trade. I'm not entirely sure because at the time I honestly felt the market was going to explode lol, but I probably should've watched it and once I saw that it wasn't going to, then exited for a better profit
Stick to your trade management rules- Passed
4 RTH trades maximum per day - But please don't "look" for setups, watch the first 30 minutes closely and then set your alarms on NinjaTrader and walk away. Go fix your other computer or something- Passed
Overview I made a mistake on not putting confidence on my plan today
The market moved strongly bull at open, the sentiment was bullish on the news, the stocks were mostly outperforming the NQ, so I thought wow did I really miss to plan for a bull trend day? So I chose to adapt on the fly, and make the assumption we were on a bull trend day.
The assumption itself wasn't too bad, but the way I chose to execute it was.
I should've been looking at the areas where price could reverse, such as the 4840-4850 zone which I put such a strong emphasis on. I didn't do that, I said ok sentiment trumps the zone today without even knowing, I was predicting that something would happen, that's a no-no. That was a big mistake.
You put these plans together for a reason. Some of your scenarios weren't far off, so why the lack of faith? Oh well.
I'm glad I was able to stop after 3 trades though, I probably would've taken some revenge trades. Overall down ~5 pts, I can live with that for a day I wasn't in synch with the market.
Life goes on, see you tomorrow!
Yesterday's excellence is today's standard and tomorrow's mediocrity
I have a default ATM strategy for all my trades which is 4.5 pts stop and 13.75 ticks target. It sounds very specific but I just had to pick 2 numbers so I wouldn't have to worry about not having a stop and target
However, I almost always modify them to the market conditions. I'll try and set my stops behind an area that I don't think the market will hit. If I get a very good fill, I'll lower my stop. If I get a bad fill and I am like 1-2 pts behind a very strong area, I will consider increasing my stop depending on what my Risk-Reward will be.
There are times when I get less than ideal entries and I can't place my stops behind a strategic area or else I'd be risking much more than I'd like. On those I make a call as to whether I will leave them at the default (4.5), or lower / increase them. The call will be based on the potential target, market strength, among other things.
This is also just for the initial stops. If the market starts to go my way then I'm always looking to lower my risk in the trade once there's more information on the table. Assuming normal conditions, there's no reason to still have a 5pt stop loss when the market has gone 15 pts your way. Sometimes it backfires and I get stopped out and the market goes my way, and other times (like today on my 3rd trade) it protects me from a change in market conditions and still exits me at a reasonable profit.
This also only applies for days like today, if we had super high volatility like during election week I have a completely different philosophy for setting my stops.
Sorry it's not as clear cut, but hey, what in trading is? Let me know if you have any other questions!
Cheers!
Yesterday's excellence is today's standard and tomorrow's mediocrity
Range went up yesterday after a steady 5 day decrease, still did not hit ATR
I honestly thought the market would have started pricing in a rate hike by now, but we have seen little volume and a creeping bull market - this can't be the market pricing in a rate hike right? right? lol
From a fundamental standpoint, I don't see anything that would turn this around today, so I guess the emphasis will be put on technicals today
Scenarios
Fall right off the open, and trend bear until we find some strong support, creep bull market after that
Break 4880 from a strong open move, then fail before hitting 4900, possibly even 4890. Look for a strong support zone and trend bull after that
Struggle ~4880 and then pass it until we get to 4900, fail there and trend down
A bit of movement at open, and then creeping bull market for rest of day, potentially setting new all-time highs
I feel like I'm missing some scenarios that are in my head tbh, but you can tell I don't have high expectations for today.
Setups I'll take today
Didn't take a picture before I got into a pre-market trade, my bad lol
~4900
LF Short
Exhaustion or strong reversal
Ideal stop is behind 4908 mark, which will be almost impossible to get unless you take bigger risks
Safe target is 4883, stretch is 4873, super stretch is 4863, but don't get hopeful pls
Don't take the setup just because, look for some strong signs pls
~4880
LF Short
We have a tight area so you could short near the top for a reversal, or you could short near the bottom for a break down
Stop behind 4883 is ideal
Target 4861 is safe, 4856 is stretch, don't get any greedier than this unless we see some OTF selling
Entry point will be key
~4860 (ON Low)
LF Long
You are looking for signs that this is a strong support area and the market is going to revervse
Stop behind 4855 is ideal
Target 4874 is safe, 4877 is stretch, and hold until later in the day if creeping bull day
~4850-4840
LF Long
OTF aren't stepping in, so let's continue this creeping bull market
This area is so big that it's hard to say where to place stop and entry, but don't let hope cloud your judgment
~4850-4840
LF Short
OTF have stepped in, market is trending bear as they are looking to exit their positions before going off to their weekend cabins
This area is so big that it's hard to say where to place stop and entry, but don't let hope cloud your judgment
There's one more setup that I'd be willing to take that is not at a pre-defined zone. If the market sees some strong support outside of these zones, then take a long trade there. Use your judgment on where to target, but don't get greedy
Things to keep an eye for
Where is OTF? Did they place their bull bets on election night and are they just hanging out?
Yesterday I got carried away with some non-trading related stuff so I didn't post my end of day summary. I'll post it later although it'll be brief.
FOMC minutes day
Historically FOMC minute days have been good days for me as volatility grows
FOMC minutes should show that December is very likely, if the minutes are extremely dovish then that might shake the market up
ON activity couldn't break the 4885 mark, although it stayed near ~4883 for a while
Durable goods orders came in much better than expected, but it's FOMC minutes day so does that mean good news = bad news?
Jobless claims came in ~ expected
At the same time, one thing to take into account is that we are near record highs before the FOMC minutes come out, is a rate hike is indeed coming does that mean that people will finally start to price in the move by exiting their longs and letting price come back down to a much better level?
ES near 2200
GC below 1200 for the first time in a long time
Biotech on the NQ is taking a hit, I'm not sure what is driving this but you'll want to take a look at it when you have some time
AMGN down 1%
GILD down 0.75%
CELG down 2.5
BIIB down 9% wow
News
Manufacturing Index at 945
New home sales @ 10
Consumer sentiment @ 10
FOMC minutes @ 2
This FOMC minutes day could work 2 ways. As usual, or like last time
Setups I'll take today
Again I didn't take a picture before entering into a trade, so my bad!
~4900
LF Short
Exhaustion or strong reversal
Ideal stop is behind 4908 mark, which will be almost impossible to get unless you take bigger risks
You can take this setup preemptively if price action doesn't point towards an instant shatter of this area
Safe target is 4883, stretch is 4873, super stretch is 4863, but don't get hopeful pls
~4880
LF Short
Reversal setup
You are looking for an absence of signs that we are strongly bullish, if that makes sense
Stop behind 4886 is ideal
~4860
LF Short
You are looking for signs that the market will drive down
This could be a pullback, or this could be the first timew e hit this with a breakdown
Watch the 50 area closely
Stop behind 4865 is ideal
Target 4846 is safe, 4841 is stretch
~4850-4840
LF Long
Reversal setup
~4850-4840
LF Short
Pullbacks, breakdown, or bear reversals are all good setups here
Area is so big to set stops and targets, but don't get greedy
Other setups not listed above
FOMC News setup - Your usual 3-4 opportunity setup could be applicable here. Although the volume and range of it might be low. Keep an eye out for the volume and volatility that we see as soon as the announcement drops
Honestly I have a couple more setups that I want to take in mind, but I don't know where to place them just yet. I usually look at the strong areas of support / resistance every day after I do my end of day prep, and I haven't done that just yet.
Things to look out for
Try and get a good gauge of the sentiment post FOMC
Ok so not much to write about yesterday in terms of entries and exits, but I discovered something about myself so I'll focus on that. My attitude yesterday was pretty bad for a trader to have, and it's something I'm going to have to make sure I don't get myself into in the future.
I was tired, I was cranky, I saw a range of 8 on the EU ON session and I was not happy as my methodology doesn't work too well under low range conditions.
In general - I was negative. I was telling myself "this day is going to suck, why did I wake up, I should go back to sleep, I don't want to be here" etc.
So what did I do? I forced trades, I took back to back trades, until I hit my limit for # of trades that I could walk away. I was done trading 5 minutes into the open, and I was happy to be done.
It felt as if I didn't want to trade so I did whatever possible to check off the "I trade today" category in an invisible checklist.
I didn't do this consciously though. I obviously didn't create a plan to go in and try to finish all my trades as fast as possible. But conscious or unconscious, the result is still the same, a day of 3 straight losses.
Late on I thought to myself, why did I do that?
Why trade just for the sake of trading? If the range looks low and the day looks like it's going to be bad, then set alarms for key areas and just walk away, go nap until one of those alarms get hit. Or just choose not to trade that day, it's not a big deal.
You are much better off not trading because you aren't in the right state of mind than trading wanting to be done as quickly as possible. I set myself up for failure yesterday, and it was all psychologically.
However, I'm glad that my limit was the 3 trades, and not like 3% or something.
You learn something new about yourself every day I guess
Overview of the week
Short week because of thanksgiving
Very low volume, low range, just not the greatest environment for my methodology. I managed to end things positively as Wednesday picked up in terms of volatility Goals set for this week
Update your expectations around risk management rules, grading trades, and managing trades - Failed, to do this week
It's a 3 day week for you, find at least ONE day this week where you don't do ANYTHING trading-related. No looking at charts, no looking at stats, no looking at news, no reading trade-related FIO stuff, just relax. - Passed!
Buy Jigsaw and start the learning process- Failed, to do this week
Look into RBC US account for any recurring payments you may have, such as kinetick / IQFeed data- Failed, to do this week
Lower win % than I'd like, but enough to end positive.
Out of those trades:
Excellent trades: 1
Good trades: 0
Ok trades: 4
Bad trades: 4
Really bad trades: 1
Quite a bit of 'bad' trades. If in the future we see some low volatility such as we had last week, I need to make sure that I am still taking good setups. Trying to get in with a trend when the market isn't going to trend for a while is probably not my best move.
Not much more to add this week. Not the greatest of weeks, but at least I ended positive so I can't complain.
Yesterday's excellence is today's standard and tomorrow's mediocrity
I have been completely absent from anything trading related as of Wednesday afternoon. This was a conscious decision as I hadn't really taken a full break from trading and trading-related. I think I'll write about how it felt on a later post.
Last week was the lowest volume week of 2016, we had a holiday but Mon-Wed were very low volume days
Weekly candles show balance between 4550 and 4920 area
Not likely that we break out of that balance this week as we have the FOMC announcement next week. Question is, will the market price the rate hike in and lower the overall price? Or has the market already adapted and assumed that the price won't drop if the fed hikes rates next week
The sentiment right now feels bullish, but I feel that it can turn at any moment.
Things might feel stable, but we have an OPEC meeting and a likely rate increase coming up soon, plus end of year. I'm assuming that some people exit out of their positions at the end of the year so they can relax? I could be completely wrong though
4885 held 2 daily tests, so look to see how price reacts when we touch that area this week
I'm still holding to my 'eye of the hurricane' hypothesis. The market is slow but I don't see it staying like this for the rest of the year
Key news this week
Monday – Nada
Tuesday - GDP, Japan Industrial Production
Wednesday - OPEC meeting, Japan and China Manufacturing Index
Thursday - Some smaller news, but nothing huge
Friday - Jobs Report
Goals for the week
Update your expectations around risk management rules, grading trades, and managing trades
Buy Jigsaw and start the learning process
Complete end of month review by Friday
Complete last Wednesday summary and End of week Summary on Monday