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In this market you should probably not be trying to trade - certainly not with a 10 tick stop. Big Mike is right on the money. !0 points would be more realistic. But the stop is only one piece of the puzzle. Unless you have a trade plan with a demonstrated edge you are throwing your money away.
Hi Tony,
Even before you place an order for 1 or many contracts be it any market for that matter you should ask yourself the following:
1. What is my purpose?
2. Do I have system and a set process to follow this purpose
3. I am abiding to the basic risk management rules
I think the reason everytime you get varied results with your trading is because of not following a set system or a process. I would still persist in trading a max of 1-3 markets and learn to master them first. Try and make whatever your system you are following objective and rule based.
For example I am Demand and Supply trader and I primary use price action and no indicators on my chart to trade but just because this works for me the same might not work for you because we are different. Have a stop loss for the day and also a set profit target for the day so that you don’t over trade and give back the money you have made. Follow one system and try and master it. Trading for a living is not easy but not impossible if you have the right mindset. Discipline is key. Just wanted to share a few cents of my experience with you. All the best and happy trading Also trade on a sim account and use the same risk management rules that you would on a love account. Only once you are comfortable and see results coming in then only shift to a live account....
Cheers,
Vishal
Can You simulate Your strategy in a software including/excluding commissions and increasing timeframe?
Most of the time You find that You do better on longer timeframes, with simpler strategies with less trades rather then complex ones with lots of rules.
If you truly are consistently directionally wrong as you say you are, and your P/L curve is nicely trending from top left to bottom right, then that sounds like a potential edge to me, just reverse your long/short positions! This assumes your losses are due to market direction, not slippage and commissions. It also assumes you have some sort of well defined rules you are following for entering and exiting positions.
With regards to "should I withdraw and go home or keep trying to get better." It sounds like you are trying to find an edge by live trading. This can be very expensive.... Much better to discover your edge paper trading and/or backtesting, then confirm it's a real edge by live trading. Any test sample under 30 trades will not give you reliable insight of the existence of an edge. Ideally 100 trades or more.
Be mindful that any edge you find is likely to be temporary, and you need to stop trading it when it stops working.
You want an edge? Get the edge the big boys use.
Read J. Peter Steadlmyre's book Steidlmayer on Markets. Learn it, Understand it. Then apply it to Volume Profiles. Start there and you're on the road to understanding the markets. And, Learn take a loss! It's not the end of the day. It's not about being WRONG! It's about making money. It's about finding a cheap entry point and then a profitable exit. A "cheap" entry will keep your losses small and manageable if your hypothesis is wrong. It's not personal! It's about understanding the market and willing to be caught on the wrong side now and then.
Winston Churchill said it best, "Never, never, never, never give up."
This business is very, very difficult, until it isn't......
Better days ahead.
N
I left the game for years after losing thousands. Recently I began paper trading again, really trying to understand reading the market structure. Every trader's journey is different. I always try to live by the old saying "If you want to get out of the hole, stop digging" Take a break... educate yourself (don't buy indicators, there is no holy grail other than education that you can get online...) .... again don't buy a bunch of indicators, if you can't find it here then there is nothing "out there" that you're going to find.
So basically yea, if you're down 20% I'd take a pause, evaluate if you need to go back to paper trading to hone in on your issues, be it emotional or technical.