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I thought I would enter in the journal this morning as I was in the process of trading. Sometimes I forget
the little notes I say to myself.
This morning is a replay of 12-6-11.
I begin at 1:45 am, pre London open.
I can't identify the trend easily between the charts, so I'm sitting and waiting for a bit.
While i'm waiting here, a bit of chart update. I am putting the Ichimoku in a drawer for a while.
It simply has little to do with what I am doing right now. I'm not in trades long enough for it to
do its magic. So until I can find a market I can stay in for hours at a time, it stays in the tool bag.
------------------------
I am in the middle of a bullish bounce off an ABC buy pattern on both the 5 and 1 min charts.
BSL placed at 743.0 - risky break out entry into a potential DT / resistance area.
moved BSL down to 742.7 for better entry price. My stock stop order should work nicely here.
1:59:45
Damn... bullish open surge blew over my BSL... moving to a Buy limit in hopes it returns.
boom filled at 743... moving stop to 742.2 - one tick below swing and right at my stop tolerance of
10 ticks... ouch...
messy entry this morning....
2:05.... price is battling / damn...
I did mention this is a DT / resistance area, didn't I ?
We're Out!! ... OK, targets.... my strategy left me between target 1 and 2, so I'm moving to 2
BE strategy engaged
2:15--------------------------
First PB occurring at 21 ticks
2:21
Price reaches target 1 ... moving stop to +5
2:24
Moving stop to B point of ABC pattern
44 ticks gathered
2:27
Price moving well - collecting Target 1 (stop moved)
54 ticks gathered
target 2 = 749.4
c'mon.....
2:30
Target 2 hit and man, price pulled back hard.... anyone who doesn't trade off Support and Resistance
levels is mad!! ( in my humble opinion, of coarse )
64 ticks gathered
oh, Lord, I do like the trending days better ....
1 and done... thank, God.... my brain still hurts from yesterday.
Will load another later.
I pray I can think this clearly when cash is on the line again...
Thank you for making the analogy of my acquired trading intuition to musical feel. This is something
I can truly relate to and will remember. I feel I am light years ahead of where I was when I was losing
money. You must, it seems, fail at trading your first time to prove that it is very difficult. The first failure probably
weeds out the the first 60 or 70% of traders instantly. The one's that remain and study on, may have a chance,
if they can overcome their "stage fright"
I have come to the realization that I will never become truly successful in this business unless I
start trading like I can afford to.
So from now on, I'm going to trade at least two cars and find the best strategy for scaling out.
I am also shifting my trading time focus closer to RTH, for better liquidity to aid me in other endeavors
I'm pursuing.
So here I go trying to figure out the best way for me to scale out.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Trade 1
I started marking my charts just after 5:00 am cdt - Market Replay.
I just finished the Al Brooks seminar, so I was pumped on trend lines again. I marked
up a bullish channel and found price moving towards the bottom, close to a confluence of
an SR line.
As soon as price started stalling at the area, I placed a BSL 1 tick above the SR line
which I had drawn and was at the edge of the swing.
5:31
price finally found me, but liquidity was still tough, so I was not filled ... chased up a couple
of ticks until I was filled.
ok... targets. I will start with the first just being a set 10 tick scalp, and let the second
have a potential to end my day quickly.
still within a large bullish channel... waiting .. I can't tell if I'm trading with trend or counter
at this point.
I think I'll wait for a HH on the 5min, before I go long again.
I woke up around 2:30 am, wide awake, thinking about the optimum 2 car scale out strategy great.
...booted up the Mac and loaded the PC partition and started playing with some replay in fast mode, studying.
I'm going to watch some live data this morning through my broker / data feed and run
a few live SIM entrys . CQG has seemed solid so far.
5:22 am
Trade 1
Looks like a missed the optimal entry after an ABC sell signal on the 5min chart that formed just after the open.
I hate entering a trend mid-stream, but I'll give it a whirl.
PA is scaring me a bit, so I'm just trying 1 car short with trend. PB entry at old support - now resistance
hopefully ..short at 785.2 at 5:25am
5:39 .. still hovering around the entry price ...arghhhh
5:44... finally! a strong move down triggers my ATM to move me to BE+1
5:51... crap... stopped out
+1
Trade 2
6:03 .... reversal entry long... 785.8 .... abc buy on 1 min. a little late to seeing the signal. I may have missed
the good counter trend scalp, so looking for a reversal now....
6:08 .... moving target to most conservative target - 786.7
taking heat... some volume coming in......
6:19....... still hovering around BE...
ouch.....
-8
Trade 3
6:30 ... trying one more time to break out of this area long... PB entry after HL on 5min. @ 785.1
stopped out
-7
Trade 4
6:42....loaded up a 2 car on what looks like a Double Bottom. ...784.4 / long
target 1 - stock 10 ticks
target 1 - filled
target 2 moved to first SR area on 15 min chart.... ATM moves stop on T2 to BE +1
will tighten stop on 5min bar close.
6:56 bar close.... holding @ BE +2 ... PA too volatile to move.
taking heat... why am I in this PA?? lol
+9 c'mon!! break out
7:05 bulls are fighting
stop to +3 just under PA
7:14 hello... can you hear me bulls!! let's go
7:21 a little volume followed a bull spike... the bears squashed it
7:25 ooohhh the bulls +14 ... not moving stop yet
7:35 +16.... stop moved to 785.4 just below current 5min PA battle... volume building
7:40 HH made 5min / 1min
7:45 I have to go feed the horses ... rain moving in early. +13 / +23 total as of now
I've been locked up in the studio for long periods of time, leaving me exhausted in my spare time.
I haven't opened up a chart in several days and am starting to Jones.
I have changed the way I am studying. I'm using the Replay data for the testing of two car strategies and
then using live sim data to put those concepts into action real time.
I need to use the replay FF functions to move quickly from one entry area to another, then slow to normal
speed for the entry and speed up again for trade result. This seems to be the best way to get as much PA screen time under my belt as possible.
So here I am - saving money to the trading account, studying and looking for other trading opportunities that will support me with outside funding.
-20 ish ( it's hard to tell exactly how many ticks with currency for me at this point - spreads and the like )
Trade 2
I switched back to 1 car and tried one more PB entry short
- 8 ish
Trade 3
OK, The bulls are still in control as the trend on the larger time frames dictated. This bear run was
just so large after making a LH, I could have sworn the trend was reversing...
"Trade what you see" .... not what you think is supposed to happen
I saw the bulls building up big pressure, but I kept moving my damn entry between a break out
and a revisit of the PB low.
Price left me - no fill on the PB entry
This is the biggest emotion I suffer from - being left behind on a big runner. The only thing that probably saved me
from getting flustered is that I did catch it (BO entry) on my cash Oanda account.
Exactly what I was looking for - getting those old trading emotions.
You MUST trade cash to feel these fully and you MUST control them.
This tells me I need much more work on my trading and the psychological aspects of this game.
It was, perhaps, a mistake jumping in to a market I haven't traded in a while, but it will come back.
Trade 4
I was proud of myself for taking a good PB entry and holding on through the consolidation until it broke.
+18 ish
Emotions took their toll again when I bailed early thinking I had enough to "Break Even"
Not a good mindset for a trader. Of course, price crashed right through the high.... there is that anger again...
but, I held it together well. I did have a technical reason for closing early - thinking it may be a DT.
But I knew price wasn't at the big resistance yet.
...So I'm down about $16 clams.
Not bad for jumping in fairly unprepared.
What I learned...
The 6E behaves quite differently than the TF - But I knew this.
I need to get some replay hours under my belt and get reacquainted with the Euro.
I am not ready emotionally to trade as a business. - Trading the 6ME will help with this greatly. You win
and lose enough
money to get your attention and piss you off when you make an error.
I will be ready when I lose or win and feel very little - just look for the next one.
You can't just keep Sim and replay trading endlessly - you are missing half the game - EMOTIONS
I had a horrible headache all day yesterday in the studio and just collapsed on the couch when
everyone split.
I woke up at 130am, like I was living in London... still have a bit of a headache and it's not going away
laying down, so I might as well trade.
Trade 1
2:15
A poor decision to enter when the long term charts were saying short, but the short term
charts were saying long.
good lesson
-18
Trade 2
2:45
The other day, I had a break out leave me behind, so I jumped on a market order
when price broke up. Of course, the pros tried to make money off me by selling into strength.
3:30 I'm still in the trade however, and finally fought my way back to the correct side of the market
3:58 almost time for some moderate impact news. I will hold my position.
the news numbers were mixed but not negative... I expect the uptrend to continue.
4:02 +10 finally some green numbers to look at....consolidation forming at new high
4:20 +16 at HH
4:25 PB 5 ticks short of target +11
Keeping SL at original level .... - 34 ticks away now... expecting a big PB
and I don't want to get stopped out now.
Up $3.75 .... US live cash money !!!! whoo hoo!!!!
baby steps, man.... baby steps....
A good day
What I learned....
I controlled my emotions well when price went against me in the first trade.
I knew it was a gamble with the mixed charts and I lost. It did not come as
a surprise or distress me.
Entering at the moment of the break out made me feel like a rookie when
price caved back in. I almost helped some pros make that Ferrari payment.
But, I held fast. With a stop in PA based location.
At this point, all the time frames were in lock step and I knew I was golden for the most
conservative target - a test of the previous high.
I had my mind right this morning. The cash will come later....
mind first.... mind first....
I found a beautiful bullish channel to do some multi-car work with.
Al Brooks speaks to me when I am trading this. I am blindly (though strategically) placing
limit orders at the top / bottom of the channels in layers and getting the stops WAY out of the
way to avoid spikes jamming through the channel. I never had to worry about spikes with the
TF, but the whole world is trading currencies, so it seems you have to have big stops - or it is definitely
death by a thousand cuts.
....like shooting fish in a barrel. ( I hate that term, I love animals so much - but it is certainly applicable!! )
Now, if I can just trade this loosely and instinctively when cash is on the line, I may have something...
aaaaahhhhh yes... the hurdle that destroys so many.... lol