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I used to think I could "tell" when something was going against me and was a sure loser, but Cl can be extremely tricky and it's countertrend noise isn't always a good enough reason to liquidate a valid trade. A few years ago, with my total belief in scalping immediate momentum, I would have considered my last sentence to be Blasphemy. But I have entered trades on CL with overwhelming speed and order flow..only to have it go up 6 ticks or so retrace a bit and do nothing for 5 minutes or more before going back up and hitting 10 ticks or more. I've seen it too many times. And it can make you pull the plug on some winners.
I struggled with this same phenomenon when I learned to trade stocks. Did it again when I moved to futures. I found my itchy fingers getting me out of trades I knew I should stay in. What finally got me over the hump was a lesson I learned from rock climbing, where I'm often far above protection, but pull it together and continue up. That pull up is based on training, repetition, and controlling fear. I knew my trades worked, but feared the fall, feared missing the small gain. Rock climbing falls have never hurt me, and they've taught me that I don't get better until I climb routes that are initially too hard for me.
And that little lesson pushed me to stay in trades, dampening the fear while knowing I would survive the loss if it came.
That said, it ain't easy. Thanks much for your very valuable thread, Lance. Thoughtful, reasoned, smart. Solid stuff.
I've had this problem too, not being able to hold a trade to target through those small pullbacks but now I've gone too far the other way - holding on too long. For instance, if I'm in a long I'm seeing the trade move up within a few ticks of target or key level (eg. yesterday's close, high, vwap, etc) then pullback, stall, move up again, only to fall just short again and once again pullback, stall, move up again, fall short again and then absolutely explode down in the opposite direction. I try to look for waning momentum, number of attempts to move up and anything else that will give me clues that it's not going to work out. Sometimes the orders just seem to come out of nowhere. Any suggestions or advice as to how you handle these situations. Thanks.
I think what you are referring to is a deliberate institutional ploy to cause the infamous "trapped traders " syndrome. What happens is you have a lot of people in a trade..assuming it has to hit that key level of support . As they make attempts, the institutions know these multitude of traders are going to hold for at least those last few ticks to hit their target. Then, they suddenly go the opposite way..and you get a snowballing effect. The scared traders try to liquidate as the price starts surging down..then others start getting their stops hit..and the orderflow can cause a quick 100 tick reversal. I see this a lot when price in CL has suddenly surged up and it's racing to that key level. In fact I try to get out before I get all the way to the top. I like to wait for those reversals and try to jump in, and grab some ticks. I do try to look for something that fails at least three times. Three seems to be a key number in a lot of these type of moves. Also, in CL..I see this a lot more when it reverses from long positions. Maybe try getting into some trades and getting out several ticks before that key reversal area.
I was re-watching some of your video at the time when CL was over 100$. I would like to know if you find CL more easy to trade now that we are much lower or more difficult?
I was looking at what you called at the time "small targets" of 40 of 50 ticks... and today 40 or 50 ticks is quite a big runner. I wasn't trading at that time but it is fascinating to see "small" intraday moves of 100 up follow by a 100 ticks down and all of that in less than 1 hours.
R.I.P. Olivier Terrier (aka "Okina"), 1969-2016.
Please visit this thread for more information.
I do notice lately on some trading threads, there are people claiming they make 30 to 50 ticks a day..or more..on a regular basis. I notice they also say this is disappointing...and that they should be making much more.
Lets look at this realistically. Even a modest 30 ticks a day for 5 days is 150 ticks a week. Doing that and you can fairly quickly build up a small account to where you can trade 5 contracts. So 30 ticks a day(150 ticks a week) x 5 contracts ($50 a tick) is $7500 a week...$30,000 a month.. or $360,000 a year. 10 contracts is $720,000 a year. 20 contracts is $1,440,000.00 a year.
So all these guys that are whining that they only had a day where they made 40 ticks or so seem kind of silly. Because if they are being real and trading real money, well, then we should have a new crop of Futures.io millionaires in no time, right?
It seems to be about the same. Some great days mixed in with some choppy ones. Maybe they seemed like small targets if there were days of 200 tick moves. I think 40 ticks now is a very good target. Most of mine are anywhere from 10-30 ticks.
You are right about the math but you forget the human factor in the equation. Here I speak for me but I guess it is the same for all of us. I'm comfortable with 1 (yes just 1) at 2 I start to be nervous I trade less efficiently, at 5 it is not clearly my level... even a very small target make me extremely nervous and at the end of the day the result are worst than with 1. I think it takes months or years to overcome this bias. I've heard people speaking of 20 25 contract one shoot, even if I had a 10M$ futures account I know for sure that if I trade this size I will be a net loser (cutting the winner to soon and losing as usual or worst). We has a bias to think in $ instead of %. Everyday I do this math in my head and I smile, every time I have tried to go bigger it has not been a success, so the logical (even it is illogical) conclusion is to stay small until you get comfortable
If we were machine, I'm sure we can achieve those kind of target. Another thing to work on
Cheers,
O.T
R.I.P. Olivier Terrier (aka "Okina"), 1969-2016.
Please visit this thread for more information.