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Did not trade yesterday. A lot of movement but all chaotic, extremely low liquidity.
Traded on Tuesday. Good technical setups, but failed. Pre-FOMC day, holiday season. Now I need to start saving bullets: I have 4 days traded and around 1000 dollars loss with largest losing day of 775 usd. In order to survive in LTP, by 10th day I need to:
1. Have a larger winning day than 775 (unless I post a bigger losing day so it has to be above it)
2. Be overall positive
3. Have at least 6 positive days out of 10.
If I can manage that I can press forward to get to the 4000 target.
Normally it would not be a problem at all, but having started well into the holidays and FOMC-waiting period, I simply don't get trading opportunities. There was one huge, which was my first trade that got cancelled by CTS due to improper trade duration setting.
So in order to survive I will now only consider the best opportunities. That probably will mean no trading for the short remainder of 2013.
Trade to live. Not live to trade.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
...OMG, WHERE did you celebrate Christmas this time...???
"If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much." - Jim Rohn
Hey ho, earthlings! Hope you all have some great time and fun was in excess!
Time to come back to market. Today was the first day I seriously watch the market for a setup on gold for my ltp.
Things aren't too great with ltp, I am down around 1300 usd and 5 days already in with largest losing day of 775.
I did not get any setup convincingly today prior to FOMC minutes. Then one medium strength setup presented itself, what made me take it with the full scale of 5 lots was the beauty of the actual entry signal. It was very nice on chart and on tape. It worked beautifully too, but it cut it at 17 tick hoping to beat my largest losing day, unfortunately price did bounce same moment and plus I paid 1 tick in spread so I made only 15 ticks and 750 usd less 25 commissions. So the task of making a greater winning day is still there. In a sense it does not worry me too much as I can win much more than that, but the issue is with a small number of days left to do that. We shall see.
Friday was the best trading day. No, I did not win big. In fact I made 3 losses and posted a largest losing day to the date. However it made me realize something very important. I have been thinking about it before, but always been moving it for another day in future. Now I know the time has come and that is my target for the year 2014.
However, let's review things at their historic order.
I did not trade on Thursday and on Friday before the NFP. The NFP was a biggest miss in several years resulting in a massive spikes and moves. There was no way to trade the initial spike, nor I was permitted to do so in LTP.
But market has come to my level in about 5 minutes past the NFP and I have placed an order to front run it.
Gold has hit my order, made 6 ticks into profit and fell back. I had 5 contracts in play. The trail stop was set to 6 ticks once in profit, but it failed to move 6, just 5. And for some weird reason Sierra was able to close only 4 of the contracts, leaving last one running naked. The exit was using stop market, not stop limit. I think it's not Sierra's fault but CTS T4 server, but I never had seen it doing that in T4. So I closed the last contract manually. The loss was minor, trade was valid, just did not work.
The second trade was done using my new approach. Price had fell back and printed a base, breaking the trend line and showing mild reversal signs on tape. I have entered the market with 2 contracts planning to add 3 more before the next level at 477.
Unfortunately it stopped me out. Price run 16 ticks against me and my stop was just 12. And then it moved into profit by a good margin.
At this point I have realized the day is already bad and I have just one chance to turn it around. It was unlikely that next level can produce a trade capable of offsetting losses, so I placed my bet with 5 lots on the next pullback setup.
It stopped me out precisely to the tick, slipping one more tick and immediately turn around and run high again, enough to take 2R profit.
In the end I have a large losing day (still below my personal daily loss limit and much lower than TST limit), and a total loss of -1800 usd in account. Which is not something dramatic as one good day could offset it, but the rules states by the 10th trading day I must have 55% of winning days and a largest winning day larger than a largest losing day. I have completed 7 days now and have 3 winning days and 4 losing days. In order to obey that rule I need to post 3 more winning days, i.e. not a single losing day by the time rule kicks in, and one of these days must be larger than Friday's loss. It's not impossible, just not very probably. I understand TST reasons for these rules (preservation of firms capital given to junior traders), but it is unnatural. I think a better model would be to follow other prop-shops lead and let people start with 1 lot live and give more size as they post good results, instead of making people focusing on beating not only market but also the TST's game same time, strategizing.
So I will commit to trade 10 days, taking 3 more days, but I don't feel like putting a lot of effort into it as it seems bit futile to me. Especially counting that since summer gold moves mostly in european session and by the time tst allows juniors to trade all moves are fake outs, especially my level trades.
But in any case I have learned a great deal from these exercises and it will help me in succeeding for my own account.
And now, finally, briefly about my revelation.
I have realized that my efforts are futile trying to frame market into my tight stop loss structure forcing my own rules on market, and then when the trade works, scaling out and reducing my wins when all fat is just starting. What I must be doing is entering light with a larger stop loss, and then scaling in more and more as market moves my way with enough energy and gusto. And close out all at once when it starts to fail the trend. It must not be complicated, there are very simple rules to enter, protect the entry, add and exit. Just few lines and that's all. What is difficult is that you have to be adding risk (however protecting earlier positions, so the risk remain constant) when you want to take something out and run to the bushes.
This is what I will be focusing from now on. No more changes in system, no more looking for short cuts. Principles are easy and they are working. Now I just need to use them properly and turn myself into a star trader.
Are you sure about this? Go over your email again. It should be 50% and not 55%. The combine is 55% but LTP is 50% - for the 30K one at least. Thats what my LTP email had and I had a 30K one. If it is 50%, you need to win 2 out of the next 3 days which is still doable and maybe you don't have to give up at this point.
I have attacked LTP today with a new approach in mind, given that I have not much to lose at this point. It gave me few shivers, but the plan worked, I did not even had time to scale 2 more cars in.
So the largest losing day is now stricken with larger winning day by 55 usd. But need to keep posting winning days and in perspective some wins. But today is another example how limit of trading time from 7 am cst is depriving of good trade and makes trade range and chop, at least in gold.