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The ES looks to be opening pretty close to yesterday's close and around yesterday's tight value area. If I had to place a wager, it would be on another tight range day as we're getting bogged down in a very high volume area. There is a definite resistance area in the high 60's/low 70's and in general the ES is in an uptrend since the 9/12 low. The ES is definitely struggling to make higher highs but is also not going down easily. I suppose in a classical chart pattern sense we're in an ascending triangle.
Regardless of the longer term stuff, my plan for today is the same as always - get into my trades being patiently aggressive (which I've been able to do well for 4 days in a row now) and STAY IN THE TRADE according to my trading plan. Staying with the trade will be probably be a real challenge today but I'm going to do my best. I'm trading from home today so there will be less distractions. I'll probably take advantage of getting away from my trading screen when I put a trade on so I won't be tempted to fiddle. This isn't something I can easily do at work.
End of Day
Man, what an awful day. I just could not get into my trades today, I was very skeptical. I had 2 short signals, one in the morning and the other just after 13:00; both were right near the current LOD. I just kept thinking, "I really don't want to short the LOD". What I should have been thinking was, "Hey dude, just follow the damn plan already". The result was 2 nice profits while I sat watching. I got a long signal just before 14:00; I did trade that but not according to my plan - got in late and moved my stops to break even really early. This long, trading according to my plan, was a stop which I recorded as such in my spreadsheet. I got another long signal at 15:16 and I really thought about taking that trade, and I had many chances to get in even at a better than signal price. I just wouldn't do it; I was too scared of a loss. Instead of just focusing on my plan I was thinking about the wrong things and blew it. The ES rallied nicely from there and that trade was also profitable. So, for my paper trades today 3 were profitable and 1 was a stop; the day overall was profitable. I was also profitable but only 2 ticks.
I really messed up today; today was a step in the wrong direction for me. I had been doing very well getting into trades but today I just didn't trust my plan. I have no reason to trust myself more than my plan, none whatsoever. But still today, I thought I knew better than my plan which is a result of hundreds, maybe thousands of hours of research, testing and live trading. I'm working on this stuff 10-12 hours per day plus time on weekends and yet when the bullets start flying I don't trust what I've worked so hard on. I really don't get it.
I was completely out of my normal routine today, trading from home. That's no reason to just chuck my trading plan out the window and do whatever. I have been doing better before today so I'm going to go back to work tomorrow and get my routine back and just look at today as an anomaly, a one off. I'm going to really focus on how much I've put into my trading plan and how well it can work if it's executed without error.
I was listening to a Podcast with Adam Grimes last night and he mentioned that you have to put yourself into different roles as a trader. Off hours you are a developer, researcher and are working to design your strategy, system or plan. It's during this time that you can evaluate yourself with your win, loss rate and your P&L. During trading, you are an order executor and your evaluation is based on how well you executed the trading plan. A 3rd role you need to fill is the boss of both of those people. I really need to kick my order executing ass because today was totally unacceptable.
Economic news at 10:00 and 10:30 but nothing beyond that. No expectations going into today. I had a pretty horrible day yesterday trying to follow my plan. This morning has been good, more normal. I will make a genuine effort to just be an order entry clerk today and follow my plan.
I've been rating myself on getting into and out of trades but I've modified it at this point to add a few more levels. It's a 4 point system. I get 2 points for proper entry, 1 point for a proper first scale out and 1 point for a proper second scale out. I will implement this starting today and track my progress.
Today I will be pretty busy late morning/early afternoon but the rest of the day looks fairly clear.
12:00
Very narrow range so far today. I have had 2 trading signals, got into both. The second I was slightly late because I was just double checking and only got 1 of 2 fills. I'm not counting that against myself as I was as quick as I should have been; I didn't stall because I was nervous or anything. I did exit that trade early though because of the volume spike at 11:45; I wasn't a fan of that so I bailed - I should have just held but I didn't. My first trade was executed as it should have been; I did miss some profit opportunity but holding longer would have been contrary to my plan so it's fine. So far on the day, according to my new trade evaluation I'm at 75%. Yesterday I was at 0% so it's better.
I'm not going to try to guess that the market will be narrow for the rest of the day; I have no idea. I'm going to continue to try to trade like I have no idea and just follow my charts.
14:40
I'm going to wrap it up for the day. The ES today has been extremely choppy and I just can't get with that. My trade entries are based on momentum and there is none today. It's been a 7.25 point range and I just can't trade that.
I did take a short at 13:26; I get an A+ for entry on that one. It was a painful trade as I took heat right away and basically the price never came back to my entry. I watched the screen for most of the trade, only stepping away for a few minutes. I'm not sure if that was a good idea or not but I survived. I considered many times taking a small loss because I was pretty sure my stop, which was a bit above the HOD, was going to get nailed. I refrained and kept in the trade. After close to 70 minutes of suck there was a bit of a flush and I took a 2 tick loss and got out of the trade. I was pretty sure I was doing the wrong thing and the ES would go down 10 points just after I exited but so far it has not and if it does I don't care at this point. I'm glad I stuck with the trade for a while and I'm also glad I'm out.
End of Day
I took a break the rest of the day and didn't watch the ES much. I ended the day down 2 ticks which is fine given the type of day it was. There are some narrow range days where my style does fine but this was just not one of them. That's okay, I understand that not every day will be good and will fit my trading style/plan.
In terms of how I traded today, I did pretty well. Using my new point system I scored an 83%, only making an error on my two scales on my first trade. In a sense today was easy because there wasn't any profit opportunity for me so all I could do is get into a trade, take heat and hold on. My last trade I exited with a small loss but on paper I kept it on since it didn't get to my entry price. On paper, my stop loss was hit so even though my exit was outside of my plan, I gave the ES over an hour to do something besides keep me offside and that's all that was happening. At this moment I think that taking the small loss was prudent. At the time I took my exit, there was nothing on my chart giving me a reason to think that the ES would continue lower at that time.
I suppose tomorrow could be just as bad but I won't assume; I don't know what the market will do. I'll be happy with my performance today, do my usual review tonight and prepare tomorrow like today never happened.
Edit: Going back through my trades now and I think, according to my plan, I should have taken a small loss and reversed long on the short trade that lasted so long. I now see a valid long signal coming in the middle of that trade and in creating my plan, it specifically says "If the trade is offside and there is an opposite signal, reverse the trade at a loss and take the opposite trade." I created this rule on back testing but it so rarely comes up...I wasn't paying close enough attention.
Cutting the short at a small loss and reversing long resulted in an overall 2 tick profit on the exchange, so not a big deal but it is something that I didn't do properly upon further review.
Unemployment report at 8:30 wasn't anything unusual and the ES has not done much off of it yet. By the looks of things we are likely to open at the lower end of prior day value and range and very close to an SR zone I have marked.
I'm not of the opinion that the ES has to be quiet with a narrow range today just because NFP is tomorrow. I'm aware that this can happen but there have been plenty of good range days on the day before NFP.
I put in about 3 hours of studying and back testing last night. I don't have a way to systematically back test so I do it manually and it takes a bit longer. I don't know that I would perform systematic back tests even if I could because I think I learn a lot by going through it manually. The biggest benefits from manually back testing for me are getting a better feel for what my plan looks like and building confidence in my plan by looking at it under different market environments. The more I can apply my plan in a practice environment the more I will be able to just react to the things I see without having to stop and think about them. I'm well off from this but I feel it's important for me to continue to work so I can make progress. In the end, there is no guarantee that I will ever be successful in trading - I could lose money until I either run out or give up. But if that is my eventuality I want to make sure I've put in all the work that I possibly can and given it my best effort. I do think (based on what I see) that if I just execute my plan that I will be in good shape.
Yesterday I scored an 83% on my entries. That would be lower if I went back and revised it to include the reversal that I didn't take (it would be a 62%). I don't expect to all of a sudden go to 100% and stay there from now on; that's probably not realistic. But, I see no reason not to try to get into, and stay in each and every signal I see today. I've really been doing a lot better getting into trades, and only the trades that fit my system - not freelancing, so in that sense my discipline is definitely improving. I feel very good about this, especially when looking back at what I was doing - it's a big change. I really need to keep focusing on the tools that I have and use them to keep my emotions from letting me make poor decisions.
I'm really going to focus on just being the order clerk today. I spent a good deal of time last night sa the developer and a little time as the boss, so today it's time to put the order clerk hat on and just trade the plan. If it sucks, I'll let the developer take the heat.
10:40
I'm at 50% effectiveness so far. I've had 2 signals and scalped out of both. It's so choppy right now and I'm having a hard time trusting what I'm seeing. I was initially encouraged by the wider than yesterday opening range, and the ES might yet make a larger move but so far it's been tight. Part of my trepidation is that the ES is caught right in the middle of two tight SR zones I have marked, higher resistance starting at 2148.50 and lower support starting at 2145.25. I just can't see good R by trading in this zone right now.
Being that I'm at 50% I might take a break for the rest of the morning and see what plays out. If the ES can't break outside of this narrow range I just won't be trading it today.
11:20
Of course, the moment I decide to take a break from putting trades on the market actually makes a move outside of range. I know I'm not cursed by it sure feels like it sometimes.
Here's a picture of my SR zones and the action so far today, pretty much stuck right in the middle.
13:00
My decision to sit out for a bit cost me. This was a conscious decision to skip some trades but it turned out to be a poor one. I really should have just stuck with the plan and let everything resolve itself. As it turned out I missed a nice long play that would have put some money into my account. I keep learning the lessons the hard way.
End of Day
I really made an effort to get my trades on today but I basically just wore down at the worst time. I ended up at 43% for my grade getting into and out of trades based on my plan. Most of the poor grade was down to me skipping trades a few times. Unfortunately for me I ended up skipping the 1 trade that was profitable. I know that I just need to trade the plan no matter what, taking either all of the trades or none of the trades and accepting the consequences either way. I wasn't cherry picking the trades to take today, I just decided to sit out because it was choppy. The problem that presents is that I have no idea when something will break out, and if I am choosing to sit out I run the risk of missing out - exactly what happened today.
I'm sure some people are able to play this market like a fiddle and make good money, but the way my trading plan is constructed this just chews me up. Based on my plan today was overall profitable because of 1 good trade out of the 8 signals I got. On a normal day, I get between 2 and 4 signals; 5 is rare. There have been some periods where this is slightly higher but those are outliers. Today, having reached 4 signals before noon was an indication that I was not in sync with the market today. I realized and acknowledged this sooner than that and as it were, missed the 1 good trade. I did continue to take trades in the afternoon - after skipping a few more. I took some crappy looking trades, things that I would not have taken if I were cherry picking. I figured at best I'd be down commissions and at worst I'd catch the wrong side and end up stopped out but I took the trades anyway because that's what I'm supposed to be doing. In the end, I just spent money on some commissions but didn't lose points - and I got to practice getting into and staying in trades until my plan tells me it's time to leave.
So, all in all the day wasn't a total waste because I got some good practice in and it only cost me a little money. I also learned, AGAIN, that I just need to take all of my trades like a dumb robot/order entry clerk during the day and let the smart human sift through the remains that night. Even though I scored pretty low on my new ratings system today, and even though I missed out on some profits, I feel okay at the end of it. I took more trades than I did yesterday, and I felt more comfortable while I was in them. I was also left with very little to do at work today, which was a bit of a curse because I basically was left just watching the DOM and T&S a lot. I took a few walks and watched some Youtube while my trades were on to try to keep myself doing something else; that mostly worked.
One day this is going to click. One day I'm going to have a day where my style is in sync with the market at the same time that I am being a good dumb robot just trading my plan. I realize that day will never happen unless I'm being a compliant good dumb robot.
The good news (if it really is) was that my SR zones contained price pretty well today.
About 30 minutes from the jobs report. I do like trading pre-market news events if they move so hopefully we get a surprise number and get a good reaction. If the number is good I would not be shocked to see the market take a dive as that would lead to a stronger perceived chance of a rate increase. That's all speculation of course, I'll just trade what I see.
I have what looks to be a pretty quiet day at work. I'm in Florida but on the other side away from Matthew so it's actually not too bad here. I really, really just want to focus on trading my plan without error today. I've been doing much better lately as compared to many weeks ago (night and day really) so I'll just keep working at it today; maybe today is the day that everything clicks.
Jobs report was 156K versus 168K consensus but did increase from last month. The news reaction on the ES did not do what I wanted it to do so I didn't trade it. It's interesting that this is the last jobs report release before the next FOMC meeting.
End of Day
Terrible day. I did follow my plan but I was on the wrong side of the market all day, got stopped out twice and quit trading for real. Kept paper trading and got stopped out 2 more times after that. Looking back one of my entries was a little sketchy and I could have skipped that but that's also hindsight - much easier.
I'm disappointed that today sucked, but it was the first losing day of the week and losing days are part of the deal.
Hopefully next week I will be able to follow my plan, and hopefully it will work better. I'm going to go back over my entries and exits from this week and do some back testing from different periods over the weekend and on Monday since the market is closed.
Same zones. I'm not expecting much today with the holiday even though markets are open. I'll keep an eye out in case anything shakes out but I'm not really looking to trade today.
End of Day
No trades today. There were a couple of setups but these occurred in the chop zone and I wasn't taking anything there. I got quite a bit of other stuff done while keeping one eye on the ES...no reason for me to trade today so I'm glad I saved myself some possible frustration and just watched.
No important economic data today but there are the FOMC minutes tomorrow at 2:00. ATR has been on the decline since 9/29 and it seems the biggest mover has been DB. I don't anticipate another dead day like yesterday but it also would not surprise me. At some point we will need to shit or get off the pot here and make a bigger move.
It's interesting that many times since late September the ES has dipped into the 30's and been bought and at the same time cracking 70 has been impossible. Breaking outside of the composite VA between 38.25 and 59.0 just isn't sticking, even when it's news driven.
As the ES is pretty close to the upper end of that range now, I'll be keeping a close eye on it. Selling around the ONH/pHi seems pretty attractive.
I think I've done a nice job as of late getting into trades. I have re-reviewed Friday many times and looking back I might have made different decisions but that's very clear to see in hindsight. There is such a delicate balance between just blindly taking trading entries my charts give me and applying some discretion in that approach. I'm not sure I'm good enough at this stage to intelligently apply discretion, as it seems when I do I end up missing winners (almost exclusively). When I paper trade I only paper trade the signals, I do not apply discretion. So...despite a poor Friday I'll just keep doing that (or at least try to) and see how it goes.
I did more back testing on older contracts and I still have not found anything out of order. I try to go slowly, bar by bar and see the signals developing. I fear, and something I'm really trying to avoid, is not taking trading signals that would have resulted in a stop loss - either by accident or unconsciously. I'd rather wreck my strategy with back testing than discover it sucks while live trading it. I'm pretty sure I'm past that as I've been live trading it for many months now, but it's still something I am cautious of.
Anyway...same goal today as normal; just get into and manage each trade according to my plan. Some days are actually pretty straight forward in that regard while other days chop around a lot and make decisions much more difficult as it's just harder to "read" what's going on.
End of Day
No trades today, a few signals popped up so I paper traded them (2 longs early and 1 short late). I really didn't like the idea of going long in the morning nor did I like the idea of shorting in the afternoon. On paper, I had 1 hit and 2 stops for a total 6 tick loss today. That seems pretty stupid considering we had a 32 point range but it is what it is, sometimes I get good trades to take and sometimes I don't.
Fed minutes at 2:00. I have time to trade this morning but will be very busy and away from my screens this afternoon. A few ways to go from here but there's a wide VA from yesterday so we could easily test the extremes today and consolidate inside. I would also not be surprised to see another move down that would suck in more shorts. If that happens I could see a rally by the end of the week.
Either way I'll just try to stick to trading my plan.
11:00
Got short at 2134.0 like my plan called for, there was a higher high with a lower high on my momentum indicator and this occurred at an SR zone. The price moved a little and I moved my stop to BE way before I should have been doing so. I got stopped out for a scratch only to see price move lower.
On paper my stop is now at break even because that's part of my written plan. On this one I didn't fully follow my written plan. Friday's lumps are still fresh in my mind and that is still there; I was thinking about the "what if I get stopped out" the entire time, even when I put the trade on...I was trading my P&L.
End of Day
Only the 1 trade, I was busy in the afternoon. My calendar is pretty free tomorrow so hopefully I will be able to do better.
The ES really took a dive overnight. Seems like 22 would be a good place to think about a short and if not somewhere around 28. Who knows though.
End of Day
Not a great day overall...just not too many setups for me to trade. I did take a short trade in the morning but bailed at break even too early. This eventually was a break even trade but I didn't stick to my plan at all.
I only made the 1 trade today even though I had 3 signals...all shorts. Once we broke back above 20 just after 12:30 I really stopped liking the idea of trading today as neither selling or buying seemed to make any sense to me.
I did paper trade in real time the setups from my plan, overall it was a -3.0 day from that stand point. I don't mind that at all really because this week has been very odd to me. Monday was a no trade day, Tuesday was trending most of the day, Wednesday was super choppy and today was basically a trend day after 10:00. Based on the size of the gap down today, there was about a 5% chance for the ES to make it back to yesterday's close and it did - so that's very unusual.
From the stand point of my trading plan, I'm okay with losing 3 points today; that's a very small loss. I have been doing a lot of back testing both during the day and in the evening lately and that's been quite helpful for me to develop a deeper understanding of what the plan is and how it fits into different market types. I've back tested weeks that look a lot like this in terms of performance; flat to down days for many days in a row and then there will be a very good day. The down days have not been huge for the most part and the good days more than make up for them. I really hope I can get in a better place mentally to get into and stay in trades so I can take advantage of the next good day, whenever that will be.
Part of the thing that's hard for me is to grind out the sideways or down days to get to the good day or days. I fully understand that I need to just keep putting trades on according to my plan, grinding out the slop so I can be in the market when the good days hit but that's proven easier understood than done.
I'm going to be extremely busy tonight with kid functions at school and allocating the rest of my time to people and not things tonight so maybe not looking at the market will be helpful in some way...perhaps I've spent too much time looking at screens this week. I hope to get some rest tonight, get up early tomorrow and smash some iron, do my morning routine and come in ready to put on (and keep on) trades like I need to be doing.
Nice bullish action overnight and this morning. It's interesting that the pullback this morning stopped at 2132.0, just 1 tick away from pHi. Things look to be set for a nice move up today to I'll be cautious; I could see a move up early get sold off as too many people rush in to get long. I'll still work to trade without bias and just trade what the charts tell me.
I've had an extremely poor week so far so I'd like to get 1 good trading day in this week and today is my last chance.
11:00
First setup of the day was a short at 2141.25. I was on the phone at the time but I did have a chance to get into the trade and had several chances later to get in at 41.25 or a little higher. I just didn't. This is now +6 to the good side and it's one I basically skipped for no good reason. I really need to get a hold of myself this weekend because I can't believe how poorly I have traded this week. It all stems from last Friday where I got stopped out on every trade; my fear of losing was basically confirmed in a big way last Friday and now I'm skittish about getting into trades again. I need to get over this hump and just believe in my charts and believe in my plan so I can start putting trades on again and try to keep them on according to my plan. Not being able to get myself under control mentally is very frustrating and physically and mentally exhausting...it's been a really rough week and I can feel it because I've been tired and lethargic all week.
End of Day
Basically what I figured would happen today happened. Just talking about my trading plan and paper trades for the week since that's mostly all that I have done (only 2 actual trades) I came into Friday with negative points for the week but only just. I had a feeling that my setups would be in sync with the ES today because I keep seeing this pattern over and over as I go deeper with my back testing; there are many weeks when there is 1 really good day and other days are so-so.
Knowing this, I was still unable to get any trades on today - zero. The first short trade ended up being +8.75. I had my orders in for that trade, my sell order and stop loss already waiting and I pulled it as price got close. I had many chances to get back in but I was afraid price would run right through me and tag my stop. Of course, there was no evidence of this anywhere on my chart, it was just a fear that was stuck in my head. The order was only 1 contract, so I can't really be trading any smaller.
After missing the good trade I figured I should just stop trying to actually trade for the rest of the day and just paper trade my setups. I figured what if the rest of the trades all added up to a 6 point loss, there I would be with a losing day for real and a winning day on paper...that would be my luck.
The rest of the day there were 3 entry points, 1 stop loss and 2 winners. I keep looking back at my live trading results and those jive really well with my back tested results - if I mixed them up I couldn't tell one from other in terms of weekly results. I'm going to continue back testing because I do think I'm getting a lot out of that, and if there's a period where there are big losses I'd like to catch it and determine the difference.
But going forward I really need to do better. I was doing pretty well and last Friday messed me up - and it was only 1 day. I feel like I'm so fragile mentally that any little thing will get me spooked. I'll have to do some thinking over the weekend about how to best approach this moving forward. I'm putting forth a great deal of effort 7 days a week trying to get this right and this week it seems like it all just fell apart and I'm basically starting over. I'm not doing so from a trading plan perspective, that's still okay but from a mental stand point I'm probably worse off than before, and just because of 1 day where I got stopped out a few times. I would kind of understand that better if I kept moving my stops back and took a 20 point loss or something but I didn't; I kept my stops where they were and kept my losses small but it's still eating at me. This whole wanting to be correct and afraid of being wrong is really strong in my mind and it's proving difficult to work around.
I really wish I could just completely disconnect myself from my results and my P&L. I know that what I really need to do is connect myself to my adherence to my trading plan, I get that part from an intellectual point of view but I really struggled this week putting that into practice.
I am glad that today turned out how I suspected it would because that does reaffirm my belief in my trading edge. I listen to a lot of trading podcasts and I listen to the ones that resonate with me over and over and over again. Some I've probably listed to over 100 times (just the meat of it). I suppose I'll give those a listen again over the weekend and try to refocus.
I also need to get back to my morning routine. I didn't follow that 100% this week and it felt like I was caught in a negative feedback loop. Generally I get up early and hit the iron for a bit, eat, hang out with the kids, meditate, etc. I slept in too late every day this week and didn't get any lifting in at all. Perhaps that's got something to do with my lack of discipline. I think I probably need every little detail in it's exact place to have a shot at getting this right.
Here's the trade I skipped in the afternoon on purpose. On paper, I caught a long at 32.50 until I got a reversal signal at 34.50 and went short. That sequence was good for 6.25 points so overall Friday was a good one.
Just read your journal entry from today and I can identify with your not being able to get into trades due to being stopped out. It has happened to me alot over the past few weeks and it's demoralizing and can really effect your trading overall.
I've tried widening my stops or removing them alltogether and that rarely works out without a defined risk amount your mind, or my mind and emotions force me out at the worst possible times.
I too saw the strenth overnight and put on an ES 2130 Call option trade and made $100 on it overnight. If I hadn't set the smallest profit target in the world it would have been a 1K trade by morning.
I took it again near mid-day and make another $175 but I knew it would top out and could have went short and should have. It's just been the most difficult thing for me to open up and let my profits run.
Take for instance last night when the DX gapped up on open, I bought 1 contract, and it sold down to fill the gap so I bought 3 more. I was down $300 at one point. Then suddenly it took off and I was profitable by the same amount. It pulled back to test it's 20 PMA and I freaked out and sold for $120 win. If I had held for about 5 more mins it took off again and rallied $500 per contract. I've traded the DX before and made money on it. Had 2K days on it. But for some reason I have just been knocking myself out of them lately.
I am working on getting past this. Past cutting my profits short, and past letting my losses run. I'm working on selling tops and buying bottoms and I'm crafting a plan to trade over a longer term time period, so I won't be so glued to the screen freaking out about every little move. I plan on setting a defined wider risk, and a longer term target to accomplish this. Also considering starting out with the mini contracts for this. So instead of a $25 or $15 tick I'll be taking a $1.25 or $5.00 Tick.
But just thought I'd share that since I enjoyed your post and hope that you can get past it. I had a good trade today that helped me re-gain some confidence. I posted it in my journal. Here.
