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Just turned "Pro" and could use a little help, or guidance
Alright, so the 25th feels like it was months ago already but I'll give it my best recollection.
On the 25th I had woken up early to trade the EU open.
On question #1 the answer is simply sleep. Well that and greed/swinging for the fences.
It looks like I staggered in two short contracts and had one set at around 31 points for an exit, most likely a support level picked out from the tick charts or the .786 fib. and the other most likely below the range trying to play for a range break. Looking at the charts i was most likely targeting the pivot low from the previous day at 15309.50. Due to pure curiosity I'm going to try and go through the logs and see if i can't parse out where I had the OCO exit.
In general the rational was most likely close one at the most viable area I thought possible for a decent trade, and let the other run. Hindsight is 20/20. But I went back to bed shortly after entering that trade and seeing price reverse. If i had been actively managing it i would have judged the situation in real time. But even going into open there was almost exactly a .618 retracement and H&S on the 1 min. So i most likely let it run looking for a continuation. To answer your question absolutely nothing is wrong with 50 points. 50 points is actually my home run target most days. But for whatever reason i thought i could get more out of it.
As for the second trade I can deduce i was looking for a retest of the lows at 15337. That 10 point range was really only established for the exact duration of the trade. And as for why, i have a rule that once I'm in a trade i intervene as little as possible. I've learned that when i "actively manage" a trade that i enter with an idea i generally tend to mess it up one way or another. So, i just let it play out. If it was a loser, and I'm wrong, which i was, then so be it. I should probably get better. I generally only risk $100-$150 per contract and one of my "don't intervene" rules revolves mainly around not touching my stops. They're there and unless there's extraneous circumstances I'm trying not to touch my stops ever.
Hopefully that quenches your curiosity. And thank you for your questions. It's rare anyone asks about or challenges my trades. So i appreciate that. Below are the charts i pulled up to get some context.
NQU2021_2021-09-07_22-21-21
NQU2021_2021-09-07_22-22-09
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
Girlfriend and i were actually lucky enough to get out of town and head down to Austin for my buddies bday and a much needed long weekend. So with that being said there was no trading on 09/02.
And before anyone asks, no, i did not trade on the plane this time. Haha.
So Friday 09/03:
Bias for the day: Neutral
Plan for the day: Try and not make any stupid decisions and figure out how the market was going to digest the NFP print
Friday was non farm payrolls and i was expecting it to move the markets either way, and it did. It's just we didn't actually go anywhere. The report was a massive miss. Like 500k short miss. It looked like it honestly confused the algos it was so bad as we had a 53 point higher in NQ, followed up by almost a 90 point move lower which bounced and bottomed out at a range that was 125 points peak to trough....
ES was slightly better. With a 20.75 point range, or .4%.
I sat this one out as i was hungover and beat down and in a different time zone.
After going and getting breakfast, getting some sun, and overall becoming human again i jumped in the market mid afternoon and thinking that a 500k miss in NFP's would actually be bearish trade fading the low vol push higher in both indexes. Got chewed up a little, but overall got some ok trades finishing the day positive by $235.60.
Really not much to say about this one. I was switching between my practice account and my combine account trying to take trade set ups throughout the night and into the morning. obviously the ranges sucked until we had a rally there towards the end of the session, 46 trades from 09/05 18:00 to 09/06 13:00 which is too many. Most likely should have just stuck with the practice account. $589 loss on the session.
Out the gate last night (09/06 futures open) there was action. And that pretty much lasted into the EU session. I stayed up into it as I was having a decent night so far. And with that i went to bed with about a 2450.00 gain. And, with that i told myself i was going to take the morning off as it was going to be my first day back at work from a 5 day weekend and the last thing I wanted to do was cough up a decent gain, again.
Well, as it turns out good thing I did take the morning off as they abruptly switched us back to WFH today and i had to grab my desk and set it up back home.
I finally got into the market as NQ was retesting resistance at 15680ish. I still had a contract short from NQ 15672 that had missed its exit by literally two ticks so i added another there and went on with the day, i dumped one contract and attempted to sell what i thought was a pullback but that pullback was one of those that wasn't actually a pullback. So took some licks there but still in control and continued to sell my levels and attempt to not overleverage. There were multiple bullish set ups in both indexes today but i was shooken out of the longs i took due to a lack of participation and volume.
But regardless we ground our way up to 15700 taking out the H&S in NDX and challenging the previous highs at around 15707. We ticked 15701.50 and ran out of juice. I think the market was once again trying to use the liquidity from shorts covering to break higher but this time it didn't pan out. First time in a long time i feel like.
Between the two indexes ES was overtly more bearish technically as it broke down from a wedge pattern and essentially retested majority of the day. Overnight and into the cash session it abided by market symmetry, retracements, and extensions exceptionally well. NQ was noticeably more resilient.
Today i kept my losers relatively small, bailing out of positions if the price action was looking unsavory towards my positions. I was operating off the 50% drawdown or "two steps forward one step back" rule for P/L gain days and was keeping track of my P/L as i had given myself a $1250 drawdown.
Long story short the cash session was a gain as well. But still more trades than i would have liked to have taken.
Absolutely. I actually trucked it through the night overnight there was enough action from the Asia session into the EU session and i had a shit ton of catch up work to do anyways. See above.
As to your answers about 8/25 thanks so much for taking the time to review that near "ancient history."
The early morn trade of being up 70 points but got stopped out....I would say you did not have a target exit set, or were asleep (understandably) but then when you were up and looking at the charts before open and seeing 30-40 points gain, perhaps you wanted more like where there was 70 in your favor. You might incorporate a rule to take any 30-40 points when the price is reversing.
Then the trades in the range, I will point out that the low of the range as in the area where there were 7 other bars whose lows were in that vicinity, imo not as you said were apparent after the fact. I typically set a target but will adjust as prices reveal how far they might go. The other deal with the top of the range was to raise the stop a bit higher; the selloff that you wanted came after another small rally shortly. Yes, I read you said you don't like to adjust the stop, so I get that. However, there are times in ranges where I would do so to avoid false breakouts etc.
Still, I have to ask are your reports correct? From the late night Sell (where you got 70 favorable points) to open you had about 20 more trades, so maybe the report is not assigning the proper close to what you had open. My report are listed chronologically and does not pair buys with sells. If yours are just a misassignment, I won't continue the querying, and look more at the profit loss.
I'll check the 9/07 trades more carefully in a bit. First glance, you missed from 4am to 10:30 it looks like.
ETA: Not trying to bust your chops. Trying to learn. I can see your method is lots of entries take a "small loss" and hope for the runners. Maybe I can learn something and perhaps increase my average win size.
NQ volume on a 30 minute chart. Guess which day was the national holiday
I wouldn't even bother with the practice account. The equity index futures are derivatives of the stock markets and those markets were closed. Enjoy a day off/long weekend instead.
Well done on having a much better day on Tuesday though and making multiples back of that small loss.
You do not win as a trader, you just get to play again the next day. If that game doesn’t appeal to you then you should not trade. Gary Norden
Bias for the day: Bearish - The move lower overnight by the Europeans of all people had me dusting off the bear suit
Plan for the day: Sell the indexes on the inevitable retest of the breakdown area, sell at will.
Risk limit: Tentative. But in general trying to stay within the $450 soft stop, $1200 profit target stop, and $1000 hard stop
Alright so this one's rough so bear with me.
So i was up again almost the entire EU session, and glad i was. It was a pretty solid night of much needed selling in the indexes and by the time i clocked out i was up about $3400 on the night. I had defbated taking the morning and even the entire day off from trading as $3400 was and is a substantial amount of money. But, as i woke up and showered the set up was almost my perfect set up, so i fired her up and got my game face on and my first two trades were actually limit longs right below VWAP as it looked like we were flagging for a further price discovery into the structure we had traded out of overnight.
I took three losses out the gate and then hit a trade in NQ for $595, a further two losses, and then a $245 win. three more losses and then one break even and one win of $255, loss, break even (i'm considering my small $10-$50 trades break even), $125 loss, $75 win. I then took a solid 13 losses in a row with a break even in there somewhere. and then three break evens, two more losses and then a $260, $262.50, $405, $1190, $950, $375, $515, $315, a breakeven, and then $100 win in a row..... This is all before 11 A.M EST.
At this point i was up about $6600 on the day(full session). Well above my profit target for the combine, and overall feeling fucking cool as fuck. I should have stopped trading. I knew i should have stopped trading.. But guess who didn't stop trading.
I think my rational was to try and pad the combine account as much as possible (??) to protect against any drawdowns in the handful of days i have left... You don't have to tell me, i know.
You thought i was going to say i blew the account didn't you.
But regardless you can literally see my falling apart in the fills. For whatever reason i was taking trades and then getting stopped out, well now i have to take another one because i have this arbitrary number in my head that i had to hit that i literally made up 20 mins ago. But i had to have this specific number.
I'm finding out quickly
It was a fucking nightmare. It's literally my bane and it's something that haunts me. I even left early afternoon to get away from the computer. But, came back and kept trading. It wasn't a bunch of losses in a row either, it was just death by 1000 cuts, especially with the ridic commission and fees Topstep afflicts. In comms and fees alone i paid over $1180.30. Over a total of 318 trades and 638 contracts.
I'm quickly finding that one of my greatest weaknesses is overconfidence, or a way i tell people is "thinking this is easy". The second you think that the market humbles you real quick. Between the night i had the night before, the morning i had, and the trading set up being my literal playground i think i fell into that "this is easy" trap.
But long story short i was in that dark place you go when you're trying to right a sinking ship or a tailspinning plane and for whatever reason i was able to pull up with a profit still for the day but.. $6600. What the hell is wrong with me.
I closed the day with a $1382.20 gain after comms and fees. Literally disgusted.
Bias for the day: Undecided. Dependent on the open.
Plan for the day: With the ECB announcing tapering early this morning for whatever reason had effected an almost reversal and almost a perfect pennant/bullflag going into open. In my experience a lot times you have a perfect technical set up the "five guys in a room" or "they" have a tendency to go the other way. So it really was fluid.
So, a little like the night before i went into the morning with a decent gain. Up about $1100 or so getting into the open. As i said above the market was giving mixed signals. Printing a perfect flag in pre market and i had multiple levels that i was going to try and sell if it did come into it. And, just like we're used to it trucked right through these levels at open tacking on like 70 NQ points and about 25 in ES.
Now, i have been practicing in my practice account as well as in market replay with larger lot sizing as i like to run 3 contract positions with staggered stops and profit targets. And, in the chaos of market open i didn't realize one or more of my charts were still in this configuration. So off the bat i was scrambling with position sizes not appropriate for the position and got off to a pretty shitty start taking 21 losses in a row.
I literally almost just went back to bed.
But, whether it be a good or a bad thing i kept trading as i saw the set ups and proceeded to grind it out. Overall, the market character had changed. Situations where someone or "they" would market a shit ton of contracts to jam price higher weren't materializing and i was able to capitalize on this. The ones who were trying to and probably used to riding those coat tails were probably confused as it almost showed in the price action with multiple attempts to break higher fizzling out.
It's environments like this that actually make me uncomfortable. The day before there was a weird and noticeable lack of participation particularly late in the day from "smart money", but this morning they were definitely there. And i was having trouble reading the tape and trying to get a feel for price action. It's when the market is undecided that makes me nervous.
So with that i was taking more contracts, and going for a shorter extension. And, in general this was working in NQ. But not ES. ES was like a truck stuck in the mud until it wanted to move, and then it did and i was already offsides.
Long story short we finally got the leg down from the consolidation, and i was brawling trying to stay positioned for a continuation and that finally came in the form of like a 30 point 1m candle in NQ around 1 o clock. The market had showed its hand and my intuition was on the correct side.
I took way more trades than i should have today, as i did yesterday, but felt less out of control. I was definitely out of my comfort zone after my excursion into unwanted overleverage in the early morning and at one point during the day fat fingered like two trades in a row, one netting me 8 contracts in NQ. No thank you.
Overall i'm happy with the day P/L wise but still not comfortable with the past two days. Again i don't know if it's over confidence or excitement but sometimes i can get a little angsty or over excited in times of high volatility. But to be fair, it's days like the past two days that are my literal playground or sweet spot. I love playing weakness and i love fast moving markets. I just need to be able to control the chaos a little better and not fly out of control. Which i know is almost an oxymoron in this world but still, it's who i am.
I did take too many trades with too many contracts as well. That's part of what i'm not comfortable with. About 1/3 less than yesterday with 216 trades and 448 contracts.
Regardless i finished the day with a $3127.40 gain after comms and fees. I have a few days left in the combine and am right at the ragged edge of my profit target. So we'll see how this plays out.
