Set-up

FinoptUSA said:
This week has really taught me that I have to find a set-up and stop reacting to price. Back to the drawing board.
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It's good you realise what "mistakes" you make. As my mentor once told me "you have to be able to look in the mirror" and be honest with yourself ... keep going now you know what you need to work on :)
 
ullrich said:
What's happened in that week? Are you sure your mistake wasn't consequence of random events :)?
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Too much reacting to price and not having a clear set-up. I was in the market when I should not have been. Sometimes seeing trades that were not there. I have relaxed and stayed out of the market since posting this. I have decided on a clear set-up. I have to have patience and work within a short-term trade versus reacting and scalping.
 
I agree, and I did the same thing early on. I margined out a few accounts trying to follow the price action. Since then I’ve leaned a lot. Mostly from just watching and getting my head in the right place (FOMO). I now will only click on the trading button if I’ve mapped out the entire trade, where I will enter IF the set up occurs, where I plan on exiting the trade if it goes in my direction (or move my stop loss to let it ride to my 2nd and 3nd exit) and where I will exit the trade if it does not go in the direction I planed. I also except the loss if that happens without remorse. Every trader has losses. I only enter a trade with multiple clear signals indicating to do so. If I do not get multiple signals then I do not enter and except it if it does go in the direction I was planning and never try to chase the trade. There will ALWAYS be another setup. You’re better off keeping your money out of the market then to use unnecessary risk. I’ll go play blackjack for that.
I’m showing my daughter how to trade and read the charts. I have her using a micro account and only putting on .01 lots when she sees a setup. It’s a lot less emotional but you still get the feeling of real money. You can find all kinds of people on YouTube claiming to make these big trades, but on a demo account. Using a demo doesn’t give you the emotional learning so you can let anything ride without thought. That’s my 2 pips. I wish you well!
 
FinoptUSA said:
This week has really taught me that I have to find a set-up and stop reacting to price. Back to the drawing board.
Click to expand...
What set-ups were you using in the past? I’m starting out and it can be hard to realize if I’m following my strategy or just creating an entry point because I want there to be one
 
The funny thing I learned about charting is if you look at a chart and use too many tools you can make it look like anything. I try to keep it as basic as I can, because if it’s basic and obvious then I know other traders are seeing it to which makes the trade that much stronger. When I set up my charts every day or if I am away from them for a period of time (few hours, half a day or so). I am first looking for strong support and resistance lines. I look on the longer timeframe charts. First the day, then 4 hr and lastly 1 hr. The only time I watch the 15 min chart is for a stronger of sooner entry point. Second, my strategy is to trade with the trend on the higher timeframes. I don’t take many counter trend trades or trade on a ‘messy looking chart’, I’ll just look at a different pair or just wait. I like very obvious trends and trade on the dips. When a pull back occurs I’ll place a fibonacci from the previous low to the current high it’s pulling back from. Then I might pull back to the hour timeframe and look for either a bullish (or bearish if that’s the trend) on a major Fibonacci line, like the 61.8 for example. If I get a strong candlestick (like a hammer for an up trend or a falling star on a down trend, etc). Once it’s confirmed it’s moving back with the trend I’ll place my stoploss right below the 100 fib line (last dip) and my first take profit at 0.0 fib line. Once the trade starts hitting and going through the next fib lines I’ll move my stoploss to 0, then 50, 23.6. That way if it does reverse, my trade will exit at a zero loss, or smaller gain as it moves up. Once it’s at 0.0 I’ll either just exit the trade (even though it could very well make the next leg up) or keep my stoploss at the 23.6 line and look for the next resistance or support line and let it keep going and exit near there. I also keep my eye on the RSI indicator for over bought / sold signs. If the RSI is above the 50 line but below the 70 line there’s a good indication it will keep trending up or below the 50 and above the 30 if it’s trending down. Once you get a lot of time watching a pair you’ll ‘feel’ for the lack of better words the ebb and flow of that pair. I also watch for major news announcements. If you’re in a trade and a major announcement comes out it can get very volatile and snap up or down without any good reason until the announcement has settled in. So I try not to trade around those or exit the trade before hand. I hope that helps. Please keep in touch and let me know how you’re doing. I’m always curious how others trade and how they do their setups. Take care! And good trading!
 
NickKalty said:
What set-ups were you using in the past? I’m starting out and it can be hard to realize if I’m following my strategy or just creating an entry point because I want there to be one
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@NickKalty If you feel you are creating entry points then you know that you do not have a real set-up. Our minds can play tricks on us because we want to trade. The hardest part is finding the patience and waiting for your move to appear. I found some success with a few set-ups but it is all about consistency and simplicity. Too much back and forth in my account made me realize that I was reacting to price and needed to go back to Demo. I was no longer trading. I was either gambling or entertaining myself in the market. I am trying to get out of my head or out of my way now and learn patience. Trading on high probability trade days and times. Currently, I am focusing on ICT Purge and Revert. I found most of my previous success in my live account by using a fib from high to low on a 1H chart and catching the reversion to equilibrium (50% retracement level).

See video ICT Purge and Revert

The key, I think, is to find a set-up that speaks to you and try your hardest to make it yours without adding bells and whistles. Keep it simple. This set-up may work for you or it may not. That's okay! Just search until you find a set-up that you understand. Demo with it as practice. When ready, go live, but with micro-lots. This helps you feel the emotion of losing, but not destroying your account. Right now, I am focusing on learning 1 pair using 450-500 units. Some may say this is ridiculous and that is okay because it works for me and my learning style. I work a full-time job and don't have time to look at charts all day, and the Daily timeframe moves too slow for me right now. 15M moves too fast, so I am testing the 1H, which has shown to be the timeframe that gives me more success. If not, then I will look at the 4H, the 1H is showing promise.
Anyhow, I say learn about you and how you interact with the market instead of just studying the market.

Hope this helps.
Finoptusa.
 
BPTrader said:
The funny thing I learned about charting is if you look at a chart and use too many tools you can make it look like anything. I try to keep it as basic as I can, because if it’s basic and obvious then I know other traders are seeing it to which makes the trade that much stronger. When I set up my charts every day or if I am away from them for a period of time (few hours, half a day or so). I am first looking for strong support and resistance lines. I look on the longer timeframe charts. First the day, then 4 hr and lastly 1 hr. The only time I watch the 15 min chart is for a stronger of sooner entry point. Second, my strategy is to trade with the trend on the higher timeframes. I don’t take many counter trend trades or trade on a ‘messy looking chart’, I’ll just look at a different pair or just wait. I like very obvious trends and trade on the dips. When a pull back occurs I’ll place a fibonacci from the previous low to the current high it’s pulling back from. Then I might pull back to the hour timeframe and look for either a bullish (or bearish if that’s the trend) on a major Fibonacci line, like the 61.8 for example. If I get a strong candlestick (like a hammer for an up trend or a falling star on a down trend, etc). Once it’s confirmed it’s moving back with the trend I’ll place my stoploss right below the 100 fib line (last dip) and my first take profit at 0.0 fib line. Once the trade starts hitting and going through the next fib lines I’ll move my stoploss to 0, then 50, 23.6. That way if it does reverse, my trade will exit at a zero loss, or smaller gain as it moves up. Once it’s at 0.0 I’ll either just exit the trade (even though it could very well make the next leg up) or keep my stoploss at the 23.6 line and look for the next resistance or support line and let it keep going and exit near there. I also keep my eye on the RSI indicator for over bought / sold signs. If the RSI is above the 50 line but below the 70 line there’s a good indication it will keep trending up or below the 50 and above the 30 if it’s trending down. Once you get a lot of time watching a pair you’ll ‘feel’ for the lack of better words the ebb and flow of that pair. I also watch for major news announcements. If you’re in a trade and a major announcement comes out it can get very volatile and snap up or down without any good reason until the announcement has settled in. So I try not to trade around those or exit the trade before hand. I hope that helps. Please keep in touch and let me know how you’re doing. I’m always curious how others trade and how they do their setups. Take care! And good trading!
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@BPTrader , That is awesome. It looks like you have found your trade set-up. I have moved back to demo from my live account to work on my patience with a set-up from ICT. See my response to @NickKalty. I like how you use the fib as a trailing stop-loss. I am only comfortable using a fib, not too good with RSI or MA (Moving Averages) on my chart. I had a teacher/mentor that used the RSI, the 50 and 200 MA's for institutional bias, with the 20 and 9 exponential MA., but it all confused me on the chart. I just did not grasp the bounce off the 9 or going short if under the 200 etc... It worked well for him and he was profitable, but I couldn't see it as well as he did, Great guy and a great teacher for those that can see it.

I prefer a clean chart using candles and a fib. As far as scaling out. I like defensive trading, I scale out when one target is hit and then close the trade at the second target. This was something I was able to take from that teacher above. Once I hit the first target, I move to breakeven. My first rule, like with many is the preservation of capital. For me once I am past 50% retracement level, I am in overbought.

As far as News goes, I set my calendar up for the week. No trades during news, cut trades before the news and restart 10-15 minutes after the news. I got that one from a guy named VP and it seems to keep me out of trouble.

Thanks for sharing and keep up the success. We all love hearing it.

Finoptusa
 
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