The trials and tribulations of a newbie.. still....

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It's the whole double bottom or double top theory lol. "It'll break.......maybe..... It'll reject....."

Wonder what tomorrow will bring with the options expirations
 
Now it does make me smile when I plot levels/targets and you get this klnda anticipated reaction to them....
 

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wow finally got around to sorting out myfxbook bits 'n' bobs... and gota say how depressing.. -87% Drawdown... alas I'm not quitting even though it looks like I should just give up and choose something else for a career....I cant let the 'boss' see the results though.... ;D
 
MyFXBook is cumulative and it should just serve as a reminder of growing pains.

I wished I was not already in a position so I could allocate some capital to trading the EUR/USD it was some beautiful divergence on GU and EU with GU edging higher and the DX edging higher with but not violating and significant highs or lows.

It was clear to me with a 60 pip range asia session that the initial stab down during the LO session was just a liquidity seeker and an opportunity to get in long. Still waiting to see that bond yield drop!
 
PAtrader said:
wow finally got around to sorting out myfxbook bits 'n' bobs... and gota say how depressing.. -87% Drawdown... alas I'm not quitting even though it looks like I should just give up and choose something else for a career....I cant let the 'boss' see the results though.... ;D

Yeah, one trouble with MyFXBook that can really trip up traders is the focus on return and %'s. Without question, that sort of thing is important, but it can be difficult to focus on just your next trade when your MyFXBook page is showing bright red numbers. Less disciplined traders might find this to be a trigger to over-trade, or over-leverage to make up a loss and get back to 'new highs' in their account (or just break even for an account with a negative return so far.)

Now, I entirely love MyFXBook, and think it's an awesome tool, so I'm not suggesting you ignore it. I'm just saying you can't let the % return get to you, and instead you just need to focus on the next trade and improving your craft. No results, no matter how bad (or good) should impact your next trading decision.

When you can take the same trading setup for your strategy cleanly 100+ times without wavering from your plan, then the results in MyFXBook can be assessed after the fact to refine your strategy or to get a better perspective on the risks of your system as you trade it live. This is where MyFXBook shines, as a stats tool, and it's really awesome for a free service.

So yeah, just focus on trading well. If you get into a positive feedback loop of following your system, seeing results, growing the account, upping your size, then the initial losses you spent learning this craft will vanish.
 
Re. Myfxbook yeah you are right, growing pains.. never looked at it that way!
What is good is that I now have a starting point for this new part moving forward.. lol and lets be honest it couldn't be much worse!

Bonds, Divergence, Yields, Triads, OTE, pivot points, News, Economics .....
I have given up using these things as it is really not necessary.
I used to think that I would need to know these things.. in order to stack the odds of success, but the last month or so I have started to re-train my brain and to be honest I feel much more focused now I don't worry about any of that.. I mean do people really think that price moves because it touched a pivot point :)

Again whilst I messed up on my execution of EJ... (at the beach with little phone signal ;D) I kinda forgot to re-enter for todays tp... 1st trade I needed to be a lil more conservative with s/l second hit my retrace point...however I had set my tp's for the move today marked with blue dash.

I have attached a pic of when it became apparent that it is not needed for all those things mentioned above...and it was done on the most volatile thing I could find. Sure there are a couple of losers in there but overall 300 pips in one day...
Whilst it may look a mess I use it to remind myself it can be done!
 

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Jack said:
Yeah, one trouble with MyFXBook that can really trip up traders is the focus on return and %'s. Without question, that sort of thing is important, but it can be difficult to focus on just your next trade when your MyFXBook page is showing bright red numbers. Less disciplined traders might find this to be a trigger to over-trade, or over-leverage to make up a loss and get back to 'new highs' in their account (or just break even for an account with a negative return so far.)

Now, I entirely love MyFXBook, and think it's an awesome tool, so I'm not suggesting you ignore it. I'm just saying you can't let the % return get to you, and instead you just need to focus on the next trade and improving your craft. No results, no matter how bad (or good) should impact your next trading decision.

When you can take the same trading setup for your strategy cleanly 100+ times without wavering from your plan, then the results in MyFXBook can be assessed after the fact to refine your strategy or to get a better perspective on the risks of your system as you trade it live. This is where MyFXBook shines, as a stats tool, and it's really awesome for a free service.

So yeah, just focus on trading well. If you get into a positive feedback loop of following your system, seeing results, growing the account, upping your size, then the initial losses you spent learning this craft will vanish.

Jack thanks for the input.... it means alot :D
 
Okay my plan this week is to watch 6 pairs... AJ, GU, GCAD, SP500, WTI and GOLD.
The SP500 I wouldn't normally watch this week due to it breaking new highs.. I think I will have to employ some kinda trailing stop strategy if I get buy signals.
Analysis on pairs to follow.
 
PAtrader said:
Okay my plan this week is to watch 6 pairs... AJ, GU, GCAD, SP500, WTI and GOLD.
The SP500 I wouldn't normally watch this week due to it breaking new highs.. I think I will have to employ some kinda trailing stop strategy if I get buy signals.
Analysis on pairs to follow.

The way gold, WTI, and SP500 all trade are way different from each other. Entirely different 'personalities' when it comes to price moving.

For instance, explosive moves down in price tied to a spike in volatility and ADR are more common for SP500 than the same going up... while WTI can have the same traits going up or down in price... and gold will trend softly like it's your best friend til the floor drops out from under it, only to collect itself and continue trending softly like nothing happened.

How long are your average holding times for these types of CFDs? And how frequent are your trades? (Asking since if you're heavy into it, depending on your trading style then trading the futures directly instead of a CFD might increase your returns by reducing cost.)
 
As crazy and unbelievable it sounds Jack... my new found love of pure Price Action doesn't change regardless of what asset class I'm 'attempting' to trade. Because i'm still kinda new to this way of trading I'm still trying to find my feet....however I am starting to employ 2 strategies for the pairs, last week was the first time I tried to implement it but I found it a little confusing to have a position on long and short on the same pair!! Sounds a headache but it did make sense. Your comment about ADR made me smile, I made reference to a few things a couple of posts ago.. Economics, Pivots etc etc... ADR I class in exactly the same way.. Price will tell me when it has had enough of going one way. just because it may have reached it's adr doesn't mean the move for the day is done... Because im starting to do my own thing, I find myself going against most of the teachings offered in both free and paid for tuition that I have come across to date.
Regarding average holding times.. can be a tp in as little as 30 mins to tp 3-4 days time. Again being a relatively new trader I still get a little nervous when I see something come back against my trade hard.. I still struggle not to close out a position and let it do it's thing.. but that was the reason for me to start being accountable to the mrs by doing these posts.....

EDIT: I have never thought of myself as an educator of anything.. cept how to race motorcycles or stunt on them :)..... however as time goes on and everyone can see the fxbook thing turn itself around... it will get peoples attention.... PMA and all that ...
 
PAtrader said:
As crazy and unbelievable it sounds Jack... my new found love of pure Price Action doesn't change regardless of what asset class I'm 'attempting' to trade. Because i'm still kinda new to this way of trading I'm still trying to find my feet....however I am starting to employ 2 strategies for the pairs, last week was the first time I tried to implement it but I found it a little confusing to have a position on long and short on the same pair!! Sounds a headache but it did make sense. Your comment about ADR made me smile, I made reference to a few things a couple of posts ago.. Economics, Pivots etc etc... ADR I class in exactly the same way.. Price will tell me when it has had enough of going one way. just because it may have reached it's adr doesn't mean the move for the day is done... Because im starting to do my own thing, I find myself going against most of the teachings offered in both free and paid for tuition that I have come across to date.
Regarding average holding times.. can be a tp in as little as 30 mins to tp 3-4 days time. Again being a relatively new trader I still get a little nervous when I see something come back against my trade hard.. I still struggle not to close out a position and let it do it's thing.. but that was the reason for me to start being accountable to the mrs by doing these posts.....

EDIT: I have never thought of myself as an educator of anything.. cept how to race motorcycles or stunt on them :)..... however as time goes on and everyone can see the fxbook thing turn itself around... it will get peoples attention.... PMA and all that ...

Hedging on the same instrument is expensive (causes you to pay the spread one more time for your hedged position.) Partially closing your open position to reduce exposure is way better.

Psychologically it's nice to see a separate (hedge) position in the green as price moves against your main position, but the net outcome once all trades are closed, in nearly every scenario, is slightly better by just closing part or all of your initial position to reduce exposure (or to gain opposite exposure, reverse the trade instead of doubling up in the other direction with a hedge position.)

It actually ends up strengthening your resolve to cut a loser and do the right thing when you flatten a trade and reverse, or reduce exposure instead of hedge, since you're reinforcing the habit to adjust instead of holding onto bad trades. It's never easy, but the more you do it the easier it becomes.

That being said, when it comes to order management, specifically when you have one long term swing position and want to scalp in the short term against the direction of your swing, then hedging in the same instrument can make life easier. My comments were targets against hedging with most trades having the same time horizon in the short term.

--

The trade duration question was going to get into cost advantages of futures over CFDs, but I won't dive into this now as you're still feeling things out with the instruments in general. But once you get really comfortable and increase your size with a trading plan around a given CFD (WTI, SP500, etc..), poke me about it and I'll show you how to squeeze an extra bit of profit out of each move by reducing costs (by trading the underlying futures that such CFDs track, which are cheaper to trade in most cases.)
 
Thanks for the heads up Jack I appreciate the nudge :)

Charts with levels marked. I will be watching what PA does around these levels.
NOTE: where price blows through levels such as GOLD... I will just go and plot some more :)
Added level AJ 91.196
 

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Also, this really more of a journal than a solidified method, no? May I move this thread to the journal section? :)
 
PAtrader said:
Thanks for the heads up Jack I appreciate the nudge :)

Charts with levels marked. I will be watching what PA does around these levels.
NOTE: where price blows through levels such as GOLD... I will just go and plot some more :)
Added level AJ 91.196

Your gold chart looks like it wants to break into new recent highs. (Although, I'm not a gold trader, so don't take it long on my account. ;P ) Got a plan around that upper level?
 
Gold..currently in a small speculative position short. Stop above H1 s/r. Will look to add to position if move goes in favor.
WTI.. just taken a position long.. although it is at a potential turning point... will be quick to collapse the trade if it turns against me
 
Currently +146 WTI, +106 GOLD, and +9 AJ... AJ.. been in you all day what gives!
Analysis to follow

Still never got round to doing the analysis.. htf's on Gold and WTI say long.. AJ spiked me out.. looking very much like open positions will be taken going to go back and look at s/r.. must've missed something
 
Hey Jonnycab --

Could you provide me with that market structure fractal indicator you are using?

Does it work well?

Thanks
 
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