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My system is pretty simple. I use some custom MA's, the CCI and Stochastics. I only look for 4 ticks per trade unless I am absolutely certain it will run. My strategy is +4/-4 so I'm hoping for a greater than 50% success rate. I traded this on ToS back in 2011 and got incredible results, however I never had the money to trade a real account. That time is now!
I'll attach my daily excel spreadsheet and also include the most recent trading stats for the day. The spreadsheet will have cool graphs however.
I've attached my 2011 paper trading, and my current 2014 real money sheets. The 2014 has a 2011 and 12 tab, but it is not part of this strategy and not accurate to this system. The 2011 Paper Trading sheet however is.
Today was a down day (bad first day): Here was the update:
Date Symbol # Cont. Commission Per Tick Value Total Contracts Total Trades # of Ticks Total Commission Net P/L Day Profit/Week Profit/Mo. Monthly Contracts Acct Bal. % profit Notes (Plan changes are in red)
9/29/2014 ES 1 $3.35 $12.50 5 5 -6 $16.75 -$91.75 $908.25 -10.10% Traded too late from the EMA Crossoer. Need to be more patient for the next indicator.
Sorry for the hasty post of Trade Journal.xls - There were some errors on the graphs and some of the columns didn't have the formulas copied correctly.
Here is today's trade. First trade set up ok, but pulled back on me and hit my stop +1 tick. I needed to wait for a better entry. Second trade went great, however I got greedy and moved my limit too far out. Trade reversed trend and went against me further than my initial stop (since I moved that as well).
My rule - DON'T GET GREEDY! +4/-4 and increase gains with contracts. Tomorrow will be better.
Date Symbol # Cont. Commission Per Tick Value Total Contracts Total Trades # of Ticks Total Commission Net P/L Day
9/30/2014 ES 1 $3.35 $12.50 2 2 -14 $6.70 -$181.70
trades were at:
Instrument Action Qty Price Time E/X Position Name Commission
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1967.50 9/30/2014 8:45 AM Entry 1S Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1968.50 9/30/2014 8:47 AM Exit - Stop1 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1964.75 9/30/2014 8:53 AM Entry 1S Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1967.25 9/30/2014 9:10 AM Exit - Stop1 3.35
I want to let you and all your readers know that in October nexusfi.com (formerly BMT) has a Trading Journal contest w/prizes. The contest runs October 1 to October 31, and the three best journals (as decided by nexusfi.com (formerly BMT) members) will receive a 150K combine from TopstepTrader.
Continuing in the tradition of encouraging journals on futures.io (formerly BMT), I am announcing a new Journal contest for October 2014.
The rules are extremely simple:
a) The contest begins October 1 and ends October 31. All decisions made …
That thread will be open for posting starting Wednesday, October 1. As the author of your journal, you need to make a post in that thread linking to your journal, and then ask users to press the "Thanks" button on that post if they want to vote for your journal to win the contest.
Members can vote for as many different journals as they want. Votes are cast in the Contest thread only, and only on the first post made by the author of the journal that contains a link to their journal. This is done so I can easily count the "Thanks Received" by author/journal, and award the three prizes.
Stick to the rules and this works. Trade when you hear the bell! Just like Pavlov's dogs.... It's difficult for me since I am a manager and constantly have people coming in to my cube so I have to hide the platform. Not so much because it's illegal or frowned upon, but I just don't want to have to explain it a thousand times.
Today's trade entry:
Date Symbol # Cont. Commission Per Tick Value Total Contracts Total Trades # of Ticks Total Commission Net P/L Day
So - Another losing day today, but two of the 4 trades I took did go all the way up to my limit price, they just didn't fill. The bid never made it up there. So here is the sad stats....
Date Symbol # Cont. Commission Per Tick Value Total Contracts Total Trades # of Ticks Total Commission Net P/L Day
10/2/2014 ES 1 $3.35 $12.50 4 4 -12 $13.40 -$163.40
Instrument Action Qty Price Time E/X Position Name
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1937.50 10/2/2014 8:48 AM Entry 1S Entry
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1938.50 10/2/2014 8:49 AM Exit - Stop1
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1941.50 10/2/2014 8:52 AM Entry 1L Entry
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1940.50 10/2/2014 8:54 AM Exit - Stop1
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1930.00 10/2/2014 10:07 AM Entry 1L Entry
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1929.00 10/2/2014 10:12 AM Exit - Stop1
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1929.00 10/2/2014 10:13 AM Entry 1S Entry
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1930.00 10/2/2014 10:14 AM Exit - Stop1
I'm still at it even though I ended up with $0 before commission. Bad week. I'm keeping at it.
Here is today's entry
Date Symbol # Cont. Commission Per Tick Value Total Contracts Total Trades # of Ticks Total Commission Net P/L Day
10/3/2014 ES 1 $3.35 $12.50 5 5 $16.75 -$16.75
And the trades:
Instrument Action Qty Price Time E/X Position Name Commission
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1954.75 10/3/2014 8:54 AM Entry 1L Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1955.00 10/3/2014 8:56 AM Exit - Target1 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1956.00 10/3/2014 8:57 AM Entry 1L Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1955.00 10/3/2014 8:57 AM Exit - Stop1 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1958.25 10/3/2014 9:04 AM Entry 1L Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1959.25 10/3/2014 9:04 AM Exit - Target1 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1959.25 10/3/2014 9:04 AM Entry 1L Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1958.25 10/3/2014 9:09 AM Exit - Stop1 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1957.75 10/3/2014 9:12 AM Entry 1S Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1957.00 10/3/2014 9:18 AM Exit - Target1 3.35
So I loaded replay data for my bad week and re-traded it. Got at least $100 winners for each day. I believe that my largest stumbling block is simply the hours that the market is active and the fact that it overlaps with the busiest part of my work day. Guess I should move to the West coast where I can trade at 6:30 in the morning.
Oh well - this can't be that large of a hurdle to get over. I won't get a new job, but I'll come up with something.
Also - started looking at Level 2 data. Anyone else using level 2 bids and asks for support and resistance levels? Would be a cool indicator that I might just have to try to code this weekend.
Ok - so off to a pretty good start for Monday. 4 trades - all "winners" to an extent.... I really should let my runners run because three of the 4 trades could have been done with the first trend. So while I had 100% successful trades, I still don't consider this a good day. Still - any landing you can walk away from is a good one, right? Know your rules and stick to them. If you are looking for 1 point a day, get one point using your system. My system usually is 2 trades for 4 ticks (1 point) each day on the ES. Seems like small fries, but remember, it's all about volume and leverage - not home runs. The idea is to be repeatable in any kind of market - trending and chop. I find that I can still usually get 1 point out of chop, but I try to stay away from that. 2 points (1 per trade) per day also means I have tight stops, so there is not a lot of loss. Remember though, I am not a professional at this. I may look back in 5 years and think "How did I expect to make a living off of this?" Still - $100 per contract - 10 contracts is $5000 a week - $20,000 a month. I can live off that even after Obama takes his 35%. Not a bad living for only 30 minutes a day.
Date Symbol # Cont. Commission Per Tick Value Total Contracts Total Trades # of Ticks Total Commission Net P/L Day
10/6/2014 ES 1 $3.35 $12.50 4 4 9 $13.40 $99.10
Instrument Action Qty Price Time Position Name Commission
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1964.75 10/6/2014 9:47 AM 1S Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1964.50 10/6/2014 9:47 AM - Stop1 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1964.50 10/6/2014 9:47 AM 1S Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1964.00 10/6/2014 9:48 AM - Target1 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1961.50 10/6/2014 9:50 AM 1S Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1961.00 10/6/2014 9:55 AM - Stop1 3.35
ES 12-14 Buy 1 1961.50 10/6/2014 10:02 AM 1L Entry 3.35
ES 12-14 Sell 1 1962.50 10/6/2014 10:04 AM - Target1 3.35
