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Zen & the Art of The Small Account


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Zen & the Art of The Small Account

  #571 (permalink)
 livin the dream 
California
 
Experience: Beginner
Platform: Ninja
Broker: Amp
Trading: CL, 6e, TF, EMD
Posts: 1 since Aug 2010
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aztrader9 View Post
Lets see how this day went. Early morning traded 1-2 lots...mostly one. I was scared with no MA. But hit a number of small winners and a couple full target winners, then had some scratch trades. High of the day was $420. I think I started to get tired after CL just ping ponged around in a real tight range. I went back to $270 then back to $390.....then the range really got narrow. But I was reading PA decently so far and decided to try a few trades hoping to catch a run. Which never came. Had a nice long string of losers....end the day -$230.


Til tomorrow then.

Az,
I have been following this thread for a while now! I am wondering, what is an acceptable daily profit target? Personally, $420 is a good day.....although YMMV!


aztrader9 View Post
Tomorrow, I will be trading 2 contracts instead of one. I felt so comfortable with the naked chart that I want to size up just a bit.

Til tomorrow then.

Be very careful here! This could be veiwed as revenge trading....the market doesn't care how you feel!

Take care and good trading!

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  #572 (permalink)
Tundi
Fullerton, CA
 
Posts: 201 since Dec 2010
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Tundi View Post
OP, are you still in trial with the prop firm?

BUMP

  #573 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
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Today was a good day. I felt in the zone especially early....much fewer trades today.

I made the following mistakes:

1. I took a couple of break out trades I did not really believe. Conviction is a strong word. You should have strong conviction about a trade before you take it. I traded 1 lot on these and so held the losses to a minimum.

2. I passed on a PERFECT trade as it was the first really high probability trade I'd seen all day and today was the first day of really using the 5 min chart to look for support/resistance and so I was not quite sold on it....but the trade validated my theory and so will not make that mistake again.

3. I sized improperly on a couple of trades. I traded more than one on a couple of small winners when I should have been trading only one....and more importantly, I did not go for broke on the one really good trade I did take. I traded three lots but it should have been 5.

4. I allowed boredom to cause me to think I needed to take a trade just because. This mistake ALWAYS cost money. It NEVER works out.

What I did right today.

1. I let my winners run....or at least they were runners for me.....20 ticks for the most part.

2. I kept my targets inside obvious support and resistance zones.

3. I read price action today pretty well with no indicators.....ok, so the fib lines are indicators and so is the MACD at the bottom of the chart.....I think I looked at it once today....

4. I did size up on a great set up.....instead of playing around with only one contract.

5. I quit when I felt myself slipping out of the zone.

6. I kept my losses small.

Net result today: +$540 over all. It would have been around $1000 without the mistakes. No coulda woulda shoulda here though.

Overall, I am very pleased with how this went. If I get better at reading the S/R and the fibs, I'll dump the MACD as well. It takes up valuable room on the chart.

For those of you wondering if I am still in the prop firm thing...the answer is yes. I blew the first one due to mostly stupidity on my part. I chose the wrong month to trade, I was unfamiliar with the platform, had a bunch of personal stuff going on and for some reason, lost trust in myself during that period. But that is behind me now....the personal stuff is mostly dealt with, this month is back to normal ranges on CL and I am reasonably familiar with the trading platform.

Additionally, I made a major change to how I trade this week but it just clicked with me......you know, that aha moment I have been hoping for a long time now. Will I be perfect? Of course not. Will I be better. Absolutely....my trading partner expects perfection from my trading. He is pretty demanding...but it has been a good thing for me. Painful yes, but good.

The charts below are the only two charts I use. The five minute chart has fib targets on it along with the S/R areas I am watching. The range chart is for fine tuning entries around those areas.

Not all the trades I took are on the chart. I marked as many as I could in real time but I know I forgot some. Also, the exits are not marked. I managed the exits better than normal but not as well as I could have.

My goal is to simply ignore the noise on the 6 range chart until prices gets to an important point on the 5 min chart and then start reading PA there for a good entry.....easier said than done but so very doable.

Cheers.....

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
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  #574 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
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livin the dream View Post
Az,
I have been following this thread for a while now! I am wondering, what is an acceptable daily profit target? Personally, $420 is a good day.....although YMMV!



Be very careful here! This could be veiwed as revenge trading....the market doesn't care how you feel!

Take care and good trading!

Well its hard to define what a good daily profit target for the day is. I used to set it at $100, then $300....or whatever number I thought I could hit every day.....that is just stupid. I think you should trade either until you run out of time do to other engagements, the trading day is over, your daily stop loss is hit.....this is an absolute must....or you feel like you are no longer in the zone. The idea that you will take a set amount out of the market every day is ludicrous. Yes there are vendors selling things like "we take 1-2 points out of the market every day". Thats cool. That is doable. But what about the losing days. On days you are trading well, you should put the pedal to the metal and take everything you can get your hands on. On the days when you are not, keep it small and in the long run you will be ok.

So to answer your question, I don't know what a reasonable profit target for the day is. I know @sharky scalps out a couple grand a day when he is pressed for time. He is trading size. Its all relative. Decide for yourself and go with it.

And I don't revenge trade. I did that once. I remember it well. It will never happen again. My size decisions are based on the set up....at least they are now. Good set up with lots of conviction equals as big a size as I can without risking the farm. Poor or questionable set up, 1 lot....or maybe no trade.

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Started this thread
  #575 (permalink)
 soumi71 
Toronto
 
Experience: Intermediate
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A quick question Aztrader , if youdon't mind , why did you add the MACD to your original setup ?
One more thing I wanted to add , is that I find your journey very inspiring
keep going !
soumi

"Risk more than others think safe.
Dream more than others think practical.
Expect more than others think possible.
Care more than others think wise"
  #576 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
In the heat
 
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Here is a pic of the PnL....just in case you are wondering

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
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  #577 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
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soumi71 View Post
A quick question Aztrader , if youdon't mind , why did you add the MACD to your original setup ?
One more thing I wanted to add , is that I find your journey very inspiring
keep going !
soumi

The set up looks almost nothing like what I started with. But the ZeroLagMACD available here on the forum actually does a decent job of "predicting" price. I don't use it like a MACD is supposed to be used. I just look at it once in while if I feel like I need something else to lean on before a trade. I do not use it to exit a trade at all. On a 6 range chart, it can be noisy. But I have noticed that often times the macd will change direction while price is going opposite. IF I see that, I will sometimes start looking for an entry the opposite of the current price direction. BUT and its a big but, that was before the light bulb moment with the 5 min chart and the S/R started popping out at me. I am not sure if it is still necessary at this point.

And thanks for the kind words.....

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
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  #578 (permalink)
 
tderrick's Avatar
 tderrick 
Nashville, Tennessee
 
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As always, great trading advice AZ.

The one thing I wrestle with is how long to hang on to a trade when it turns against me.

Do you manually bail out if the the trade doesn't go postive right away?

I try to leave my stop just below SR so I hate to give up on the trade if it is fighting.


AJ
Nashville, Tennessee


"Life On The Edge of SR"
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  #579 (permalink)
 Twiddle 
Sydney, Australia
 
Experience: Beginner
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Are you still trading with a small account AZ?

The daily profits you have been attaining over the past little while are pretty impressive if this is the small account you started with.

  #580 (permalink)
 
PandaWarrior's Avatar
 PandaWarrior 
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tderrick View Post
As always, great trading advice AZ.

The one thing I wrestle with is how long to hang on to a trade when it turns against me.

Do you manually bail out if the the trade doesn't go postive right away?

I try to leave my stop just below SR so I hate to give up on the trade if it is fighting.

I struggle with this too. No easy answer. I put on a 3 lot trade today and my heart beat like a hammer all the way through to the 20 tick target. Every time I got a red bar I wanted out. I also had a trade that went against me immediately. I bailed and of course it went back up. I jumped right back in and got my profit but with more trade than necessary.

So, my thought is this. If price is moving nicely, then get out right away and back in if price goes the way you thought it would. If price is in a chop area and you think you got in at a good place, leave it alone, if the stop is eventually hit, at the very least it will have prevented you from making lots of trades in the chop while you waited for the one to get hit. If it breaks out in your favor, then great, if not, only lost trade.

All that being said, its still a personal decision.....but I think I have lost more money getting out of trades that I knew were good with a tiny loss than I ever did taking a full stop in the correct place.

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci


Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
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