A Jedi Trader's ES Journal
- Thread starter Financial Yoda
- Start date
Thanks everyone for following along.
I appreciate the feedback.
I do acknowledge the necessity of having confidence in my system. Since this has some element of discretion, I have not altered the system other than to reduce size during this drawdown. And reduced my aggressiveness factor in my trading. I have a daily loss limit that is pretty stringent (more stringent now than when I began) that helps me to not have a day that blows my account out entirely. If I reach that daily loss limit, I am locked out of my trading platform and I can go to sim to continue practicing.
Sure that's like training wheels, but it helps me to think about the obvious scenario of "what if I'm wrong" and to avoid adding to loosing positions, which is NOT part of my system, as well as learning to pull the plug when the trade has a low chance for profit.
I use the daily profit goals as a guide kinda like a trendline of "ideal equity growth". Right now I'm far from that goal but it is calculated for me already, so its there as a reminder. BTW I don't even have the spreadsheet up when I trade so I'm not refering to it at all during trading hours, and don't know what the calculated stuff is until after trading is over.
I believe that there is so much opportunity in the ES market that achieving something like my daily profit goal is not impossible. It may be improbable for me at this time but anyway that's my belief about the market.
I'm fully aware of the statistics regarding trading and especially how they relate to small accounts all too well!
But I believe risk control and money management can work wonders if executed optimally. Obviously, my trading is a work in progress and If (big if
) if I'm successful this blog will become legendary and If I fail, nobody thought I'd succeed so no loss except risk capital.
Its kinda like I'm learning driving Formula 1, its fast and its dangerous but that's how I decided to drive/trade.
Todays trading was a D if I give myself a grade, I was able to dig myself partly out of a hole by taking small 4-5 tic profits and although I was aware of longerterm targets I quickly surmised that this was gonna be a range bound day but not before going -375 in the red, so I dilligently traded my way out of a big(as a % of account) losing day. I don't count commisions in my equity but I think all in I lost about $100.00. I was happy with the way I didnt give up or loose composure after digging myself a whole and faced with 7/10 days traded in the red since inception of this journal.
http://screencast.com/t/Y8UGl3U2vwa2
I appreciate the feedback.
I do acknowledge the necessity of having confidence in my system. Since this has some element of discretion, I have not altered the system other than to reduce size during this drawdown. And reduced my aggressiveness factor in my trading. I have a daily loss limit that is pretty stringent (more stringent now than when I began) that helps me to not have a day that blows my account out entirely. If I reach that daily loss limit, I am locked out of my trading platform and I can go to sim to continue practicing.
Sure that's like training wheels, but it helps me to think about the obvious scenario of "what if I'm wrong" and to avoid adding to loosing positions, which is NOT part of my system, as well as learning to pull the plug when the trade has a low chance for profit.
I use the daily profit goals as a guide kinda like a trendline of "ideal equity growth". Right now I'm far from that goal but it is calculated for me already, so its there as a reminder. BTW I don't even have the spreadsheet up when I trade so I'm not refering to it at all during trading hours, and don't know what the calculated stuff is until after trading is over.
I believe that there is so much opportunity in the ES market that achieving something like my daily profit goal is not impossible. It may be improbable for me at this time but anyway that's my belief about the market.
I'm fully aware of the statistics regarding trading and especially how they relate to small accounts all too well!
But I believe risk control and money management can work wonders if executed optimally. Obviously, my trading is a work in progress and If (big if
) if I'm successful this blog will become legendary and If I fail, nobody thought I'd succeed so no loss except risk capital.Its kinda like I'm learning driving Formula 1, its fast and its dangerous but that's how I decided to drive/trade.
Todays trading was a D if I give myself a grade, I was able to dig myself partly out of a hole by taking small 4-5 tic profits and although I was aware of longerterm targets I quickly surmised that this was gonna be a range bound day but not before going -375 in the red, so I dilligently traded my way out of a big(as a % of account) losing day. I don't count commisions in my equity but I think all in I lost about $100.00. I was happy with the way I didnt give up or loose composure after digging myself a whole and faced with 7/10 days traded in the red since inception of this journal.
http://screencast.com/t/Y8UGl3U2vwa2
would grade myself a C on execution of trading plan, got into mild trouble with -175 intraday drawdown. Was in a profitable trade but had to exit early due to needing to get to work.
Good to see some green on my spreadsheet but trading a total of 10 contracts, I expect more yield than 112.50 but that is under my control.
http://screencast.com/t/90E73wEyX8xz
Good to see some green on my spreadsheet but trading a total of 10 contracts, I expect more yield than 112.50 but that is under my control.
http://screencast.com/t/90E73wEyX8xz
Doubling your account monthly is next to impossible.
The volatility required to generate that return makes your risk of ruin so high that even if you get lucky in one month the strategy could not be maintained.
After reviewing my monthly account statement. I'm going to include net rather than gross profit/loss because those are the actual realized gains/loss. I think I was playing a mental game by not including them, so from here on out I will be posting the net profit/loss not the gross.
Thanks for all the feedback. There is nothing to debate, and there are more references for why something cannot be done, including trading profitably at all!
I choose to be the exception rather than the rule and this journal will be a record of my success and or failure. Don't forget to grab the popcorn as you view the spectacle/debacle.
Thanks for all the feedback. There is nothing to debate, and there are more references for why something cannot be done, including trading profitably at all!
I choose to be the exception rather than the rule and this journal will be a record of my success and or failure. Don't forget to grab the popcorn as you view the spectacle/debacle.
Sideways to down market and low volatility.
I have something to do this afternoon so stopped trading by 1pm
I gave myself a B-, not an A for not avoiding 2 marginal trades in this environment, costing me 10 ticks total.
I decided to track a few other metrics ala Hitman's journal, and to add an equity curve graph to my spreadsheet. I'm thinking about tracking ticks per contract and % profitable trades on separate graph.
Date 04/04/11
total ticks +22
net profit $245.25
# or round turns 7
commision $29.75( 11% of gross profit)
% Profitable 71.43%(5/7)
Ave ticks per lot 3.1, if losers are excluded is 6.4 ticks per contract.
http://screencast.com/t/bsdkBdk3fiBe
PS: still working on formating new spreadsheet so any calculated result other than equity is not correct.
I have something to do this afternoon so stopped trading by 1pm
I gave myself a B-, not an A for not avoiding 2 marginal trades in this environment, costing me 10 ticks total.
I decided to track a few other metrics ala Hitman's journal, and to add an equity curve graph to my spreadsheet. I'm thinking about tracking ticks per contract and % profitable trades on separate graph.
Date 04/04/11
total ticks +22
net profit $245.25
# or round turns 7
commision $29.75( 11% of gross profit)
% Profitable 71.43%(5/7)
Ave ticks per lot 3.1, if losers are excluded is 6.4 ticks per contract.
http://screencast.com/t/bsdkBdk3fiBe
PS: still working on formating new spreadsheet so any calculated result other than equity is not correct.
No trades taken today, was away from my trading desk.
Great market day IMO
Great market day IMO
traded globex session:
Graded myself a B+, due to moving target 1 tick to take earlier profit, markrt went 4 ticks beyond my original target, i attribute that to sleepiness.
Date
04/06/11
+25 ticks
$299.75 net profit
3 contracts traded
$12.75 commish (4.1%)
100.00% profitable
8.3 ticks per contract average
http://screencast.com/t/4BHhRnochgC
Graded myself a B+, due to moving target 1 tick to take earlier profit, markrt went 4 ticks beyond my original target, i attribute that to sleepiness.
Date
04/06/11
+25 ticks
$299.75 net profit
3 contracts traded
$12.75 commish (4.1%)
100.00% profitable
8.3 ticks per contract average
http://screencast.com/t/4BHhRnochgC
Hi,
Only profitable traders should be using a "daily profit goal".
In contrast, traders that are not consistently profitable should be using a "follow the trading plan goal" via essentially rating their ability to follow the trading plan if there's a discretionary element in their trading (you mentioned you had a discretionary element in your trading).
Also, trading the Emini ES futures is one of the toughest games in town and the goal you've described is greatly dependent upon volatility. Simply, if volatility isn't there (currently it's not in comparison to one month ago)...you will not come close to achieving your goal.
* Why did you chose to trade the Emini ES in comparison to any other futures trading instrument ???
* You mentioned you've been trading Emini ES for the past 2 years...were you profitable the past 2 years ???
Your answers will tell me if you should be trading it. Also, my point about the volatility is that you need to first determine how sensitive your method is to changes in volatility via measuring the correlation of those 2 year trading results with the VIX or VXX.
You can then begin to determine a more realistic daily profit goal assuming you were profitable overall in those 2 years of Emini ES futures.
Mark