CL Redux
- Thread starter schizo
- Start date
Yes, my blotter posts Mountain Time, 3 hours before Eastern.
I've heard of bar counting strategies and never gave it a single thought. Normally I start watching charts at 5 a.m. my time and so I see price action unfold in real time. Today I left for quite a while and when I returned and looked at the CL chart the breakout pattern jumped out at me. I saw 3 breakout bars and a pullback (starting with the 9:55am bar), an ascending triangle, 3 breakout bars and a pullback (starting with the 11:05am bar), then typical midday narrow range consolidation on low volume, and just then it broke out again, so after the 3rd bar completed, I quickly shorted with my stop at the HOD. Because of the tight stop, I traded 4 lots (nothing like an overnight profit to make one a bit cocky). My target was a tick above the low of the 1:30pm bar because each previous pullback was 40 ticks and I thought I was being rather conservative with my target. Price hit .86 then moved up. I assumed it had found higher support and I moved my stop to the high of the previous 3-min bar. I switched time frames (mistake) instead of just leaving my stop at b/e. Price then dipped to within 1 tick of my original target, but I was already stopped out at .99. A case of micromanaging the trade.
My trading strategy is not bar counts, but a pattern emerged that I saw right away and the way it set up allowed me to very comfortably take a small risk for a potentially significant gain. I really had visions of a breakdown of .80 (there's that bear porn again)
For me, bar counting is akin to card counting at the Blackjack table. It's a powerful strategy if you know what you're looking for. Take measured move for example. Suppose CL moved up 80-ticks to $84.50 in 30 minutes. You intuitively know that the HOD will occur near $85.15. Where do you then anticipate the market would go before another reversal takes place? That's right, $84.35. Once the rally begins in earnest, it should take approximately 30 minutes. But 30 minutes prior to when? Well, that's for another time.
comments on this...click here...Oil PUTS!!!
Look like lotto tickets to me
I thought most traders have a profit target in their mind (of course different traders will have different targets, some may aim at 30ticks, some may aim at 50 ticks, or some may aim at 100ticks) before they initiated a trade, that is why we saw measured move (the magic number, maybe majority traders have that almost the same target in their minds), particularly in the future markets (most are day traders?), of course in the stock markets, in intra-day day charts, it is hard to find those patterns since most players are investors, not traders.
this friday I was watching DEAR, almost buy it in the noon doldum time($3.4~$3.5) (thought it is trending up consolidation from volume drying up/no further going down and strong support), but I do not know where it will shoot to or drop to if wrong. my intuition gave me the number of $4, it is right even I did not count the bar, it seems to me I loved that number and I want that number as my profit target, if I am wrong, I want to got out at the opening price, that is $3.1 around. in hindsight, it is a measured move. from 3.1 to 3.5, about 0.4. from 3.5 to 4, about 0.5, almost the same. unfortunately I did not buy it.
I do not know what kind of profit target here for most crude day traders? to me, my standard PT is 30 ticks(loss per trade is 30 ticks at maximum, if exceeding 30ticks, I may kill the trade),my R/R is 1:1, 100 ticks are home run to me, so most of my gains per trade is around 20ticks to 100ticks, I never gained 100ticks plus since I started to trade crude, but I do lose 80ticks in crude one time(my mind freeze before the move, did not kill the trade since I use mental stop loss). so basically I was chasing those little moves or scalping, or I focus on those little moves, while ignore the session's major moves. I try to move my PT to 60 ticks to 150ticks, I found it is hard, those little 30ticks move are very attractive to me and I need hold hours to realize big PT (that is very boring, I can not sit tight), most time, I end up with 50ticks below even I know there is 100ticks move there. I hope I am able to trade less, aim for big PT.
this friday I was watching DEAR, almost buy it in the noon doldum time($3.4~$3.5) (thought it is trending up consolidation from volume drying up/no further going down and strong support), but I do not know where it will shoot to or drop to if wrong. my intuition gave me the number of $4, it is right even I did not count the bar, it seems to me I loved that number and I want that number as my profit target, if I am wrong, I want to got out at the opening price, that is $3.1 around. in hindsight, it is a measured move. from 3.1 to 3.5, about 0.4. from 3.5 to 4, about 0.5, almost the same. unfortunately I did not buy it.
I do not know what kind of profit target here for most crude day traders? to me, my standard PT is 30 ticks(loss per trade is 30 ticks at maximum, if exceeding 30ticks, I may kill the trade),my R/R is 1:1, 100 ticks are home run to me, so most of my gains per trade is around 20ticks to 100ticks, I never gained 100ticks plus since I started to trade crude, but I do lose 80ticks in crude one time(my mind freeze before the move, did not kill the trade since I use mental stop loss). so basically I was chasing those little moves or scalping, or I focus on those little moves, while ignore the session's major moves. I try to move my PT to 60 ticks to 150ticks, I found it is hard, those little 30ticks move are very attractive to me and I need hold hours to realize big PT (that is very boring, I can not sit tight), most time, I end up with 50ticks below even I know there is 100ticks move there. I hope I am able to trade less, aim for big PT.
C'mon, you know I'm just a money-crazed noob!
Those are all valid points. One of the first things that I was taught as a trader is that you can't demand anything from the market. You must take what the market gives you.
Regardless, I belong to the school of thought that advocates the view that prices don't fluctuate in random. There's an underlying law that governs the price movement from one magnet to another. You can actually see this happening everyday. Prices move from one support to the next; from one resistance to another. To and fro, back and forth.
Hence my aim is not to hit homeruns every time but to anticipate these turning points.
yes, most tutorials taught about "take what the market gives you". but actually this is strongly against most trader's profit-target view. I thought most patterns are driven by trader's PT view.
if someone enters a trade, he/she must have initial thoughts about his PT, otherwise he will not enter it. in reality, you take what you want, while not take what the market gives you, it is impossible to take what the market gives you, that is why we can not catch the market from bottom to top. if most crude day traders use 30ticks as their PT, you will see lots of 30ticks move pattern. because of those PT, the market creates repetitive patterns. to me, I believe lots of time the market is driven by those PTs, but in 10% to 20% time, the market will not follow this since fundamentals suddenly changed like news release or some unpredictable events happens, in that situation, the market will rebalance those PT views, the winner will be shocked and the loser will be shocked too since the market gives the winner more than he wants, while the loser loses more than he wants to lose.
if someone enters a trade, he/she must have initial thoughts about his PT, otherwise he will not enter it. in reality, you take what you want, while not take what the market gives you, it is impossible to take what the market gives you, that is why we can not catch the market from bottom to top. if most crude day traders use 30ticks as their PT, you will see lots of 30ticks move pattern. because of those PT, the market creates repetitive patterns. to me, I believe lots of time the market is driven by those PTs, but in 10% to 20% time, the market will not follow this since fundamentals suddenly changed like news release or some unpredictable events happens, in that situation, the market will rebalance those PT views, the winner will be shocked and the loser will be shocked too since the market gives the winner more than he wants, while the loser loses more than he wants to lose.