CLA - Price Action Journal (SLA)

I had come to believe that I had seen it all technically wise in trading.
In order not to stay be blasé from the technical side, I was curious to see
if I could be proved wrong: that indeed there was something new under the sun.
So please , tell us more.
 
The reason I'm trading part-time is that I don't want to be involved too much. Trading is a individual endeavor and one has to go through the process to get it. So keep in mind that in all likelihood my input is going to be sparing. I have recently begun to found my own footing and don't know how much energy I have to try to figure things out for other traders. I have my threads where I post already.

You're going ahead with forward testing but have you OBSERVED price for some time without regards to entry/exit signals? Have you observed the difference in price behavior between ES and NQ? It would be better to do that first. How you do things and what you trade is your personal matter. There are many who are profitable traders and trade CL or FX. I am not one of them.

As for NQ or ES, I prefer NQ. One can always use more contracts to increase stake. ES has smaller moves whereas for the same swing NQ has a larger point move. This larger move makes it easier to read the tussle between supply and demand that's the basis for all this SLA method. For learning purposes I just trained on NQ instead of complicating things further. Most illustrations by Db were also in it so I took the easy route.

You seem to understand lines breaks and retracements but it seems you're not in tune with the context. A retracement isn't taking place just about anywhere. Wait for some major S/R or TC top or bottom before you start using the lines for entry. Every wiggle isn't a retracement or a line break. Does CL respect retracements? Just because Db wrote that's how it worked on NQ doesn't mean CL is a vehicle that behaves in a manner conducive for it. In CL retracements might give faulty signals or may take place a few times before price goes in the intended direction. These are the kinds of things you need to keep an eye on if you're to trade CL, or ES, or anything else.

I wish you all the best.

Gringo


Gringo, thanks for your advices I´m going to keep them in mind, and try to observe the price and the behavior of each market in order to start my own procces



Lajax, the market will tell you what you need to know if you listen to it.
I assume you're in the process of characterizing your market. If so, you may be discovering that it's not the right market for you. This is not a tragedy. There are many markets to trade. You just have to find the one that will enable you to reach your goals.

Db, thanks for your words and let me tell you that you have a great work and I admire it, is a privilege that you post in my thread, I hope you could keep me helping in this journey.

About this thread for the moment I´m going to continue with the forward testing until I get the 100 trades in order to have more information to conclude about this market and maybe move forward with the NQ
 
You don't need forward testing to figure the nature of the market out. You can do back testing to see how the market behaved.
 
While I don't want to discourage you, until you've characterized your market (Appendix E), there's nothing to test, much less trade. You can draw lines and play-trade for years and end up with nothing.

I suggest you begin posting charts along with your observations of what traders are doing without drawing any lines at all. Don't even think about your own entries and exits. Without a trading plan, you have nothing to trade. Without testing, you have no trading plan. Without observation and characterization, there's nothing to test.
 
You don't need forward testing to figure the nature of the market out. You can do back testing to see how the market behaved.

While I don't want to discourage you, until you've characterized your market (Appendix E), there's nothing to test, much less trade. You can draw lines and play-trade for years and end up with nothing.

I suggest you begin posting charts along with your observations of what traders are doing without drawing any lines at all. Don't even think about your own entries and exits. Without a trading plan, you have nothing to trade. Without testing, you have no trading plan. Without observation and characterization, there's nothing to test.


In order to start with the process of characterization and observation, I will show you my work for the 18th of February, and the way how I read the price from the point of view of buyers and sellers. If you have any comment about it, please let me know. I also let the Image in blank (attached) if you want to give me an example of how you would analyze this day without regarding about entries and exits.

I also want to mention that I had already noticed that 3 hours is enough time for me before lose the focus, so that´s the reason why I choose the trading time between (9 am – 12 m) (I apologize in advance for my English is not my native language).


CL 04-14 (1 Min)  18_02_2014.png



At the open: The Price Spike with the highest volume of the all day (retrospective) (1.752)

First 10 minutes: Great activity and movement, and the incapability to give the confirmation of a retracement, situation that didn’t define the direction of the market

Second 10 minutes: The price tries to go to the down side but is listless and end up on a little range

Third 10 minutes: The price continues on a range of 8 ticks

In retrospective the period of time analyzed (9 am- 12 m), was frame into a conjunction of a range and Hinges of different seizes with fake break outs; situation that create a volatile environment in the market.


I also have a question... would it be the same,try to understand the nature of the CL eleven months ago when the macro context was a channel, and now, when the price is out of this channel on a downtrend? what do you think about it?
 

Attachments

  • CL 04-14 (1 Min)  18_02_2014 blank.jpg
    CL 04-14 (1 Min) 18_02_2014 blank.jpg
    74.7 KB · Views: 48
Last edited:
If you can continue to analyze charts in this way, you will have made a good beginning. Once you've done what you believe is a sufficient number, begin analyzing them in the same way via replay, i.e., without knowing what's going to happen next. If you are satisfied with your work in that step, then you can begin backtesting, which is where entrances and exits come in. The observation phase needn't take long depending on whether or not you can avoid thinking about how you would trade what you're looking at. If you can't avoid thinking about it, the task will take longer. Perhaps months. Even years.

As to the macro, it will be necessary at some point, but it isn't necessary for the observation. You can pick any day at random and play it. Via replay you can do several sessions in one day.

If you need a guide, there is only one person who is pursuing this who is going through the observation phase (finally). While he isn't doing it exactly as I would (too many lines), there is no one way to do it. The objective is to understand behavior; not everyone is going to meet that objective the same way in the same amount of time. If you're interested in his work, begin here: http://www.elitetrader.com/et/index...ce-action-via-sla.282101/page-21#post-4070878. If you benefit from what he's doing, it wouldn't be a bad idea for the two of you to talk to each other.
 
1 minute chart?!! Are you serious? ! Your just trading noise, do you even know what this is doing on the more dominant time frame?
 
Back
Top