How do you know when to stop trading for the day??

[Fangdog]

gimp570

I think everyone has experienced what you are experiencing. I finally came to a point where I had to let the market determine what I do as opposed what I wanted it to do. I developed a technique whereby my trades are market driven and not bias driven. It is a mistake to have a profit goal because it is what you want and not what the market gives you.

My profit varies from day to day and I stopped looking at as dollars. I simply accumulate points. At the end of the day I add the points and what ever the accumulation it is my profit for the day. some days they are big and some days they are small, but I don't care as long as it ends a profit big or small.

 

[CaliforniaKid23]

Quote from increasenow:

how do you trade with the ADX?

i used to place orders when the market just kept going sideways. so i wrote myself a rule that i won't place any new orders if ADX is below 20. but ADX seems like a lagging indicator, so i use it with other indicators like MACD.

but read up and experiment with ADX, then see if it fits your trading style.

 

[ManhattanTrader]

when I start worrying about my trades it's usually time to call it a day

 

[trader_david]

if I had loss exceeding my tolerance level, in my early trading career, I follow "stop trading a while" wisedom. but I find that problem will always haunt me, create a vicious ciecle. "recoup my loss" idea after a break becomes even stronger, it seems the next morning the first thing I want to do is "kill the market and take my money back" and I feel very angry, often created more loss because of this emotional thing.

so I told myself "in order to be a successful trade, I must trade under the fire, even with loss moutained", after several time of tough trading, now I feel verey confident about loss. if in the morning I was down a lot, I just trade as normal even heavily, most times, I came out of woods in closing and I feel I am in the zone without any fear and any greed, recouped my loss and even gained lot in the afternoon and feel I won the market, all those angers are gone and I get great sleep. next morning when I wake up, I will feel I am ready to fight another war and very confident to win the war. finally I feel I am in the right track.

do not follow traditional wisedom, you must pass this obstacle then you can rise into a successful consistent trader

 

[piezoe]

I judge the character of the market from price, volume and the market internals. When the market is not to my liking i don't trade. Often i quit by 11:30 est, but when do i, i will often as not come back and take another look at around 1:30 to 2pm est. Sometimes i'll be expecting a move near the close, and i'll just wait around to see if it is going to pan out and present another opportunity. If i see opportunities i am inclined to take them, but on the other hand, if i have something i want to do i just leave for the day.

Often i will review the whole days action in the evening and see where i would have had good opportunities had i stuck around. But it doesn't bother me in the least. There is always another train leaving the station. After years of observing the market i seem to have developed a sixth sense with regard to what is likely to happen. Its paid off handsomely. I am a far better trader now than when i began, but i never did lose a really large amount of money when i was learning. I must of had luck on my side, because it was definitely not skill that saved me. Of course i made all the usual mistakes, except the big one -- blowing out my account.
I'm not sure who first pointed out in these forums that there was essentially no barrier to getting involved in trading. (Maybe it was Austinp??) But i think that explains very nicely why so few traders succeed in the long run. Any one with a few bucks can try it, but i think few start out understanding how much knowledge, and skill is required to trade well consistently. It may seem easy once you have learned how, but it is certainly not easy to learn. It takes nearly all really good traders a long, long time to master the art of trading well. Many who try trading become discouraged and quit before they reach the point where they can consistently turn a profit, and i suppose there are even some who could, for whatever reason, never become good traders no matter how hard they tried. I'm satisfied with my trading now, but i try to stay constantly on guard against becoming overconfident or complacent. I have never agreed with those many ET posters who say trading is simple.

 

[NihabaAshi]

Quote from gimp570:

...I just don't seem to have the discipline to walk away from a losing day...

How do you recognize when you are losing control of you emotions and walk away from the computer when you are having a down day?

Any help or info is greatly appreciated

cheers

z

Quote from gimp570:

well a good reason to stop trading for the day is bad days usually get worse....when you are not trading well its cheaper to just quit,, regroup and live to fight another day

The above first quote states that you don't have the discipline to walk away when you are losing.

The second quote above states that you know what happens when you don't walk away when losing.

What's really going on in your trading or the environment (your surroundings) that you're not revealing???

Resolve what's causing your discipline problems (stuff you don't talk about) and you'll be ahead of most.

Mark

 

[Warrior4g]

i usually quit when the hooker rings my doorbell.
seriously,if i am up a nice amount,i walk away no matter what.,

 

[target0]

I have a number that I won't exceed for a day in loses. I also have a daily goal that when I reach it, I protect gains. It took me a long time to figure it out, but once I did, this problem became very clear. I used think to myself, if I just had those 2 big loss days a month back, it would have been a pretty good month. I found that while it was true that sometimes I would come back from a big loss, the norm was that it just became bigger. So I put a do not exceed number on it, stopped caring how it happens, and just shut it down if I get there. I feel much better actually knowing what the worst that can happen is.

 

[gimp570]

Quote from target0:

I have a number that I won't exceed for a day in loses. I also have a daily goal that when I reach it, I protect gains. It took me a long time to figure it out, but once I did, this problem became very clear. I used think to myself, if I just had those 2 big loss days a month back, it would have been a pretty good month. I found that while it was true that sometimes I would come back from a big loss, the norm was that it just became bigger. So I put a do not exceed number on it, stopped caring how it happens, and just shut it down if I get there. I feel much better actually knowing what the worst that can happen is.

great advise...this will also help with the brutal swings that come with trading...its better to just nickel and dime em everyday then to have big up and BIG down days...makes it much easier to sleep at night also......slow and steady wins the race...who needs the stress of going for homeruns when one can make just as much money with MUCH less stress just keeping it simple and making money slow and steady

 

[kiwi_trader]

I follow targets strategy but also have a break if I make two critical errors in a day. What the errors are has varied over time but I find that if I make two then the probability has been that the day will continue poorly.

I like trading so its also a built in punishment.