jasinhbca's quest for discipline, knowledge & profits

Time sure flies. Been about a month since last update.

I've been doing a little sim trading but mostly working on my revised trading plan. It's taking longer than i expected due to work and life's little interruptions. The attention to detail this plan has also requires more thought and time.

Trying to balance strict rules with the discretionary reading of the market and context is tricky for me. For testing purposes i'd like the rules as unambiguous as possible. Some of my set ups/exits have that, some don't. That's the reality of trading , IMO. Entry triggers and exits have become more defined which will be extremely helpful going forward.

I'm still wrestling mentally with different exits. The balance of greed and fear of missing out on more profit with the accepting what the market is offering. Trailing stops vs targets, scale out or not. And the reminder that it doesn't have to be perfect, just profitable.

I'll post again when i have something worth sharing.
 
The plan is improved but not perfect. Exits still are rough and looking ahead to trading multiple contracts i'm not sure about scaling out.

There has been improvement in results though. (Still trading CL)

It finally set in that It's a Numbers Game. I put together an excel w/s showing various % wins/losses and average win/loss. My goal became to have 40% wins averaging 15 ticks and 60% losses averaging 7 ticks. This provides an edge and seemed quite possible. It made the series of losses easier to accept by keeping in mind the bigger picture of the Numbers Game.

December results came in with 46 % wins and 54% losses. Unfortunately average win was only 6.09. Clearly not a winning strategy.
The review of my trades pointed out the problem i've had since day 1- not holding winners.

With this in mind i resolved to hold winners when PA dictated. By knowing this was my weakness and reminding myself in trades to hold, remembering its a Numbers Game, focusing and doing some diaphragmatic breathing i've seen some improvement. There were a couple trades that were hard to hold yet by staying in paid off well. Still, i have plenty of room for improvement. Today i panicked (why ?) and sold for +4 when i should have held for +25.

Results for January 41.2 % wins, 58.8 % losses. average win 13.93, ave. loss 5.80 Net was 79 ticks on 34 trades.

I'm happy with the results and expect if i can stay focused on improving my trade management i can get better results. Ideally i'd like to get my win % above 45% also.

I still print out my charts everyday and save to jpgs the good ones. I've also started saving to a different folder Questionable trades. Trades where i probably didn't read context correctly. Maybe after some review i can find my weakness or a rule thats helps my set up criteria.

Sometimes i think consistency will be ever elusive then other times i think - it's just a numbers game, hang in there.

how about some charts ?

good day :)

followed by today:( although +7 for day
 

Attachments

Monday after 3 losses in a row i thought i probably should quit for the day. My focus was poor and i was trading in chop. I ended up taking one more loss. In alot of other areas in life we can push through being tired or dig a little deeper to push on. Not the best strategy, for me anyway, to try that in trading.

The interesting thing is we often know the right course of action. Choosing to listen is another thing. That's the discipline so often talked about. I think it's partly a matter of accepting we can't be 100% all the time.

The rest of week went fine. Finished nicely positive.

A couple other things. One, i'm not drinking coffee during trading anymore. I love coffee but i think the caffeine wasn't a good mix.

Two, i mostly enter using stops now. I used to always enter w/ market orders before. It makes quite a difference in being able to, usually, calmly plan your trade then place your orders. Frequently i'll cancel if it doesn't move as expected. This works alot better for me than making quick, reactive decisions to fire off a trade. Once i place an order i can start thinking about possible trade management.

Somewhat off topic. I recently read "Miracle in the Andes" by N. Parrado. Traders around my age probably remember the book in the '70's titled 'Alive" about the rugby team whose plane crashed in the Andes. "Miracle" was written a few years back, 30+ years after the crash, by one of the survivors that hiked out. Absolutely incredible story about survival and perserverance. He writes about the whole ordeal then talks about what he's been doing since, why he wrote the book and what the other survivors ended up doing. Inspiring i thought and a reminder that whatever set backs i may have in trading are minor in the scheme of things and can be overcome with a never give up attitude.

I'm hoping to trade another week or two then expect i'll be too busy with work until late april.

lastly, my wife has been spending alot of free time watching the panda cam. Actually very worth checking out. The little guy is very entertaining.

http://www.sandiegozoo.org/pandacam/

I think that covers everything and then some.
 
Since my last post i only had time to trade 2 more days. Feb 15 was my last trading day. That's more than i traded last year in Feb.

Feb. results : 23 trades. 39 % losing. Net +46 ticks in CL. Average win + 13.67, average loss -5.50

This is two 'months' in a row of profit and the best results i've had, by any metric, since i've started this journal. Best absolute $$ gain, best profit/loss ratio, best mental focus etc.

I would have liked to finish out the month to see if i could have really finished positive. It would've been a nice confidence boost to have two complete months of profit but oh well. I'm happy with the progress.

I'll start trading again in April. First sim then back to live. I need another month of good results then i'll consider increasing to 2 contracts and scaling out. Adding to winning trades is something i will also need to consider.

When i started this journal i didn't want to miss any trading days for fear of missing the next big trade. Now i miss trading simply because it's beginning to be fun. I like the challenge of trying to maintain calm focus, the challenge of reading the context of price action and the reviewing of trade stats and market behavior to find ways to improve.

See you in April.
 
And so the journal continues a bit longer.

First full week of live trading. + 55 ticks ; $ 470 net. All of this comes from thursday trading when i caught a + 84 tick trade in CL. I exited way earlier and should have held for another +40. A trailing stop would have worked well. The exit was based on a channel as well as any excuse to book profits. It was my best trade ever and I was eager to close. The prior week i traded live once and was - 21 ticks.

Today only two trades(-6). Not a great night of sleep and i admit hesistant to give back $ profits and emotional profits from yesterday. Still i like the trades i took. i did miss one trade where i placed an order in the wrong spot so i cancelled it and couldn't get it replaced quick enough. A total of maybe 5 seconds but i missed a nice 15 -20 tick trade.

I felt a bit out of practice this past week so i honestly expect better results going forward.

Most of my progress has come from focusing on my weaknesses. A current issue i have is when i become slightly positive on the day, especially after being down, i usually stop trading. That happened tuesday. Trades i saw and should have taken i passed on. I'll be working on that by simply accepting that i will have to take trades which may result in going back negative for the day. If i can do that now , continue to take trades, it will make me a better trader in the long run.

Another goal is to add to a winner. This month i have to add to at least two trades.

I think i tend to under trade. Possibly a confidence issue. Ill be thinking about that.

Have a great week end traders !

ps Did i mention i had my best trade ever ? i was rather excited. :D
 
Thanks Hooti ! I hope your trading is going well. oh, BTW that big win was off an Elliot wave set up. I don't take those too often but this was a count i couldn't pass up. Let me know if you want to see it.

.................

Lately I've been reading “ Subliminal. How your unconscious mind rules your behavior” by Leonard Mlodinow. Most of what I read are books that I hope will somehow improve my trading. (Except for The Hunger Games a while back which a friend recommended and I quite enjoyed). Well, I think I found a little nugget that could be helpful.

In chapter 8 Mlodinow discusses In & Out Groups. Humans have evolved with an 'us versus them' mentality. Historically, our family or living group (In group) must be ready to fight outside groups for scarce resources. Within our living groups are other in and out groups. Our nationality, ethnicity, sports team we play on, our career etc can all create an In group/ Out group mindset. Based on whether a person is in our group or out of our group will affect how we feel about them. But more importantly our perception of ourselves and our actions can be affected by the group we feel we belong to.

A Harvard study gave a math test to groups of Asian American Women. “These Asian American Women were members of two In groups with conflicting norms: they were Asian, a group identified with being good at math, and they were women, a group identified as being poor at it.” The women were 'primed' by giving them a questionnaire prior to the test. One group was asked about their family, the languages they spoke, questions that would make them identify with being Asian. Another group was asked about co-ed dorms and questions that would make them identify with being a women. A third control group was asked about phone and cable services.

The women primed to identify as Asian did the best, the control group performed second best and the women who were reminded of their female In group did the worst. Their performance had been subliminally affected.

Another study was done in Petrified Forest National Park. “.. researchers created a sign condemning the fact that many visitors steal wood” from the forest. When the sign was up 8% of the visitors stole wood. When the sign was not up only 3% stole. Subliminally, visitors were hearing (reading) that the group norm for 'visitors' was to steal and since they were in that group they became more likely to do so.

OK so what's this have to do with trading ?

I identify myself as being in the In Group called “Traders”. What's the one thing we know about traders ? Exactly ! 90 % of traders lose ! Holy smokes does that mean that for me to belong to the group I have to lose ? Is that what my subconscious is hearing ? I don't know but I think it's possible.

This is what I will be doing. On an index card I will write then read every day “100 % of traders who review their trades are consistently profitable”. Really ? That's me ! I review all my trades therefore I must be in the group of consistently profitable traders.

Will this work ? Again I don't know but I’m certain it won't hurt.

The Mlodinow book is an interesting and easy read. The author has a good sense of humor. And “Catching Fire” is on my Kindle waiting to be read.
 
I had a time also when I thought losing was just to be expected, part of the price you paid to learn.

Then NoD started talking about having losing trades but... when she followed her rules... which you might call reviewing your trades (before you place them!)... she said she basically had no losing days.
No losing days is a very realistic goal.

My latest bump up in quality of trading came from considering Xspurts observation that when he trained people, one of the commonalities was that they would start by saying what kind of trader they were and how they would trade. After watching them trade for a day he'd ask them if they traded the way they had said. They said 'yes' and totally thought they did. But he observed they were not doing what they were thinking and saying they had done.

I hope I am representing what he said rightly. At any rate, I started looking for places I was not doing what I thought I was. Which is an odd thing to do! I finally found some, and my trading improved immediately. Tho what I was doing.. that I didn't think I was... had become a habit, and changing that is much harder than it would appear, even with awareness.

In terms of 'reviewing their trade' I'm not sure if you mean before or after placing it? Sounds like before. I totally agree. The process of reading the market, deciding what it means, looking for valid reasons to pass... also if it doesn't do the expected, to reverse. Continuing the process with placing an order and trade management. This 'process' is far more important than the setup itself. If I skip any part of it, pffft, the trade becomes an amature thing and the data from it is meaningless. There is really nothing to learn from these trades, IMO, but to become professional and create data that you can learn from.

It was recognizing that my data was not useful that made my ear perk up when Xspurt make his observation about traders he mentored. His POV on it and way of describing it was very helpful.

I do EWT also, think I know where you were. Tho I don't always catch them! And the counts and fibs lately are not lining up as nicely as sometimes. All the best
 
Excellent piece

Thanks


Quote from Hooti:

I had a time also when I thought losing was just to be expected, part of the price you paid to learn.

Then NoD started talking about having losing trades but... when she followed her rules... which you might call reviewing your trades (before you place them!)... she said she basically had no losing days.
No losing days is a very realistic goal.

My latest bump up in quality of trading came from considering Xspurts observation that when he trained people, one of the commonalities was that they would start by saying what kind of trader they were and how they would trade. After watching them trade for a day he'd ask them if they traded the way they had said. They said 'yes' and totally thought they did. But he observed they were not doing what they were thinking and saying they had done.

I hope I am representing what he said rightly. At any rate, I started looking for places I was not doing what I thought I was. Which is an odd thing to do! I finally found some, and my trading improved immediately. Tho what I was doing.. that I didn't think I was... had become a habit, and changing that is much harder than it would appear, even with awareness.

In terms of 'reviewing their trade' I'm not sure if you mean before or after placing it? Sounds like before. I totally agree. The process of reading the market, deciding what it means, looking for valid reasons to pass... also if it doesn't do the expected, to reverse. Continuing the process with placing an order and trade management. This 'process' is far more important than the setup itself. If I skip any part of it, pffft, the trade becomes an amature thing and the data from it is meaningless. There is really nothing to learn from these trades, IMO, but to become professional and create data that you can learn from.

It was recognizing that my data was not useful that made my ear perk up when Xspurt make his observation about traders he mentored. His POV on it and way of describing it was very helpful.

I do EWT also, think I know where you were. Tho I don't always catch them! And the counts and fibs lately are not lining up as nicely as sometimes. All the best
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