kserra's emini trades

Did not trade at all yesterday, and today made the mistake of still trying to trade the december contract, kept thinking wow where is everyone today ?

Remember these trades are taken from the december chart

Trade #1 Long @ 1071.5, stop @ 1070.25, Cover @ 1072.00 + .5 pts

11:10 This trade was taken off of a good signal, price went up pretty good at first but then began chopping around for about twenty minutes before I decided to get out. There was serious support at 1071 but I decided that I was bored and wanted to get out with a profit, would have been better just to set a stop right below 1071 and walk away if I had wanted patience however I felt I had stayed in this trade long enough and it showed me that it was not going anywhere for a little while.

Trade #2 Short @ 1071.5, stop @ 1072.00, cover @ 1072.5 -1 pt

11:55 This trade was taken off of what at the time of the trade was a valid crossover with the MACD pointing down. This trade proved me wrong faster than I could get out of it.

Profit/Loss for day: -.5pts

Overall Profit/Loss: 35.25 pts


 
Compare the two contracts, the march had a volume of around 700K while the december had a volume of less than 150K. I would rather trade where the volume is at.
 
The only real difference in the december and march contract is that the december will track more closely and closer to the actual S&P. Just make sure your trading the same thing your charting! (if like me you use one system for charting and a different one to trade.)
 
This week it looks like I wont be trading, unless someone is willing to take my finals for me. Will continue as schedule probably next week.
 
Trade for 12-17-03

So originally I said I was not going to trade this week however today I came home to see a perfect setup occuring right before my eyes, so I decided to take the trade. After I took the trade the market was not doing much so I decided to stop for the day.

Trade #1 long @ 1070.5 , Stop @ 1069.5 , Cover @ 1071.75 , +1.25 pts

10:43 Took this trade and not much was happening marketwise, right after I took it the MAs did a bounce, instead of ditching the trade I pulled my stop in tight to the 1070 level until the MAs recrossed, this way if the bounce was for real I would get out with a small loss, however I thought that the bounce was a psyche out move turned out I was right as the averages crossed back over. Once the averages crossed back over I moved my stop back to 1069.5, the trade took a really really long time to play out so I had to be patient and was. after about 15 minutes the trade really started to pan out, I trailed a stop 1 point behind the high (this stop was equal to my original) when my profit target was reached (1071.5) I trailed a stop by .5, when this was hit I got out of the trade. Overall this was a really good trade on my part and I am happy with the results. The only thing I wished for was more contracts to play with so that I could have moved my stop to breakeven while waiting to see if the price was merely pulling back or actually turning around.

Tomorrow I will not be trading, but may trade friday.

Small range today really sucked and made it hard to pull in points, I am unfamiliar with pre-holiday trading, is the small range a function of the holidays closing in upon us combined with the fact that ranges have been small anyways? Historically what is trading like during the christmas/new years season ?


Profit/Loss for day: 1.25 pts

Overall Profit/Loss: 36.5 pts
 

Attachments

kserra, there's no way to ask this without sounding rude, but I am curious why don't you show ALL the trades your system triggers? It seems like you show the ones that work. It isn't hard to look at a chart in hindight and pick the ones that worked. I don't know how this thread has survived so long. People must really like seeing charts of someone that says they are doing well. I guess you are keeping the hope alive.

If you really want to have a useful journal stop cherry picking the trades and using arbitrary exits. Use something consistent and then show the results.
 
Quote from voodster:

kserra, there's no way to ask this without sounding rude, but I am curious why don't you show ALL the trades your system triggers? It seems like you show the ones that work. It isn't hard to look at a chart in hindight and pick the ones that worked. I don't know how this thread has survived so long. People must really like seeing charts of someone that says they are doing well. I guess you are keeping the hope alive.

If you really want to have a useful journal stop cherry picking the trades and using arbitrary exits. Use something consistent and then show the results.
More...

I show all of the trades that I have taken for the day. If I was not awake to take a setup or not around, why would I post the trade ? I do not trade from about 9-10:30 and therefore never take any trades during this time period.

So on friday if I had traded all of the setups that occured according to what I have just posted, I would have taken seven setups, trading this mechanically at a 1:1 r2r would have yielded the following:

trade #1: 7:10 long @ 1087.75, stop @ 1086.25, sell @ 1089.5 +1.5 pts

trade #2: 8:05 short @ 1087.75, stop @ 1088.75, cover and reverse @ 1088.25 because of new crossover - .5 pts

trade #3:8:15 long @ 1088. 25, stop @ 1087.75, sell @ 1088.75 +.5 pts

trade #4: 8:30 short @ 1088.5, stop @ 1090.00, cover @ 1086.00 +1.5 pts

no trades through lunch

trade #5: 10:55 long @ 1084.5, stop @ 1083.5, sell @ 1083.5 stop @ reverse -1 pts

trade #6: 11:05 short @ 1083.5 from stop and reverse, stop @ 1084.25, cover @ 1082.75, +.75 pts

trade #7: 11:25 long @ 1084, stop @ 1083.00, sell @ 1085, +1 pt

profit on the day 3.75

this is only an example of one day, however from my research this is a pretty typical day (although a few more trades than normal), even though this is a small sample size there is some proof here that shows you can be profitable with this method trading it purely mechanically, a lot of the moves are parabolic moves where I likely would have held out for slightly more gain on the trade.

I have nothing to lose by posting losing trades, in fact it is probably the area where I can learn the most about myself as a person and trader. I am usually the most anxious to post my winning trades so that I can gain some insight into the mistakes I may have made. I also tend to write the most about losing trades, as most winners tend to speak for themselves.

My trades do not have arbitrary exits. I always look to get at least a 1:1 r2r on the trade I am in, once I reach the 1:1 area for an exit, I consider what price is currently doing, if we are in the midst of a parabolic move and price is doing nothing but going in my favor, I am going to stick around for as much of the move as I can get. This is not 100% mechanical, but it seems to be working for me.

I am not offended to your comments about why every trade triggered is not featured on the chart, however your accusation that I am cherry picking my trades seems uncalled for. I have nothing to gain by not posting all of my trades including my winners and losers. The reason I started this journal is so I could learn from my mistakes and hopefully get some input from others in the process.
 
So have you started to trade live yet? Its a completely different world trading funny money than your own. Emotions dominant the markets and that is a huge factor that you haven't been having to deal with yet. I think that you'll find trying to control and manage your thoughts and emotions during the heat of the battle is going to be more important than all your moving averages and TA; all the moving averages and TA in the futures are just peoples perception or emotions in a mathematical equation. So get some live trades on and receive some real money in your account. You can do it. :)


Dominic
 
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