My First Journal

Today was interesting. Yesterday's problems were still present, but they weren't as acute. I'm getting a handle on some of them...TAKE YOUR LOSSES is still the hardest one, but while I did get stopped out a few times, I took my losses a lot of the time. Not perfect yet, but its improving.

I'm doing some testing of my stop strategy right now. Seeing when they kick in and out etc. I'm also considering changing time tables a little bit.
Today wasn't very profitable, at all, but its an improvement over yesterday's fiasco.

results= +1.75 points

5 days trading +15 points
 

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I'm changing things up a little bit. I will be using a longer time frame, with a larger profit target. I will be widening my stops, but not by much.
 
Quote from jonbig04:

4th day of trading=1st losing day. Damnit.

The reasons I lost today are many, but the awesome thing about trading is that its only yourself that you have to change.

1.Trading too much. Instead of waiting patiently for the optimum entry points, I pushed it. I wanted to make something out of every move. It was greed in a form i wasn't prepared to deal with. Its covered now though.

2. My stops. My trailing stop was too close. Looking back i was in early on some large (8-10 point) moves, however i was only able to capture 1.5-2 of those points. I can't have it all, but I should be locking in more profits then that when I am right,

3. Revenge trading. Internally I was trading with one thing on my mind: making back my losses. I need to make every trade completely independent of the last, regardless of its outcome.


I am going to set a limit on how many trades I can do per day. I'm not sure what it is yet, but I will think on it. My stops will also be adjusted. Tomorrow is a new day, however I sure didn't like ending the day with a loss...sucked.

today's result: -6 points :(

4 day's trading results= +13.25 give or take.
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Jon,

Congrats on having accurately identified three of the most common trading mistakes in your trading. Now the real challenge is not to repeat them :p

Donna
 
Quote from NoDoji:

Jon,

Congrats on having accurately identified three of the most common trading mistakes in your trading. Now the real challenge is not to repeat them :p

Donna
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haha how right you are.
 
My head was clearer today. I realized..I don't HAVE to trade. I was resolved not to take any trades if I couldn't see any.

I saw one trade and almost took it...but I wasn't sure. Turns it wouldn't have been a great move anyway. So I waited. I found one that I liked. I came within 4 ticks of being stopped out, but I was trying to watch to see if the situation I recognized was changing. It wasn't, so i held on. Thankfully that one trade made me 5.75 points. That's probably the only trade I'm going to take today.

I need to do some calculations and figure out what commish/fees is going to cost as was suggested.

Thanks for the input, all.
 

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So it looks like I've racked up around $330 in commissions so far. Ouch.:(

Depending on how many contracts I was trading, that takes a decent or insanely large chunk of profit.

Here's the break down depending on contracts traded minus commish:

Profit for week 1

Trading 1 contract= $80
Trading 2 contracts= $479
Trading 3 contracts= $910
Trading 4 contracts=$1,325
Trading 5 contracts=$1,740

This isn't entirely accurate as there are of course multiple tiers of commish costs, but it just to give me an idea.


Either way from now on my trading will be further limited to 10 trades per day...another great lesson learned from fake money trading.

This also gets me thinking about how many contracts I should trade whenever I do go live....only 1 is very expensive on a commission per tic basis.

I also need to find out what ninja costs per month, anyone happen to know of the top of their head?

Hope you all are having a fun week end. I will be at home with NQ charts...
 
Hey jonbig04...great thread...IT BLOWS MINE AWAY!!!...seriously...great job on your trading...my biggest challenges have also been overtrading and REVENGE trading...I need to become so disciplined that if "such and such" happens I trade no more for the day or do not trade at all...go for it...IncreaseNow
 
Quote from increasenow:

Hey jonbig04...great thread...IT BLOWS MINE AWAY!!!...seriously...great job on your trading...my biggest challenges have also been overtrading and REVENGE trading...I need to become so disciplined that if "such and such" happens I trade no more for the day or do not trade at all...go for it...IncreaseNow
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Thanks bro. My profit statement from above is way off, I misunderstood the commission structure. I have been learning a lot of lessons as well, but that's what practice is for.
 
Quote from jonbig04:

Thanks bro. My profit statement from above is way off, I misunderstood the commission structure. I have been learning a lot of lessons as well, but that's what practice is for.
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when you say "practice" do you mean paper trading?...I thought you were trading real/live money?...are you fulltime trading or working another job and trading on the side?
 
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