My Wyckoff journal
- Thread starter damnpenguins
- Start date
cheers.
This first setup is based more on balancing markets and AMT. Trending markets and SLA style entries will be tested and integrated later
I focussed more on range based entries as reversals jumped out at me the most when I did the 100 ranges exercise.
I thought it best to focus on the one setup.
The aim being to get to the point where I immediately recognise the entry criteria and execute the trade.
This first setup is based more on balancing markets and AMT. Trending markets and SLA style entries will be tested and integrated later
I focussed more on range based entries as reversals jumped out at me the most when I did the 100 ranges exercise.
I thought it best to focus on the one setup.
The aim being to get to the point where I immediately recognise the entry criteria and execute the trade.
Blown away by this post. Particularly after having spent the weekend working through "Trading in the Zone" - Thankyou NoDoji.
This is printed out and put in my regular reading folder.
Another update -
I've been demo and sim forward testing my trade plan, and have added another entry type for trending moves. Not specifically SLA but close to it. Kind of a mix between SLA and The simple Price Action approach thread Metal started years ago.
I have about 300 entries documented. I'm not massively happy with that as a sample size - its not great but it is a decent start. I have roughly 120 of those reviewed and 20 or so screen recorded as examples. I watch a couple of those each day prior to starting so the entry sequence is fresh in my mind.
Anyway - the stats are coming out pretty much the same as my first pass - aside from one anomaly....
My average trades per day has risen from 4 trades per day to over 7 with pretty much the same win / loss for this out of sample run.
I have to say that I'm surprised at the jump in total entries...
I've been demo and sim forward testing my trade plan, and have added another entry type for trending moves. Not specifically SLA but close to it. Kind of a mix between SLA and The simple Price Action approach thread Metal started years ago.
I have about 300 entries documented. I'm not massively happy with that as a sample size - its not great but it is a decent start. I have roughly 120 of those reviewed and 20 or so screen recorded as examples. I watch a couple of those each day prior to starting so the entry sequence is fresh in my mind.
Anyway - the stats are coming out pretty much the same as my first pass - aside from one anomaly....
My average trades per day has risen from 4 trades per day to over 7 with pretty much the same win / loss for this out of sample run.
I have to say that I'm surprised at the jump in total entries...
addendum -
I'll be making the switch to live trading in the next week or two.
The focus will be on Mark Douglas' 20 Trade exercise to begin with.
I could be doing this in demo etc but in all honesty I feel I have to do it with money on the line to get full value out of the exercise.
Putting live trades on is where the hard work will really start no doubt.
So there you go..... all up to date now
Just wanted to say too that I've also been reading NoDoji's journal and been getting a lot out of her thread. So inspired by her honesty and transparency. Because of that great example I'll be posting my results on a daily basis.
I'll be making the switch to live trading in the next week or two.
The focus will be on Mark Douglas' 20 Trade exercise to begin with.
I could be doing this in demo etc but in all honesty I feel I have to do it with money on the line to get full value out of the exercise.
Putting live trades on is where the hard work will really start no doubt.
So there you go..... all up to date now
Just wanted to say too that I've also been reading NoDoji's journal and been getting a lot out of her thread. So inspired by her honesty and transparency. Because of that great example I'll be posting my results on a daily basis.
Unfortunately, based on the first dozen charts he posted, he falls into the same trap as just about everyone else who trades price. Whether he does this in his attempts to explain it or does it in his own trading is unknowable. Either way, the charts soon illustrate the elaborate and complex matrices that so many PATs come up with, whether out of fear or because they at bottom don't truly understand what they're looking at. And the questions are the usual: where do I enter? where do I exit? where should I put my stop? how do I draw these lines/channels?
As I wrote long ago in "Trading By Price", trading price requires a conceptual and perceptual shift. Most can't do it. But even many or most of those who do never get away from bars and candles and intervals (1t, 200t 1600t, 1m, 5m, 3m, whatever) and opens and closes and lines and channels and so on infinitum. They never understand that neither entries nor exits nor any of the rest of it matter. What is most important to the PAT, or the SLAyer, is price flow. Not order flow. Price flow. If one is in synch with price flow, then the most important question -- if not the only question -- to be answered is Do I Want to Be in This Trade? If the trader can't answer the question, then he should pass on the trade, or on what appears to be a trade. Giving an exact entry is impossible as exact entries are in a continuous state of flux, as are exact exits. And the attacks on PA trading come from those to whom none of this makes any sense whatsoever, usually the results of never having actually studied the market itself, choosing instead to study books and blogs and message boards and newsletters and so forth.
It is informative to note that none of the pioneers of trading price -- including but not limited to Wyckoff -- ever gave exact entries or exact exits or exact stops. This has for decades been a source of unending frustration to traders who want to learn how to do this but aren't willing to put in the time required for study, hence the untold number of books, etc. And so they decide that it's all nonsense. And perhaps that's all to the good.
No you don't. It's hard to explain the use of sim to traders who are newer. I made the mistake of going live straight and paid dearly. The money isn't the problem. What's dangerous and most harmful to progress is the ingrained fear that gets etched into the mind.
We are what we repeatedly do. What we do is a product of our habits. Our habits are created when we do small things repeatedly. We do small things repeatedly when we learn to associate an action with a cue (Cue -> Habit -> Reward). Fixing bad habits is a lot harder than building correct habits. And the old patterns are not entirely gone. They do get replaced with better habits but are lurking in the dark. Remember an alcoholic avoiding drink for 10 years. That person is still an alcoholic despite not having had a drink all this time.
If you wish to build correct habits, practice with no pressure. Your mechanically doing the correct thing will not yield much emotional response but behind the scenes will be creating neural pathways that turn into correct habits. Later when you move to live trading you'll be repeating the same actions with added emotion, but with the correct habit already in place it would be so much easier to do the right thing, despite having the added pressure of real money being on the line.
Please see this video (at 1.25x speed). It might save you the trouble of fixing bad habits which I can assure you is not a path you want to take. Also read The Power of Habit. This one will tell you how to fix the bad habits (Cue -> Habit -> Reward).
The best thing is not to have to deal with bad habits. Just build better habits from the start and you'll be miles and miles ahead of everyone else. It's not the knowledge that we lack, but rather the habits to use that knowledge according to our plans.
Wish you all the best.
Gringo
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This is largely the point I've tried to get across over the years with regard to observation, but I can count on the fingers of one hand -- with fingers left over -- those who have actually done it. The whole concept of watching price and how it moves and how and where and when it slows and stalls and reverses without any consideration of any kind of where to enter is so foreign to traders, beginning and otherwise, that it may as well be a foreign language (though I suppose in many ways it is). One can explain via hindsight charts, whether static or replay, what to look for and what this or that means in terms of trader behavior, but even if one puts all the trolls on Ignore there is a threshold that must be crossed in order for the big Ah-Ha! moment to occur. Given that children are able to do this easily suggests that the chief reason why adults rarely can has to do with all the mess in their heads. How to get past all that, or through it, is a quandary.
Water, Helen. Water.
Water, Helen. Water.
Absolutely correct. You can never learn to trade successfully unless you get in and do it for real and have real losses. No amount of backtesting or sim will prepare you to trade correctly. In fact, spending too much time "practicing" is a waste of time and you will develop bad habits, like curve fitting and skipping accountability. Practice is next to worthless.