New to futures, first post, many questions!

L

LuserName

Hey guys, I'm fairly new to the world of futures and so far I'm liking what I'm seeing; my chart setups seem to be working pretty well, so far. This leaves me at my first question though ...

How many contracts can one take on per trade without running into liquidity and slippage issues? Of course, I plan to start off really slow, but eventually, as my account grows in the long term, so will the number of contracts per trade, and I don't want to have to do all this work to find out that what I had been trading cannot handle my account growth.

I'm currently looking to trade the ES and CL. Is there a threshold for contracts traded for scalping/daytrading and one for swing trades?

I've heard of people taking on over 50 contracts for day trades on the ES, but how often can this be done? I'm looking to take just 2-3 points at a time (or more during runners), is a 50 (or even 10, for that matter) contract trade too high to do consistently?

What about on the CL? I know ES is supposed to be far more liquid so where does that leave CL when the object is to trade for 10 cents (or better during runners) at a time, can the CL be traded with 10-15 contracts consistently for 10 cent moves without issues?

Basically, what are the thresholds?

Thank you in advance!
 
ES can pretty much handle anything you throw at it. If liquidity becomes an issue for you with ES, we should all have your problems.

CL/GC are another story, Slippage can be quite painful at times. CL/$.10 consistently? a bit more difficult,

You may want to spend some time on the search function, AMMO and/or NODOJI + CL to get an idea,
 
LuserName said:
----How many contracts can one take on per trade without running into liquidity and slippage issues?
----don't want to have to do all this work to find out that what I had been trading cannot handle my account growth.
----50 contracts for day trades on the ES....
----looking to take just 2-3 points at a time....
----where does that leave CL when the object is to trade for 10 cents...
----can the CL be traded with 10-15 contracts....
More...
1) It varies ..... it depends. Your position size with respect to what is shown on the price ladder will have a lot to do with it. :)
2) Slippage can occur in either market though it's more likely with crude oil. :eek:
3) With crude oil, you have to be willing to be content with smaller profits taken with a trailing stop-order instead of being filled with a limit-order 10 ticks away from your entry price. Otherwise, you're vulnerable to frequent losses. If the 10-tick target is "hard", you'll be missing out on larger profits that will make up for the losses. :(
4) Start with 1-lots and get accustomed to the randomness/sloppiness/algo-ness of each market and make adjustments from there. :cool:
 
thank you all for your responses, they were all helpful!
I've been going through the forums pretty much everyday, just reading and trying to catch up.
Thanks again!
 
Welcome. Ready for the bumpy ride? up and down.

Remember to trade small and have plenty of cash to ride with. You do not have to a genius to make money. There is plenty dumb money out there. But you'll need discipline. And plenty of cash.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top