Thanks.
She has an excellent trading mind. Can't go wrong listening to her lectures.
Enjoying your journal.
NQ Trades
- Thread starter AFterburner
- Start date
Thanks.
She has an excellent trading mind. Can't go wrong listening to her lectures.
Enjoying your journal.
Your doing just fine in comparison to many traders I know...
We all have our discipline demons.
More importantly, I truly appreciate your journal and hope you continue it until you've reached your goals...
even better...restart your journal when ever you take a step backwards.
Two steps forward and one step backwards is still progress.
NihabaAshi
We all have our discipline demons.
More importantly, I truly appreciate your journal and hope you continue it until you've reached your goals...
even better...restart your journal when ever you take a step backwards.
Two steps forward and one step backwards is still progress.
NihabaAshi
I've been trusting the tape and it's been signaling down for several days. It has been doing so in such a way that I couldn't ignore it and subsequently have been holding a position trade. About once every three months I get a feeling about a position trade, and I usually take it (most of the time it ends up producing more gains than I could by actively trading the same time frame). Right now feels right for the pullback I've been waiting for. I'm looking for the NDX to hit 1200 before it hits 1300 again. My experience tells me that the dip buyers are about to get hurt. I'm not going to lie, I got hurt bad today. I've been short since Monday afternoon at 1281.5 (I felt like a hero on Tuesday morning short lived as it was). I was unable to watch the market today and unfortunately locked in a loss of about 15 pts because of a stop that got hit. As far as today's action goes, from a technical standpoint, I was thinking that if the NDX went through 1280 again (which I considered a small probability) that it would then touch off 1290 but I never thought that it would go any higher than that. I guess the move beyond 1290 was purely momentum (the last day of the month may have had an effect as well). However, I feel that today was a false breakout, and thus I have reinitiated the position in the after hours market (hopefully it works this time). I know that a smart trader would wait for the employment data, but I didn't. The reason I haven't been posting this week is because I was paranoid to post an open position (after today I realized that it couldn't hurt to post my directional bias) and also because I haven't been trading (I've been holding a position). I know that this isn't the norm for what I've been posting, but I thought that I would at least touch base with the journal. In all honesty though, I'm disappointed about today and was just using this as an opportunity to vent and to collect my thoughts. Please don't bother to point out all the mistakes I've made this week, I'm aware. I am also getting sick of hearing people talk about all the things I did wrong in hindsight (I especially don't want to hear that when I'm trying to manage an open position). Once I have closed this trade there will be plenty of time to analyze it. Thank you for your understanding. I've also been debating whether or not to continue this journal; hopefully I will have made the decision by the time I start to actively trade again.
AFterburner,
I now think this journal is not good for you nor is it meeting your goals...
A trader with a public journal that doesn't want to hear the good and bad...
I highly recommend you end this public journal or get a private journal.
Your honesty is appreciated but at the same time your somewhat unfair when others are honest with you...
espeically when your attempting to control when they can speak or not speak.
Further...I think you've underestimated the possible psychological damage that could be caused at 830am est tomorrow while your this emotional...
I truly hope your right especially with 945am est and 10am est reports around the corner.
Key Economic Reports for August 1st:
Employment Situation
8:30ET
Personal Income and Outlays
8:30ET
Consumer Sentiment
9:45ET
Construction Spending
10:00ET
ISM Mfg Index
10:00ET
http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/b-econoday.htm
http://finance.lycos.com/home/research/econ_calendar.asp
Probably best for you to send the moderator a message to Close the Journal.
Best Regards,
Mark
P.S. I only posted the above times because too many traders key in on one critical economic release time while forgetting about the others...
I'm just trying to help and not be rude.
sometimes charts make news and sometimes news makes charts. when you get a new data point like this morning you have to reconsider your position. we closed kind of sloppy so maybe a top was made today but you have to consider the possibility of an upside breakout here.
Afterburner wants to be recognized as a tape-reading guru.
He will pay any price the market charges him in order to attain this goal.
There is nothing wrong with what he wants. He is not undisciplined. It's very cool, to be able to read the tape like he does, not many people can.
He will pay any price the market charges him in order to attain this goal.
- He continually lets us know he is tape reading
- He knows there are sound reasons not to enter the trade but asks us not to comment until the trade is closed
- He hangs onto losing trades even after he sees other reasons to close them
- He is already well-off financially, he does not need the profits from trading
There is nothing wrong with what he wants. He is not undisciplined. It's very cool, to be able to read the tape like he does, not many people can.
I hope i'm not taken out of context in that last post.
I'm not being sarcastic, I meant what I said.
Just calling it like I see it. Could be wrong.
I'm not being sarcastic, I meant what I said.
Just calling it like I see it. Could be wrong.
You may be on to something. Tonight I realized that this is a source of my problems. Making money trading is not difficult for me. What I struggle with is that many times in order to make money (or more accurately maximize profits) I must take trades that I feel are not the right idea. Today I had my short position from last night. Then at 9:50 EST (I don't have the exact time in front of me right now) I sold some more at 1279 (taking a larger position than on Monday). Shortly after 10:30 EST when the NDX was at 1262 and had just completed a double bottom, I knew that I should step aside for awhile and wait to re-enter at a higher price. The problem is that I was confident that the buy the dip thing wasn't going to work today (not that it wouldn't be attempted) and that when it failed the market would move down quickly. Instead of putting this information to use (waiting for the failure while capitializing on the short term opportunities), I did nothing. I should note that the tape was not pointing down today. I don't really know how to explain how the market can go down without the tape pointing down, but it did. It just felt like the move down today was more from a lack of buying than an abundance of selling. It was like a vacuum. That alone should have been a warning to me because I was anticipating something a lot stronger than this. Even after I had given up a good portion of my day's profit, I sold a little more at 1269. It was so frustrating to see the dip buyers struggle to accomplish what I knew wouldn't work, that I felt like I was going to go insane (whenever I feel like I am fighting then I am wrong). Finally I realized that the problem wasn't with the so called dip buyers, it was with me. I was trying to make the market fit into my plan instead of planning around the market action. With this realization, my priorities in trading became apparent. They are be right, trade right. Money doesn't really enter into it (I made a lot of money today, but could hardly be more disillusioned). If money is the only/main purpose/goal then I don't want to trade anymore. Notice that being right is more important to me than trading right. This is obviously wrong, but true. I cannot seem to force myself to take trades that I know are illogical (when I say illogical I am meaning wrong) but profitable. The problem is the word illogical/wrong. Illogical/wrong to whom? The omniscient tape reader of course (note sarcasm). I don't think that a person can call anything the market does wrong. The market does what it does. It's not the job of a trader to question the market or to pass judgement on its actions. A trader's job is to trade. This involves following directions (directions being the tape's signals). My losing trades are a result of my defiance to the tape and nothing more. Losses equal defiance. This is not really a discipline issue. It is an ego issue. Can a failure to submit be overcome? I don't know. Maybe after being punished/forced to a great enough extent a person's will can be broken (think breaking a horse). Not that I think that is the answer. I do know that as long as I place more faith in my own judgement than I do in the tape that I will never be the trader I want to be. More accurately, I will never be a trader. The question remains, do I want to be a trader? Lacking an answer, I exited my entire position at 1269.