One Trade at a Time

+67.

I've been over-trading all day, and when it finally hit me, I stopped. Thankfully I quit while I was still ahead, even if ever so slightly.

Here's all my trades and what I did correctly, as well as what I think I did incorrectly.

Before I go into detail, let me say that I was reading a book on trading last night, and I now am trying to see losses as lessons. Instead of feeling the emotional pain that comes with less money, I'm trying to see the lesson, the mistake I made, and learn from it. After all, there are only so many mistakes to make, and only so long before I run out of money, so I might as well learn form them ASAP.

BTW, charts are linked for each trade.

-115 AMZN. The first two candles couldn't break 186.99, so I bought the breakout. I was filled 10 cents late, and set too tight of a stop. Sure enough, I was stopped out. Lesson learned: Don't force setups just to trade or make money. It doesn't work. http://imgur.com/uIZ7a

-115 MCO. I tried to buy what I thought would be a bounce upwards with the 10:10 candle since price had been falling all morning. It was a failed breakout before I could set a stop, so I covered quickly for another loss. Lesson learned: Stick with the trend until you get better. http://i.imgur.com/rMTyX.jpg

+161 CF. Made some chump change as the bottom fell around 140.76. Being nervous about the money I already lost, I let my emotions get to me, and I covered way too soon. Left a lot of profit on the table. Lesson learned: Stick with the plan no matter how I feel. In order to do this, I need to accurately describe my plan. If asked, I wouldn't be able to perfectly explain it yet, so I still need improvement. http://i.imgur.com/lxCQ9.jpg

+203 RIMM. Probably the only decent trade today. Jumped on board as the 10:15 candle broke through the previous low, and just moved my stop above the high of every new candle. Covered at around 27.60 for a nice profit. http://i.imgur.com/UfCHn.jpg

+60 SPY. Saw a swing high form, and then, from studying SPY, I set my stop 20 cents above, covered half my shares at 10 cents profit, and the rest at 20 cents profit. Another decent trade. http://i.imgur.com/ExiQy.jpg

Tried two more breakouts in AMZN. First was just above the 11:05 candle; it failed immediately. I sold for a loss of like 80 bucks or something. That reminded me that I need to stick with the day's directional bias. Today that was down.

Moral: I got excited today and ventured out into other stocks when I saw AMZN was just congested. I made some okay moves, some not okay moves, and a decent play or two...

Point is, I need to remember why I was sticking with one or two stocks. It's because not only do I know them better, but hopefully it will keep me sitting on my hands if I do not see a good setup. I <i>must</i> wait for a good setup, rather than trying to force one that's not really there.
 
Update:

I've always viewed trading as a dues-paying thing. I hear many people say that it's just like anyone who wants to become a doctor. There's tuition and years of schooling. In the past, every time I read that, I would just say quietly to myself, "I'll do it quicker than them."

Well, that's just not true. Ha. Of all the books I've been reading, the latest one has me thinking about the whole journey. The forest not the trees. I'm trudging forward. To trudge means to walk with purpose. Call it corny but it's true.

I can now see how I have to go through the losses in order to get the wins. I have to be humbled enough. I have to get so used to losses and so used to the markets that I no longer have to spend lots of time thinking about it.

When I started out, my motivation was riches and lots of money. I saw dollar signs and greed took over. But now I see it slightly differently. I still would love to get filthy rich ha, let's not lie! But my primary goal is now to keep moving forward until I'm consistent and a winner. I've spent so much f*cking time already devoting my life to all this, I won't give up now. My short term goal is to learn a new lesson every day or to further ingrain an older one.

So every day, I'm going to try my best to post several things: First, I'll post my trades for the day, including charts for others to see. Second, I'll post the lesson of the day that I learned or rehashed. And third, I'll post a random entry for random things (i.e. any other thoughts I have or things I'd like to improve, or detailed study of my losing trades, etc. You get the idea.)

Today I'll kill two birds with one stone. This should be considered my lesson learned and random entry post. And the lesson learned today was that there is a lesson available to learn every day, with every loss.
 
-373.

Today was just a splendid day for what not to do! :(

Right as the market opened, a friend called me to meet up. I had that on my mind the entire time. I don't even feel like using that as an excuse though, because that certainly should not be a reason to lose money in the stock market.

And here's the ah-ha moment! Light bulbs are turning on as I write this!

As the market opened, I saw a nice long opportunity in SPY. I tried hiding it, but if I'm honest with myself, I know that I really was kinda upset that I missed the opportunity. Money lost! Well, not really, but that's how I saw it, and from that moment I began looking for every opportunity that I could find to make it back. Or should I say I forced setups that weren't there. And every trade that lost money, I felt even more desperate to win some back on the next trade.

And that is a valuable lesson!

Lesson Learned: Fear of losing money, or not making enough. Damn it's a strong fear. And I have this really strong suspicion I won't be as successful as I'd like until that's gone.
 
No trading today.

So I had a very important day yesterday in my little world of trading. Ironically, it didn't even involve any trades.

I now have an ET friend!

A very kind person and myself had an exchange about trading. This person called me on my sh*t essentially. Threw a PM my way and said what many on here woud call suggestions.

And guess what?

It helped so much that I don't think I realize how beneficial it was.

My focus has turned once again. This time for the better I believe.

Let me sum up the last month or so of my perspective on trading:

Somewhere in my head I've had this idea that I would build an awesome trading plan and be able to start trading awesomely. The problem I always encountered was that I didn't have a fully developed plan. I still don't. The difference between then and now is that I didn't think I needed it. I was too confident in myself. Perhaps arrogant.

So I read a book a few have suggested (Al Brooks' <i> Reading Price Charts Bar By Bar</i>), and I thought I knew enough to trade successfully. Mind you, I skimmed through the book, specifically the chapter that detailed the best trades, and thought it was enough. I went into trading trusting my gut, but after a few losing days (and a few winners), I quickly grew fearful again like many times before. This time it wasn't of the market though. I was fearful of my gut intuition. Because I knew I needed a trading plan.

This is all hindsight though. I didn't consciously know this. I didn't think I needed a trading plan. I didn't think that the path to success would be this comprehensive. However, I would have never told you I knew what I was doing. I would never have said that I <i>didn't</i> need a detailed trading plan. <b>But I acted as if all the above were true.</b>

I continued to trade even though I didn't trust myself or my nonexistent "edge." I continued to trade even though I was chasing the lost money. I continued to trade even though I needed a definitive plan. It wasn't until this kind soul here on ET stopped me in my tracks just enough to listen.

So here's what I'm doing and it is all going into this journal.

I'm writing a new comprehensive trading plan. As things progress, I'll start trading again. For now though, I'll just be posting new thoughts and lessons I'm learning. And, depending on how things go, I'll post my trading plan once it's done for all to give feedback!

Then, hopefully the trading will continue and I'll be able to share with everyone the learning curve and growth I go through.

Happy trading to everyone today!:)
 
Quote from Chris_Anonymous:

I have a terrible habit of saying I'm done when I'm not really done.

Anyway, the new total for today is +693.70.

Subtract commission costs and it's probably around 600 flat.

Question:

How can I get paid ECN rebates?

I'm using Sterling Trader Pro. The firm I'm with said to use ARCA to enter and EDGX to exit.

Not sure what that means, but if anyone can clarify that'd be great.

When I see ARCAALO, does that mean ARCA limit order type A(NYSE)?

Thanks in advance to anyone that can clear this up for me!
More...

Hey Chris, you can use ARCA or EDGX to get paid, but you have to add liquidity not remove, both ECN's pays for adding liquidity. I'm not sure if it works that way for retail though, i'm trading for a prop firm and that's how it works but you should check that with your broker.
A quick advise for the thread, try to add how many shares you buy/sell per trade, that gets a better a understading of what you're doing.
Keep it up!
 
Hey Chris....just wondering if your firm has a loss limit for the day? Also, how many tickets and trades are you taking a day on average?
 
Quote from Shanb:

Hey Chris....just wondering if your firm has a loss limit for the day? Also, how many tickets and trades are you taking a day on average?
More...

Yo Shan,

My firm does have a loss limit. It''s 500 per day. Whatever trade puts you over 500, even if it comes back below it, you are only allowed to close positions for the rest of the day.

Right now I'm halting trading until I further refine my plan. But before I stopped, like last week, I was trading 300-500 share lots maybe 4 or 5 times a day.

I read somewhere a while ago that studies were done and the most successful traders were either taking hundreds of trades a day (the high frequency guys' algos) or they were only taking between 3-5 trades per day.

I assume those guys are keeping their trading to a minimum and only take the best setups.

EDIT: Also, if I choose to, I can set a smaller daily loss limit than 500.
 
Chris,

That is a high loss limit...well relative to your account size it might not be? How big is your account? I have a 10k account and have a loss limit of $100. I've been trading for the past couple weeks and only trading 100 shares at a time lol. Every trader that I talked to that trades equities at my firm and other firm's all told me to keep my size really small enough to last in the game until I am good enough!
 
Quote from Shanb:

Chris,

That is a high loss limit...well relative to your account size it might not be? How big is your account? I have a 10k account and have a loss limit of $100. I've been trading for the past couple weeks and only trading 100 shares at a time lol. Every trader that I talked to that trades equities at my firm and other firm's all told me to keep my size really small enough to last in the game until I am good enough!
More...

Hey Shan,

It's good that you're trading in very small size.

I have a $7500 account for now. I agree it is a high loss relative to my account size however, up to this point, I've been grateful I haven't had tighter restrictions because no one is preventing me from feeling the pain that comes with losing money. So, I look at it like it's helping me change!
 
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