Prop Trader Journal
- Thread starter Shanb
- Start date
So...a little bit more info about me:
I am currently at a prop firm that trades equities. All traders must put up their own capital as I have done. The firm provides leverage, platform, and some training. You also get the benefit of being around some good traders for 7-8 hours everyday!
I will be going live next week and will be day-trading equities. Like I said before, I am using this log as a place to collect my thoughts and to track my progress as I go along. Hopefully I will also get some feedback from some of the good traders in this forum!
I am currently at a prop firm that trades equities. All traders must put up their own capital as I have done. The firm provides leverage, platform, and some training. You also get the benefit of being around some good traders for 7-8 hours everyday!
I will be going live next week and will be day-trading equities. Like I said before, I am using this log as a place to collect my thoughts and to track my progress as I go along. Hopefully I will also get some feedback from some of the good traders in this forum!
So today was my first day of trading and it went as expected...not the best, but I took things easy and put on 3 trades, all of which I got stopped out of with a loss. I will post screenshots of some of these trades. This is my first day day trading equities so my style is still developing and I am still learning!
One of the head traders in my room suggested that I only do 1 ticket every day this week and make it the best setup/trade that I see. In the mean time just observe price action, level 2, and get a feel for move. Also to write down trades with outs on paper and see how they turn out. I am also looking at the SPY throughout the day and marking the closing price every hour to get a feel for the movement of the market in general.
P&L= -29.00
Trade 1: SPY long 129.27, Stop out 129.21
-I got long as we opened up on a gap and broke above the most recent high at that time. Got long on the test of the previous Resistance.
- I was looking at the 1-minute chart as I was watching this and I probably didn't have a sense of what trying to move I was trying to catch and the stop may have been too small.
Trade 2: MCP long 50.85, Stop out 50.72
-MCP had broken to highs and had been holding an intra day trend line. I got long off of the trend line with a small stop below.
-I was looking at the 1-minute chart with this trade and targeting the previous day intra day high. Looking in hindsight I probably didn't have a good enough level to enter off of and the nature of the entry didn't conform with the trade objective!
Trade 3: C short at 38.73, stop at 38.83
- Citi broke to new lows and was holding below the low of the day and a signifcant level. I got short after the initial test held.
-This trade looks okay to me in hindsight and the target was the low at 38.44.
One of the head traders in my room suggested that I only do 1 ticket every day this week and make it the best setup/trade that I see. In the mean time just observe price action, level 2, and get a feel for move. Also to write down trades with outs on paper and see how they turn out. I am also looking at the SPY throughout the day and marking the closing price every hour to get a feel for the movement of the market in general.
P&L= -29.00
Trade 1: SPY long 129.27, Stop out 129.21
-I got long as we opened up on a gap and broke above the most recent high at that time. Got long on the test of the previous Resistance.
- I was looking at the 1-minute chart as I was watching this and I probably didn't have a sense of what trying to move I was trying to catch and the stop may have been too small.
Trade 2: MCP long 50.85, Stop out 50.72
-MCP had broken to highs and had been holding an intra day trend line. I got long off of the trend line with a small stop below.
-I was looking at the 1-minute chart with this trade and targeting the previous day intra day high. Looking in hindsight I probably didn't have a good enough level to enter off of and the nature of the entry didn't conform with the trade objective!
Trade 3: C short at 38.73, stop at 38.83
- Citi broke to new lows and was holding below the low of the day and a signifcant level. I got short after the initial test held.
-This trade looks okay to me in hindsight and the target was the low at 38.44.
Hey Shan, congrats on the first day of trading. In the stock world it's all about stock selection. Actually that's true with futures as well. With experience you get really good at finding the right stocks to trade everyday. The better you become at that, the easier trading becomes. So what made you choose C and MCP?
For the record, two of the best places to find stocks are obviously stocks in the news. And stocks near all time highs or at least 52 week highs. That is a good starting point.
For the record, two of the best places to find stocks are obviously stocks in the news. And stocks near all time highs or at least 52 week highs. That is a good starting point.
I don`t mean to sound like your father, but do you have a written trading plan and well defined setups?
If you don`t, there is no reason you should lose as much money as I did during my initiation phase.
Good luck!
When I was swing trading stocks a few years back, I used the daily winners and losers column to find stocks that potentially were on the move
I could for example spot a stock that were breaking out of a base or I could spot a stock that had severely overreacted (in my opinion) and fade the move.
That worked very well for me back then.
Hey Mav, thanks for stopping by
. I was looking at some other stocks for today, but nothing setup in a way I liked or else I missed some of the moves off the open. I chose MCP was because we were coming off of a pretty high volume day yesterday and looked like futures were opening higher. MCP has an 11 % short interest so I thought there would be a good move off of the open. Citi was just something that I noticed off of my new highs/lows box. I will keep in mind the stocks near highs/lows. I'm mostly using stocks with earnings and with active news. For example BBY was the major stock in play!
When you say stock selection is paramount...do you say this because they tend to have more volatility ie. tradable moves. Or that they trend more often than not?
Quote from Laissez Faire:
I don`t mean to sound like your father, but do you have a written trading plan and well defined setups?
If you don`t, there is no reason you should lose as much money as I did during my initiation phase.
Good luck!
When I was swing trading stocks a few years back, I used the daily winners and losers column to find stocks that potentially were on the move
I could for example spot a stock that were breaking out of a base or I could spot a stock that had severely overreacted (in my opinion) and fade the move.
That worked very well for me back then.
I do have a basic written trading plan...with things like trading with the trend; minimum R:R of 3:1; cut losses, let profits run; trading with confirmation from order flow, volume, and price action.
One thing tho...the head traders in my firm tend to downplay the importance of well defined setups. They are more feel type traders and tend to take the whole picture into mind.(levels, volume, trend, PA, inter-market etc.) So i'm following in those footsteps.
I do look for certain setups, like a PA above/below a major level and a fade. Trend trading with S/R. A break above/below a range and retest etc.
Ya the traders at my firm have shown me this as well. Using the new high/lows box to find momentum plays or see what is in play!