Successful Trading and Compounding

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after a couple years, you must have found one strategy that you know how to drive , get in the car,give it gas, steer, hit the brake,close the car door,walk away...that after 5 or 10 years will still be there...in those years you will have tried hundreds of ways to add to that strategy,after 10 years ,you might have mastered or stuck with 3 or 5,tossed 100's aside,you then take 3 or 5 as many trades,right now you should just take the layups and practice being profitable each day ,even if it's 1 pt,$50 ,take it and sim the rest of the day,one thing that happens in trading,but rarely anywhere else,is the beat down you have taken in the last 3 years,you(95% of us when starting out) conditioned yourself to accept losing as a means of survival,you need to fix that ,since all the decisions are coming from that area,it's like water in your fuel tank,try to just have a winner per day,don't take it unless it's a layup with the one strategy you win most with,sitting on your hands is as important,maybe more,of a strategy as winning,that is where you don't give it back,,I've been where your at,i am going to turn the corner this time,i have learned,it will be different,but when you enter the trade,you are saying this will probably not workout,history says so,you need to address that thought process,fear,i don't know any other way than grabbing those winners and sitting on your hands,building a string of winners,the market will be here a month,year,5 years from now,where will your head be in a week,month ,year,this is something that needs to come to the front burner and squashed ,does it depend on where your acct is,no,as far as the mrkt is concerned you nor your acct exist,if that's true then all the stuff in your head is luggage that has nothing to do with the market,your head has to be entirely in the game wrapped in the screen ,all those other thoughts turned off,while trading..utmost discipline and skill deciding next move..just trade that one strat..over and over..paper trade or document the rest...your acct will go up ,slowly at first,be patient,this whole career is a mind fu until you learn to turn it off and just trade the setups,learning this is vital,without it ,all the setups in the world won't make you money that you can hang on to
 
Quote from gmst:

Hello,
Thanks for following.

I will describe my screen arrangement for you. Extremely basic. For Fx, I have 5m, 30m and daily charts of Euro and 30m and daily chart of Aud on my screen and 1hr and daily chart of Yen. Only price, no indicators. This is the stuff I make money on. For ES, where I lose money, I have 5m ES chart (rth) with 20 EMA and 1hr ES chart (globex), Both these charts have volume displayed.

About posting trades, I do around 100 roundtrip trades per day - around 40% would last 10 seconds to 5 minutes. So, pure scalping. So, I don't see any benefit from posting trades, other than wasting my time and reader's time.

My purpose from this journal is to be more systematic, disciplined and to ensure that I don't blow up, to learn how to handle risk and grow my account steadily. If this journal turns out to be successful, the main purpose it will serve will be to illustrate journey of a blow-up prone trader, to a boom and bust cycles level trader (where I currently belong imo) to a consistently profitable trader. The emphasis needs to be on record keeping, in-depth analysis, identifying errors and market conditions/behavior patterns which lead to losing money and eliminating them and instilling iron-clad discipline to follow one's system rather than on trade-setups or edges or things like that.

FWIW, I have multiple well proven edges but I am still not consistent because I am not disciplined to follow them.
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poster--ammo, you said it well.

@gmst.... as it has also been stated ions ago,

a picture is worth more than 10,000 words....

would you be willing to or

would you be able to or

would you have time to....

just post a picture of your trade(s) ON YOUR TRADING SCREEN, it does not matter if that or those trades were profitable or not, or live or sim, alright?

thx for the post and hopefully your next post with screen shot, would allow us to follow your trade more delightfully and insightfully too? thx much, gmst.

remember, you are under no obligation, nor pressure, nor duress nor anything remotely negative toward your post, OK?

just like you to show us GRAPHICALLY what you have been delineating and describing so interestingly, OK? thx again, gmst.

sincerely hope you would be willing to oblige and show us a thing or two on screen. cheers and happy new year to you and yours and also everyone on board. :p
 
Quote from gmst:

Shopster,

First I must salute the effort you have made to go through so many of my posts and dig out those statements and post them here. Just awesome work, I am amazed ! However thinking over what you have posted for more than a day, I have been trying to understand what message you want to convey to me.

All the quotes you have posted were written in a context. The context would have needed positive statements, negative statements, statements describing my stupidity, my analysis, my inability to follow my system etc etc. So, I kind of 'guess' that probably you are pointing out that I need to improve primarily on psychological front ?? Am I right.

It will be very helpful if you can please write in plain English what message you are trying to convey. Because no doubt you have spend a lot of time going through the journal, and I do want to get benefit from your insights. Thank you !! :)

Edit: Reading it again, it seems that you have made a very fine list of many of the mistakes that I have done - in terms of psychological errors, not following the plan, bad execution etc. Basically everything. If this is what you mean - once again thanks a lot. Yes, if I am smart, I should not repeat those mistakes, especially when someone has taken the time to point them out to me in such a wonderful way.
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........................................

GMST,

trading is a journey and it never ends.

you go into the tunnel and the light flickers at the other end
it gets brighter as you progress.

there are many mistakes made as you try to find your edge.

navel gazing and introspection is required....it also is a singular experience.

many apply, but very few are chosen.

when you come out the other side you will know yourself better than any other vocation.

only you will know when you have arrived.

every trader has made these mistakes and it was easy for me to sift thru your posts.

fully examine how to go forward from here.

you are on the right track .

cheers,

shop
 
this is very simple for scalping,on a turn, there are either 2 ups and a down,or 2 downs and an up candle,don't trade it ,just sim it for a week or two,see what works,where you would put stops,where you would take losses,where you would trail,take profits,the stops and trails are just safeties,you needn't wait for them to get hit ,but see what happens when you use the stops for your outs and when you get out on discretion,when you can profit more on discretion,then go back to live,this is mainly to get you to cut losses and ride winners,i don't suggest scalping but learning it in sim is a good base for other styles,for entries, exits ,longer term trading down the road the rectangle in center is lunch ,notice the turns are sharp on 2 candles,whippy area,easy to give back the morning,don;trade it,the hns and inverted hns set up in all timeframes,let you know when they are accumulating or distributing,look for the 3 candles at the trendlines for an entry,its easier to enter at supp/res it either goes thru the line and you stop out or the line holds and you get a nice move in your favor that you can trail and not get shaken out,...this is loose stuff just to try to get your mind to recognize what you do know for sure and what you are unaware of..if you were watching the uvol/dvol exchanging leads it was a good day to sell high buy low as those patterns suggest an inside day,doesn't usually go anywhere,increases your odds
 

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Quote from ammo:

this is very simple for scalping,on a turn, there are either 2 ups and a down,or 2 downs and an up candle,don't trade it ,just sim it for a week or two,see what works,where you would put stops,where you would take losses,where you would trail,take profits,the stops and trails are just safeties,you needn't wait for them to get hit ,but see what happens when you use the stops for your outs and when you get out on discretion,when you can profit more on discretion,then go back to live,this is mainly to get you to cut losses and ride winners,i don't suggest scalping but learning it in sim is a good base for other styles,for entries, exits ,longer term trading down the road the rectangle in center is lunch ,notice the turns are sharp on 2 candles,whippy area,easy to give back the morning,don;trade it,the hns and inverted hns set up in all timeframes,let you know when they are accumulating or distributing,look for the 3 candles at the trendlines for an entry,its easier to enter at supp/res it either goes thru the line and you stop out or the line holds and you get a nice move in your favor that you can trail and not get shaken out,...this is loose stuff just to try to get your mind to recognize what you do know for sure and what you are unaware of..if you were watching the uvol/dvol exchanging leads it was a good day to sell high buy low as those patterns suggest an inside day,doesn't usually go anywhere,increases your odds
More...

a great looking chart, a practically perfect trendline chart indeed.

thx for posting the chart, ammo, DID YOU MAKE ANY TRADE using that chart, pls? ought to be all winners, right? congrats and thx again.

and @gmst's personal trading chart(s) should be following pretty soon.
 
Quote from ammo:

after a couple years, you must have found one strategy that you know how to drive , get in the car,give it gas, steer, hit the brake,close the car door,walk away...that after 5 or 10 years will still be there...in those years you will have tried hundreds of ways to add to that strategy,after 10 years ,you might have mastered or stuck with 3 or 5,tossed 100's aside,you then take 3 or 5 as many trades,right now you should just take the layups and practice being profitable each day ,even if it's 1 pt,$50 ,take it and sim the rest of the day,one thing that happens in trading,but rarely anywhere else,is the beat down you have taken in the last 3 years,you(95% of us when starting out) conditioned yourself to accept losing as a means of survival,you need to fix that ,since all the decisions are coming from that area,it's like water in your fuel tank,try to just have a winner per day,don't take it unless it's a layup with the one strategy you win most with,sitting on your hands is as important,maybe more,of a strategy as winning,that is where you don't give it back,,I've been where your at,i am going to turn the corner this time,i have learned,it will be different,but when you enter the trade,you are saying this will probably not workout,history says so,you need to address that thought process,fear,i don't know any other way than grabbing those winners and sitting on your hands,building a string of winners,the market will be here a month,year,5 years from now,where will your head be in a week,month ,year,this is something that needs to come to the front burner and squashed ,does it depend on where your acct is,no,as far as the mrkt is concerned you nor your acct exist,if that's true then all the stuff in your head is luggage that has nothing to do with the market,your head has to be entirely in the game wrapped in the screen ,all those other thoughts turned off,while trading..utmost discipline and skill deciding next move..just trade that one strat..over and over..paper trade or document the rest...your acct will go up ,slowly at first,be patient,this whole career is a mind fu until you learn to turn it off and just trade the setups,learning this is vital,without it ,all the setups in the world won't make you money that you can hang on to
More...

Thanks ammo, very insightful, especially about the last 3 years downbeat affecting my psychology. I am going to print this one out and post on my table.

I am sure I am going to break out of this boom and bust cycle and reach the status of a consistent profitable trader very very soon.
 
Quote from nakachalet:

@gmst's personal trading chart(s) should be following pretty soon.
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Nakachalet, I honestly don't think posting my setup is going to be of any use, simply because there is nothing in it other than bar chart of prices. But since you insisted, here you go!

The upper left graph is AUD Daily, lower left is EUR daily. Middle graph is Euro 5 min, Upper right is Euro 30 minutes and lower right is Aud 30 min. I know its a messy setup and I have disappointed you but I work from a 14" laptop screen, so don't have space to display everything properly.
 

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One more chart for you. As you can see nothing special. It just has volume and 20 EMA. I am not an indicator guy.

Again, sorry to disappoint you, but this is what I have.
 

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Update for week 22 ending Dec 30, 2011 :

+300$ for the week.

Didn't post last week was in holiday mood, and was reading the book Trading in the Zone. Also did long pending analysis of my performance for the last 5 months, which I plan to post tomorrow. I must say that analysis was very encouraging :)

This Week's Stats:

Withdrawal: 0$

1. Week PL: +300$
2. Start Equity: 4.2k
3. End Equity: 4.6k
4. Maximum equity run-up: 4.7k
5. Max Win day as % of that day's start equity: 24%
6. Max Loss day as % of that day's start equity: -12%

Below stats are from Journal start day:

Withdrawal: 1100$

1. Total PL: -1600$
2. PF: 0.95
3. RoI: -21%
4. Max. DD: 82%
5. Current DD: 28%
6. # of winning days 51%, # of losing days 49%
7. Av. win day: 16%
8. Av. Loss day: -14%
 
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