The Price Action Journal

[mccullek]

Here's my chart for the day. The blue circles are entries and the red circles or exits. I took a total of 38 ticks today, only to give 24 back on my only losing trade of the day. Luckily we had the nice break out and run in the afternoon, or this would have been a losing day for me.

I ended up with a +14 tick day. Not the best, but considering I was down heavily at one time, it really felt like a solid trading day. Not long ago, I would not have made this back, and probably would have thrown more away in an attempt to make it back, or just quit for the day a loser.

I really thought prices might break higher on the big loss, so I gave that trade a little more room and that was a mistake in which I paid dearly. I need to work on tighter entries closer to the S/R areas, and stick with the tighter stops, particularly when it's choppy like it has been lately.

I fought the urge to trade the chop all morning, but then fell to temptation on the failed break out higher. I actually came within 1 tick of hitting my 4 tick scalp and then going to BE, but I should never have moved my stop below the swing. Woulda, shoulda, coulda... I'm sure many of you know the old saying.

 

[Floyd Roberts]

tv92670,

Do you ever use S/R lines that have already been broken or taken out? If yes, under what circumstances? Thanks.

Floyd

Quote from tv92670:

rsikit,

Good ?. I extend important S/R lines from prior days and I draw lines all day long. As a matter of fact, my chart looks like a child got a hold of it w/ an "etch a sketch" by the end of the day. For illustration purposes I just show lines that confirm a trade setup.

Ty

FYI- Fundamentally, I'm an AHG follower. Was a consistent loser until that thread. KISS and anyone can trade.

 

[tv92670]

FR,

Yes, I keep them up on my daily chart even when they break. The more times price touches and repels these "flip" lines, the more validity they have to me.

Ty

 

[Max22]

Hi tv,
Do you have cetain criteria that triggers the trade once price hits an s/r level. It looks like Susana uses a retrace/pullback after a 3br occurrs at the s/r level.
Thanks for sharing your charts.
max

 

[sandygray66]

FWIW, I find Point & Figure charts very useful in seeing S/R zones because they cut out a lot of the noise (there's no time element on a P&F chart, just price movement over a specified size).

I favor a 1 x 6 for the ES (which means a new bar only prints when there's been 6 ticks or more in price movement in one direction or the other). You obviously can set it to whatever degree of detail you want to see.

 

[HooLee]

Nice Sandy, I see the same use in PnF charting.

But you might want to increase the box size, a 0.25 box value chart will print all highs and lows like any other non-time based charting (tick, volume, range, etc.), only box size larger than 1 tick will filter out noise. For example, a 1 point(4 ticks) boxsize chart prints 1270 if price goes to 1270.75 and reverses. Same in the low price part of the chart, if price hit 1269.25 and reverses, it will also print 1270. So there is as much as 3 ticks "noise" may be trimmed by the chart, both top and bottom.

 

[tv92670]

Max,

No real system. I use a 1 minute chart and wait for price to firm up in the area of a potential trade. I try to accumulate w/ buy/sell limits at the best prices I can get without chasing trade.

Ty

 

[amitman]

Quote from Floyd Roberts:

tv92670,

Do you ever use S/R lines that have already been broken or taken out? If yes, under what circumstances? Thanks.

Floyd

Here's a good example why you should keep lines even if they were broken in past days (and as other mentioned makes them even more important). I didn't trade today and only now looked at the chart of today, all lines were drawn in previous days based on their's S/R. Notice how the down move today stopped exactly at these lines.

 

[Max22]

Quote from tv92670:

Max,

No real system. I use a 1 minute chart and wait for price to firm up in the area of a potential trade. I try to accumulate w/ buy/sell limits at the best prices I can get without chasing trade.

Ty

Hi tv,
I do it the same way, but since it is kind of subjective, i tend sometimes to wait to long and find myself missing a lot of good trades. So I was considering coming up with an objective trigger to get into a trade.
thanks for the response.
Max

 

[ggoyal]

today around 11am Merrill was heading down and I chased it by shorting it without the pullback. obviously got out with a minor loss.

It could have been a winner had i shorted it when it made a LH.

Nonetheless, I am still reading AHG and it is probably the best thread on this site. 2nd would be this one because I found AHG after following this and what Susana said.

Also regarding double tops and double bottoms, anyone know the percentage of times they work(i.e., short a double top, long a double bottom). I was thinking about playing ALL double tops and bottoms I see during a day and place a stop $.01 below the line. obviously now double tops and bottoms dont happen every 10 minutes( I see maybe 1-2 a day from the amount of time i spend, sometimes more). And ofcourse this will be small scalp.

I have read 76 pages of AHG so far and here is my generalization so far:-

1. Mark highs and lows

2. Look for HH and HL for uptrend, LL and LH for downtrend(easy to identify)
Question- When there is a pullback(LH, how do i know thats the highest it will be to take a short position? this is the hard part)

3. Mark S/R lines and go back couple of days if possible. Look for DT's and Db's.

I use the ameritrade charting, I use the 1 day chart and 4 hour chart. 1 day chart for the big picture, 4 hour for a better picture.

Question- Looking at the 1 day chart shows me potential for bigger rewards with bigger risk and I don't want to place a trade with a big stop(AHG). looking at the 4 hour chart, i get caught in the smaller trend. What is the possible solution?