The real reason trading is difficult

I will pitch in with my today's trades & the reason I made it through is because I never give up (as long as there are valid reasons to remain stubborn), you may be on the wrong side of the market, but you have to remain rational about your stops & potential targets. BTW today's performance was not unique, I manage to screw up my own analyses amazingly well & on regular basis.

I will add some colour here:

Long 1388 off 1 & possible 2, stop near 1386.5, emergency hard stop 1378

-0.5 don't like p/a

Long 1379.5 off 1, stop near 1378.5, hard stop 1368.5

-1.25

Long 1377.75 off 1, stop near 1376.5, hard -10

-1.25

Going to watch charts for a while

Long 1374, stop near 1372

-1.75

Long 1370.50 off 2, stop near 1369, hard stop -5

C'MON SQUEEZE 'EM BULLS!!!! (personal mantra moment)

Scaled out 2/3 +3.25

1/3 +9 after 50% retrace
 
Jem...


your approach/thinking style is correct & suitable for the market you are involved in = stock/shares...

If i try my style into stocks, surely I gone bankrupt

thats why I choose another market: commodities, which randomness is not really random. I had tried Malaysian stockindexfutures (i'm foreigner in US), but the randomness already kicked-in, no clear trend, so I forego that, and now studying charts of US commodities and i thought some commodities have good potential.

Thats why I mentioned before, the choice of market is important in order to mint money ...as long as we can moving with market @ dancing with wolf , we shall make money...

:D
 
Quote from stock_trad3r:

Make fewer trades and you will make more money.
More...

the key is not trading something that matches ones' personality, once one finds what that (trading terminology) personality is....

for example,

buy, hold, until proven right! is best suited to investors, not traders or want to be traders

buy, hold, until proven right works with stocks, bonds, dividend plays and some long term option plays...

Emini futures and regular futures contracts as well as rapid fire stock trading (pairs trading, basket trading, hedge trading, etc.) works for other personality types, of which most are not well suited for. Oh, don't forget forex trading too.

because most are not well suited for the excessive demands that it takes to become consistently profitable in these trades / markets the concept of making a living at these trades becomes elusive, desirable, something of which movies are made about, etc....

(Rogue Trader, Wall Street, Boiler Room, Trading Places, etc.)

ok, that's my one word answer,

uh, one reply answer....
 
opps... in one sentence you said:

"Need to be at the right marketplace, at the right time and place the right order, to ensure trading looked easy"

So be at ...the wrong marketplace,at the wrong time and place the wrong order...will make trading life difficult.
:)
 
The market is neither random or irrational it just speaks a language that few manage to comprehend.

Once you learn to read it, like any other language, you can communicate well with it.

Reason is difficult at first is because, once again, like any other language it takes years to become fluent at it but once you do, the understanding begins.

NN
 
Wow I gotta say that I actually think that Jack's post was very straightforward and had lots of elements of truth.

He's not usually so concise with his speach. Even though i've had differences with him in the past ... I don't know why so many people think his comments are off base.

That said... I think channels and PA are one in the same bunch. But, that's all semantics and who gives a shit about that.
 
Quote from jem:

O.k. my explanation was lost on a few of you. Maybe you are all disciplined.

I have taken thousands of trades and traded millions of shares and thosands of contracts. I was a daytrader who made 20-50 trades a day for 5 years and I daytraded for years after that at lower levels.

I would say they 95% of the trades I took when I first pulled up chart went right against me. probably hundreds and hundreds of trades.

Why?

Was I that unlucky on my impulsive trades? Was I unlucky on my signaled trades. I know from speaking with other traders- they have experienced the same thing.

On an intraday basis -

If the market is going to move in your favor - quickly - it will be tough to get the entry. As price will not be there very long.

However, if the market is going to move against you - you will plenty of time to get in and plenty of shares available.

Lets say you are a systems trader who sometimes interferes with your system.

Because the good trades are harder to get you are bound to get all of your bad trades but only some of your good trades.

If you have a short term system in which you get the signal and then have to make the trade - you may still run into the same problem.

I realize this is probably too deep for the people who have participated in the thread.

but if you have enough experience taking discretionary trades you probably understand.

For instance if you are buying into support and it is good support it is frequently hard to get filled and a good trade spot on lasts a fraction of your trading time frame. Where as if support is going to fail you will probably have all day to choose to get in.
More...

Spot on!

Head fakes on limit orders are a problem. That fat little order just dangling there before the actual confirmation.

Speed of move faster than your trigger finger. Market fills offer large slippage.

I watch many trades setup and blow through the entry too quickly to pull the trigger. I refuse to chase.

This is the case with shorts more so than longs.

All this in regards to intra-day trades.

Great post!
 
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