The Road to Consistency

Post my gains in % of $$

  • Total voters
    19
I have a couple of suggestions:

1. Don't jump around, pick one area to specialize and stick to it. Don't be a Jack of all trade master of none. Trading is just about the most competitive endeavor in business, there is no room for generalists.

2. You have to be able to explain in a few short sentences why fundamentally your system has an edge, otherwise, you could be fooled by randomness.

My total trades were profitable every year except 2011 because I simply bet with the bull market, so no real skills needed. When this bull market ends my profit will stop.
 
ironchef said:
I have a couple of suggestions:

1. Don't jump around, pick one area to specialize and stick to it. Don't be a Jack of all trade master of none. Trading is just about the most competitive endeavor in business, there is no room for generalists.
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Oct and Nov have been mostly(99%) stock trades only. Trying to hone that skill down.

2. You have to be able to explain in a few short sentences why fundamentally your system has an edge, otherwise, you could be fooled by randomness.
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Yes.

My total trades were profitable every year except 2011 because I simply bet with the bull market, so no real skills needed. When this bull market ends my profit will stop.
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That's a very odd way to put it. I think if and when the bull market ends and the bear market commence, I think my performance will get even better. I thrive on volatility. Bear market volatility is much higher. The declines are faster and uglier. The bear market rallies are more violent. I can't wait. Plenty of opportunities to make money fast. I don't like sitting on positions in a normal bull market. I like fast actions.
 
trader99 said:
That's a very odd way to put it. I think if and when the bull market ends and the bear market commence, I think my performance will get even better. I thrive on volatility. Bear market volatility is much higher. The declines are faster and uglier. The bear market rallies are more violent. I can't wait. Plenty of opportunities to make money fast. I don't like sitting on positions in a normal bull market. I like fast actions.
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Have you noticed that if you take a long view, i.e. 10-20 years, bull markets (up trend) is ~80% and bear market is ~20% of the time, so if your skill is making money during bear market then 8 out of 10 years you lose?
 
ironchef said:
Have you noticed that if you take a long view, i.e. 10-20 years, bull markets (up trend) is ~80% and bear market is ~20% of the time, so if your skill is making money during bear market then 8 out of 10 years you lose?
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I do noticed that that bull markets are more prevalent than bear markets. That's why I invest in 401k and never look at it.

I never said my skills is in making money ONLY in bear markets. haha. I said it seems as though I would make money FASTER in bear markets. Just thinking outloud.

But that could be just my old thinking talking. Now that I have switched to just mostly longs I think making money in bull markets would be much easier. I just haven't caught the super moves in bull market yet. Trying to improve on that.

However, this doesn't preclude the possibility of making money in bear markets too since I've been in the last couple in recent memories.

What you say does have a grain of truth. Bear markets are tougher and more violent in its moves. As recent as Q4 2018 we saw huge moves in the "bear market"(market did drop 20%). I wasn't really trading actively back then. But as recent as May/June/July of this year, there were days with 600 Dow points swing in the futures. I loved those days for trading futures.

Actually, now that I focus exclusively on daytrading, it doesn't really matter. As long as there are stocks that trending up then I will hop on for a ride. I don't even care about macroeconomics or big picture market stuff since my trades are only within that day(from minutes to hours at most). In fact, I realize when I try to mixed higher time frame I usually lose money. Just focus on the intraday action and think in that context then I will be OK.

I'm not saying this is easy to do this! It's the damn hard. That's why this journal is called "The Road to Consistency." LOL. There are days I win and days I lose. I'm still working on the winning consistency part. Not an easy gig.
 
Last edited:
11/11/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gain:
-$3079.64
==============
Horrible! I did NOT countertrend trade. I bought a gap upper but then it reversed. I had only "only" 4000 shares and wasn't really paying attention then it reversed. Shouldn't have looked at the long term chart to say it's ok. I'm a daytrader and a scalper at that.

Lesson learned!
 
Last edited:
11/12/2019:
Taxable Acct: Trade Zero
=============
Realized gain:
$1129.05
==============

Total scalping CHK and a few other names today. Bust mostly just CHK. Scalping is my safest and surest way to make money. But it's not the most efficient. Traded over 600K shares today to make over $1K+. lol. I would have never used this style of trading until zero commission became available. Zero comm made it possible to be net profitable with under a penny move. I prefer at least a penny. But sometimes the PA tells me otherwise so I flip out right away and still net profitable albeit very small.

With scalping, my win rate is basically 85%+. 12 out of my 14 trades today were profitable. And the losses were super small compared to the winners. There were a few very small net profitable trades too where I made like $22 for a quick in an out. I've been trying to catch the big trend ride with some size but not much success. Scalping is my surest way to make money. But I wonder if it's scalable to hit my $5K/day goal.

I like the in and out action of scalping. If I get lucky I might catch a very smooth trend. But most of the time it might reverse or just stall.
 
Last edited:
11/13/2019:

Taxable Acct: Merrill Edge
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Realized gain:
$3,589.37
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Taxable Acct: TradeZero
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Realized gain:
$860.14
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Total profit: $4449.61

So close to my $5K/day target @Overnight @jl1575 ! Most of the gains were from overnight. I used the afterhours and pre-market execution capabilities of Merrill Edge for the first time! I'm glad I did because afterwards that stock just tanked.

I think I just need to learn to hold for bigger moves. Swing big size for a penny makes you feel cool but doesn't generate much profits. Yesterday new big size was 60K shares but net profits were minimal.

The TradeZero account trade was on a puny 1K+ shares but it capture like 40-90cents move. I should have added size to that one. I knew it would breakout too but I'm more of a buyer BEFORE breakout type of trader than a buy big size once BO starts. For me once it starts moving I'm afraid to add more size because I'm afraid of a sudden pullback.. But I know that's how breakout traders do it.
 
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trader99 said:
...For me once it starts moving I'm afraid to add more size because I'm afraid of a sudden pullback.. But I know that's how breakout traders do it.
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See? You are trading stuff that makes sense to you. So long as you stay away from GC. :-)
 
trader99 said:
GC is nasty with scary volatility!! I stopped trading futures. Just focusing on equities! how's your trading?
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Very sloooowww. I've been poking around here and there live, and trying to hone entries and stops on day trading in sim. Most results are good in sim, but live I am way too skittish for my own good. The trauma of trying to swing through 4 corrections since Feb 2018 and not letting swings recover has fucked me up big time. Oct last year was the lynch pin that nailed my coffin on swinging. So yes, I am still struggling.

The fact that we are at ATH before Dec 19 contract expiration is not leaving a scar on my brain, no sir! :-)
 
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