Quote from actionzip54:
I thought you didn't scalp, but your best trades today are scalps?
At what point do you decide the losing trade you have had on for four hours is a loser? You seem quite confident. How long have you been trading?
> In truth I don't want to scalp but in this particular scenario when you've been in something for 2-3 hours and it's put you offside and you only average a little bit of size... you're happy just exiting for a tiny amount of profit.
> Also, funny enough, for the past 2 months my 'bread and butter' strategies have become more and more dangerous. I'm risking 10-20k just to make 1k more often. What I am forced to do, is look to other things, to try scalp money here and there on small substitute size. It keeps me in the game, and if I go offside in my bread-and-butter stuff, then I don't need to average hard in them... I can just let them ride. OR, I can just 'wait' because I don't want to take a crappy price yet. If you only trade 1-2 products, on every single half-move they do, you will be inclined to enter them.
To be honest, most even big traders are complete scalpers. However, they do not just exit straight away for a small loss. They always work around to see what they can try and do. The big guys at my firm are not running massive 500-lots for like 8-10 ticks here and there. Trust me, they are taking a tick when they are approaching that size... I'm serious.
Most of them are scalpers. If they 'build a position' they'll have a target on their core size but the majority of their size is to try to job little amounts of ticks here and there.
> I decide it's a loser because of the specific time frame I'm doing it. The euro session is closed.. I'm in Australia.. its 2am... and when it lets me scratch at 5am I am out. The alternative is to wait till 8.30am to try see if it maybe pays a tick. Not worth it to me... since I was awake at 8.30am the previous day. This game is all about sitting in front of that screen, doing your hours. When markets change, or get sh*tty, or get dangerous, you know them as soon as it happens. You get first hand. Algos and bots need to trust back-testing for 3 months.
For example, I noticed from Day 1 that holding an Australian equity spread into its re-open @ 9.50am was not guaranteed money anymore. It worked 4/5 times for 2-3 months straight. But then it stopped, and the spread was only 50% chance of making money, or losing a little, or opening at scratch. So you need to get out immediately on that re-open auction.
> It's constant variables like this which are toggling through out the day. There's no perfect rhythm. You need to be able to apply yourself in all these scenarios. It's not a gift from God.. just practice and focus and discipline and journalising everything over time.
You just get gut feelings over time. If you don't like how the chart looks, you just get out early.
> I'm never really confident in this career. Some would say I act confidently but trust me, I have very low self-esteem and confidence. When nothing works in this job, it won't be 1 day.. it will bleed you out for 2 months while you struggle, toss and turn to adapt.
It can take everything just as quick as it gave you the hope of making it. I've been here for 2.5 years. For the first 1.0 years I made ZERO. I went through multiple products, trading for free, living off nothing, finding my own things and creating stuff. But right now, I have skipped the 'cruise for a few years' period of slowly staircasing size. I'm aggressively adding to my account. I only see myself getting marginally, very marginally, better over time in the next 2-3 years. I know how unsophisticated the big guys are sometimes, they're not geniuses.... it should prove to be inspiration for those who want to tackle the big numbers game too.
The only confidence I truly have.. is that I have
copied the masters of the game. I know how to scale up. I know everything I need to do, in order to be a 7-figure trader in a few years. It's just a matter of building dollars in the account to back myself. I copied everything. I asked the right questions, and listened to the right people and took on board the best stuff. I share everything on this forum under this account.
There are a lot of c*nts in this industry. Ruthless, pathetic, scumbags. And most of them are sh*t traders too. I won't be like that.
Our oldest trader, who's been profitable for 20 years and never had a down month, said to me... my greatest asset is that I'm a sponge. I look, learn, listen, to everyone. Whatever info they have, I'll take it all in, and re-work it in my head. Just copy the best bits from other peoples stuff, you'll end up somewhere great with your own list of pearls.
Sometimes the answers in this game are right infront of you. It just takes a little push to get your ideas executed.
