Trading NQ via Price Action

[dbphoenix]

Comes back to that fear thing. I would see it work on 2 charts... and then it would be messy for a couple of charts.. and so I would be back to the drawing board. I would think I needed a better entry...an entry closer to the breakout. Then I see that these really chop you up. Sure the profits are bigger, but way too many losing trades.

Visually I could see it worked, but the moment I encountered some negative data, I was scared to continue. Not unlike while in a trade, the minute that RET/pullback happens, I'd want to run for the exits!

I just didn't think I had something good enough, without actually having the data to show me if it was good enough or not. I thought that if I missed most of the move with a RET entry high above the breakout level that this was a bad trade since it missed most the action. I could see some instances where right where the RET happens, price congests and then drops down again. So this RET entry was a failed entry and it made me second guess the entry method.

Sadly the next two days are so busy, but by the weekend, I should have some sort of number to work with.... my very first statistic. I think I will choose 2 variables... same setup though. The RET entry once the RET bar is fully above the trendline. Stop will be the low of the previous bar, and target will be either 1 times or 2 times the stop.

I seriously couldn't do this yet because I just didn't nail down exactly what I needed to see.

If you're afraid of old charts, then viewing charts in real time will be of no benefit to you whatsoever.

As for RET entries, you still haven't defined what you mean by "break", so any examination of "RETs" will be time and effort wasted.

While this may sound discouraging, your refusal to engage this work must be addressed. Cheerleading is not going to result in a robust trading system.

 

[k p]

Why not?

Furthermore...

You know how in life, when you really really want something, you put yourself in quite the precarious position. If you actually go after it with all your heart and soul and you still fail, its a long drop down, there will be nowhere else to go but down when you hit the top of everything that you could have done. If on the other hand you just circle around this thing that you want, you can always fall back onto the excuse that you just never really tried hard enough, so you could have gotten there. It really is much easier to almost make it and still leave it open as an option than to give it your all and still fail.

So as silly as it sounds, I'm just scared that when I collect my stats that I will have nothing. I perhaps won't have trades that would have already lost me almost $4000 which is where I'm at... but I'm scared that I won't have anything good enough to trade. So if I can't have an edge from over 100 charts, I'm scared of what else I will be able to do to look for that edge. I'm scared that I will be told my lines are all wrong, that my exit criteria is just random noise... etc. So I guess I just really want this to work, but I'm scared of the result.

 

[k p]

If you're afraid of old charts, then viewing charts in real time will be of no benefit to you whatsoever.

As for RET entries, you still haven't defined what you mean by "break", so any examination of "RETs" will be time and effort wasted.

I'm no longer afraid of old charts actually.. they really contain the necessary information to move forward.

As for the definition of a break, you're gonna have to help me here Db. I have no idea what you mean... what are the possible options? A break just means to me that price goes through the trendline. It may come back down below it, but when my entry happens based on a bar that is the RET bar, this RET bar has to be fully above the trendline. What else do you think I need in this definition?

 

[dbphoenix]

I'm no longer afraid of old charts actually.. they really contain the necessary information to move forward.

As for the definition of a break, you're gonna have to help me here Db. I have no idea what you mean... what are the possible options? A break just means to me that price goes through the trendline. It may come back down below it, but when my entry happens based on a bar that is the RET bar, this RET bar has to be fully above the trendline. What else do you think I need in this definition?

I've already answered this question. Review my recent posts.

 

[k p]

I've already answered this question. Review my recent posts.

Here is what I found from here...

http://www.elitetrader.com/et/index...via-price-action.281995/page-117#post-4049807

"That's why you have to define it. If you don't define it, you have nothing to test. If you have nothing to test, you can't formulate a rule.

Is a break a "close" beyond the line or is penetration enough?

If a break is a "close" beyond the line, may price return to the other side of the line while retracing or must it clear the line and stay beyond it?

This is extremely easy to define: yes/no, black/white, right/wrong, 1/0."

In this respect... a break is just penetration, but whether a trade is going to be put on will fully depend on price closing above the trendline because that RET bar has to be above the trendline... this is what I will start with! A close just above the trendline is not good enough because if this penetration happens in the last few seconds, the bar might close above the trendline but who cares, it only spent seconds up there. Since price is continuous, these bar opens and closes can be tricky. So I think that the secret is price staying above the trendline for at least a minute... hence why I will look to see if the RET bar being fully above the trendline is good enough for a filter.

 

[bh_prop]

KP: After reading the last several posts of yours this needs to be said . . .

If you refuse to do the work (defining and testing setups, developing a plan, etc) because you fear the end result of that work will not be to *your* satisfaction then you have 100% already determined your outcome: a trading failure - 100% guaranteed.

ATP tennis pro Stan Wawrinka lost 2 brutal 5 set matches (and 4 matches total) to then world #1 Novak Djokovic in 2013. Yes, he failed when it mattered most, but he *knew* he was getting closer to the end result he wanted. He then proceeded to have the following tattooed on his forearm:

“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail Better.”

Let that sink in for awhile. Or don't and continue making excuses . . .


p.s. Wawrinka went on to beat then world #2 Novak Djokovic and eventually #1 Rafael Nadal to win the 2014 Australian Open title

 

[k p]

Or don't and continue making excuses . . .

I'm done with excuses... hence why its so easy for me to admit it now!

I just really wanted out outline exactly what is going on in my head as I'm sure others perhaps have similar mental constraints. I want this journal to be just as much about helping me as others. Its the only way I know how to give back and to pass forward all the help that others are giving me.

 

[NoDoji]

I'm done with excuses... hence why its so easy for me to admit it now!

I just really wanted out outline exactly what is going on in my head as I'm sure others perhaps have similar mental constraints. I want this journal to be just as much about helping me as others. Its the only way I know how to give back and to pass forward all the help that others are giving me.

I took notes on everything surrounding a setup and no one told me how to go about it. I did "guess and check" stuff. For example, if price breaks through the HOD by N ticks (tested 1-10 ticks), what are the odds it will run at least 20 ticks higher than the HOD before dropping back inside that level by more than 10 ticks? I did all sorts of analyses like that. It's really, really tedious and time-consuming work. I spent hundreds of hours on it. You want the end result without the work.

 

[k p]

I took notes on everything surrounding a setup and no one told me how to go about it. I did "guess and check" stuff. For example, if price breaks through the HOD by N ticks (tested 1-10 ticks), what are the odds it will run at least 20 ticks higher than the HOD before dropping back inside that level by more than 10 ticks? I did all sorts of analyses like that. It's really, really tedious and time-consuming work. I spent hundreds of hours on it. You want the end result without the work.

I guess in a way I just wanted to make sure I was on the right path. Kind of like when I was seeing how beautiful price can reject an OH. I figured why not just sell when we get within a point and lose two points if we go one point above. I didn't get around to the stats, but I saw this didn't work well enough. Once again though, this was with my rose colored glasses on that still thought I should be looking for a setup that would yield better than 80% win rate. It is a shame that up till now, given all the hundreds of hours I have put into this, I don't have any stats yet, so I do see this time could have been better spent. Mind you though, I just didn't know well enough what I was looking for, and its really hard to find it if you don't even know what you're looking for. (I was also partly reluctant to do the stats because I didn't want to be trading patterns, I wanted to try and figure out what traders wanted... so it took some time to rationalize what I thought were two competing approaches.

The other thing, and this is big, is that it probably wouldn't matter even if someone told me exactly how many ticks to use and when to buy. If you don't build the system yourself, if you don't collect every stat yourself, then you will more than likely not be able to trust it when its time to use it. I remember in an interview, Elon Musk answered a question about how he could tell someone was not telling the truth on the their resume. He would ask them what kind of challenges they faced in a project and how they overcame this challenge. It is only those people who actually had to fix the problem who actually knew intimately the painstaking work that was necessary. A person who hadn't lived through this experience just wouldn't be able to describe in minute detail what it took to overcome this problem.

So although I might be further ahead if I started on the right path, I just don't think that it was possible for me to do so until I failed enough and lost some money and proved to myself that I couldn't just wing it. A crappy result is still a result, and so I have proved to myself what not to do. It takes a while to turn from man to machine, a critical transformation necessary for trading.

 

[fourtiwinks]

I'm done with excuses... I want this journal to be just as much about helping me as others. Its the only way I know how to give back and to pass forward all the help that others are giving me.

Hey kp, you definitely are in this regard!

Fyi, your journal is a treasure for a struggling trader like me, both for the invaluable help from experienced traders and for your candid struggles. I can't contribute meaningfully, but I really appreciate what you are doing.

May you achieve the breakthroughs needed to be a successful profitable trader.

Best wishes!!