Hi guys, The journal - Total Trader, is now available for free download on my blog http://daytradearcade.com There are 5 short instructional vidoes to help you get the most out of it. I'd be grateful for all feedback (both good and bad!) Also, if you like Total Trader, I'd be grateful for a donation as I spent about 200 hours building it + $200 for a programmer to build the macros. Let me know what you think! The direct link to the download is: http://daytradearcade.com/trading-journal2/ Let me know your feedback (both good and bad!).

ORB + ABCD + DOUBLE TOP MU | 18th June I took 3 trades on MU today. The first was a ORB identified on the 5 minute chart above VWAP, with an ABCD confirmation on the 1 minute chart. When the volume came in, I went long and sold for a 2:1 profit ratio (no identified profit levels to try and sell to). The second trade was an ABCD pattern (A @ 09:40, B @ 09:45, C @ 09:47). Unfortunately the ABCD pattern did not eventuate despite a confirmation on volume and I got out for a small loss. As soon as I exited the second trade, I noticed a double top on the 1 minute chart and after the stock couldn't break above the MA on the 1 minute chart and struggled to move higher again, I went short with a target of VWAP. Even though I made profit on the third trade, selling most at the VWAP, the profit ratio was just over 1:1 and I should not have taken the trade.

This is a very common question, so here is a breakdown of the Account Report in DAS. To access the report, navigate to menu Tools > Account Report. Please note that the commissions assume SureTrader's rate structure, and may not necessarily match your broker's fees. If you plan on using Interactive Brokers, a good estimate of commissions is to multiply number of shares traded (B below) x $0.005. ====================[TOP]==================== [A] Tickets - A Ticket represents any and all executions that result from one order being entered. Regardless of how many partial executions result from one order being sent, only one ticket is generated. One Ticket = one commission. [b Shares - Number of shares bought/sold and shorted/covered [C] SEC - Securities and Exchange Commission fee calculated as a percentage of the dollar value of the trade. Read more on Investopedia. [D] FINRA - Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Trading Activity Fee. Read more. [E] Trade P&L - Gross profit/loss before any commissions or fees. E = L+C+D+G [F] Commission - Based on SureTrader's commissions structure. Unsure of exact calculation used; could be $4.95 per round-trip trade (?) Other users who are with IB say it could be using tiered commission rates, or $1/ticket. [G] ECN - Fee or credit for removing or adding liquidity to the market, respectively. Read more. [H] Net P&L - Net profit/loss after all commissions and fees. H = E-F-C-D-G, or H = L-F ====================[TOTALS]==================== Total Trades - Total tickets, equal to A above [J] Bought Shares - Total shares bought/covered [K] Sold Shares - Total shares sold/shorted [L] Day-trade P&L - Profit/Loss before commissions, but including ECN, SEC, FINRA. L = E-C-D-G [M] Total ECN - Equal to G above [N] Total SEC - Equal to C above [O] Total FINRA - Equal to D above In Summary, the value in H is your take home pay/loss at the end of each trading day.

Great setup, everyone! My system is overkill for day trading. I custume-build my PC for Gaming. Motherboard: Asus ROG STRIX Z370-E Gaming Processor: Intel Core i7 8700K 6x 3.70GHz Processor Fan: be quiet! Silent Loop 360 Ram: 16GB G.Skill Trident Z DDR4-3200 DIMM CL14 Dual Kit Memory: 2x 250GB Samsung 960 Evo M.2 2280 NVMe PCIe 3.0 x4 32Gb/s Graphics Card: 8GB Asus GeForce GTX 1080 Strix Advanced Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro 64-bit Power Supply: 550 Watt be quiet! Straight Power 11 Modular 80+ Gold Case: Fractal Design Define R6 Blackout Webcam: Logitech Brio 4k Ultra HD Keyboard: Corsair Gaming K70 RGB RAPIDFIRE CHERRY MX RGB Speed Elgato Stream Deck Monitors: Workstation Monitor HP Z43 107,97 cm (42,51") 4K-UHD Gaming Monitor ROG Swift PG278Q (27") 2K WQHD (2560 x 1440), 1ms, 144Hz, G-SYNC Backup: iPhone X Hotspot & MacBook Pro 13"

My set up is still evolving. Primary monitor is a 43 inch LG 4K and to the left of it is a 27 inch Acer (2560 x 1440). These run off an Acer ROG gaming laptop. On the right I follow the BBT chat, scanners, news, etc. from my 2011 iMac 27 inch, with a 25 inch Dell (2560 x 1440) on top and another old Dell 22 inch monitor to the right. I have my hotkeys programmed on this side keypad. ThinkorSwin doesn't allow you to have custom hotkeys like sell half, but you can customize the keystrokes for hotkey functions. So it works fine for me right now. I'll give DAS a shot once my speedtrader account gets set-up. It's taken forever, I've submitted the application three times already and no response. Once I get DAS, I will put that on the primary monitor and have TOS running on the iMAC for swing trades, options and charting.

it was great

Agreed on the price action negating profit targets. I sometimes also use the same price action to ‘scratch’ a trade if order flow or action does not seem ‘right’ before hard stop target. I think there is no other way, I believe that of 5 trades if we hit 1 at full Risk, 1 at full Reward or more and the interim at small profits or scales or scratches, our overall profit factor and win rate will give us that 2.0 return at 55-60% winners. Holding on to the hard Risk or Reward target will not work and should be deemed initial ‘targets’. Again, I am just a beginner and these are my current thoughts and belief system. I am only trading on a SIMM.

I really agree with Carlos M. on this one! Using MU as an example, I often buy 1000 shares, with a profit target of around 40 or 50 cents, usually yesterday's high/low, 2 days ago's high/low, or previous days' close. My stop loss will be anywhere from 10 cents to 20 cents below my entry point. Usually a few cents below VWAP or another strong support level. I generally will sell the first half at around 30ish cents, another half at 35ish cents, another half at the price target of around 40ish-50ish. Leaving the last 125 shares to sell when the stock starts to look weak again. A lot of this depends on how the price action looks. If it look strong, I may hold a little longer. If I'm skeptical, I may get out a little sooner. I'm still using a simulator. But, I have found this strategy to be more profitable than what I was doing before. I'm really interested in hearing other's opinion on this!

I repeated mistakes today I'm sure others have mentioned, and that chat room regulars will recognize as all too common. At the risk of being repetitive, I need to vent (on myself)... Mistake 1 -- After making a good, early trade on LOW (within 10-min of open) that put me above my daily goal, I continued to trade. Mistake 2 (also, trade #2) -- I followed Andrew into a trade that he called out. I was watching the stock out of the corner of my eye and when he said 'long', which is what I'd been thinking, I jumped in as though I was playing a video game. It didn't work out, I lost a little money, and I continued to trade. Because I managed the loss OK, I don't characterize the trades I continued to make as revenge trading -- I didn't trade this particular stock again -- but it was greed. Also just want to add that I have a habit of muting Andrew for this very reason -- but recently have taken to simply turning the feed down a bit. I think it's a good exercise to hear him mention stocks, or even talk through successful trades, while staying focused on my own trading. Didn't work so well in this example. Mistake #3 -- A bit later in the morning session I got back into LOW. I did so with too large a share size for my risk tolerance. The price went against me but believing I was right about the trade, I hung in too far past my stop and lost all daily profits and then some. And (you know what comes next) I continued to trade, this time sticking with LOW because I just KNEW it was a short. Never took a break. Never walked away for a breather. Just kept at choppy, piece-of-garbage LOW. In the end, I lost 4% of account value. This comes after several consecutive green days with one or two red days during which, by staying focused, disciplined and dispassionate, I effectively managed the losses. This pattern of consistent, steady gains only to take a day of disproportionate losses is a persistent issue with my trading. It is really, really hard to admit that you're wrong. It is really, really hard to "give up" and to turn DAS off while in the red for the day. It is really, really easy to allow days like this to get away from you (me). I'm sure that like other in the chat, I'm a competitive person and first and foremost, I compete with myself. I have come to believe that while this may be a useful characteristic in many areas of life, it's extremely dangerous to trading and for myself, one I must learn to 'put away' while actively trading. As a relevant aside, I struggled today to narrow down the watchlist. In recent weeks I took a page from Brian's book and began watching fewer stocks. I redesigned my desktop to support this approach and have since had enough success to believe that for where I am on the day trading learning curve, focusing on fewer stocks is a good move But then comes a day with a big gappers list of different stripes (low float, mid float, NYSE, NASDAQ, etc.) and I lack criteria for this situation. I suppose experience is the key ingredient here.

Hi Everyone, I took a 1 year off work to learn how to day trade and have created a blog which contains videos of all my recaps (both good and bad!). http://daytradearcade.com Also, I created a free journal where you just paste your data from DAS and it calculates all the most important stats. Took me 3 months to create using some programming help on-line. I'm happy to share it if interested -be good to get some feedback! Bart

My favorite mistakes (favorite because I make them so often): - Taking too many shares in hopes of a bigger profit. When I do this, to avoid going over my max risk on any single trade, I inevitably set my stop loss too close to my entry, which means that I'm much more likely to get stopped out before the stock truly moves against me. - Not being comfortable with the possibility of losing money on a trade. When this happens, I either stop out too early (taking a small loss only to see the stock go against me, having never hit my target) or take profit too quickly at the first sign of resistance. Stocks rarely just go through the roof and not recognizing that pull backs are inevitable, even for stocks going in my direction, is a great way to cultivate FOMO. - Not stopping once I have a decent profit on the day. I've come to believe that your profit target should be set to be some multiple of your maximum risk on any one trade. If I decide that my max risk ® on one trade is $100, my profit target for the day should be something reasonable like $150 or $200. Once I make $100, I find that my fear of losing those profits often results in placing tighter stops, which makes it more likely that I slowly give back my profits to market choppiness. After recognizing this, I've started switching to sim once I hit > 1 R. While it's below my profit target, I'm happier to slowly grow my account every day than ruin my day with the regret of having given my earnings back to Wall Street. - Jumping the gun around VWAP. When stocks get near VWAP, they're truly like a tennis ball that clips the top of the net. Instead of gambling and guessing which way it'll go, I've discovered that it's best to accept that you might get a worse entry, and simply wait for a sign of the VWAP being lost in one direction or another before entering a trade. Otherwise, you'll find yourself chopped out.

My biggest mistakes include, but are not limited to: -Revenge trading. Repeatedly trading the same choppy stock over and over as if it personally owes me money. -Over trading. Thinking I can recover from losses by taking low quality setups in rapid succession. -Not stopping at daily goal or 11:30 AM. Slowly giving back all my gains. -Not stopping out. Freezing like a deer in the headlights and letting a small loss grow into a big one. -Not taking a break after a bad trade. Continuing to trade when my psychology is in tatters. -Thinking I need to be in every move. Forcing bad trades rather than waiting for the chart to provide confirmation. -Increasing share size when losing. Trying to double down and recoup losses. After seeing how consistent my trading can be when not doing the above, I've realized that trading is 90% psychology. When I'm able to be disciplined and controlled, the money comes easily. When I regress and repeat bad habits, losses can quickly spiral out of hand.