Leaderboard

Hi fellow traders. I would like to share with anyone who may find this useful or perhaps provide a helpful ‘head start’ into the world of Hot Keys. When I began to learn day trading and the importance of using hot keys, I created an editable PDF file which I would refine and develop as my trading progressed. To this day I still refer back to this chart as a constant reminder of my complex hot-key layout. One very nice thing about the PDF I am providing here is the fact that all the comment text boxes and red square boxes are ‘live and editable’. You can use this file as a head start to customize your preferred hotkeys vs. creating one from scratch. (Bit of a time saver) You will find that as you evolve your hotkeys, you will revise your PDF on the fly continuously making it more detailed and accurate for your desired use. Just a note; All I did here was take a photo of my actual keyboard and added some black space around it. I then saved a .jpg file and converted it to a PDF file. A few things I would like to point out here in hopes to answer some possible questions. This layout I am providing here is simply how I ‘personally’ have found to work for ‘my’ for my trading style. Yours can of course differ. - The text boxes Highlighted in ‘yellow’ represent the very active hotkeys I use most commonly - The colored stickers on the keyboard (purchased from a dollar store) are something I did to help me learn with clarity/confidence under pressure. Once you have used them for a while you will most likely find that you do not need colored stickers. Your hotkeys become natural to you. That day will come. - The hotkey scripts I am providing are based on using DAS trader version 5.3.0.5 (and in particular IB as my broker). Please note to ensure that you test out all your hotkeys in simulation mode before you go live. Make changes as necessary. - From my understanding and experience using hotkeys in DAS Trader Pro 5.3.0.5. Hotkeys associated with ‘stop order’ like actions DO NOT work in pre-market environments. (I do not know why). So use at your own discretion and ensure to test out all of them in the simulator environment. Perhaps now that I have done this, it might be nice for other fellow traders to share their hotkey layout and what works well for them. Be nice to see other trading styles. Happy trading everyone! And good luck! Uploaded; April 20 2019 Revision: 0 DAS HotKey Layout and Shortcut Scripts REV0.pdf

My Wife has been telling me that I have the head for Day Trading for Many years. In the past we have worked hard on a small business in Key West and since have always had Jobs along with some kind of retail business weather it was the Art store in KW, a Donut business, an online retail business that we still operate and recently an Amazon PL business. This last adventure cost us a few bucks but fortunately I was able to get ride of most of the product and not fall too far in the red. I have recouped enough for a small Day Trading Account. I talked to a few people at work about this and they all had the same thing to say "Its tough and no one makes money doing it" after talking with them a bit more I realized that they were willing to put the money in but not put the time in to educate themselves and of course they lost money. Most of them are still holding on to Bitcoin for the long haul. I decided to start reading some books on this and I started with Stock Trading for Dummies and realized that was not the right book for me. I then found Andrews first book and was hooked. I should have listened to my Wife a long time ago. It just so happens that I work nights Sunday - Wednesday as a Poker Manager from about 3:30pm to 3:30am (home to home) eastern time, so I am able to get a few hours sleep before I wake at 7:30am to get ready for my Classes I joined BBT as a Lifetime Member on the 4th of July. I was almost done with Andrews first book. I woke up in the AM to watch the premarket show and at the time I would follow along on Think or Swim. I did this till the 15th of July. From the first day of practice I did keep a journal on paper until now (I think I will still write it as I feel like doing it twice cant hurt help me remember). I showered last night right before bed. I woke today nice and fresh, brushed my teeth, made myself an espresso and ate a protein bar. I had plenty time to do some of my own research before Carlos came on at 8:30. The last 2 days I have been very happy with my premarket analysis as most of what I have is either on Carlos watch list or is a low float (which I can not seem to get the info from the Das Sim platform). 9:34 +MGM at 30.99 (should have been 30.90 but I was slow on the hot key) I partialed out at 31.13, 31.25 and 31.34 and got all out at 31.60. My stop was previous candle 30.89 and Target 31.61 from the daily charts Realized +25.63 I took this Slower moving stock in play as I felt more comfortable with it. 10:02 +INTC 52.62 P - 52.69 and out at 52.56 (again I was slow on the trigger on both) My stop was prev. candle 52.55 and Target 53.00 on 5min VWAP Realized +.50 My total day +26.13 This is at 100 shares of each. If starting with $5000 my 1% rule would have been 500 shares of each for a realized profit of +130.65 The last two days after I have decide I was done for the day I went back to just play around and try to learn more midday strategies I took -TWTR misread what I thought was a drop and lost out along with a reentry +TWTR and this time it fell, LOL my mini Hulk.... I know myself and If I was in for real money I would have never even come back to the market for the day. but I will add this ticker also so maybe I can figure out what I misread.

Great job with the interview. I just watched it. Congrats on being the top equities trader on the DAS challenge!!

Live trading summary of the month of July. So by the end of June I have gone 8 months without a positive month and I have had a flat P/L for the last 5 months. Three days before the end of last month I was thinking seriously ending the month early and SIM trading to lock in a profitable month and solid score card. I thought that was silly and was thinking even if I lose every trade for the next 3 days I will still have a positive P/L. But that was assuming I stuck to a -1R loss. I under estimated my self-sabotaging behaviors. The following 3 days were a disaster, losing every trade and not holding to the -1R loss. Thus June was another flat P/L month and mediocre score card. So Thursday morning I was thinking, “not again.” And decided to take SIM trades only the next two days and lock in a positive P/L. Which I did. So finally, my ninth month trading live, is green. Kind of funny that those two SIM days were my best two trading days of the month. Would they have been as good if I was trading live? My win% (for live trades) for the month was solid at 58%. I added quite a few SIM trades this month on 5/10/15 min ORBs and saw an improvement as the month progressed. Using Van Tharp method for analyzing trading systems, the 17 live trades in July with my 1min/2min ORB setup has a very good rating. But that is a small sample set. The 3 months previous has a rating of poor (but tradable) due to the 5 trades I let the loss pass -1R. All it takes is two trades a month, that you don’t stick to your stop, to go from a “very good” system to a “poor” rating. I am still trading with Centerpoint and it has been OK, but not great. I haven’t experienced any more tech issues since the second week. The execution speed is OK. I only trade very liquid stocks so I wonder why I get different speed results from day to day. Not impressed by the short list. Since they have a “hard to short” app, their easy to short list is not extensive. I remember when both ROKU and CGC were dropping like a rock one day. I had neither available to short and I hear people with IB making great trades on those stocks. In July I read (actually listened to) The Willpower Instinct which was recommended by Tommy. I wrote a review for it. https://forums.bearbulltraders.com/topic/1278-book-review-of-willpower-instinct/ I also listed to Trading beyond the Matrix by Van K. Tharp. The book is actually free on their website: https://www.vantharp.com/trading-beyond-the-matrix-the-red-pill-for-traders-and-investors-soft-cover It’s worth a read, but does read like an advertisement for their courses. With that said, it worked, because I am taking one of their courses. I started taking the course (home study version): Van Tharp Institute Peak Performance Course for Traders. To place some accountability on myself to finish the course I started to post my reading notes and assignments online. Please see my link if you are curious about the course: https://forums.bearbulltraders.com/topic/1286-van-tharp-institute-peak-performance-course-for-traders-my-journey-through-the-course/ Stats for February/March/April/May/June/July: February March April May June July Total # of live trades 21 34 36 36 38 19 Hulk Days 0 0 0 0 0 0 Max Loss Days 0 0 0 0 0 0 Broke max trade rule 1 1 0 0 0 0 Hoy Key Mistakes 1 1 0 0 1 2 Score card 81% 81% 84.5% 85.8% Only half the trades as usual since I had 9 SIM only days this month. My two hot key mistakes was issues switching back and forth to SIM. My score card was lower than I had hoped but at least an improvement from last month. Goals for July: 1) Don’t go hulk. 2) Learn to control your emotions after a loss. 3) The trade score card average for the month should exceed the previous month. 4) Increase risk per trade from $25 back to $30. 5) Keep improving health. 6) Follow the new 11 rules I specified in my June 28 weekly 7) Keep making SIM trades on 5/10/15 min ORBs

Van Tharp Institute Peak Performance Course for Traders Vol 1: How to use Risk Chapter 3 The most important trait that a winning trader can have? Personal responsibility. Ed Sakota in Market Wizards said, ”people get exactly want they want out of the markets.” This chapter has two stories describing the above statement. One who got rich and lost it in the dot-com bubble and who still blames everyone else. The other example is the author who got into a car accident. A witness would clearly see it was the other driver’s fault. But was it? The author hated the car he drove and was actually receptive to have the car destroyed. He was shocked to realize that yes he was likely also at fault for the accident. Then it became clear how one totally creates their world. Personal responsibility is the most important characteristic for the person who wanted to transform himself or herself into a good trader or anything else for that matter. If you believe in personal responsibility, you could change. The author plays a marbles game with his traders “in training”. The marbles are randomly picked and are labeled as winners and losers of different degree. It is designed to give the player an average return of 0.45R. So it would be a really good trading system. 1/3 of the class go bankrupt. 1/3 lose money and about 1/3 get rich. The unusual differences has to do with position sizing and is not the point of the course yet. The point here is some of the losers blame the person who picked the marbles from the bag and had a losing streak. Thus not taking personal responsibility. They did not recognize their mistakes and thus will not learn from them. So they will repeat their mistake over and over. The best thing a trader can do, when things go wrong, is to determine how he or she produced those results. Then determine what the choice point was and give yourself other options to take when you encounter a similar choice point in the future. Daily debriefing (journaling): Acknowledge the mistake, determine the circumstances that caused the mistake, then mentally rehearse an alternative (more useful behavior). Assignment: listen to Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret. It took a few days for my request through the local library to go through. I have listen to some of it already. When I finish I will come back to this page and update it. The secret is the “law of attraction,” Which is essentially positive thinking gets positive results. But it pushes two thoughts with that. One is negative thoughts attract negative results as well and that this law of attraction has some new age “power” to it. Forgetting about the latter for the moment I have seen the former in action. I meant one of the luckiest people and worked with him in graduate school then the cooperate world for about 12 years. It’s amazing how luck is always on his side and he always makes the assumption that luck will be on his side. After 12 years I see how it actually works. It’s two major traits. One there must be dozens (or more) little decisions made every day that are very binary. He will always lean to making the decision that may bring something positive, though the odds are very small. I will tend to do the opposite and make decisions that may cause something negative to happen. After say a week, a few hundred of these choices have occurred. One or two pan out or a combo of several and something reasonable go his way and the opposite for me. Since it is impossible to follow the repercussions of all these choices, it looks like good or bad luck. The second trait is an open mind to different possibilities. If you think that something positive may happen, when an opportunity, though it may be outside the box, crosses your path, he would see it and act. I would be close minded and not see it. There is actually some data for this. I once read about an experiment where volunteers were gathered. One set of people considered themselves usually the lucky type and the second group considered themselves unlucky. Everyone was given a newspaper and asked to count the number of pictures in the newspaper. The unlucky group usually took 2 or 3 minutes to count all the pictures. The lucky group usually took around 10 seconds. Because the lucky group all noticed a big sign on page two stating, “there are 46 pictures in the newspaper.” The unlucky group were focused on just looking for pictures and never noticed the sign. You can imagine how that applies to day trading. So you need to make yourself luckier by using the power of attraction.

Live trading summary for week ending 7/26/19. Traded full share size ($25 risk/trade). Only traded live for the first 3 days of the week. Since the first 3 days of next week I will be trading from a hotel I will limit it to SIM. Thus I am calling Friday 7/26 the last day of the month. Since it is the last day of the month I was going to be highly prone to self-sabotaging behaviors. I usually have a positive P/L going into the last few days of the month where I give it all back. So just to prevent this behavior this month I stopped trading live the last two days of the month. So I only took 4 live trades this week. My score card for the week was better at 88%. I only live traded AAPL but I did take quite a few SIM trades which were much more successful than last week. My last two days of the week, which was SIM only, were my two best trading days of the month. Would it have been if I was trading live? Back test data shows primarily the same as last week. AAPL in play and MU, FB and TSLA are possibilities at the open. As for TSLA I will need to trade that stock in SIM first, to get to understand its personality. Since I am trading SIM Monday-Wednesday of next week I will reevaluate what is in play Wednesday night. Here is my plan for this week: Concentrate on process and score card, not on W% and P/L AAPL is still in play at the open. Make it the primary focus. Both MU and FB are marginal. They should be secondary focuses. Choose order based on premarket and previous day action. Increase risk to $30 risk per trade. Trade SIM Monday-Wednesday due to unreliable WiFi. Take advantage of this to improve partialing and trade TSLA. Don’t add to any trade, even winners.

Friday 7/25/2019 I had a well-being score of 6/10 this morning. My nerves were fine. I took one SIM trade with FB. I was looking at TSLA as well at the open. I honestly wasn’t looking at much else since I really like FB’s premarket. The scenario I was most hoping for is FB drop down to the $200 level and bounce back and I would go long when it broke the PDC. FB did just that but 6 seconds after the open. At 5 seconds before the open it dropped and bounced off of $200 and at 6sec after the open it broke the PDC. This is too early for even me to take a trade. I waited another 10 seconds for the fluctuations to die down and then I went long with a large stop. My stop was all the way down to the $200 level since it is still so close to the open. My target the 203.43 daily level. But, I knew in my gut that target was too far away and more likely the high of PM was all I would get. Again, like yesterday, even though I knew that it was a SIM trade my heart beat like it was real. Now my objective was to take decent partials. WOW! I pushed my patience to the extreme. This was tough for me even in SIM. I took only two small partials on the way to the PM high. This was a $1 move. I usually take 5 partials by then. Then I waited two minutes and a nice ABCD was setting up. But the wait was killing me since if I exit then I have a one and done, but if it reverses, since I took small partials, this is a small win only. So I took another partial. The market was nice enough to teach me a lesson and 1 second after I took another partial the price popped. I thought this was about all the move I would get from FB and partialed out. But, over all I thought it was an improvement on my partialling patience. Oddly, even though it was SIM, it was a big enough trade to call one and done, so I couldn’t get myself to take another SIM trade. The chart when I took the trade. The entire trade: What I did good today: Created a workable trading scenario so I can react fast at the open. I don’t have to think, just follow the plan. How did I challenge myself today? Tried to be more patient with the partialing. What I did bad today: I really like this trade. I am going to give the complaining a rest today. What can I do better: Keep working on the partialing. But, it was a good start today.

26.Jul.19 No Trading today, as I breached my rule of trading beyond my maxloss yesterday.

July 25, 2019 - $AMD (Partial) Today was all about execution. The goal today was to execute each step of my trade plan with violating any rules. Identify Profit Targets - Accomplished Place Stop Loss - Accomplished Analyze the Risk - Accomplished Entry Execution - Accomplished Profit Taking - Accomplished The only rule I violated today was trading a stock not in play. I had $BMY and $TAL on my watch list. The entry I look for did not form on $BMY and $TAL went on SSR. (I do not trade SSR stocks). So, I went to my favorite list and to see if I could get an entry to work my profit taking as that is my focus right now. Proper execution of my profit taking plan. I found an entry and executed the profit taking to a tee. Took a partial at 1R and left the rest to either hit the profit target or stop out at the break even. I will say I met my plan today and advance my understanding of controlling my emotions when the stock moves in my direction. Sample Set Results, S E P 14 15 16 17 18 19 20