Leaderboard

Tuesday - June 30th, 2020 Futures Watch /ES Futures closing at the highs and fading slightly lower into today's PM. Tightening range and consolidation with a volume pocket above to get to the Volume Point of Control (POC). /NQ Futures closed strong and had a slight fade pullback, currently hovering near the 10,000 mark and no direction clear at this time. /RTY Futures closed strongest yesterday and appears to have tested Volume POC twice. Ideally other markets will drive directionality. Premarket Review at 9:00 ET $SPY - Flat around 304 area. Market expecting more information before making a move. Watch 303 area major consolidation yesterday and high volume node. $QQQ - Flat around 242.75 area, had a major pullback off the 237.35 tweezer (double bottom) lows from yesterday. Watch 242.46 yesterday pivot high before closing rally. $IWM - Flat around 141 area, break above Friday highs so showing relative strength for a move higher in the coming week. Watch highs and lows from yesterday defining the range we're in. Bonds slightly higher, $TLT at a volume node and may consolidate as it did last month between 162/168.5 Oil Futures down 1.8%, but showed some strength in correlation with the markets yesterday, so may be pulling back similar to S&P. Natural Gas Futures very strong up 3.8% after yesterday strength, watching again today for continuation. Gold Futures consolidating below 1800 resistance, fairly flat. Silver Futures flat and volatile range between 17 and 18.5. Not on watch. Volatility Futures up 1.9%, keep watch for this to show a early signal for market directionality. Premarket Sectors at 9:15 ET Strong Sectors: From yesterday, Metals and Home Builders performed well. Volume was light overall across all sectors. Today, watching Technology for continuation and Utilities for a break of Friday highs. Semiconductors ($SMH) are quite strong, so may help Technology carry forward. Weak Sectors: Financials and Energy are continuing to be the weakest sectors overall, daily ranges are reduced on Energy so possibly slowing momentum to the downside. Things to Watch: $WFC due to relative weakness in weak Financials, possibly due to dividend cuts over other banks (failed stress test). $FB getting away from 220 after two volatile days. $MU gap up and strength in semis.

Purpose: Provide a overview of the markets by using different instruments and evaluating prior activity. Use overview to understand market directionality, strength/weakness, and driving factors. Focus on areas with most potential. Outline: My process involves reviewing what the markets did last week using the Index ETFs, Index, and Futures in order to understand the day structure and market profile from the prior session. I will often mark areas of consolidation and volume acceptance as levels of interest to carry forward outside of daily levels and trends. Once an overview of the market products is assessed, I like to quickly scan the SPDR Sector ETFs for any obvious standouts relative to the current SPY Percentage Change. This is normally done close to Market Open around 9:00 - 9:15 ET. I like to have a list of candidate stocks that are good representative names for any sectors that are 'in play' relative to the markets. For example, if Energy stocks are moving independent of the markets, I would want to find a good Energy stock that has high Relative Volume and Percentage Change to trade 'the best of the best'. Instruments: Index Products: $SPY/SPX/ES Futures $QQQ/NDX/NQ Futures $IWM/RUT Index/RTY Futures Sector Products: $XBI - BioTech $XHB - Home Builders $XLB - Materials $XLC - Communications $XLE - Energy $XLF - Financials $XLI - Industrials $XLK - Technology $XLP - Consumer Staples $XLRE - Real Estate $XLU - Utilities $XLV -Health Care $XLY - Consumer Discretionary $XME - Metals Other Products: Bonds: $TLT & /ZB and /ZN Futures Oil: /CL Futures Natural Gas: /NG Futures Gold: $GLD & /GC Futures Silver: /SI Futures Volatility: VIX Index & /VX Futures Dollar: $DXY US Dollar Index

Justin, thanks it works now. How would the Hotkeys be for covering shorts 50% and 100% please. I assume the Set stop to BE remains the same. Thanks in advance Dieter

Very helpful. Thanks dude.

I know this is an old post, but I was looking for away to do this as well. You can do this by Right click on the chart - Data Config - Un-check the show pre/post Market. Now you should be able to view the charts without the Pre-market data.

Monday SIM +3.3R BYND 1MinOrbDown +3.3R When second candle failed to hold VWAP, I went short. I thought about adding for the 5MinOrbDown, but decided against it, BYND can be very erratic, so I just decided to play with what I had. I also continue to make improvements on my self awareness. I had a couple of trades that I would usually have entered, especially since I was in a winner already. But I took a breath and realized they did not meet enough criteria for me and I stayed away. I looked and looked for another trade, but didn't see any that I liked. I need to keep improving on my self awareness. I watch William's meditation video in the morning after the pre-market show and before the open. This BYND trade worked exactly as I had pictured it during the 3 Min Meditation. I have also started muting the chatroom at the open. It is helping me concentrate on the trades I'm looking for without getting distracted by the trades Andrew and Brian are talking about.

I agree with Peter B. When you are starting out, you really are not going to know how you will trade and what your edge will be (or your specialty). It took me years of trying things to figure out what works for me and I also stopped trying to correct and change my style. I just created something that works around it. Focus on probability, and at least for me I don't use a daily goal. I use a weekly goal instead. I do this because I never know when the good days will be. On good trading days I can make my whole weekly goal in a day or even in minutes. I always push it and trade bigger on good days where there are lots of setups in the Nasdaq futures market. It's really important to not turn trading into a 9-5. The fact is you can make in a month what some do in a whole year. To better understand why a stock or commodity trends while others chop around, it is all about order flow and price action. Watch it and learn about it. You will get it over time but it takes a lot of screen time to read price action well. It's especially hard with stocks because all stocks trade differently.

I like this rule !

This is way more useful then MSNBC! I'll be checking this out, thanks J dog!

@leilijHey! Congrats on going live and keeping it small. Handling losses is something traders never fully gain control of...so instead of trying to completely remove yourself from that emotion I focused on improving my accuracy. I found that being very picky on my setups helped me 'outweigh' my hulk days. For example last week I was up $800 then had a 2K unrealized, instead of wasting time sitting in the trade and potentially turning that loss into a 4k loss (which would be very hard to come back from), I took the loss and moved on. I was down $1200. I changed my approach to now work on smaller modest scalp trades and ended to the day green $800. Accuracy has helped me become profitable along with minimizing my losses. You reach a point where how much money is enough? Money became a less interesting driving force and it was more about 'can I trade well and win at the game'. I'll admit at the start it was all about the money lol. That's when I began to improve my trading.

2020-6-29 <SIM> Breathe in...Breathe out... Ok, I admit...I am a little frustrated after today... I went in with some pre-conceptions on my stocks for my watch-list given the morning news. Specifically $BA, my theory was the stock would be bullish, and indeed it was...but I lost substantially across the day. How can one have done the correct research (pick the stock in play) and have a correct momentum theory and still lose... Back to the basics is the only thing I can come up with... I felt like I got stopped out a lot today...maybe my stops are in the wrong place, too tight, or just all out reading the price-acition wrong. Yep, frustrated... Look at this awesome chart on $BA today Opens at 181, closes at 194...has a beautiful trend lines...how do you not make money here ? My approach here is analytical. Dissect it, identify the issues and come up with a plan to resolve them... $BA Trade 1 Stock drops below the 5 minute range, I go short and get stopped out. Not once, not twice, but three times...seems funny now. My rule triggers me for my first break...(three losses in a row = break) 5 Minute 1 Minute After one, looks like revenge trading...new rule (?) Only one shot per ORB (?) Trade 4 & 5 $BA Realizing that $BA is moving positive and it has set an ABCD pattern I am long at 10:03, later entry and less than ideal share size with only 103 shares. My thought process was, "this could be the trade of the day, I could probably just hold this all day and come out a hero" The stock goes up and stalls and I sell at 183.72 for a +1.82R... Happy to put some green on the books... Not happy I am not letting full or partial position run all day... ...So I fire again and rebuy, get stopped out and lost 1.29R... Trade 6 $BA I shorted at 10:37 after it broke that 9 & 20 for a reversal... Took a profitable partial, then it jumped back on me while trying to change my stops in the montage... -.04R $BA Trade 7 and beyond... $BA cracks the major technical over-night high level and I called it out, "This stock is going to 195!" Trade 7 Long in the consolidation phase of ABCD at 13:32 and stopped out !! (WT?) Held for 22 minutes, that could be a record ! Trade 8 Hitting it again in these mutliple ABCDs... Long and stopped out... This one is a little more obvious to me...I am using the 9ema on the 1 minute chart as a stop, way to tight. Trying to pick up larger share size, costing me over and over again... Trade 9 $BA breaks through the barrier of $190 (I called this one!) I go long, it pulls back and I add another 100 shares...I sell the 100 for a small profit...and I end up bailing out on the larger share for a small loss... What am I thinking (???) Trade 10 Long again at 14:54 at 190.24 It pulls back and I am confident of the 190 support so I double my size No big momentum up so I partial at 191.16 and close the balance at 191... I actually made 2.56R here...hmmmm... My last couple of trades were so sloppy, I can't even post them... Total $BA Trades = -3.97R ========================================================================== Afterthoughts: Well...I thought with this detailed journal there would be some obvious things to jump out at me... Only a few things...(not what I was hoping for) Study the basics of ABCD.... Maybe need some scheduled breaks if I am going to be trading all day... I am going to keep going through these, seems that I should have some more constructive items to work on after today... Will find them and keep improving ! = Ok, one more afterthought. If I can focus more on a better entry. This allows for a multiple of things 1) Bigger share size so I can partial and take profits and 2) I can leave a fraction in that should be somewhat substantial in order to take the longer runs. = Concentrate on proper stops...

Jarad, Your summary will allow us a quick read into the market and what many traders may be thinking allows us to get to our watchlist based upon market biases.

Monday - June 29th, 2020 Markets closed weak last Friday, June 26th with major index products closing near the lows after a roughly 2% decline throughout the day. Notably Technology and major names like Facebook and Amazon were sold off heavily and led the entire markets. Sunday Night /ES Futures opened lower at 2986.25 with low at 2983.5 before coming back above 3000s. Getting above 3025 area would be of interest as that brings us into the major breakdown area from last week. /NQ Futures opened lower 9785.5 with low at 9780.25 before coming slightly higher. Overall below areas of consolidation from last Friday and still showing weakness. /RTY Futures opened lower 1362.2 with low of 1359.6 before coming much higher to test 1400. Showing relative strength given already recovered the breakdown area from last week. Monday Premarket at 9:00 ET $SPY - Trending higher from Friday low, holding at roughly 0.5% higher near Thursday's low. $QQQ - Range bound between Friday's low and Thursday's low, roughly flat 0.0% $IWM - Trending higher off Friday's low attempting to test Friday high, up as much as 1.5%. Bonds are slightly lower from last week, I expect a small pullback as bonds have had a nice run from the recent lows. $TLT recovered from recent lows at 153.00 area up to 166.5 in after market last Friday, a roughly 8.5% gain in roughly two weeks. Oil Futures pulling away from 41 Gap Fill Highs, up slightly today. Natural Gas Futures very strong up 6.25% from recent selloff last week, I expect a strong bounce from these extended yearly lows. Gold Futures flat from last week, extended at 1800 resistance on /GC. I expect $GLD to have a pullback this week before attempting a breakout. Silver Futures down slightly after a major run over the past months, consolidating in 18 - 19 range. I expect silver to underperform gold in the coming months, but still remain bullish. Volatility Futures down 2.4%, with 23/51 day contracts roughly same price (slight contango). Sectors Premarket at 9:15 ET Strong Sectors: Industrials with $BA up 6%. Financials with most large bank names up close to 1%. Weak Sectors: Communications down with $FB down 4%. Things to Watch: Since major Tech was down heavily last week, watching $XLK and MAGAF names closely. If selloff continues, other potentially 'risk-off' sectors may get bought at these lows like $XLU (been weak for a while).

Matthew, Thank you for summarizing, I have something similar via powerpoint but I struggle to summarize. Mine are a little too detailed for quick view. This is awesome. I can share a google drive if you want to view my version.

5-Minute Opening Range Breakout (ORB) 5_MIN_ORB.pdf High of Day Break / Low of Day Break HOD_LOD_Breaks.pdf VWAP Reversal VWAP_Reversal.pdf Mountain Pass Mountain_Pass.pdf 1-Minute Opening Range Breakout (ORB) 1_MIN_ORB.pdf Rising Devil Rising_Devil.pdf Falling Angel Falling_Angel.pdf Parabolic Reversal Parabolic_Reversal.pdf