Tommy's journey

[Mike B 624]

Nice short on $SE. 

[Mark D. 435]

I agree with Mike, that $SE trade was great, timing was just right and you scaled out with one piece at the low. 

[Tommy 55]

Thanx guys

today i did not trade that well, i did end positive though.
i made 7 trades, 3 winners and 4 loosers.

i went short TSLA before market open because it looked like a head and shoulders and close to the open they tend to move back to vwap once. I didnt want to hold it during the open so i got out but with some profit, i went short again, almost same as andrew i believe but got stopped out and didnt get back in again, that was unfortunate.

i was also looking at  LB, i went back to vwap and above but got sold off again quickly so i went short, it went down a little but went up again just as fast, my entry wasnt good, but i think it was not a bad try.
This move however mad me think its a long and i went in on a little pullback on the 1 minute.i topok one quick partial but then it went down to my entry and i got out because i didnt want to go minus since i had a partial.
i think i need to reconsider this as this threw me out of a nice ride. i was very strong so i got back in one more time on a pullback i got out again now just above breakeven, again i need to work on this. 
i took one more long at the point where it was making the wedge but got out without a really clear reason. but if not i would have probably get stopped out on the last wig down before it eventually popped...

i took a shot on mu for a short at vwap,  got stopped out at a bad spot, should have gotten out bit earlier. 

 

not great trading today, getting out early on a winner is not good trading .
its been many times now i get stopped out on something that is just a short spike.  i need to decide to get out more based on price action instead of entrypoint i think. 
but this could be very dangerous too... 
Still i may need to take a wider stop on some trades.

Edited May 23, 2019 by Tommy

[Tommy 55]

may 24, im not sure how many trades i made..
i came back home just in time for the open today, had a dinner and quite a lot to drink after work. i was thinking of not trading but since i got home in time and im doing sim anyway i figgured why not.i
i just put on watchlist what andrew waas mentioning., in order to not be influenced by andrew i put the sound of chat off.

So FL looked very much in play.
at the open it was a bit choppy i found but i still got in 

in the first 5 min i went long twice to get out both times with a small profit, and short twice once i got out at breakeven and once i took a  big loss.
after this the stock finally seemed to have decided on a direction and it got in though with a bad entry. i got out with profit but again not a great trade.

then i believed it had found a bottom, i wnet long  with a stopless in mind when it broke the support below. it turned out  to be good but moved so slowly i got out to quick.
 

 

roku, first 2trades was in between FL, i looked like an abcd but i didnt wait for the c and got in at the b to stop out at the c (if that makes sense) once i got out with a small loss and the other time was a short i gout out at breakeven after partial.
these 2 trades im not sure why i took, well, i really thought it would be a long first but i had my eye on FL too much (this was before my long on FL)

i went long again on roku after a pullback but it turned against me, then i got out because it kindal looked like a bdouble top was forming.

then i did a stupid thing, i tried to short the stock twice  even though it was strong, the first time was kinda ok, i thought there was a possibility for a double top and i got out at breakeven since i realized i was wrong.

the second time however there was no reason at all to go short and even worse i shorted it a third time. even when im holding the position i was thinking oh, this actually relly looks like it still wants to go higher but i didnt get out when i got a chance.

 

this was a pain to write, i want to go sleep.. but i feel this is important i do this for the record.  i had to look at my tradelog to remember what i exactly did
so it confirms what i thought, dont trade when drunk... kinda obvious right... 
its also kinda because of sim i think. i likely would not have taken so big risk letting it run. i have learned my lesson with that. still i want to make sim as real as possible  so i should not have done what i did.

bad bad trading, although FL was not too bad except for overtrading at the open.

ill update some more tomorrow i think. today is finished, goodnight

 

Edited May 24, 2019 by Tommy

[Patmartel27 37]

35 minutes ago, Tommy said:

may 24, im not sure how many trades i made..
i came back home just in time for the open today, had a dinner and quite a lot to drink after work. i was thinking of not trading but since i got home in time and im doing sim anyway i figgured why not.i
i just put on watchlist what andrew waas mentioning., in order to not be influenced by andrew i put the sound of chat off.

So FL looked very much in play.
at the open it was a bit choppy i found but i still got in 

in the first 5 min i went long twice to get out both times with a small profit, and short twice once i got out at breakeven and once i took a  big loss.
after this the stock finally seemed to have decided on a direction and it got in though with a bad entry. i got out with profit but again not a great trade.

then i believed it had found a bottom, i wnet long  with a stopless in mind when it broke the support below. it turned out  to be good but moved so slowly i got out to quick.
 

 

roku, first 2trades was in between FL, i looked like an abcd but i didnt wait for the c and got in at the b to stop out at the c (if that makes sense) once i got out with a small loss and the other time was a short i gout out at breakeven after partial.
these 2 trades im not sure why i took, well, i really thought it would be a long first but i had my eye on FL too much (this was before my long on FL)

i went long again on roku after a pullback but it turned against me, then i got out because it kindal looked like a bdouble top was forming.

then i did a stupid thing, i tried to short the stock twice  even though it was strong, the first time was kinda ok, i thought there was a possibility for a double top and i got out at breakeven since i realized i was wrong.

the second time however there was no reason at all to go short and even worse i shorted it a third time. even when im holding the position i was thinking oh, this actually relly looks like it still wants to go higher but i didnt get out when i got a chance.

 

this was a pain to write, i want to go sleep.. but i feel this is important i do this for the record.  i had to look at my tradelog to remember what i exactly did
so it confirms what i thought, dont trade when drunk... kinda obvious right... 
its also kinda because of sim i think. i likely would not have taken so big risk letting it run. i have learned my lesson with that. still i want to make sim as real as possible  so i should not have done what i did.

bad bad trading, although FL was not too bad except for overtrading at the open.

ill update some more tomorrow i think. today is finished, goodnight

 

Roku was a really nice ABCD pattern in 5min chart, but I found it was hard to estimate the R/R beacuse it's at all time high.

[Tommy 55]

i went over yesterday again, i did 13 trades, only 4 were winners, 4 i got out reaching pretty much breakeven and 3 rather big loosers. 
im not going to trade anymore after alcohol...

in order to make my profit/loss more even across the trades i just adjusted my hotkeys, before i had them based on amount of shares. now i adjusted them based on the stoploss i believe would be needed
to define weather the trade is a winner or a looser.
one problem i have had is that i stop out early because im not willing to risk more dollars, so my stop was often based on PL in stead of the chart.
adjusting these hotkeys i hope will prevent this and also it will make me more focused on a predefined stop where as before i didnt always think about that clearly. now i will have to.

they look like this for long position, i set them for  a loss target of 35$, ill see how it goes. they are not hard stops so i still need to get out by myself.

[Tommy 55]

5 hours ago, Marek said:

Trading the open is very difficult, it could take a while to become consistently profitable. Not everyone learns as well as Carlos and Andrew. It requires some special visual skills and a fast CPU chip in the brain that allows you to process information flying at you at lightning speed at the open and then also the ability to quickly integrate that data and turn around decisions that are appropriate for the way price is developing. I feel like it's even choppier now the market is topping. Everyone has trigger happy fingers and the moves peeps try to capture are getting smaller and smaller so you need to adapt every day and watch what the market is doing - and most importantly always keep a chart of SPY close by when you are entering a trade or managing it. At least that's what's helped me to become better. Also, be adept at using Level 2 and T&S for entries and exits. I am decent at reading price action but still lag a lot with using Level 2 and T&S data so for me that's an area I am looking to improve the next few months.

Stocks like ROKU are standouts so I keep them on watch every day but even ROKU is not easy to trade. You need to get a good entry on every trade otherwise you can easily get screwed over real fast if you don't immediately get out of your position.

I look at SIM as another way to size your position down except you have little to no way to dose your exposure to "real risk" since it's a binary decision. I really think trading live with small size is the way to go. Of course you need to be able to handle the losses from commissions but if that's hard you might not be adequately capitalized in the first place. I have been trading live 9 months, took heavy losses the first 4 (2018) and have been green in 2019. I was also very frustrated at the end of the year 2018. Journaling and writing down things will help you progress. I also enjoy reading books and that was a nice way to take my attention away from the losses and be productive. It's important to take note not just of the things you need to improve but also the things you are doing well. In the end, the biggest battle happens in your mind so you need to find a way to slowly increase your confidence in your abilities so you can trust yourself to intuitively make the right decisions.

it sure is not easy, i kinda thought i could be consistent quicker but i understand now that it was wishful thinking. 
the past weeks i have  always kept  a small chart of the spy open, it sure does help sometimes, i agree that small size on a live account is the better learning way, in my case i have messed up a bit too much so i have to prove myself first i can be green on sim consistently again. this will give me some pressure to take sim seriously because im eager to go live again but it just doesn't make sense at the moment.

id love to trade all day even if its just for training but that is no option for me, ideally i should stop after the first hour. but in the end that is the best hour too even its difficult for a beginner. actually the biggest losses i have made so far are after 10h30 and the best wins in the first 10 min.
im still trying to improve my journaling, i have come to understand the importance of this aswell. reasons why i document some in an open journal are, there is nobody around me that i can talk too about trading and this gets me more in the community which i also have come to understand the importance off, and another reason was to make myself a bit more accountable. knowing that you will share your trades with the world makes you be more aware of emotional trading mistakes. or so i thought anyway because while im in it, i tend to forget that. but its getting better. i know it.

[Tommy 55]

May 28 2 trades pl80
It sounds ok but I’m not really happy with this days trading. I let opportunity slip by.

My psych wasn’t all that great, I felt good though and was eager to trade. I actually changed my account to live  before the open. Perhaps that was why.

But it turned out that I had a very good market feeling today. Just not the confidence to act on it.  I was watching amd , roku, and momo.

I seriously thought about scalping roku for a long at the 50ma in the first minute but couldn’t pull the trigger, could have been a good scalp but also risky so I didn’t mind not taking this. 
So at first I went long on amd, that was good however when I decided on a stop loss I actually pressed my hot key for twice that amount of stop, so half share size which was quit ridiculous really. It wasn’t a hot key mistake either. Not really sure why I did that. 
No confidence probably since I had changed it to live account . I got out way too fast it turned out too, it was still an ok move however because of the wide stop I didn’t even get a 2R on it. Such a waste.

I kept on watching roku and about 3 times I was thinking , now is good entry where I can get a tight stop but everytime I hesitated and offcourse the stock don’t wait for you. 
I love/hate this stock. It kicked me in the balls quite hard multiple times so that’s also what makes me hesitate to touch it but one can not deny the opportunities it gives as well. 

I took a longtrade on momo instead which was a bit more risky but it turned out ok though again I couldn’t get 2r but that’s just because the move didn’t really happen.
Still I’m happy with this trade because I didn’t stop out even though I came quite close to it. I took low from previous candle as stop.

I missed out on some other entrys to get back in amd and also the reversal, I saw a head and shoulders and I have been quite successful with this pattern. But again I didn’t get in, I had a price in mind where I told myself to get in 28,30but it missed it by I think 2 cents. That was really close enough I guess to get in.

So a bit mixed feelings about this day.
Maybe It was because I went back live, maybe I should have stayed in sim, maybe I’m not cut out for this, maybe one day I will...
I never once thought about chasing the stock though so at least that was something I did good.

 

Edited May 28, 2019 by Tommy

[Tommy 55]

may 29, PL 95, 22 tickets

it was not bad again but a lot of room for improvement shows up, my execution must improve a lot to take advantage of a winning trade.

a trade that i unfortunately missed was goos, i went short but got an invalid share size error, not sure why. maybe it was something  to do with that the stock was on SSR. need to look into this.

i traded AMD first, i went long for an ORB but the price just stalled right after i got in, it looked like it didn't want to go up so i got out,  then i thought it would at least go  down to vwap so i got in short, partialled out and took last part when it crossed the 50ma, it  didnt hold the break so i went short again just below vwap which was good but i always partial out too quickly so again i missed the good move. i really need to work on this, not sure how.

later in the day, i wanted to short amd 1 more time,  wanted to short it on the 9ma but my montage wasn't selected, when i noticed i got in quickly but i really shouldn't have don that.
the moment i got i knew its a bad entry. i wasn't happy with it and i got out, earlier then my intended stop because it crossed the 9ma and i thought it might go higher again which it eventually did before getting more bearish again.
i regretted taking this trade, i just felt like being in a trade and let myself get a bad entry.

i traded roku at the open for an orb but again it didn't feel strong so i first got out 50% to reduce my share size, then got stopped out the rest, further then i wanted, my initial order didn't go through, it stayed in open order, i canceled it and send another order which got filled promptly. again, i need to take a look at my hotkeys.

roku was called out in the chat that it was forming a wig, i agreed on that but i wasn't sure what to put as a good stop target and while i was wondering it broke out. i then though i will get in on a retest if it crosses the high of the day, it didn't really want to retest this level but i still got in, i didn't really catch a nice move but it was enough to pay for the earlier loss and the commissions lol.

 

I really must work on my exits, having a good entry is key but where you exit has a huge  effect on your profit. i feel this will take some time to improve.
but i have to work on this, losses will definitely come again so not being able to capitalize on winning trades is a problem

 

 

[Tommy 55]

Today’s trading .... pl -80 but about 50 tickers... live account that is...

i relapsed and started trading like a mad man xbcbcnx (I want to use some other words but not sure about the tolerance of this forum so I’ll keep it civil...xbsndndb)

first I missed a trade on amd, my order didn’t go through, then I went short on roku but also I didn’t get in.... I thought what the hell and then I noticed my montages was still locked.. perhaps this was a sign that I shouldn’t trade today, boy did I ignore that.

i traded roku , mu, jd, aapl..couple of times. In The middle of all of it I managed to get back to zero once but yeah, there was still some comission cost I had to pay for.. so I pretended it was happy hour and I continued, stupid idiot.

i actually thought I had the revenge trading covered.. disappointed in myself now.

ill update charts later on...

 

edit

 

well i really traded like a 90percenter... i made 18 trades of which 13 loosers, way too much, getting in and out too quickly with no real setup. i traded again off the 1 minute with little respect for the 5 i see now.
the 1 minute was very choppy on mu, i think it was heavily influenced by the spy, so not very in play. broke some rules like only get in on a pull back, i watched jd, getting higher, told myself wait wait for about 2 min but then somehow i got in at the almost top lol, only roku was a bit of a success though i missed most of the move due to my playing around with mu. and i did loose some when i went short roku which i thought was a double top.
double tops seem to be difficult, i find head and shoulders more reliable., double bottoms on the other hand are easier.

so now im again about breakeven for the week, friday i may not be able to trade, might be back home too late.

win percentage so far this week is now 46% so  not the 65 i was aiming for before i should go back live.... yesterday it was still 84%
to end with a positive note, i did not start increasing my share size to make up for losses and i did not go below max loss which i told myself 100$,
so maybe this means im actually improving....10% here i come :)

 

Edited May 31, 2019 by Tommy

[Tommy 55]

Last Friday I ended up trading after all.. I shouldn’t have. I had a bad day, very bad. I don’t feel like going in detail about this. I think I broke all my rules. Well I have never treated those as rules actually, more like guidelines. But they should be treated with the respect they deserve.

i lost my discipline, again I should say, I’m on a business trip at the moment and decided to go a day earlier and go hiking in the mountain. I love doing that. While hiking It made me think I have a tendency for dangerous behavior.. like speeding with the car, I had to loose my license once before I actually changed a bit.. been stopped by police several times before that already.. when I go to the mountain I often start wondering off of the path and go exploring , at least I always have my gps with me for when I get lost which happens quit quickly in the mountain forests, and bear spray although that one not always. I’m usually even by myself telling nobody I even went to the mountain.. I often thought if I have accident now, I will never ever be found.. but I always managed to get back.

well, with trading, dangerous behavior gets punished quickly and quit hard at times. And there is no gps to rely on to tell you to go south or north. The one that has not enough discipline will get punished. 

If I wish to succeed I must change this, I’m taking the week off, if I can not take the week off I might better stop completely. I’m wondering if that would be the wiser choice. I might regret continuing, I know I will regret quitting..  

to be continued..?..

[Rob C 826]

2 hours ago, Tommy said:

Last Friday I ended up trading after all.. I shouldn’t have. I had a bad day, very bad. I don’t feel like going in detail about this. I think I broke all my rules. Well I have never treated those as rules actually, more like guidelines. But they should be treated with the respect they deserve.

i lost my discipline, again I should say, I’m on a business trip at the moment and decided to go a day earlier and go hiking in the mountain. I love doing that. While hiking It made me think I have a tendency for dangerous behavior.. like speeding with the car, I had to loose my license once before I actually changed a bit.. been stopped by police several times before that already.. when I go to the mountain I often start wondering off of the path and go exploring , at least I always have my gps with me for when I get lost which happens quit quickly in the mountain forests, and bear spray although that one not always. I’m usually even by myself telling nobody I even went to the mountain.. I often thought if I have accident now, I will never ever be found.. but I always managed to get back.

well, with trading, dangerous behavior gets punished quickly and quit hard at times. And there is no gps to rely on to tell you to go south or north. The one that has not enough discipline will get punished. 

If I wish to succeed I must change this, I’m taking the week off, if I can not take the week off I might better stop completely. I’m wondering if that would be the wiser choice. I might regret continuing, I know I will regret quitting..  

to be continued..?..

I have been through that tough patch and after 5 months I quit trying to learn how to trade. After about two weeks I started back slowly and changed a lot of things, but spiraled down again and after a $1k hulk day I was on the verge of quitting again. I got lucky that the hulk day occurred on January 31 and my CMEG account just got setup. So Feb 1st, the beginning of the month,  felt like a new beginning. I knew I needed to change everything. Adjustments here and there wouldn't cut it. I needed to change everything now. 

Below is the list of things I changed which has helped me. But in particular the risk controls need to be in place. And let me tell you it's embarrassing to ask for them from your broker and embarrassing to admit that you need them. Different traders on the chat use them differently. Some stay below the PDT rule of 3 trades a week. Some have max shares traded a day. I have realized gain and total (Unrealized+realized) set at a certain limit through CMEG and it will lock me out until the following day if I exceed it. The one good thing about setting those risk controls, as once I set them and knew they were there, I have not broken them.

I don't have the love of adventure/danger that you have, I do have something just as harmful to a trader. Though I consider myself a very honest person, I found out quickly I am a chronic lair to myself. And wow the market will destroy someone with this behavior. I am sure I could have lived the rest of my life without dealing with it, but as a trader it's something I have to fight every second. Journalling online really helped me. The first month it was funny to see my personal journal completely transform into an honest journal entry when I retyped into the BBT website and know that other people will be reading it.

My first 3 months of live trading I had 6 hulk days and 16 max/loss days. Since I made these changes 4 months ago I have had zero hulk days and zero max/loss days.

1)    Switched brokers to CMEG so I could reduce my account size so blowing it up is not as much of an impact.

2)    Added risk controls from CMEG/DAS. Realized max so it would prevent me from going hulk and unrealized in case I lose internet in the middle of a trade.

3)    Made a simple goal for 3 months. Don’t go hulk. I could trade terribly but as long as I never went hulk I reached my goal.

4)    Started with 1 trade per day max. I tried the 3/day rule during my first three unsuccessful months, but I kept breaking it. 1 trade a day is very much an on/off switch with very little gray area. It was REALLY painful and FOMO was high, but after a week it got easier. The satisfaction of having enough discipline to stop at 1 trade was enough to be proud of myself. After about one month I switched to two trades a day allowed if the first trade was a winner. If the first trade was a loser, I am done for the day. I use to trade terribly after a loser.

5)    Remove the unrealized gain window. This was tough, but surprisingly after a week I got use to it.

 

Setting the risk controls (at the broker level) is the key. The changes to your trading will be swift. I hope you find something useful in my list.

 

I hope you don't mind me asking but I am curious where you live with mountain forests and bears.

[Tommy 55]

Hi Rob, thanx for your message. Yes if I wish to continue I definitely need to make some changes and if  I can’t by myself, enforce them with risk control settings. A max loss is a must I think.

I’m taking a break from trading this week, reestablish trading rules and consider some things. I want to give it another shot with a different approach. I’m understanding now how a max set   Of trades per day isn’t a limitation at this point. I need to make this a part of risk control until I can actually control myself. 

Oh, I live in a concrete jungle. Yokohama, below Tokyo. But I travel a lot for work, spend about 100 night per year or more in a hotel for the past 9 years or so.(Its getting a bit much I feel now) So many times when I go to Hokkaido which is my favorite part of japan and I actually hope to move here some day,  i try to make some time to go to the mountain. They do have a lot of bears here although I have never encountered one. 

Have a green week!

 

 

[IamKarthi 342]

On 6/3/2019 at 12:55 PM, Tommy said:

Hi Rob, thanx for your message. Yes if I wish to continue I definitely need to make some changes and if  I can’t by myself, enforce them with risk control settings. A max loss is a must I think.

I’m taking a break from trading this week, reestablish trading rules and consider some things. I want to give it another shot with a different approach. I’m understanding now how a max set   Of trades per day isn’t a limitation at this point. I need to make this a part of risk control until I can actually control myself. 

Oh, I live in a concrete jungle. Yokohama, below Tokyo. But I travel a lot for work, spend about 100 night per year or more in a hotel for the past 9 years or so.(Its getting a bit much I feel now) So many times when I go to Hokkaido which is my favorite part of japan and I actually hope to move here some day,  i try to make some time to go to the mountain. They do have a lot of bears here although I have never encountered one. 

Have a green week!

 

 

Actually if you like to limit your trades per day/week, you may choose to reduce your account size to less than $25K. Then the PDT rule applies (with the US brokers ofcourse and not with Offshore brokers). 3 Trades per week is extremely good idea for anyone who feels they are overtrading, because then they have to be really picky before getting into a trade. Lot of thoughts and preparations go in before taking the trade. Stay Green!

[Mike B 624]

On 6/2/2019 at 9:04 AM, Rob C said:

Setting the risk controls (at the broker level) is the key. The changes to your trading will be swift. I hope you find something useful in my list.

I always considered the Risk Controls more like a safety belt in a car. Although, you know how to drive, you never know what the other drivers are going to do, so the safety belt is there to keep you safe.