trading on instinct?

i dont know how to describe this but lately i have been able to just trade "on instinct" or kind of get a feel of the market and trade, and have been so far successful i doubled my account and am still doing well. is this normal? i mean i do look at indicators and all but i dont use a mechanical system nor do i look at news, just pure instinct. i dont feel as bad for losses any more i usually just ignore them and winning doesnt make me happy either it feels like a game to me but i dont know has anyone gone or is going through what i am now?? its a good thing i know but it feels weired!


TIA
G-dogg

What kind of money are you playing with? (more out of curiosity....feel free to ignore the question if you like)

I fear the road may get rocky at some point. I used to trade stock and future options they way you speak of. It doesn't last.

What pairs are you trading? I personally believe that instinct would just do absolutely nothing except break your account with a pair like eur/aud or eur/gbp. This is because these currencies are all very correlated with one another and it takes (in my opinion) strong analysis to figure them out. However, if you are using instinct to trade say... ***/JPYs, then instinct should do you a little better.

What pairs you trade?

lol, stocks. I lost 10% of my money on a bad trade... trading with instinct. I gave that up. Ohh boy... bad memories.

i usually trade longer periods like daily, weekly and monthly so i see the big picture and from there i can see where the reversals start and can easily top and bottom pick, its just wiered.

It seems like you're actually trading unconsciously off of price action and not really instinct if you're looking at the picture and looking for reversals and such.

It sounds like your on a streak. BUT...don't get over confident and decide to take any unusual chances. Continue going at it slowly.

I say just enjoy it.when u can feel free on your bad trade and feel nothing as if nothing on your winning trade..it's a good mind set.indicator/ TA is just like a tool to make ur trade more effective.that's why experience trader always said..cut your loses and let the profit run.my 2 cents

Don't look at charts. Look at a price ticker. Meditate or close your eyes, and see where the price will be in one hour, one day or one week. Trade on what you see.

That's instinct trading :

lol, sounds more like prophesizing to me.

Jose has been successful 12 out of 14 times with the NFP and he uses instinct to predict the market movements. You may want to connect with him.

I am going to continue to watch Jose's predictions.

Perfect example of "If it aint broke, Fix it till it is"
Do what you are doing until you have to change. Most people here would love {and work toward} having a Method that works within their Gut.

{The 100% mechanical searchers are looking for 'Easy Money' which probably doesn't exist.}

98% yes. 100% I still find elusive.

===========================================

while "instinctual trading" is an asset pursued with mostly hope, achieving it is something reserved for the very very few !

i would imagine though, that even the most instinctual of traders would glance at the news on occassion --- instinct may be all well and good, but knowing something is coming up that might alter the currencies trend might be considered of some importance also.

now im a "manual" trader, usually trading from the open of the london market to a few hours into the japanese.

"systems" are for those who dont understand technical analysis (and forex is nothing, if not technical analysis !) or for those who simply want to plunk down the money and go golfing --- being a "manual trader" who starts the day with the london market and ends with the japanese market, I use no system, nor would i ever even think to do so --- a trend is a trend, be it up or down (sideways doesnt really count, although one can make a lot more than pocket change simply by playing the "range")

one of my signatures reads "trade for the joy -- the money will come". I love trading, with all that goes with it --- the money is simply a byproduct and not the reason i trade. It may be different with others, and so be it, but for me the joy of a good trade is its own reward (the money aint bad either !)

if it works for you, enjoy --- most cannot ever hope to achieve it !

enjoy and trade well

mp

g-dogg,

If you feel nothing when losing money and not very happy when winning, you're on the right track.

I'm currently able to time my entries nicely using 5 min charts. There's no indicator as well. I read the price action to find the shift of buy/sell pressure. Anyway, good entry is not good enough. Exit is where the money is.
Good luck to you.

who is Jose?

Ehhr.
Is any of this {apart from the couple of definative posts} helping you?

It's good to see someone is thinking outside the box. You could say I trade on intuition. I look at everything that's going on - news, price action, fundamentals, sentiment - and then form an opinion. Sometimes I'll just know the move underway is "wrong" and which way it "should" go. These feelings are usually pretty strong. I have a few simple rules, add to winners, time stops, and some risk control measures (this used to be my biggest problem, when I start trading poorly I get a bad case of "gotta make it all back", but if you put the risk measures in place, ie size down and put stops on your account equity, eg. stop trading for a week after a x% drawdown etc... it goes better).

I did a trading journal, trading my intuition, for 5 weeks and made 50% with drawdowns under 20%. You can check it out here - http://www.moneytec.com/forums/f118/...trading-18533/

By the way, g-dogg it's egyptian not egyptien.

First off, it’s not instinct you’re using, it is intuition. It’s not a semantical issue here, but a true understanding of what you’re doing.

Instinct is an innate response to external stimuli. Animals have multiple instincts honed throughout the millennia. It is argued that humans have retained only one instinct and that is to flinch from loud noises.

Intuition is a bit trickier to define and I’m sure someone will challenge the definition I use. For me, intuition is unconscious competence, especially in what we’re talking about here, which is looking at price action and making bets on where it’s going to be in the near future.

In all pursuits that require skill acquisition, all follow the same path. I’ll put this in bullet form to make it easier to follow.

The first step:

Unconscious Incompetence: we come to trading thinking it’s going to be easy. How hard can it be to make money buying and selling something? We open demo accounts (some go right into live accounts) and get lucky, or unlucky. We make and lose money, but we have absolutely no idea as to what we’re truly doing. This is the stage of euphoria, when we think we’re going to quit the day job soon and retire in a couple of years. All forums are populated with these people and we see them as being naïve, to say the least.

The second step:

Conscious Incompetence: after some time, we start to realize we don’t know what we’re doing. The luck has run out and our accounts are decimated. This is when we go looking for systems, indicators, anything that will help us be successful. It’s the start of the long learning curve. We have finally acknowledged that we have to learn how to do this. We even begin to acknowledge that there is a lot of luck involved in this and that we can’t depend on it.

We then devote a lot of time and effort learning this thing called trading. It’s a lot of hard work, but slowly we begin to see the big picture.

The third step:

Conscious Competence: after a lot of intensive study and practice, we finally feel as if we’re getting a handle on this. We have a system(s) in place, we understand money management, risk control, etc…all the components of successful trading. We can look at charts and figure out to the best of our analytical skills what the best probalistic move is at any given time, whether it’s buying, selling, or being flat. It’s a lot of work, but we feel competent at it because we see positive, reinforcing results. This is where many people are after a couple of years of working at trading.



The final step:

Unconscious Competence: this is where intuition begins to play a much larger role in our trading. After years of looking at the same things over and over again, we can now recognize them instantly, without having to measure, calibrate, project, etc manually. We’ve seen so many double bottoms, triangles, breakouts, etc, that we don’t have to put too much conscious effort into identifying them and figuring out how to play them. We’ve seen so many economic reports, COT charts, and all the other fundamental aspects that when they all line up in a certain configuration we essentially have an “aha” moment and know that every time we’ve seen this same configuration, X usually occured. Our trading seems to be almost effortless at times, because it is. This is intuition at work.

Intuition is nothing mysterious. Humans love the mysterious and it’s a major problem for the most part when we base decisions upon it. Intuition in trading is simply the brain being able to do all of the processing you did during the Conscious Competence stage in a fraction of the time you used to require and without any conscious thought.

So, what does this mean for you? Well, first off, you have to be perfectly honest with yourself. How much experience do you have in trading? Do you honestly believe that you have an “innate” ability to trade? Do you honestly believe that you’ve beaten the learning curve? Do you honestly have total, unshakeable belief in your ability to “feel” the market? If you have less than 5 years of full-time trading under your belt, then the odds of you having an innate “feel” for the market are slim.

The problem with trading the way you have been is that your belief in your abilities is easily shaken and eventually destroyed. Sure, you’ve been doing ok so far. But what happens when you hit a losing streak? With a well defined and thought out system, one can determine in advance what the potential losing streaks will be. Can you do that now? I doubt it. And when it does come, what will you fall back onto? With a system, you have hard parameters that guide your actions. Even if you break said parameters, you will still have something to measure your performance against when the dust settles from a losing streak. With what you’re doing now, you have nothing to measure your performance against in order to determine if your performance was within acceptable norms or if you were outside the deviation levels.

With this type of trading large losses will occur. One may say that their “feel” tells them when to get out of losers, but in time your ego is going to become so involved in your “feel” that it’s not only going to shoot off your foot, you’re going to blast your entire leg off. Do I know for a fact that you will do this? No, I don’t. You may be a wunderkind of trading. However, being in the probability business, I’d always take the bet that eventually you’re going to crash and burn with this method.

So, what does intuition in trading look like? Intuition is when a piece or two is missing from what you would normally expect in a trade set-up. However, you’ve looked at enough current info, both technical and fundamental, and something in you is telling you to take the position even though you don’t have the usual amount of info you require. That something is some type of info that perhaps you’ve just looked at but didn’t process consciously, but it registered on the sub-conscious level. Your intuition is urging you to take the trade even though you can’t rationalize it consciously.

Intuition is a piece of trading methodology; it is not a methodology in and of itself. Let’s take a look at Jim Rogers. He is one of the most successful fundamental traders of our times and ex-partner of George Soros. He’s made amazing plays in markets around the world, but he tends to be very early in his moves. He never looks at charts. But he does study the fundamentals extensively. One would be tempted to say he trades on intuition. But he would tell you that he simply sees the same situations over and over again, basically undervalued markets that are begging to be bought. He has little idea when they’ll move, and he’s consistently off in his timing, sometimes by years, but he’s very good at it. He just “knows” when a market is ripe for buying. It’s his intuition telling him that, but it’s an intuition honed by decades of being a full-time student and trader.

Ultimately, you’re going to do what you’re going to do. But whatever you do, don’t lie to yourself. Examine everything with openness and honestly. Be scrupulous in your assessment of your actions. I think you’re doing this right now because you need to do it. It’s the whole “fate” thing in that all of our choices lead to where we are right now. I strongly suggest you read, “Fooled by Randomness” by Taleb. We need to understand when our successes are due to luck or to ourselves. Only honesty allows us to discern the difference.

Whatever you do, good luck.

Try to play this free game at www.iitm.com
As long as you manage your stops properly, your instincts can make you rich.
Enjoy your harvest ! Give yourself and those around you a good time.
You cannot lose if you spent already what you won !

Meet Jose:
http://www.forexfactory.com/showthread.php?t=20532