Daily Trend Trading Journal

Previous Experience: Not Good.

Attempt: 2nd and Last.

Starting Trading Capital: $6400 (starting journal at the point where it's $7000)

Markets:

EUR/USD, USD/JPY, GBP/USD, XAU/USD, AUD/USD, USD/CAD, NZD/USD, EUR/JPY, GBP/JPY,
CHF/JPY, EUR/CAD, AUD/CAD, AUD/JPY, CAD/JPY, NZD/JPY, GBP/CAD, GBP/AUD, USD/ZAR

Time Frames used: H1, H4, H8, D1, W1

Indicators used: None.

Style: Price Action.

Trading Philosophy: Take position in favor of daily trend till the trend ends. Repeat.

Hi Monty505

Good luck with your journey, I'm an avid trend trader, don't understand why anyone would trade against it, beyond belief in MHO. I tend to trade 1 minute trends myself but I've just started an EOD strategy around strong moving daily candles. My belief is to only trade the strongest trends where you have absolutely no doubt which direction the trend is going. Very clearly up or down, no doubt whatsoever. any doubt then find another chart to trade, can't find one??? then don't trade..

The most important think for me is to only trade strong trending pairs, I've designed my own little indy to do just that its called my TTindy, TT as in Top Trender. It shows you the top 8 trending pairs and can be setup on any timeframe. Heres what its looks like right now....



The left hand coloumn is set to hrly and the right hand to daily, the top 4 strongest trending daily pairs right now are GBPUSD, EURUSD NZDUSD and USDCHF...

Here's their charts, any argument about which way they're going???? Of course one thing to be careful of with my TTindy, don't forget the old saying "the trend is your friend until it ends" so you have to decide whether the trend is in full force or about to end??? I usually look at the last drive down and if its clearly taken out the previous drive then trend still in place enter on next pullback.... If its built up a strong support/resistance level then breakout entry on break of that support/resistance level. I use pending orders for entry under/above the last pullback candle eg red candle in an uptrend, green candle in a down trend..









I use an 8 period CCI for my pullback entries if it pulls back so much it turns the my 10 lwma but if price staying one side of 10 LWMA then just place pending orders under each pullback candle, remember these are top trenders so works very well. Momentum indicators like my CCI are awesome in strong trending trends showing the swings in momentum before the candles turn in many cases so giving you a leading indicator, yep you read that right "a leading indicator". Check out some of those CCI turns they proceed the price so just place your pending order soon as the CCI starts to turn, as price is sure to follow 7 times out of 10...

Heres a little GBPUSD chart illustrating a strong trend, look at the 100lwma sloping up strongly, and I've marked 4 CCIs that signaled before price moved back up, leading the price!!! look at the other CCI signals all pretty good aren't they especially the ones around the 100lwma...



Have attached my TTindy in case you want to use it hope this helps you to succeed this time we trend traders need to stick together....

Hey Clive,

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and the indicator - its awesome that you've developed a strategy out of CCI, LWMA and your own trend strength measuring indi, i did some experiments with CCI though never touched the LWMA, in that front it was mostly Exponential or Simple - as far as I could get it, here's what you do:

1. deduct trend direction
2. measure trend strength via indi
3. If strong enter on pull back, if ranging enter on break out - and you have your own specialized entry system that relies on 8 CCI combined with LWMA and is order based rather than market condition.

As of now I'm nit confused on your exit strategy. And it's something that I myself am still divided on - as in I have an exit strategy which is short term but I'm thinking capturing a daily trend completely will be awesome but that requires leaving entries on BE sl and then I observe markets that are choppy for months and my calculations are like "dude just stick with short term exits". I am a fan of EasyPips millipede equity idea but as of now cant combine that with trading in a market that starts ranging.

I agree with the daily trend directions on your charts though I think the line does lag a little when indicating trend change. But nevertheless thanks for the best wishes and hope you make some good pips yourself.

So I guess what I mean is because my entries will be short term, I will be able to exit before the daily trend changes in most of the cases and so am not so worried about the daily trend strength.

If you want to trade shorter timeframe trends thats fine as I use basically the same system above on my 1 minute trading too,you've got it about right with your summary, all I do is identify a strong trending pair then trade ABCD moves where I get a strong AB move which takes out the last drive up/down then wait for BC move identified mostly on lower timeframes by my CCI going over bought in a downtrend(+100 levl) or oversold in an uptrend (-100 level) . My best entries are break and retest of key levels,25 levels, S&R or the 100lwma coinciding with a cci signal.

I also have an alarm on my 100lwma so when it reverses it alerts me to have a look at that chart, I've found something trending up strongly on a lower timeframe will very often reverse very quickly, especially if the upmove was a pullback on a higher timeframe. EG 1 min races up page about 25 pips but its a pullback in the 5 min chart so looking for the reversal and my 100lwma to turn over. My best reversal signals are break and retests of the 100lwma, they are awesome entries and usually fly!!!

As I'm sure you are aware the best entry in a trend is the first pullback which is a reversal setup for example something is trending down producing LHLL s then turns up takes out the last LH and produces its first HL, thats the place to get in IMHO. My 100lwma alerts let me know when that happens so I just check for that reversal setup get in, get to BE pretty quickly and way you go. If the first HL takes support off of last LH in downtrend its an awesome entry....

Heres a perfect example of what I mean, buying first HL after 1st HH takes out last LH.



Heres something to take note of, look at the CCI signals both up and down, to me they signify the tops and bottoms of the waves. Green CCI up waves, red CCI down waves, each cross of the zero line denotes a new wave. See how clearly they identify this reversal move?? If you compare each CCI signal with its proceeding one you start to see the market structure very clearly. It also quickly identifies the HH and HL so you know theres a reversal happening. In a range these CCI signals are DTs and DBs so you know your trend is faltering and maybe about to range...

You talked about my exit strategy well I tend to trade the ABCD moves especially on my 1 minute timeframe might be different on these higher timeframes but just to illustrate to you my current exit strategy I've marked the ABCD move in red letters on the chart above. Note the strong AB move taking out last LH, then the BC move to my entry point and finally point D where I would exit, in line with the AB=CD theory. I also look for price to falter at key levels again so this D point coincides with the next BRN 173.00 so a typical exit.

Now in a perfect trading world I too, like you, would like to hold until the trend ends but so many times it comes back and takes me out so I tend to stick to just capturing the CD moves, if the trend continues then take the next ABCD setup and so on and so on, trading the trend until it ends by capturing and banking every momentum run(CD move) like this because you never know when its going to suddenly reverse on you.

If I was holding each entry on the trend then I think you will find the 100lwma is as good as anything else out there just hold until it changes colour again and starts to slope down. eg uptrend over close all buy entries. Apart from a little sideways which you might hold through this particular entry has gone nearly a 1000 pips with no colour change yet so you could still be holding with another couple of entries on this chart too.

So to cut a long story short, if you really want to trade the trend until it ends, try to enter on first pullback just after 100lwma changes colour(slope) enter on each ABCD move in the trend and close out when 100lwma changes colour again. Sounds easy enough but God is it hard????? Requires incredible discipline because 7 times out of 10 you're going to get knocked off as the trend doesn't develop.(70% of the time price ranges) However one solution is to bank half your profits on each ABCD move and hold half that way you get the best of both worlds.

All easy to write about here but requires very very good discipline and patience of which I have very little so trade 1 min charts and still struggle with my discipline!!!

By the way the TTindy can be used on any timeframe you like you can set the inputs to suit the timeframe you trade, I normally have the 1 min on the left and the timeframe above the 5 min on the right. When they agree hold, when they have the same pair top of both indys but opposite colours then a possible reversal is on the cards... Like all indys knowing how to use it takes time with trial and error a plenty.

If I was to give you one word of advice it would be to always trade the strongest trending pairs from the top 4 only , everything works really well in top trenders, price action, indicators etc etc.

Finally there are 2 types of trade entries on trends the continuation when you jump on board in the direction of the trend, identify these by price clearly taking out last high or low and enter on break and retests. Then theres the reversal when a top trender reverses giving you a very clear reversal setup. Its actually still a trend trade but you are entering on the first pullback in the new trend with very high RR's acheived and if you do catch one then hold through at least 2 pullbacks eg waves 3 and 5 of Elliot wave theory.

Anyway I've gone on too long sorry to hijack your thread , don't want to out stay my welcome. I wish you luck my friend and if you don't mind I might pop in every now and again to see how you'll doing, post your trades good and bad and lets see whats happening, quite often nice to get someone elses view on your trades , i know it helps me....

Good luck...

Nov 3:
I knew I'd be rusty so decided to be ultra conservative. Less than 1% risk per trade.

First trade of day: XAU/USD
Reason: since I had captured 500$ from it last week (started trading again last wednesday) - felt like going short lol and well... not every day is Friday.
Lesson: past is not indicative of future performance lol.

Second trade of day: GBP/JPY
Reason: break out - was going well but after some other stupid mistakes in third trade, decided to just end the day positively and reflect - and sort out stuff.
Lesson: chill out.

Third trade of day: EUR/JPY
Reason: break out - so I buy and it's going well and good - until I realize my position size was not according to my trading plan because I had typed the stop loss incorrectly - rather than risk it, I had to let go of 0.3 of EUR/JPY from the 0.5 of what I bought. Worked out fine but stupid stuff should not happen.
Lesson: Check entry details properly

Fourth Trade of day: AUD/USD
Reason: I thought a miracle might happen and the daily trend might hold but oh well.
Lesson: A small loss is a good confidence booster.

well dude my hats off to you for trading the 1 min or any time frame below 1 hour - the discipline and difficulty level are both high and I sometimes do question whether the rewards are worth it - but if its working for you that's great. I do get the thinking behind having certain indicators that tell you when the perfect time to enter on a pull back - but im not that much of a perfectionist and would just jump right in. I mean if it's going down and is just pull back for five minutes, I'm just gonna give it some space - if I'm wrong then I'm wrong.

I agree first pull back in a major trend gives the best risk:reward and also has good momentum, but if we're gonna catch it for lets say as long as it flows towards the daily trend and then leave on the first sign of pull back I think we're missing out on a lot of potential. I think you hang on till wave 4 or 5 but frankly I'm slowly and steadily becoming convinced that EasyPip was right in his millipede thread - just get an entry to BE and leave it to grow by itself - if it dies, zero loss - I think you and I have both mastered a style of entry pretty good and can sense when an entry was wrong and whether to close it - I look back at moves that I captured and can easily see I left out good $$ and wouldn't have been closed. Lately I have not even been following my own exit rules and exit even earlier than I am supposed to but deep down I know these profitable entries are the first that I have seen after months of back testing and I need to pocket some to grow some confidence. Anyways, its hard to leave entries on BE and see profit die out.

Your AB=CD exit makes me think 1:1 risk:reward and it reminds me of my own exits and I'm forced to consider the reality that we ourselves are making good success ratio mandatory for ourselves to survive - if and when it drops, we'd be left wounded.

I call your two types of entries Break Outs and Rejections - I'm fine with trading both.

Hi Monty

Had my best day ever today trading as after reading your thread I decided to trade the trend on my 1 minute charts and GBPJPY went up 250 pips which helped me to get my biggest daily total ever of 656 pips!!!!

Won't block your thread up with my charts , but its all documented on my thread if you're interested???

That's great clive, well done man - happy for you. And the fact that you traded it on 1 minute is just mind blowing. I did check out the chart at ABCD thread.

Nov 4 -

Trade 1 - AUD/USD - Short
Reason - H1 entry signal - got trapped - Stop Loss Hit
Lesson - Not going to use H1signals anymore, going to use H1 to further refine H4 entries only.

Trade 2 - GBP/CAD - long
Reason - H4 signal - stop loss set to BE before news, lost 5 bucks cuz of slippage anyway and of course, just to add to the insult the price went back up. Didn't entered again cuz no H4 signal.
Lesson - Give some space to price before setting BE Stop Loss.

Trade 3 - USD/CAD - Long
Reason - H4 signal - after losing 5 bucks on GBP/CAD, I set BE to this one also, saw price falling further, closed it and took the 6 bucks - BE stop loss would have been hit but price resumed going up soon after.
Lesson - Allow for volatility and trust in the set up.

The fact that two of my positions would have worked out pretty well gives me hope that I only need to smoothen out a few things - and I hope not following H1 entry signal will avoid me falling in a trap like I did with the Aussie today.

Live to fight another day.

Nov 11-

Will most probably end updating this thread if no other person contributes, points out mistabkes or discuss their ideas cuz that was what I started this thread for. I guess my style of trading based only on price chart and no indicators leaves little room for discussion.

Anyway, after Nov 4th I traded on Nov 5th - managed to again take my equity around 7060 or something by 3 or 4 trades.

On Nov 7 I shorted USD/GBP but price started crawling against me - which led me to change my stop loss cuz I was sure my trade was in the right direction - but price kept crawling up and hit my stop loss - making me lose around $210 - after which of course it started crawling down - at this point I lost my control and initiated a revenge trade and was lucky enough to get back $270.... however, the whole experience was a bit unnerving cuz I have been trading for nine months now and I shouldnt have moved my stop loss in the first place and shouldnt have initiated a revenge trade with a considerable amount - risking around 800 to get back what I did.

The weekend resulted in much thinking and re-tweaking of my idea of entry and exit in my strategy. I am happy to say that today i took 10 trades and all of which were of a very small amount with a very liberal stop loss and two step exit strategy: either via H1 or D1.

As is obvious I employed the H1 exit for 9 trades and only employed D1 exit strategy for NZD/JPY which was initiated yesterday.

My rational behind two step exit strategy: since I am trading only in the direction of D1 trend, my stop losses are based on D1 levels (risking 2%) - so when I initiate a trade based on H1 or H4 signal (Higher High, Lower Low etc and break out of H1 or H4 resistance) - I can exit on either those time frame basis when trade goes as planned and if it doesnt goes as planned I hand over the trade to D1 time frame (the thinking being that either price will reach levels which will end daily trend or it will return back to my entry level). Lets see how this works out. Of course for now I am just taking smaller time frame exit signals but my thinking is that Daily trend doesnt changes that often and my success ratio and small profits will pile up to take the hit of when it does.

Equity Curve (started 27-10-2014)

Nov 5 trade: