Quad Candle System

Any suggestions or will I reveal my approach ?

Masterrmind..............

Accounts current monthly gain is +1.75%.

Max loss on any previous month so far is -1.3% (October just gone).

I don't like recorded monthly losses and to get 2 in a row would be something I do not wish to see.

So what should I do and how should I plan my attack, if an attack is indeed going to take place ?

Masterrmind...............

What about considering the AWR's to give me an idea of how the pair has been progressing this week relative to its averages.

Example,

EN --> WR @ 91.4%.

Any reason to suggest the range will get exceeded ?

If so in which direction ?

Masterrmind..............

Perhaps with only 1 day to go before month end a 2 octive move on a symbol with 244 pips per octive is a little optimistic !

What are the other options ?

Masterrmind..............

What about EURCAD !

Masterrmind..............

EURCAD !

Euro news ......

CAD news .......

Brexit news .......

Economic data ?

Bias ?

Up or Down

Trade it or leave it alone .... whats the call ?

Masterrmind.............

EURNZD [H1; Short Cycle in progress]

Masterrmind..............

EN cycle still in progress.

Not much progress so it will run on.

Closed out a minor profitable trade on UJ to add something to the current months gain.

Masterrmind.......

EN

Just managed to close out 1 EN short for a few more pips.

That's probably about it for the month of November.

Trading progress will be uploaded to Post 1 tomorrow.

ps. closures were due to nothing more than wanting to top up the months gain which is small but positive.

pps. it is a marathon afterall and not a sprint.

Masterrmind.............

Wow, great posts I found in here. Will look carefully again over it during the weekend to understand and search if I can find trades and post analysis. I see you put on the table the issue of account % vs accounts reward.
I was wondering this myself but what about finding new ways to generate more transactions? I mean wouldn't it be better to find a way to get a few more trades a month instead of increasing % per trade? I know it's easy to say but hard to do.
I am pondering myself about the few options:
1)trade on lower timeframes. Good: More potential trades Bad: Lower Reliability of the patterns, trends
2)increase % on the existing daily trades. Good: If the system itself is profitable it would mean overall more profit Bad: If it's done in an excessive manner it would put pressure on us and increase risks by emotions
3) find a way to generate more trades. Good: We keep D1 timeframe, we keep the same risk % Bad: We have to run 2 systems at the same time and could mix in our head?

I'm leaning towards step 3, but haven't got a clear approach. I will try to find more information during the weekends and post.

Some commentary on the current EN cycle (shorter term)

Notes:

1. Unable to remain at charts so a decision had to be made;
2. Chose to close out what trades I could at the time and force an increase in the months gain;
3. Could have reduced the target and allowed trade to run but would have preferred to do this in the case where locking in a reasonable amount of pips however based on slow progress at the time I was not given this option so I closed out the trade for a small gain;
4. Next day I noticed price had dropped nicely and triggered my next Sell Stop which is currently in profit so unless a nasty reversal to the upside occurs in combination with a weekend gapping event then progress for the start of December is headed in the right direction.

I still have to contend with the current floating DD which is close to 4.2% so no real issue on the account.

1 GU long (0.01 lots) remains active and is the major contributor to the floating DD and accumulating negative swap.

1 UJ long (0.03 lots) is in minimal DD but as price ranges between the 112 and 114 handles positive swap is being accumulated.

It is planned to have the UJ long run on and eliminate all negative swap accumulated by the GU long subject to UJ remaining range bound.

Loss in October was -1.3%
Gain in November is +2.3%

Drawdown Recovery has been effected leading to an increase in account equity yet with some floating DD still present.

The chart in Post 1 (at the top of the page) displays the Equity Growth line and the Equity line.
The constant spacing between the 2 lines represents the ongoing floating DD the cause of which is the longer term GU trade.

The objective will be to manage this GU position and perhaps apply a series of entries into the GU pair that seeks to reduce the floating DD.

What is needed is a complete closure of the GU trade with minimal damage and no floating DD at year end !

Net Gain in Equity ($ & %) is what is most important so long as the account has applied risk control measures that prevent DD being exceeded.

Masterrmind.............

Plenty more information to come so be prepared.

Here is an Excel chart showing some projected and actual trading data.

I encourage all traders to use an Excel sheet to project, monitor and analyze their trading progress.

Trading analytic websites are also very useful (I use them too) but by manually entering in ongoing trading results yourself it helps to keep you in touch with your current progress and how far you might be lagging behind the Target MoM (target Monthly compound %).

Are you performing at a level that will achieve your goal (short, medium and then longer term) ?

If yes well and good, carry on !

If not, find out why you are lagging behind, look for reasons why and search for solutions.

The Excel data indicates that my performance is lagging behind what I planned to achieve which is to compound the account MoM at about 5.93%.

Currently its at 3.56% MoM compound which means that Equity is about $420 behind where it should be.

In my case its not necessary to immediately trade aggressive in an attempt to get the account back on track over the next month unless opportunities arise and the risk applied is carefully monitored.

The last thing you want to see is the Equity or Balance curve taking a massive dive.

I will be a little more aggressive, looking to trade more opportunities that arise but give myself a 3 month window to try and close the gap.

Gap refers to the difference in Equity as $ or % between target and actual.

Traders faced with this situation can also project their current MoM figures into the future using Excel and if the target is say1M then find out how many extra years and months it is 'likely' to take to hit the target.

At 3.56% MoM (consistent) means that 1M will take about 5 years and 5 1/2 months longer to hit target (so 15.5 years approx).

Recall that I have an additional 9K set aside specifically for this MT5 account which I may use within the first 3 years to gain a relatively higher impact.

My focus is on attempting to close the gap over the next several months (perhaps only a few but time will tell) before resorting to an injection of captial approach.

I do want to take 1K up to the target afterall so all avenues will be applied before the injected capital were to be used and if it was used there is a calculation that can provide benefit versus gain based on timing (or delay) of injected capital as a function of the compounding effect.

No real need to go into this calculation at this stage but I may later.

Masterrmind............

There is a fine line between trading more aggressively to reduce the gap and over-trading with too much risk applied.

Another option is to work out the predicted time to target at current monthly compound rate and if the time is acceptable then keep trading the same.

In the case of the MT5 account I'm not so keen to keep trading the same way and taking at least another 5.5 years longer to get the job done.

Another consideration is that at the commencement of a new trading account very very often the Equity curve drops below initial equity level.

Looking over several traders equity curves will highlight this pattern and it might suggest trading at less than preferred risk initially.

Once a 'buffer profit' cushion has been created then slowly increase the risk to a level more likely to meet longer term goals.

Compounding is a very powerful process especially if Equity rises month on month but it also has the opposite effect on sequential losing months.

Risk control and risk management are therefore critical factors to get right and driving the account in the 'right' direction is never an easy task.

I use the trading analytic websites and the Excel analysis to keep me headed in the right direction and being consistent as much as possible over the longer term.

Masterrmind............

COMPARISONS

Next lets consider the current trading performance of my account compared to other indices and benchmarks.

The relevant period is from the start of the year until now so lets use YTD (Year to Date).

I am only considering raw net gain here without inference to leverage or DD or any other factor, just pure 'bang for buck' %Gain in Equity.

What we might want to know is how much Equity has grown from lets say a $10,000 account.

MT5 Account

YTD = 40% Gain (net);

$10,000 would have grown to $14,000 (profit = $4000).

Indices (major):

S&P500

YTD = 1.6% Gain (net);

$10,000 would have grown to $10,160 (profit = $160).

NASDAQ

YTD = 3.8% Gain (net);

10,000 would have grown to $10,380 (profit = $380).

DOW

YTD = 2.1% Gain (net);

$10,000 would have grown to $10,210 (profit = $210).

Russell 2000

YTD = 1.1% Gain (net);

$10,000 would have grown to $10,110 (profit = $110).

Hedge Funds (major):

A mixed bag to put it bluntly and far less than impressive returns from many of the major funds.

Major exodus of AUM in recent months due to poor monthly returns on investment.

I won't bother making any comparisons here.

Forex Index:

Fundseeder (https://fundseeder.com/)

YTD = 3.57% Gain (net);

$10,000 would have grown to $10,357 (profit = $357).

Note 1: return stated is based on an index made up of the top 5% of traders with a variety of other conditions (refer to site for more information).

Note 2: individual FX trader returns can also be assessed some trading more than one asset class.

Bank Interest (depending on country):

Lucky if you can get 2% pa on your money and it does depend on the country.

However, the applied risk is typically close to zero and you can't match that trading an FX account, then again if $200 on a 10K account floats your boat then go for it.

The information provided above is meant to compare the trading account performance with other performance measures without going into the deeper analytics.

The MT5 account is actually doing ok in that case !

ps. Comparison applied here is based on raw gain without considering other factors such as strategies applied, drawdown cycles and recoveries etc.

Good trading,

Masterrmind..............

Remember comparisons are important.

Traders should keep in tune with the major indices at least because if by year end you cannot at least beat an index trading privately then you are better off simply putting your money straight into an index.

FX retail trading applies higher risk so the returns also need to be higher.

No point gaining 5% pa if your DD turns out to be greater than say 25% (or 15% or even 10%) ...stick it in a bank and get 2% at almost 0% risk.

Rarely is anything black and white its usually a mix of many shades of gray meaning a trader needs to consider how the gain and the applied risk compares to other choices out there before coming to a decision.

Good trading,

Masterrmind.............

During demo trading money is not an issue here since no real money is at risk.

As the trader progresses to a real account then initially as learning continues he/she needs to apply some risk capital.

If after 12 months of trading the individual is not consistently generating a profit then questions need to be asked and answers sought.
The possibility of putting the money somewhere else whilst continuing to learn on a demo account should be considered.
Analyzing in great depth the reasons why their trading is not profitable is a critical factor.

Traders should strive to be the shark not the sharks food !

Good trading,

Masterrmind.............

Excellent food for thought and ways of keeping a trader in line with profit targets.

AUD-CAD - Sell @ 0.9790 TP: 0.9720 SL: 0.9850 .

Considerations to enter:

Daily:

1) Fibs 61.8 at 0.9809 area
2) Round number: 0.9800 are
3) Price getting close to extreme MML zones

Negatives:

- Price is in an ascending channel so longs should be considered
- Tomorrow news: RBA Rate Statement
- No price bars showing exactly an exhaustion

Weekly:

1) Resistance at ~ 0.9800 area


Monthly:

1) 4/8 MML at ~ 0.9765 area

My thoughts: The price could be pushed higher because or before the RBA statement and then could retrace as it faces some resistance ahead. However I'm not very convinced of the trade quality if it will go to TP, so I'll do my best to move stop loss as soon as possible if I'm at the pc. That is if it won't go directly to SL

* the more I browse the charts I start to get a feeling of overall AUD selling to be a good ideea?

AUD-USD Sell @ 0.7350 TP: 0.7280 SL: 0.7420 .


Considerations to enter:

Daily:

1) Ascending Triangle
2) Price in extreme MML
3) Some rejection from extreme MML but also some rejection from the buyers
4) Resistance around 0.73664

Weekly:

1) Resistance at around 6/8 area


Bad Aspect: USD seems to me to enter into a bearish direction.

News to consider:

USD ISM Manufacturing PMI
AUD RBA Rate Statement

Not to much structure in favour of the trade so not sure of the outcome but it's going to be another experiment based on my demo account. I try with pending orders to limit the loss if trades go against my way.

CAD-CHF Buy @ 0.75100 SL: 0.7465 TP: 0.7565

Considerations to enter:

Daily:

1) Fib 61.8 held
2) A small double bottom
3) Unfortunately it seems to be a range between 0.7470 and 0.7565
4) I would put the pending order lower but I think it won't go down again below the round number
5) Some rejection in the candles is shown

Weekly

1) 0.7510 seems to be a support

Monthly

1) Price seems to be in the middle of the range located at: 0.73164 - 0.78069

News to consider:

None seem to be important tomorrow.

Again not very convinced of the trade so a pending order is placed