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vsa with Malcolm

  • #35,001
  • Nov 24, 2021 1:32pm Nov 24, 2021 1:32pm
Quoting trezo
Change timeframe didn't do anything for me, I told that timeframe is not the problem.
Just the way it is mate, we cant learn it over night. If we could then everyone would be a VSA'er.

Im in the same boat as you, im on a losing streak aswell, but weve just got to bend over and take it until all the pieces fall together, unfortunately thats what learning is all about.

Have you been through the Tradeguider youtube videos and through this thread?
  • #35,002
  • Nov 24, 2021 2:14pm Nov 24, 2021 2:14pm
Quoting trezo
Change timeframe didn't do anything for me, I told that timeframe is not the problem.
Ive just watched the latest Tradeguider youtube video mate, I recommend you watch it. Gavin takes a short trade on a 1 minute ES chart.

It will give you an idea of what too look out for, especially the trigger bars.

Gavin and Grigory had an interesting chat about whether to wait on the 5 minute to rollover first, or whether to go down to 1 minute for a more aggressive entry. Both had different views as Gavin is more aggressive, and Grigory is more conservative.
  • #35,003
  • Nov 24, 2021 2:51pm Nov 24, 2021 2:51pm
Quoting Paulscaff1
{quote} Just the way it is mate, we cant learn it over night. If we could then everyone would be a VSA'er. Im in the same boat as you, im on a losing streak aswell, but weve just got to bend over and take it until all the pieces fall together, unfortunately thats what learning is all about. Have you been through the Tradeguider youtube videos and through this thread?
Ye, I am watching, reading a lot of material.
Daytrader
  • #35,004
  • Nov 24, 2021 3:53pm Nov 24, 2021 3:53pm
Quoting Paulscaff1
{quote} Ive just watched the latest Tradeguider youtube video mate, I recommend you watch it. Gavin takes a short trade on a 1 minute ES chart. It will give you an idea of what too look out for, especially the trigger bars. Gavin and Grigory had an interesting chat about whether to wait on the 5 minute to rollover first, or whether to go down to 1 minute for a more aggressive entry. Both had different views as Gavin is more aggressive, and Grigory is more conservative.
Do you have any link to the video? thanks
  • #35,005
  • Nov 24, 2021 4:25pm Nov 24, 2021 4:25pm
Quoting Cyberforex
{quote} Do you have any link to the video? thanks
Aye mate, here its is. The part im talking about was around the last 15-20 mins.

Inserted Video
  • #35,006
  • Nov 25, 2021 4:18am Nov 25, 2021 4:18am
Quoting trezo
Hi guys again, sorry if someone felt bad of my comments ,but I am trying to be better at trading, I am learning VSA but it doesn't work well for me. I don't know what should I change, but a few of you ignored me because I wrote something. You are angry ok, but you could understand me. but it doesn't work well for me
Hey, Trezo, I am also struggling but making good progress in mastering vsa. What I can say is that you should use other methods that can help you make sense of vsa. Do not limit yourself to just what is taught in the books or webinars. Experiment and fail and experiment more. Your hardwork will eventually pay.
Fred
  • #35,007
  • Nov 25, 2021 9:45am Nov 25, 2021 9:45am
Quoting Chronus
{quote} Hey, Trezo, I am also struggling but making good progress in mastering vsa. What I can say is that you should use other methods that can help you make sense of vsa. Do not limit yourself to just what is taught in the books or webinars. Experiment and fail and experiment more. Your hardwork will eventually pay.
Edit: Sorry, had to add charts after posting as 2 wouldnt upload, so order is a bit messed up

Yeah mate, I think sometimes in can get confusing when you see different methods because you may attempt such method without success and are unsure if you either made a mistake..... or it was simply just a losing trade

Lets say you post a losing trade using the "TopBot" method or something similair, (im using the Tradeguider term here but basically its just a counter trend or reversal trade).

Everyone is trading VSA in their own way, Anotan, Malcolm and HG from what ive seen are pretty different.

Your losing trade may show up mistakes by the different traders based on their own understanding of VSA and the individual methods that they use.

This has made me think about the trade that Gavin took the other day on ES just before the end of the video.

We didnt get to see the trade play out but I had a look and it turned out to be a pretty good trade.

I will try and breakdown what I saw in the video based on my own chart. (Blue Line is the trade area)

H1- Looks like a clear uptrend, Medium term and Diamond Trends were up.

M15- Ranging all day up until NYSE open when we had a big increase in volume as usual with an absorption bar up through todays highs.
The next bar continued the effort to rise on high volume with further absorbtion through the previous days highs.

The high you see on the chart is the all time high and this was where the short trade was taken.

M5- This is where Gavin got his alert for potential climactic volume and the trigger bar was automatically marked on his Tradingview. Medium Term Trend and Diamonds still up.

M1- Gavin went down to M1 to refine an entry, but Grigory was being more conservative and was waiting on M5 for a trigger break out and low volume entry.

Gavin pointed out that he noticed the "Mushrooming over" and price failing to push through the trigger bar high.

We couldn't see how he entered but he did say he was in the trade a good while before it breached the trigger low, I did try and point out 3 potential entries.

I would guess at the least he would have taken the entry after the diamonds and medium term trend turned red but cant be sure.

Turned out to be a really good trade, Im guessing Gavin would have trailed it all the way down to the low where the volume started to get ultra high.


What interested me about this trade was that even though I showed H1 and M15, Gavin didn't appear to even look at these timeframes (from what I recall anyway).
He simply got an alert for UHV/SOW on his smart centre on M5 and took it from there.


So couple of devils advocate questions for anyone.

1. Would you have taken this trade and why/why not? (method bias aside, thinking outside the box)

2. Lets say Gavin never spotted this trade, but one of the lesser experienced guys on this thread did (including myself)....they took the trade, based on the same background, stop loss at the high, but get stopped out. Would the feedback be "unlucky, good trade though, keep doing what your doing", or would they get pinged for taking a bad setup with no trend allignment and potentially poor background?

All thoughts appreciated.
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  • #35,008
  • Nov 25, 2021 9:55am Nov 25, 2021 9:55am
Update.

Here is the M5 Chart that I forgot to post where Gavin initially saw the setup.
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  • #35,009
  • Nov 25, 2021 11:41am Nov 25, 2021 11:41am
Quoting trezo
Hi guys again, sorry if someone felt bad of my comments ,but I am trying to be better at trading, I am learning VSA but it doesn't work well for me. I don't know what should I change, but a few of you ignored me because I wrote something. You are angry ok, but you could understand me. but it doesn't work well for me
This is probably going to be a really long post. I may have to break it up into two posts.

I debated whether or not to post this at all, but we are all here to learn and grow together.

The only guarantee in trading is that you will have losing trades. If you can't handle loss STOP TRADING. Accordingly, what follows will not stop you having losing trades, but it will increase the probability that the trades you take will succeed. No matter what you read on FF, or in social media in general, trading is about uncertainty.

For some reason, you really want to trade the M1 chart. I suggest you look deep inside yourself and make sure that reason is not that you want "action". If you want "action", learn to play blackjack. But if you want to be a trader, learn patience.

Okay, so let's get to it. I implore you to give this a try for more than 3 days. It would behoove you to seriously commit to this method for more than a few days.

Take a look at these two charts. This is a Duel timeframe method employing the M5 and the M1. There's a lot of stuff that you can ignore here, so let's walk through it together.

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You need to set up your screen with the M5 and the M1. These are the only two timeframes that you are going to pay any attention to.

*The TREND chart: M5

1. This chart should be blank. That is, you do not want, nor need, any price bars on this chart. The only thing you want on this chart is your TREND indicator. In these charts, it is called CHART MODE, but you can call it whatever you want.

2. I want to say, you should determine what indicator you want to use, but I can already hear your push-back. So I will give you this: I believe the best indicator to use is Williams %R (36).

a. You want to set it up like a bi-color histogram (as all the TG indicators are). This is because the only thing you care about is the color of the indicator. RED = Trend is down. Green = Trend is up. Yes, you can change the colors if you want.

b. When the %R output is above -50, the trend is up and the histogram should be GREEN. When the %R output is below -50, the trend is down and the histogram should be RED.

This is how you are going to define your higher timeframe trend, and you are only going to trade in the direction of the higher timeframe trend. I repeat. You are only going to trade in the direction of the higher timeframe trend. I don't care if you think that gets you in late or causes you to miss moves. You are only going to trade in the direction of the higher timeframe chart. If you can't do this, go buy some lottery tickets and leave trading to those with patience and discipline.

**The TRADING chart: M1

1. You're going to be trading with Volume Spread Analysis (VSA), so you will need volume on this chart.

2. Above the volume pane, you want to place another TREND indicator. If you don't have one you like, you could use the TG medium-term trend indicator (posted a few posts back).

3. Below the volume pane, you want to place Williams %R. Personally, I prefer volume-based indicators, but the most important thing is to determine the trend of price. And since I don't know how to code for Mt4, I can't give you any assistance with replicating my favorite, the Volume Pressure Gauge.

But the ATR Williams %R (36) combination is very powerful.

The same rules apply: Only go long when both are Green and Only go short when both are Red. The Trend is not just your friend; it's your lover.

I know you have used two MAs before, so you can use two here as well. I suggest using a 20 EMA and a 50 EMA.

a. Only take longs when Price is above both MAs and when the fast MA is above the slow MA.

b. Conversely, only take short when Price is below both MAs and when the fast MA is below the slow MA.

The last element needed to determine trade direction (Trend) is the Trigger Number Matrix. Specifically, Half Back (HB). Place a Trigger Number Matrix on the most recent climatic volume bar. Ignore the examples on the above charts. Your Trigger Matrix should include a line at the high of the bar, a line at the low of the bar, and a line at the midpoint of the bar. The complete matrix also included the 25% and 75 %, but you can leave those off for now.

*** Only take longs above HB and only take shorts below HB.

Entries: This thread is replete with entry examples. But in sum, look for Tests at HB or the TM (H) and Look For No Demands at HB or the TM (L).

Edit:

Although the timeframes are different, here's a better (more recent) look at the method.

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Without VSA, you're playing checkers while the Smart Money plays chess.
  • #35,010
  • Nov 25, 2021 12:07pm Nov 25, 2021 12:07pm
Quoting HiddenGap
{quote} This is probably going to be a really long post. I may have to break it up into two posts. I debated whether or not to post this at all, but we are all here to learn and grow together. The only guarantee in trading is that you will have losing trades. If you can't handle loss STOP TRADING. Accordingly, what follows will not stop you having losing trades, but it will increase the probability that the trades you take will succeed. No matter what you read on FF, or in social media in general, trading is about uncertainty. For some reason, you...
A full scale trade plan....cant ask for more than that!
  • #35,011
  • Nov 25, 2021 12:12pm Nov 25, 2021 12:12pm
Quoting Paulscaff1
"Tradeguider Diamonds are based on a moving average that looks at relative volume".......(Actually Just a colour changing 20SMA) Tradeguider Medium Term Trend.....(Actually just a 2xATR Histogram)
Gavin maintains that both indicators use volume and that neither one is, or employs, a "moving average".

I don't believe him, and Gregory once said that the Medium Term Indicator does use a "moving average".

Trying to determine exactly what TG indicators are is all well and good, but I would argue that it's more important to understand the logic. And by logic, I mean the necessity of knowing, and following the trend. There are some good trend indicators out there, it's up to the trader to find the one(s) that best suit his core beliefs and go with them.

Don't get me wrong. You've done some nice work here. I absolutely think people should take a look. But if a person is going to put it on their chart and still trade against it, whatever was the point?
Without VSA, you're playing checkers while the Smart Money plays chess.
  • #35,012
  • Edited 12:48pm Nov 25, 2021 12:38pm | Edited 12:48pm
This is a great example of my personal frustration with Gavin. He claims to be a trend trader but often takes trades against the trend. Especially, during a LIVE webinar (again, this is because he is trying to sell software and make "winning" trades during the webinar. If the trade works, it's all about the Software. If the trade doesn't work, well, the Software was right, but his timing was wrong.)

In addition, he doesn't show the entry. He says "I entered the trade" and shows his dom minutes later so you don't know if the trade took a lot of heat initially. And if he gets stopped out, he doesn't actually have to say anything since the audience doesn't "see" the entry.


Quoting Paulscaff1
1. Would you have taken this trade and why/why not? (method bias aside, thinking outside the box)

Quoting Paulscaff1
2. Lets say Gavin never spotted this trade, but one of the lesser experienced guys on this thread did (including myself)....they took the trade, based on the same background, stop loss at the high, but get stopped out. Would the feedback be "unlucky, good trade though, keep doing what your doing", or would they get pinged for taking a bad setup with no trend allignment and potentially poor background? All thoughts appreciated. {image} {image} {image} {image}
The answer for both is the same: bad setup with no trend alignment and potentially poor background. I would ad that price needs to be below HB to go short.

p.s. if you conflate VSA with the TG Software, you've fallen into the trap. They are not one and the same. Accordingly, it is possible to be a believer in VSA and not a believer in the TG Software.....
Without VSA, you're playing checkers while the Smart Money plays chess.
  • #35,013
  • Nov 25, 2021 1:59pm Nov 25, 2021 1:59pm
Well done HG you have the patience of Job and if he does not get it and follow exactly as you laid out well he is simply a stupid troll .. ignore

My experience with the 5 minute and 1 minute tick junkies is exactly what you said .. blackjack or race racing

There is too much noise at these speeds for the solid principles of VSA to consolidate and play out as they are intended

And yes you have summarized the mind set of GH exactly .. it is very dangerous to follow the pied piper off the cliff

Those principles i posted a ways back are Toms own and the truth about the VSA world, i wish people would learn these first and then complicate their lives with triple back flips later

Occams Razor comes to mind

Good post thanks
  • #35,014
  • Edited 4:12pm Nov 25, 2021 3:59pm | Edited 4:12pm
Quoting HiddenGap
{quote} This is probably going to be a really long post. I may have to break it up into two posts. I debated whether or not to post this at all, but we are all here to learn and grow together. The only guarantee in trading is that you will have losing trades. If you can't handle loss STOP TRADING. Accordingly, what follows will not stop you having losing trades, but it will increase the probability that the trades you take will succeed. No matter what you read on FF, or in social media in general, trading is about uncertainty. For some reason, you...
Thanks for advices. These are helpful.

I have problem with rate of background. Is it weak or strong. There are a lot of signals. One time I have a BUYING CLIMAX, then market will go a bit up, and UP THRUST, and going down. I am trying play longs and it go to the hell.

I should also add that from sometime I am looking for more timeframes M1-M15 sometimes higher.
Daytrader
  • #35,015
  • Nov 25, 2021 4:27pm Nov 25, 2021 4:27pm
Quoting trezo
One time I have a BUYING CLIMAX, then market will go a bit up, and UP THRUST, and going down. I am trying play longs and it go to the hell. I should also add that from sometime I am looking for more timeframes M1-M15 sometimes higher.
Please post a chart and answer this: Why are you trying to go long after seeing a Buying Climax and an Up Trust?

These are signs of weakness. They tell you that the Smart Money is Selling. After the Buying Climax, you should be looking for the market to mushroom over and change behavior. When it does and eventually heads down, you look to enter on a No Demand.
Without VSA, you're playing checkers while the Smart Money plays chess.
  • #35,016
  • Edited 6:24pm Nov 25, 2021 4:35pm | Edited 6:24pm
Quoting HiddenGap
{quote}Don't get me wrong. You've done some nice work here. I absolutely think people should take a look.
Its ok mate it wasnt much work at all, just an obervation I noticed after seeing a pattern in Malcolms charts, and then a quick google search for the indicator, and there it was.

quote=HiddenGap;13801289]{quote}But if a person is going to put it on their chart and still trade against it, whatever was the point?[/quote]

Yeah mate that makes sense, but if I could come in at a slightly different angle I would say that statement can conflict with some of the principles that Synax mentions.

Take Syntax's favourite one, SOS 6 for example....

Lets say that, on M30 we see stopping volume - short rally - low vol retracement to take an entry.

There is a good chance that all the PA in this sequence could play out under a moving average/against a trend indicator, especially if the drop before the stopping volume was severe.

So you would either take an entry under the MA (against the indicator) or wait for it to cross and take an entry further into the markup.

Or

You could drop down to M5 or dare I say M1 to refine the UHV trigger, at which point the trend indicators would have a chance to "flip" whilst still getting a tighter entry and have all your confluences lined up (obviously apart from M30). But then Syntax could say that M5 or M1 are in noise territory?

Point I was making is that, there will be times when you see a trade setup and not all the stars allign so maybe sometimes have to go by discretion?

Gavin did say somewhere that the Vol Thermometer and Medium Term Trend "dont have" to be on your side. In order to stop banging on about Gavin, I will say the Tom also said something along these lines.... im sure it could be in the Newsletters Q+A.

So perhaps this could be utilised in a trade plan where by lack of indicator allignment could mean a reduced risk for example.

Im sure Anotan also stated before about being flexible in your tradeplan and not having too "rigid' rules which sort of ties in with this.

Lets say Trezo (sorry mate ) gets clued up and spots "bag holding" followed by "no demand" and takes a short trade against the indicators and trails it down for a 10RR trade....are we really going to say it was a bad trade?

With the software im going to go against the majority and say that it looks pretty usefull, especially for an active day trader or scalper, I mean lets face it, without the software you would have to be a cracked out rain man to be able to monitor all pairs, all backrounds especially over all lower timeframes for between 4 and 8 hours a day solid.

Just my thoughts but am welcome to any criticisms.
  • #35,017
  • Nov 25, 2021 4:57pm Nov 25, 2021 4:57pm
I'm just going to say this:

If you put indicators on your chart you should NEVER trade against them. If you want to trade against them, what's the point in having them on the chart in the first place?

You either want to catch tops or bottoms or you don't. I don't. I trade the trend and I don't trade against my indicators.

That may not be the only way, but it is the best way for me.
Without VSA, you're playing checkers while the Smart Money plays chess.
  • #35,018
  • Nov 25, 2021 6:36pm Nov 25, 2021 6:36pm
Quoting HiddenGap
I'm just going to say this: If you put indicators on your chart you should NEVER trade against them. If you want to trade against them, what's the point in having them on the chart in the first place? You either want to catch tops or bottoms or you don't. I don't. I trade the trend and I don't trade against my indicators. That may not be the only way, but it is the best way for me.
Makes sense mate.

I try to make myself as unbiased as possible to see things from all sides, so you could say that im pretty much on the fence.

I suppose some trading plans may include reversal as well as trend trades, and in that case the stars wont always allign.

If you dont mind me asking mate, how does the Facilitation indicator influence your trades? Does it have to be a certain colour at a certain bar to take a trade, is it important in your decision making process?..........does it get used?
  • #35,019
  • Nov 25, 2021 9:56pm Nov 25, 2021 9:56pm
Quoting Chronus
{quote} Hey, Trezo, I am also struggling but making good progress in mastering vsa. What I can say is that you should use other methods that can help you make sense of vsa. Do not limit yourself to just what is taught in the books or webinars. Experiment and fail and experiment more. Your hardwork will eventually pay.
I'm in the process of figuring things out myself as well. I'm of a mixed mind on branching out to other strategies. This is pure conjecture, but my uneducated guess is that most experienced VSA traders mastered the foundational skills through repetition, and then tacked on supplemental ideas to further optimize VSA such as HVZ, WRB, etc. I worry that if people (myself included) try to ‘optimize’ VSA w/ new strategies before they’ve mastered the fundamentals of VSA to the point of profitability, then combining a new strategy might just make for even more inefficient trading.

When it comes to frustrations w/ VSA, I can’t speak for others, but for me, I realize that a lot of my issues are based around my inability to strictly follow the rules of VSA. For example, when I’m itching to go long, every buying climax feels like an absorption bar and every down bar on increased volume looks climactic... until I get stopped out . I think there's a gap between being able to understand VSA in hindsight on a random chart, versus keeping that objectivity during a subjective situation (ie: in a live market w/ money on the line).

Also though, I’ve read Master The Markets twice and I’m currently reading Undeclared Secrets a second time. Even after taking a lot of notes, there’s a lot of stuff that I read in my first go, but didn’t actually execute in my trading until my second read. And yet, with these things I executed in my second read, I haven’t repeated them enough to remember to account for them every time I read a chart.

Another example is during backtesting there’s plenty of times where I hit a wall, revisit MtM and realize that I’m doing the exact thing that the book says not to do. Reading the book once or twice and doing some backtesting does not translate to an expert grasp of VSA because there’s so little knowledge that the human brain locks in without tons of repetition.

Even then, there have been times where I reread MtM and realized that I was overlooking a key part of VSA, yet when I start using it to base my trade decisions, my P&L declines. I’ve realized that it isn’t because VSA is flawed, but because when I tried to implement something new today, I often lost focus on the VSA tactic that I had been practicing for the last two weeks. Nothing is locked in until it’s repeated hundreds of times. At this point, I think trading is more about slowly eradicating hundreds of mistakes repeatedly until everything becomes second nature.
  • #35,020
  • Nov 25, 2021 10:24pm Nov 25, 2021 10:24pm
One other suggestion I want to make is to track your trading. It is hard to see any progress when you aren't tracking metrics. Even something as simple as revisiting a trade from a month ago and realizing it's a trade you would never take today is a big sign of progress imo. It is easier to correct mistakes when you track your trades and see the pattern.

I've read recommendations that say to move away from an unrelenting approach such as “Am I profitable or not” and instead get a baseline of your skill level and then compare your progress from there. Mark Douglas (videos on YouTube) talked about testing strategies 30 trades at a time to have a baseline of your skills and what to expect from your execution of a strategy. It could be that after 30 trades, your stats show that your average trade has a negative expectancy where you lose an average of 10 pips per trade, it doesn’t matter as long as you have data and a baseline with a large enough sample size. From there though, your goal is to make adjustments and see whether or not those adjustments make a difference in your next 30 trades. Let’s say hypothetically your next 30 trades show that you lost an average of 4 pips per trade… you might not be profitable yet, but that is a clear sign of progress that you would have been overlooked if you didn’t track your stats or just focused on whether your last 60 trades were net profitable.

Let’s say you follow up with 30 more trades but this time, it resulted in you losing an average of 7 pips per trade. Instead of throwing your hands in the air, you can investigate what the differences were between your last 30 trades and the prior batch of trades before that. The goal is just to get more and more data and refine your approach based on the data. When your focus shifts away from profitability and towards the long term pursuit of collecting data, backtesting becomes less stressful and trading (imo rightfully) shifts towards a long term endeavor instead of a skill set you can master in a season.

Also, since we as humans are visual creatures, visualizing the data helps a lot too. Last month, during a drawdown, I was beating myself up about my lack of progress, but when I visualized the data I was shocked that my backtesting was net profitable. The narrative I was telling myself was completely disconnected from the actual data but I wouldn't have known that if I didn't actually have the data.
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