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Call me Vidvad - I day trade futures

  • #561
  • Jan 16, 2025 8:19pm Jan 16, 2025 8:19pm
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #562
  • Edited 7:45am Jan 17, 2025 6:28am | Edited 7:45am
Quoting vidvad
I've been re-reading TooSlow's HOLO thread, page by page, post by post. He commonly uses the following emoji pair: {image} It signals he is waiting. Price has not reached the level and fulfilled the conditions to trigger an trade. TooSlow is a Top 5 FF member, imo.
I like TooSlow and how he works his thread. But, I am surprised you chose that technique to be your "main" technique.

There is no "good" money in it for the long run. Period. I do not want to explicate on it, outside the marking below. But, as we say in my favorite country, America, "To each their own".
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  • #563
  • Jan 18, 2025 3:02am Jan 18, 2025 3:02am
Quoting vidvad
The profits earned from the TradeDay prop account will ultimately be used to fund a trading account with sufficient equity to secure an income I can rely on. I have a long way to go and there is no expiration date on my attempt other than the day I die. As I don't know the day or the hour, I'll just operate as though there is no expiration date {image}
I am on step zero.
Plan to get funded this month.
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I might be wrong , I have been wrong before
  • #564
  • Jan 18, 2025 6:17am Jan 18, 2025 6:17am
Quoting Mandariin
{quote} I am on step zero. Plan to get funded this month. {image}
Good luck!

Keep us posted!
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #565
  • Edited 11:33am Jan 18, 2025 6:46am | Edited 11:33am
Quoting driven18
{quote} I am surprised you chose that technique to be your "main" technique. There is no "good" money in it for the long run.
You might want to go back in my journal where I copied and pasted his HOLO rules and made some changes, specifically noting where my money management approach diverges from his.

At the same time, I have and possibly always will be more comfortable using a money management that uses both e a fixed stop loss and a fixed take profit, even if that means I sometimes take a profit that could have been larger had I "let my profits run."

For most of November-December I was trading a 2:1 on the NQ, +25 point take profit and a -12.5 stop loss, and it was the most consistently profitable two months I've had.

I only deviate from it now because the volatility in the NQ has increased to the point that the stop loss I would be required to use to maintain the same consistency is larger than I am comfortable with at this time. A 50 point stop loss is $1000/contract. A 12.50 point stop loss is only $250/contract.

The micro MNQ, and the micro MES are both subject to odd spikes and outsized movements that are not mirrored in the parent contracts (NQ & ES).

The YM and MYM, on the other hand, seem to be less subject to market anomalies and more closely track one another.

I can adjust risk by using the micro MYM. The MES and MNQ are more difficult to use to minimize risk as they do not track the corresponding minis at times.

As an example, I submit this actual example from this past week.

On Thursday morning, I Bought the MES at the level of the overnight open. In this chart, the MES (micro) is in the upper panel, and the ES (mini) is in the lower panel.

Prior to the 8:30 data release, I bought as price traded below the overnight open and came back up through it. The low of the entry bar on both MES and ES was 5987.50. I set my stop below that level for a -3 point risk. I set a take profit at +10 points.

Seconds BEFORE the data was released, the MES spiked down, sweeping my stop as well as thousands of others. What did the ES do at that moment? Nothing. It behaved as a professional market would be expected to behave. Immediately following the news, both the ES and the MES moved up, and the +10 point profit target would have been filled. Instead, my MES position had been stopped out, and NOT for the -3 point risk I had set the stop loss for. I was stopped out at almost the low tick for a -6 point loss!
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Now, back in the day when I was trading forex with a typical bucket shop (FXCM) I expected this BS. But I do NOT expect this from the CME. And yet there it is!

I see this over and over and over with the MES and MNQ, which is why I mostly avoid trading them. While there is often SOME disparity between the YM and MYM, it is usually just a tick or two.

Here is the MYM (top) and YM (bottom) from the same time. The MYM made a lower low than the YM but just 1 tick, which is perfectly reasonable and to be expected.
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Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #566
  • Edited 8:23am Jan 18, 2025 8:00am | Edited 8:23am
Yes, you made some positive changes that I believe would give you a "bigger buck for the bang". I never liked trading retracements, so bias continues.

I traded Nasdaq and S&P 500 Futures very little, as once discover Dow Jones Index, never looked back. I did try those other indexes once or twice for weeks at a time, but always came back to Dow. She is my Girl .

BTW, thanks for the charts, love visual presentation of the issue.

I also like your determination and perseverance, you are on your way, just like @MachineLearn.

Partly suggestion/recommendation: Once I got that "trading" bug, I spend 10-12 hours a day doing all I can to be where I am right now. There is no other way. Hard work pays off.
  • #567
  • Jan 18, 2025 11:47am Jan 18, 2025 11:47am
Quoting driven18
I traded Nasdaq and S&P 500 Futures very little, as once discover Dow Jones Index, never looked back. I did try those other indexes once or twice for weeks at a time, but always came back to Dow. She is my Girl .
With the increase in volatility in the NQ and to a lesser but not insignificant extent the ES, coupled with the unacceptable bucket shop behavior of the MNQ and MES, I'll be focusing on the MYM/YM for the immediate future.

I set up a progression to move me from micros to mini's in stages.

Stage one limits the trade size to just 2 micros ($1/tick risk), and the stage is complete once +100 ticks net profits are closed. This can be one trade or 20 trades, it could take 1 day to complete this stage or 20 days.

What is most important is simply to trade the defined set ups, and not to deviate from the plan.

Actually, if it takes 20 trades there is likely a problem. If I stick to the proper set ups and my trading plan, it shouldn't take more than 4 trades to net 100+ ticks, which allows for a couple of losses.
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #568
  • Edited 2:20pm Jan 18, 2025 12:06pm | Edited 2:20pm
I am doing my prep for next week, in the meantime, let me make a suggestion, if you ready.

If you want to check, how your technique performs, you can do a challenge, 50 trades with identical rules(0 changes to the rules of Entry, Trailing, SL, TP) with increasing lots schema that you proposed above. We can see the stats at the end of 50 trades. That would tell you, if you are at the start of realizing you have an edge. You can stop at any point, if you see something is not working, but then will restart again with the new rules.

I took similar challenges 3 years ago.

I had a great last week, achieved my monthly goals and in "giving back" mood. Of course it is up to you, but would of been interesting, if a potential new successful trader is emerging.
  • #570
  • Jan 18, 2025 5:10pm Jan 18, 2025 5:10pm
Quoting RickM
{quote} Hi Vidvad I feel you may have been a bit unkind to CME in regards to the ES / MES price spikes.
CME owns the matching engine and it failed at that point. Those REAL people were not people like me and the other guys and gals posting here at FF. Those REAL people were allowed to dump and pump what is obviously an easily manipulated market. They are the Kansas City Chiefs of the trading world.

I don't see the stop run you're referring to "about 8 bars later." Are you looking at M5 bars, M1 bars?
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #571
  • Jan 18, 2025 6:53pm Jan 18, 2025 6:53pm
  • #572
  • Jan 18, 2025 11:42pm Jan 18, 2025 11:42pm
Quoting vidvad
{quote} CME owns the matching engine and it failed at that point. Those REAL people were not people like me and the other guys and gals posting here at FF. Those REAL people were allowed to dump and pump what is obviously an easily manipulated market. They are the Kansas City Chiefs of the trading world. I don't see the stop run you're referring to "about 8 bars later." Are you looking at M5 bars, M1 bars?
Hi Vidvad

I suppose what we can learn from your charts is Stops will always be easy targets from the Pro's if we have them too close to entry near data releases.
Those trades would have been a spilt second move and I'm sure CME couldn't prevent a dump and run exercise without blocking them or delaying the order execution to match them with their own orders. Isn't that manipulation by CME and worse.
I prefer all orders to be executed ALWAYS then let CME deal with those issues - but I would be pissed of too if that was my loss.

As for the stop run 8 bars later, sorry I made a mistake so disregard that comment.

Cheers
Trading thin liquidity at the boundary of the charts
  • #574
  • Jan 19, 2025 7:39am Jan 19, 2025 7:39am
Quoting medici
To me this is due to the much lower liquidity in MNQ, and the price you pay for trading a less liquid contract.
"The price you pay" = the risk you take. Rick's point was also about lower liquidity. I understand that, but who wins? Who loses?

When you answer that question, these wide and frequent discrepancies which can be, as you noted, "arbed away" become more clearly explained as large trader manipulation. In the market, nothing like this happens by accident. When accidents happen, which are very rare, it results in major events where everybody loses. For example, the May 6, 2010 flash crash.
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #575
  • Jan 19, 2025 7:49am Jan 19, 2025 7:49am
Quoting RickM
{quote} Those trades would have been a spilt second move and I'm sure CME couldn't prevent a dump and run exercise without blocking them or delaying the order execution to match them with their own orders. Isn't that manipulation by CME and worse.
I have to believe, Rick, that if Goldman or BOA were the one on the public side of those trades, CME would have made sure the orders were matched which is part of the exchange's responsibility. It was very quick, indeed. And you have to remember there was no split second movement on the ES. It didn't budge. It was "situation normal" until moments after the data was released.

I do not trade the micros much at all. It is really only the last few weeks with the increase in volatility that I've done so. I knew from seeing the results of friends who trade micros rather than minis that there are frequent deviations between the MNQ and NQ, and likewise between the MES and ES. But that particular instance really struck me as something outside the realm of what has been typically reported to me.

It doesn't really matter though. It cured me of ever trading in either the MNQ or the MES ever again. Never for me, in fact. I've always traded the NQ and the ES and if conditions are such that I cannot assume the risk of trading even one full size contract I will trade something else or not at all.

I will do a few trades using the MYM over the coming days, maybe for a week or two, but only for me to get more accustomed to the movement of the index, which is often very different from the ES and NQ.



The CME and the brokers really make the micros too expensive for anything but practice trading. They are not built for a consistent campaign.
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
  • #576
  • Jan 19, 2025 8:49am Jan 19, 2025 8:49am
It really does not matter, if there are spikes of liquidity or brokers "hunting the stops" or whatever else excuse is.

It is part of the business and I always account for it in the trading plan as an "unexplained event". Who cares what it is, fact is, It Is and always will be.

It is all about if trader has an edge or not..to find out, refer to my above challenge post.

https://www.forexfactory.com/thread/...4#post15120264

After challenge it is simple, Edge - Yes or Edge - Not. Allot of time wasted on "thinking" there is an Edge, where there is possibly none.
  • #577
  • Edited 11:44pm Jan 19, 2025 11:22pm | Edited 11:44pm
Quoting vidvad
{quote} "The price you pay" = the risk you take. Rick's point was also about lower liquidity. I understand that, but who wins? Who loses? When you answer that question, these wide and frequent discrepancies which can be, as you noted, "arbed away" become more clearly explained as large trader manipulation. In the market, nothing like this happens by accident. When accidents happen, which are very rare, it results in major events where everybody loses. For example, the May 6, 2010 flash crash.
From the beginning of exchange trading of commodities many centuries ago, speculators have been welcome market participants as they go between buyers and sellers to ensure that the quoted price is the "right" or fair price, reflective of the actual balance between supply and demand, rather than the price influential buyers or sellers may want the market to believe is right.

For as long as speculators have operated in open markets, some of them have engaged in market manipulation. Such as buying a large position in coffee and spreading a false rumour of a freeze in Java, Indonesia. And for equally long, exchanges have pursued such practices as being criminal.

Then there are other types of manipulation that are based simply on market activity. Such as pushing the price of coffee down by selling large amounts, down below what everyone considers to be important support levels, causing market participants to believe that the price is crashing and thereby selling their positions...only for the speculators to pick them up and push the price up, as they knew that there actually was a freeze in Java, and they wanted to pick up as large a position as possible as cheaply as possible.

This latter form of manipulation some would decry as "stop hunt" and want banned, but from the point of view of the market it's just speculators doing their job of bringing more complete price information to the market while some will have to pay for their ignorance. And that's how we all make money as speculators - from market inefficiencies of one sort or another.

And sometimes we, as you did in the example shared, fall victim to market inefficiencies if we are unaware of them, thereby paying for our ignorance. The comparison to fx bucketshops is completely out of place, as that is a case of the market defrauding its own clients. CME doesn't do that. CME, SEC, and DOJ are monitoring futures markets for any sign of fraudulent activity, and pursuing cases found through harsh legal measures.

Such as the 2010 flash crash which wasn't an accident but an event caused by a type of fraudulent speculator activity called spoofing.

And the micro contracts are perfectly viable to trade if you are aware of the minor inefficiencies.
  • #578
  • Jan 20, 2025 2:39am Jan 20, 2025 2:39am
Quoting driven18
It really does not matter, if there are spikes of liquidity or brokers "hunting the stops" or whatever else excuse is. It is part of the business and I always account for it in the trading plan as an "unexplained event". Who cares what it is, fact is, It Is and always will be. It is all about if trader has an edge or not..to find out, refer to my above challenge post. https://www.forexfactory.com/thread/...4#post15120264 After challenge it is simple, Edge - Yes or Edge - Not. Allot of time wasted on "thinking" there is an Edge,...

Well said. Makes me think of my favourite trading quote:

Quote
I love this game simply because there is no one I can ever blame for things that go wrong. It’s all on me, and I like it that way.

Those are the first two sentences in this video, which offers a relevant perspective on this discussion:

Inserted Video
  • #579
  • Jan 20, 2025 4:46am Jan 20, 2025 4:46am
Quoting vidvad
{quote} Seconds BEFORE the data was released, the MES spiked down, sweeping my stop as well as thousands of others. What did the ES do at that moment? Nothing. It behaved as a professional market would be expected to behave. Immediately following the news, both the ES and the MES moved up, and the +10 point profit target would have been filled. Instead, my MES position had been stopped out, and NOT for the -3 point risk I had set the stop loss for. I was stopped out at almost the low tick for a -6 point loss!
Hi, Vidvad, I see you've received some very good comments concerning your unpleasant recent losing trade experience, and I would like to add another.

Your description of events suggests that in your written trading plan (which you have, right?), there is no mention of flattening a position before any kind of significant news release. There should be. The only sensible alternative to this is when a position is winning and you can place a stop loss of at least, say, b/e +20t or so, risking your profit for a large spike in your favour. Holding an index trade into news, expecting protection from a 3 point stop is a serious error. Better not complain about the CME, look at yourself in the mirror and realise you screwed up, it's the only way to come though this cleanly. Otherwise you will drown in a victim mentality.

Forgive me if you feel I'm being too harsh, you seem like a really good fellow and I wish you success in your trading journey. Lastly, I can assure you that I have made every error you have referred to in your journal... and probably 100x worse !

Edit: Just to be clear, by "flatten a position before...", I mean at least 2 or 3 minutes before the official announcement time.
  • #580
  • Jan 20, 2025 5:21am Jan 20, 2025 5:21am
Quoting jtrade
{quote} there is no mention of flattening a position before any kind of significant news release. There should be.
I wopn't have a position before CPI, PPI, and NGP. I won't have a position before an FOMC announcemtn.

But I've held countless ES positions on a technical set up into retail sales and while I have had losses, I never had my stio slipped by more than a tick or two, and a majority of those positions held into retail sales hit the take profit rather than the stop loss.

Nothing is going to convince me that there wasn't something untoward when the MES, which is supposed to track ES does a 6 point spike when the ES didn't move from the current bid ask spread.
Life itself is a privilege, but to live life to the fullest is a choice
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