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Please help, 40% drawdown

  • #21
  • Apr 9, 2025 3:32pm Apr 9, 2025 3:32pm
And I don't know how to backtest anything by Al Brooks, but his methods do work as far as strategy is concerned, except if you use it without any stop losses you will eventually lose the entire account, so stop losses are needed but the way I am applying stop losses is not working and sabotaging the strategy. The reason I cannot backtest anything by Al Brooks is because it is candlestick based and it's a bit hard to code candlestick patterns, it's easier to backtest from indicators and so forth.... So I prefer just to demo this strategy, and I have tested it successfully without stop losses, but with stop losses I cannot make it work.
  • #22
  • Apr 9, 2025 4:54pm Apr 9, 2025 4:54pm
Better stop asking around, stop to trade. Seems you do not know anything about trading? Be real and see what is the result without carry a mask. It is hard to see all the time waste in several trades running out of hand as sand you can not hold for ever.
Candle stick is fluid, take it not serious and do not think alone a candle stick will answer about the market. Make clear what you see the last years, what are the pkaces the instrument breath and explode. Be sure you will take the monthly view and above to get a clue here and there. Be sure you finetume your trades after time and time. First learn to keep balance in the higher state and go more and more in detail with getting understanding. One point more. Go to stuff from Wyckoff and deep learn it, realy deep breath his stuff in and out. Make it to your one and only if it comes to trading. This helped me to find a calm way to trade loke a airplane over the clouds.
I will you not make down, but in life comes to see the things in a mirrir not in movie.
Do not drop that fast and be strengthen yet. It is your one and onlly life.
Perfection is the enemy of good enough!
  • #23
  • Apr 9, 2025 9:24pm Apr 9, 2025 9:24pm
At the moment this trade (split into three trades) hit the stop loss, the price action did not seem to be at the level of where the stop loss is at. I spend most of my time just doing this, and then when my patience runs out, I unintentionally switch to revenge trading mode with no stop loss, no risk management and too high volume. I need to solve this particular issue to solve my revenge trading issue. I thought I solved it using a 6*ATR stop loss, but it's still happening. I do take medication for my psychosis so it should be controlled, but am I seeing things here? Or is there information not showing on this chart that I should be able to see, the ask spread is hiding behind the bid price, so the spread is extremely low, is it possible momentarily the spread went down there so quickly that I couldn't see it? I must solve this issue as I cannot think about trading. All I can think about is the fear of unnecessarily hitting the stop loss.
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  • #24
  • Apr 10, 2025 12:45am Apr 10, 2025 12:45am
Thankyou guys, for your patience, I feel I have sorted the issue out now, I just have to forward test it, 6*ATR seems to be working, that previous screenshot was actually a 2*ATR stop loss but I was unaware as I didn't save the 6*ATR stop loss in the risk management settings properly, so it went back to 2*ATR, the trades I am taking now are not getting stopped out unnecessarily and I don't have that sense of fear because the stop loss has room to breathe, I feel I have learnt this lesson well and it took a lot of pain and frustration to learn which means I'll remember it. I can't believe that I am actually not getting stopped out while using a stop loss, what a relief! (Months of struggle and pain) I'll keep you updated.
  • #25
  • Apr 10, 2025 12:50am Apr 10, 2025 12:50am
Quoting PianistMat
At the moment this trade (split into three trades) hit the stop loss, the price action did not seem to be at the level of where the stop loss is at. I spend most of my time just doing this, and then when my patience runs out, I unintentionally switch to revenge trading mode with no stop loss, no risk management and too high volume. I need to solve this particular issue to solve my revenge trading issue. I thought I solved it using a 6*ATR stop loss, but it's still happening. I do take medication for my psychosis so it should be controlled, but am...
This chart tells nothing without the look from the sky (minimum monthly)! It is the same as you want operate on the heart without have the overall look on the patient.
M15 comes late and later, after time invest first in bigger timeframes. Do not want to much force staying in such small timeframes, relax and stay for entry minimum on the hourly chart. With more understanding you can after that finetune more and more. Going to M39, M15 and so on ... if it is needable. In many cases it is not.
Also reflect your instrument, how it does breath, what are the tricks played with it.
Perfection is the enemy of good enough!
  • #26
  • Apr 10, 2025 1:08am Apr 10, 2025 1:08am
Thankyou.
  • #27
  • Apr 10, 2025 5:39am Apr 10, 2025 5:39am
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These are my stats today. The drawdown is now 10%, and today I increased the account by $180 without using any revenge trading, and with using 6*ATR stop losses, that was my problem, I was using stop losses that were too tight. I'm glad I figured that out. Let me keep testing. For those who told me to stop trading, it is good advice applicable to many situations similar to mine, but in my situation, I just can't as I felt so close. I knew it was just one thing, the stop loss, so I significantly lowered my risk % per trade instead. Let's see if this remains consistent. By the way I don't have the urge to revenge trade anymore because the root issue I believe has been solved pending future consistency, I'll keep you updated.
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  • #28
  • Apr 10, 2025 12:14pm Apr 10, 2025 12:14pm
Quoting PianistMat
4936810 4936810 {image} These are my stats today. The drawdown is now 10%, and today I increased the account by $180 without using any revenge trading, and with using 6*ATR stop losses, that was my problem, I was using stop losses that were too tight. I'm glad I figured that out. Let me keep testing. For those who told me to stop trading, it is good advice applicable to many situations similar to mine, but in my situation, I just can't as I felt so close. I knew it was just one thing, the stop loss, so I significantly lowered my risk % per trade...
10% DD is still too high for my risk appetite.
You should really lower a lot your initial risk and use a proper money management when things go wrong.
Cheers
  • #29
  • Apr 10, 2025 7:10pm Apr 10, 2025 7:10pm
Thankyou, Merka, I also agree, I will and have lowered the lots to 0.1.
  • #30
  • Apr 11, 2025 6:32pm Apr 11, 2025 6:32pm
Quoting PianistMat
Hello. All of you guys are geniuses to make trading work. I have developed an appreciation for what those of you who are successful can do. I feel so stupid. Please help. I have a 40% drawdown and don't know what I'm doing wrong. I trade price action on the one-minute charts. I tried using an atr stop loss and an atr trailing stop loss, take profit, high risk-to-reward ratio targets, and low position sizes, and I ended up losing countless small trades because the stop loss kept getting hit no matter how I adjusted the risk-to-reward ratio. I then...
@PianistMat

What was the Market Type conditions in the month of March that caused the 40% Drawdown.
It can be that your trading system did not perform well in certain Market Type conditions.
Perhaps your trading system is not suitable to trade the Market Type conditions in March.

Quoting one trading book author:
<quote> All systems have drawdowns. You can’t have a profitable methodology, without taking some calculated risks as well as some losses. Trend following drawdowns are a function of the risk level desired. Risk level among trend followers varies depending upon the size of the profit they seek. For example, if you sought 100%+ a year gains you must be prepared for the possibility of a 30% drawdown. Anyone who promises you can make 100%+ with only the possibility of a 5% drawdown is lying.<unquote>


Attached Image


A drawdown above 30% is impossible to recover for any novice trader.
Most novice short term traders only look at the platform drawdowns statistics as numbers but do not see the other details of the drawdowns. There is drawdown in absolute dollars and % of equity. This is only the magnitude or the depth of the drawdown. What is not seen is the duration of the drawdown and the recovery period. We read many claims how traders turn $10K to $1million and even one claim turning $1K to $1million. Another example in 2011 one trader started to turn $5K to $1mil in 3 to 5 years. He was just looking at the effect of compounding his profits. He did not mention how he will recover from drawdown which happens. Obviously he blew his account and failed to reach his financial objective. He did not know about the duration of his drawdowns and did not have the required skills to recover from his drawdowns in a given period of time. There are of course other reasons why that trader did not achieve his dream goal.

Now should be the time for you to work on your recovery plan. Do Not look at P&L on Monthly basis.
I trade using a target of 10% profit cycle every 20 trading days. This 20-trading days cycle is important for my system because when I suffer a drawdown during this 20-days, my system has a recovery system to re-gain the lost equity. This is the reason why I kept my drawdown to a 10% maximum. Once you achieved 10% profit in less than 20 trading days, you start the next 20 trading days cycle.
The key performance index KPI is the average number of trading days to achieve the 10% profit.
Any drawdown above 10% is extremely difficult to recover in 20-trading days.
This is what I call having a SMART objective in my trading systems.
SMART = Simple, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-based.

...
Honesty is a very expensive gift. You wont find it in cheap people.WBuffett
  • #31
  • Apr 11, 2025 9:46pm Apr 11, 2025 9:46pm
Thankyou thankyou, I'm ok now, I'm down to 5% drawdown because I realised my stop loss was too tight, using 6*ATR seems to have worked, I felt so frustrated as I was so close but knew maybe just one slight thing was wrong messing it up. Now with the stop loss at this level I can trail the stop loss to break even and pyramid when there's a very strong trend which we all know there have been ample of these in recent days. I trade both trend and range, for range trading I am still working out my stop loss distance, but for trend following I have found the ideal stop loss distance for me. I am realising traders need to become very skilled with their stop losses and where to place them, so I am just using 6*ATR for trends because it is mostly outside of any obvious area where they can hunt the stop loss and is not in any obvious location. I think with range trading I can bring the stop loss much closer so I might just place it manually eyeballing it, I will see, I have only been trading for a few months with real money, I don't want to put too much money into the account at first, I am just testing the waters. Thankyou again.
  • #32
  • Edited 10:49pm Apr 11, 2025 10:33pm | Edited 10:49pm
Quoting PianistMat
Thankyou thankyou, I'm ok now, I'm down to 5% drawdown because I realised my stop loss was too tight, using 6*ATR seems to have worked, I felt so frustrated as I was so close but knew maybe just one slight thing was wrong messing it up. Now with the stop loss at this level I can trail the stop loss to break even and pyramid when there's a very strong trend which we all know there have been ample of these in recent days. I trade both trend and range, for range trading I am still working out my stop loss distance, but for trend following I have found...
Trending market is always easy.

And Sideways Wide Range volatile market will also work out.

But Sideways Narrow Range bound quiet market will be hard.


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Your trading system needs to have a Statistical Edge to survive long term.
Keep your losses small minus -1R
Let your profits run above +2R
and you will recover all your 40% DD losses.

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...
Honesty is a very expensive gift. You wont find it in cheap people.WBuffett
  • #33
  • Apr 12, 2025 2:04am Apr 12, 2025 2:04am
Hi, PianistMat

Generally, you have to trade on a demo until you are successful for at least five months, where you can be free to try anything and evolve. That's basic. And no BS talking like demo and live are different, bla bla bla. It is not. You are either capable of doing it or not. The rest is invented by brokers to drag you to live trading ASAP.

I'm an ex-banker with vast trading experience, can give you a few online lessons to correct and improve your trading.



Take Care
  • #34
  • Apr 12, 2025 2:25am Apr 12, 2025 2:25am
You don't need a better idea.
You need the guts to start.
'Ideas don't win-execution does."
  • #35
  • Apr 12, 2025 7:04am Apr 12, 2025 7:04am
Thank you so much. This is excellent advice. I do try to avoid tight ranges, as I think that's more for the HFT algorithms. I check that the standard deviation is wide enough before trading a range. I also use ADX to help confirm if it's ranging or trending but it's not foolproof because sometimes a wide range has a high ADX.
  • #36
  • Apr 15, 2025 11:50am Apr 15, 2025 11:50am
Quoting PianistMat
Hello. All of you guys are geniuses to make trading work. I have developed an appreciation for what those of you who are successful can do. I feel so stupid. Please help. I have a 40% drawdown and don't know what I'm doing wrong. I trade price action on the one-minute charts. I tried using an atr stop loss and an atr trailing stop loss, take profit, high risk-to-reward ratio targets, and low position sizes, and I ended up losing countless small trades because the stop loss kept getting hit no matter how I adjusted the risk-to-reward ratio. I then...

Trading off of the 1m chart is madness in my opinion. Why? Because when price exits the area of structure it moves on to the next one. Usually quite a few pips away. 1m chart should only be for entries to 5 to 15m patterns. Meaning you see a pattern developing on the 15m, you then switch to the 1m to see the internal price action. I have a trade posted on the UJ chat that shows this. I saw a 15m rejection candle. I then went to the 1m to see where price would retrace to before going north. So the pattern was identified on the 15m. The 1m was just to enter. This will give you time to get out should the trade go wrong.
Don't compare your trades to others. Most often the masses are the asses
  • #37
  • Apr 15, 2025 11:52am Apr 15, 2025 11:52am
Quoting YanceyTate
Hey PianistMat, You're clearly putting in the work, and that matters. But here’s the short version: 1-min charts + 3ATR SL = death by a thousand cuts. Noise will eat you alive. Stop blaming "stop hunts." Your SLs aren’t being hunted—they’re just poorly placed for that timeframe. Step up to higher timeframes. 15m, 1H—price action makes way more sense there. Forget indicators. Master structure, liquidity zones, and context. Your biggest enemy is revenge trading. Walk away after 2 losses—hard rule. Risk less, aim for clean A+ setups only. Final tip:...

I approve this message. Except I believe stops are hunted. Why? Because I hunt for them, and place my entries where others place their stop losses lol
Don't compare your trades to others. Most often the masses are the asses
  • #38
  • Apr 15, 2025 11:58am Apr 15, 2025 11:58am
Quoting elpusso
Hi, PianistMat Generally, you have to trade on a demo until you are successful for at least five months, where you can be free to try anything and evolve. That's basic. And no BS talking like demo and live are different, bla bla bla. It is not. You are either capable of doing it or not. The rest is invented by brokers to drag you to live trading ASAP. I'm an ex-banker with vast trading experience, can give you a few online lessons to correct and improve your trading. Take Care
How much does it cost ??
  • #39
  • Last Post: Apr 15, 2025 2:06pm Apr 15, 2025 2:06pm
Quoting PianistMat
Hello. All of you guys are geniuses to make trading work. I have developed an appreciation for what those of you who are successful can do. I feel so stupid. Please help. I have a 40% drawdown and don't know what I'm doing wrong. I trade price action on the one-minute charts. I tried using an atr stop loss and an atr trailing stop loss, take profit, high risk-to-reward ratio targets, and low position sizes, and I ended up losing countless small trades because the stop loss kept getting hit no matter how I adjusted the risk-to-reward ratio. I then...
A friend, unfortunately in short -term transactions, there are no profitable traders, only brokers rich in such transactions. When you lost only 40% of the deposit, then the fact that you still need to win 80% of the remaining amount to stay with your own. In this game, risks are always against the trader. All,
What can you do for success to open are transactions that last long, from two days to two weeks. Then the risks will be on your side, because one such a long good transaction will block a hundred of your small stop losses. Go to daytime graphs and become medium -term trader, buddy.
There are no other ways to win the market
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