Why oh Why .... | Forex Factory

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Why oh Why ....

  • #1
  • First Post: Nov 15, 2007 9:42am Nov 15, 2007 9:42am
New topic then.

Why oh why ...

I'll start the ball rolling.

yesterday afternoon i took audchf short and euraud long, was a good trade with my method rules and stops were reasonably tight.

checked em last night, nothing had moved but was still happy.

got up this morning, had a look at 6am, little or no movement so went for a walk for an hour in the country.

came back around 7:15 got the cup of tea to sup, sat down and looked.

Nothing had happened, i mean nothing - it had dithered from -10 to +10 all night - for 12 hours.

some other trades were setting up so a bit later i thought 'sod it, close em and re-invest elsewhere' I got break even on one and +12 on the other.

now this isnt really like me, once i've set my exit robot in motion I leave it and it makes money or it loses with no bother. I could care less USUALLY

literally 20 seconds after i closed the trades BOTH pairs broke the range. Within 5 minutes they were 40 and 50 pips up and as i write both pairs have been in the 100+ range and are still running.

Now here's my question ...

WHY OF WHY THE FU^%$ DID I CLOSE THOSE TRADES????

grr, spit, mumble, cuss .....

your turn ....
https://linktr.ee/Soultrader
  • #2
  • Nov 15, 2007 9:48am Nov 15, 2007 9:48am
They say that there are only two ways for the market to make you exit:

  1. It can scare you
  2. It can bore you

It looks like you got taken out by the latter. It happens to all of us as you undoubtedly know.

Just think, if you had walked a little further you would have made more money. Another good reason to exercise!

  • #3
  • Nov 15, 2007 9:49am Nov 15, 2007 9:49am
You were bored.
  • #4
  • Nov 15, 2007 10:01am Nov 15, 2007 10:01am
Just a quick question: Would your robot have allowed your positions to stay in a state of non-movement forever if you hadn't intervened?
If I enter a trade and it does nothing for a certain amount of time, say 10 or 15 candles then I start to wonder if my analysis was correct.
Of course it depends on many variables, but still, I do like to see the market prove me right within a reasonable amount of time. After 10 or 15 candles of non-movement I like to look at the chart as if I were seeing it for the first time and ask myself if I would make the same entry based on what I'm seeing now.
Your robot should eliminate that tendency, but splinters of gut-feeling and good trading sense are bound to leak through from time to time--especially when you see your capital sleeping while new setups are forming.
  • #5
  • Nov 15, 2007 10:02am Nov 15, 2007 10:02am
I personally consider time-stops often in my trading approach. In my opinion, if upon entry price does nothing but to butt around sideways for hours upon hours on end I don't hesitate to close out and re-asses the situation. I see no point in being positioned in a stagnant market.
  • #6
  • Nov 15, 2007 10:35am Nov 15, 2007 10:35am
lol, the idea of the thread was to stimulate some more 'why of why's' and not really dissect mine in particular sometimes you guys are too serious - I know the answer was boredom but wanted a place to vent our spleens when we do something stupid

in answer however, my robot trader only closes trades, it's not an auto system, i don't believe in them anymore having ran one for over a year. In actual fact I think they are dangerous to a traders health, but that's a different topic.

My robot would only have closed the trades if there was a short term trend reversal so yes, in theory it would have allowed it to remain in non movement for a considerable time.

of course the real answer to my question why of why is usually

"Because you are a twat!"
https://linktr.ee/Soultrader
  • #7
  • Nov 15, 2007 10:48am Nov 15, 2007 10:48am
Quoting soultrader
lol, the idea of the thread was to stimulate some more 'why of why's' and not really dissect mine in particular sometimes you guys are too serious - I know the answer was boredom but wanted a place to vent our spleens when we do something stupid

in answer however, my robot trader only closes trades, it's not an auto system, i don't believe in them anymore having ran one for over a year. In actual fact I think they are dangerous to a traders health, but that's a different topic.

My robot would only have closed the trades if there was a short term trend reversal so yes, in theory it would have allowed it to remain in non movement for a considerable time.

of course the real answer to my question why of why is usually

"Because you are a twat!"

I think most of us knew that you knew the answer. How could you not? But I think most of us also thought this was a theoretical question that would produce a few different answers that would be of benefit to all.
Though you didn't get additional why oh whys, an interesting topic did crop up--Time Stops.
  • #8
  • Nov 15, 2007 10:53am Nov 15, 2007 10:53am
Quoting soultrader
wanted a place to vent our spleens when we do something stupid

That's the reason my journal has a few thousand posts
Trust price. Know yourself.
  • #9
  • Nov 15, 2007 11:20am Nov 15, 2007 11:20am
Quoting soultrader
New topic then.

Why oh why ...

I'll start the ball rolling.

yesterday afternoon i took audchf short and euraud long, was a good trade with my method rules and stops were reasonably tight.

checked em last night, nothing had moved but was still happy.

got up this morning, had a look at 6am, little or no movement so went for a walk for an hour in the country.

came back around 7:15 got the cup of tea to sup, sat down and looked.

Nothing had happened, i mean nothing - it had dithered from -10 to +10 all night - for 12 hours.

some other trades were setting up so a bit later i thought 'sod it, close em and re-invest elsewhere' I got break even on one and +12 on the other.

now this isnt really like me, once i've set my exit robot in motion I leave it and it makes money or it loses with no bother. I could care less USUALLY

literally 20 seconds after i closed the trades BOTH pairs broke the range. Within 5 minutes they were 40 and 50 pips up and as i write both pairs have been in the 100+ range and are still running.

Now here's my question ...

WHY OF WHY THE FU^%$ DID I CLOSE THOSE TRADES????

grr, spit, mumble, cuss .....

your turn ....

LOL!!!....been there!....done that!....next trade is just around the corner...
  • #10
  • Nov 15, 2007 11:21am Nov 15, 2007 11:21am
Quoting soultrader
New topic then.

Why oh why ...

I'll start the ball rolling.

yesterday afternoon i took audchf short and euraud long, was a good trade with my method rules and stops were reasonably tight.

checked em last night, nothing had moved but was still happy.

got up this morning, had a look at 6am, little or no movement so went for a walk for an hour in the country.

came back around 7:15 got the cup of tea to sup, sat down and looked.

Nothing had happened, i mean nothing - it had dithered from -10 to +10 all night - for 12 hours.

some other trades were setting up so a bit later i thought 'sod it, close em and re-invest elsewhere' I got break even on one and +12 on the other.

now this isnt really like me, once i've set my exit robot in motion I leave it and it makes money or it loses with no bother. I could care less USUALLY

literally 20 seconds after i closed the trades BOTH pairs broke the range. Within 5 minutes they were 40 and 50 pips up and as i write both pairs have been in the 100+ range and are still running.

Now here's my question ...

WHY OF WHY THE FU^%$ DID I CLOSE THOSE TRADES????

grr, spit, mumble, cuss .....

your turn ....
Hi ST,

Strangely enough, only you can answer your own question in the given scenario.

I don't know your rules of engagement. I don't know whether you had a lack of discipline, or whether it fell into your own discretion. If it was a discretionary decision (which I assume it was), I have to refer to one of my post in the "how to let profits run" thread of yours: if the trade(s) was (were) still within your window of opportunity or were according to your original entry set up(s), then a mechanical method would most likely have told you to do nothing at all. Instead, you made a decision based on some impulse that had nothing to do with your original entry signal - personally, discretion for me is just another word for indecision.

On another note, you don't strike me as the type of trader that would exit a trade because he is bored with it.....unless you're exposed to the limits and need to free capital for another opportunity.

So, if you weren't bored - what was the real reason? Maybe there was a degree of anticipation that it might go the wrong way because it hasn't gone the right way immidiately (or within a relative short space of time)?

regards
daytrading
Enter Signature
  • #11
  • Nov 15, 2007 11:41am Nov 15, 2007 11:41am
I know the answer.

in the last few weeks ive took on some additional funds - about an extra 200k in all.

Now i know of old that my mind needs time to get use to the jump in stakes and so when this happens, usually for the first few weeks I de-leverage and de-trade. instead of my usual 2:1 per trade I tend to go 1:1 or less.

In addition to this I also limit myself to trading a specific number of trades at once. my current limit is 3 trades at any one time and this morning I had 3 trades - 2 of them doing diddly squat.

In a week or so I will start ramping back up as my mind gets used to the larger pot but for now this is how I handle increases in stake sizes. It's all psychological of course and I do it because i know how irrational I can be when my stakes increase a lot in a short time.

so that's why I closed them - I was not over exposed or scared or bored, but I am limited until next week to take only 3 trades at any one time - those two were stopping me taking some more which were setting up (which have only just kicked in by the way!)

there ya go
https://linktr.ee/Soultrader
  • #12
  • Nov 15, 2007 12:06pm Nov 15, 2007 12:06pm
Soultrader, thanks for bearing your soul and letting us fix it for you...LOL
  • #13
  • Nov 15, 2007 12:08pm Nov 15, 2007 12:08pm
Quoting soultrader
I know the answer.

in the last few weeks ive took on some additional funds - about an extra 200k in all.

Now i know of old that my mind needs time to get use to the jump in stakes and so when this happens, usually for the first few weeks I de-leverage and de-trade. instead of my usual 2:1 per trade I tend to go 1:1 or less.

In addition to this I also limit myself to trading a specific number of trades at once. my current limit is 3 trades at any one time and this morning I had 3 trades - 2 of them doing diddly squat.

In a week or so I will start ramping back up as my mind gets used to the larger pot but for now this is how I handle increases in stake sizes. It's all psychological of course and I do it because i know how irrational I can be when my stakes increase a lot in a short time.

so that's why I closed them - I was not over exposed or scared or bored, but I am limited until next week to take only 3 trades at any one time - those two were stopping me taking some more which were setting up (which have only just kicked in by the way!)

there ya go
So the answer is you felt your capital might be better used elsewhere--considering your new situation? Like a Timestop, but one you normally wouldn't have used.
  • #14
  • Nov 15, 2007 2:47pm Nov 15, 2007 2:47pm
no, i was a wuss
https://linktr.ee/Soultrader
  • #15
  • Nov 15, 2007 2:56pm Nov 15, 2007 2:56pm
grr, look where it would be now!! +150

i was in from 1.0111
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https://linktr.ee/Soultrader
  • #16
  • Nov 15, 2007 2:59pm Nov 15, 2007 2:59pm
Quoting soultrader
grr, look where it would be now!! +150

i was in from 101.11

Peanuts. Listen, the more you go on about it the more you'll just annoy yourself..and you'd only do that if you felt you deserved to feel bad.

Spend your energy asking yourself why you would want to do that / feel you deserve to feel bad instead, it will show to be a more fruitful enterprise
Trust price. Know yourself.
  • #17
  • Nov 15, 2007 4:11pm Nov 15, 2007 4:11pm
I can see why you would close one of the positions if you had another one setting up and had reached your position limit. But I would note a couple of things:

- why close, both, why not only one?
- there is a long documented history of stock traders closing next years winners and opening next years poor performers with the same money



Which brings me to my soap box. I've seen people here say "psychology is nothing" and others say "you've got to control your emotions." IMO neither is right. What you did is caused by your mind (and thus the realm of psychology).

I suspect boredom was present. Or a little fear of reversal.

My recent path, following reading on modern neuro-science has been to move away from the "control your emotions school" that often follows NLP types into the "control your reactions but love your emotions" (sounds catholic doesn't it (substitute hate, sinner, sin)) school.

The idea is that we have emotions whether we want to or not. They arise in a number of parts of our brains and all traders have them. Suppressing them is bad for a simple reason - we lose touch with them (control) but they come back and bite us by generating actions which we can't explain afterwards.

So instead I anticipate emotions (boredom, fear in sideways market). Then I notice that they are there. Then I name them ("I feel fear ... fear") because naming them reduces their strength (because it moves processing power from the amygdala to the forebrain ... seriously this really works), then I activate my plan for when I experience this emotion in this circumstance.

So I have a bunch of plans for different circumstances and the emotions I expect to have then. Each time you do this you reduce the power of your old bad habit. Each time you do this you become more aware of your internal landscape but you reduce its power to misguide your behaviour.

I'm not perfect but I get better over time

Refs: Anything by Denise Shull. http://www.mindfulness.net.au/links.html



But, seekinglight, I should mention one of my own "Why oh Why's"

My classic which I did yesterday trading the Nikkei is to lose and then almost immediately take a trade in the same direction ... why, oh, why do I screw myself over like that?

FWIW .. my plan if I do it is to shut down order entry and walk away for an hour. My plan if I catch myself about to do it is to concentrate on feeling the emotions (wanting to feel good again after a loss, hang over conviction that the direction is right (but the excuse- I just got the entry point wrong) and not do it (to extinguish the behaviour)).

Cheers
  • #18
  • Nov 15, 2007 5:54pm Nov 15, 2007 5:54pm
Quoting soultrader
grr, look where it would be now!! +150

i was in from 1.0111
Hi ST,

sorry to be the devils advocate, but thats precisely the reason why I trade 100% mechanical - that includes the pos. size. In a similar case to what you just shared with us, my method would have dictated to stay in with the initial size (1 unit - or lowest risk level) until such time when a stop was hit or in turn when it would have turned profitable. I increase the amount of units when in profit according to what the method tells me.

regards
daytrading
Enter Signature
  • #19
  • Nov 16, 2007 2:01am Nov 16, 2007 2:01am
you guys kill me lol

this thread was supposedto be a bit of fun, now everyone and their granny is giving me advice what i should do

the thread about how many traders does it take to change a light bulb come to mind.

get a grip guys, it's only trading!!
https://linktr.ee/Soultrader
  • #20
  • Last Post: Nov 16, 2007 2:20am Nov 16, 2007 2:20am
Quoting soultrader
you guys kill me lol

this thread was supposedto be a bit of fun, now everyone and their granny is giving me advice what i should do

the thread about how many traders does it take to change a light bulb come to mind.

get a grip guys, it's only trading!!
Hi ST,

with all due respect, what did you expect?

I can't speak for everyone of course but I post a reply when I find the thread interesting - and not because I am bored or want to have fun.

No one is telling you what to do either - you know best.

regards,
daytrading
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