Silent Service Method

Wow Stefan that looks great. I'll definitely be testing this this weekend. What a great tool.

Thanks for posting.

Simon

Was wondering what your thoughts are on the SP500 which is back below 1,000 today. Here are a couple of charts i was messing around with. Was curious what you guys were drawing as S/R Zones. On these, I drew them from 990-1,010 (20pt zone) by eyeballing and drew another minor one around 950.. Would you guys draw them differently? I'll attach Daily & Weekly Charts:

http://i437.photobucket.com/albums/q...2009-daily.gif

And the Weekly:
http://i437.photobucket.com/albums/q...009-weekly.gif


What would be your trigger levels to set up a short? Perhaps a close below 990, and attempt to run higher and then short from there? I realize it's only Tuesday, so we need to wait for it to develop, but this week & last combine for a pin-ish looking 2-wk formation. Anyway - Would appreciate any & all input.

Thanks Mike. Have you tested this and know it works correctly? I've used a few online calcs and they have come up with different position sizes for the same calculation. If this is a good one then I'll bookmark it.

Cheers
Simon

Hey hel13rock,

Since i have my S/L & T/P set, i think i will sit back and enjoy the ride whether in Plus or Minus........the 1-hr looks quite bad....all consolidation...........

I'm trading it on a lower time frame to the standard ss method so I want to be in the market and out again with a quick profit, if there's nothing going on I'd prefer to leave it alone.

My feeling is it's going to break downwards at some stage, I don't think all the selling is over yet but I'll take a slice of the trend tomorrow if it's available with my pivot point system.

No problem. Let me know if you miss something or have a feeling that somethings wrong with it. If my rare time allows to fix it I'll do so. Currently I'm dancing on too many partys.

Stefan.

I agree with 1000 and 950...possibly even 900.

I am looking to short this anyways. I might sell calls on the SPY instead of forking all that money over, and I don't really like to play around with futures too often, so we will see.

Great indicator. I was about to program something similar myself, but you just saved me some time Thanks for posting!

I have to admit I haven't. I am still trading on demo at the moment and my focus at the moment is in just trying to become more consistent. The link from Stefx looks just the job however and may be all that is needed

Mike

Why sell calls instead of buying puts. Buying puts and calls has always worked for me. How do you use selling these as a strategy?

I prefer selling because statistically they work 80% of the time. I prefer to be paid, rather than pay others. However, you shouldn't do it with all stocks or ETF's.

To be honest, to go into all the reasons and differences would take a thread of it's own.....

I too have a bearish bias at the moment on the US stock market. ALso significant that the S&P couldnt hold the psychological 1000 mark

(points to last post in my blog)

Any thoughts?

Am I on the right track???

VB,

Yes. I would look at the area as 89-90 though. See those bars that are on the 4 hour chart - seem to repeat? That's a solid line of support in my opinion. However, if it goes below there - look out below!

IF I were going to short this pair - I would do it at about 8875 just to give it a chance to break free.

However, I like the look of your chart mate. You are getting there.

Chris

By the way, I meant to comment on this post. I understand your hesitation about mentioning another system. Don't feel that way at all please. I know we recently had a bit of an issue with my former group, but it was not personal. (I believe I cleared that up in some of my postings.)

I know there are many great teachers.

I would personally recommend several, including James16, Hector, feb2365, BillyRayValentine, Jacko, and probably about 10 that I am not thinking of off the top of my head at the moment.

I learned a long time ago that in order to be successful in any business, you need to be two things: attentive and sincere. If you are the latter, the former comes naturally.

I know that a lot of business in the "real world" comes from word of mouth these days. I think I paid my dues a long time ago, and for the most part - I enjoyed doing that.

I just feel that's what I am doing now with this little business venture. In fact, I am thinking of a few things to do......

Scholarships of some sort. Maybe a charity for the group to support. (I am involved with "Save the Children" myself, and it's a great organization.)

In the end, trading is a ton of fun - but hell, you can't take it with you when you die. You really want to make a difference somehow.

Chris

Thanks CW,

VB,

This is going to be a long post, I am sorry. It actually comes from the last one I just posted, it somehow made me think about this.

One major thing I am convinced that made the difference in trading for me is this: I learned to let go. Here's the ugly truth: Any idiot can be taught to read a chart. It really isn't that hard. It might be at first for the new trader, but it's like any other profession, it has it's own language. You have to learn it is all. The market speaks, and quite loudly at times, but do you know the language it speaks? That's what technical analysis is.

What I mean about letting go is this: I learned that no matter what I do, life goes on. So does the market, with or without me. Knowing this, why is worrying about my trade going to do anything?

Indicators? They are nothing but mental crutches for most people. It makes them "feel" better about their decisions. Truth is, most people have no idea what it means to make a true decision. Hell, most people can't decide on what to have for dinner tonight. Add in a situation where money is involved, it only clouds the judgment even more. Money does funny things to people.

I want to share a little story with you. I had a really bad stretch of time a while back. My mother was very sick with cancer, and struggling. My wife was pregnant and about to have a baby. I had quit smoking about 6 months before. I was sitting on the couch watching television when it happened.

I suddenly felt a little sick, and then my heart suddenly started racing. Like I had been sprinting, it was pounding in my chest, but at irregular beats. It just kind of sputtered. It would speed up, and stop, and beat slowly, then fast. I yelled for my wife when it got worse.

As I felt like I was going to pass out, I remember thinking a few things. One was "If I hit the floor, I am dead. This is it." I also remember thinking "I have a son I haven't met yet, and he is going to grow up without his Daddy." Another thought was "This is going to kill my mother. She is going to give up after this if I die." And ironically, my last thought was "Damn it, I quit smoking after 22 years, and I die of a heart attack 6 months later." It's nice to know that even faced with this panic, I didn't lose my sense of humor.

My wife is a nurse. She took my pulse, it was 230 beats a minute. Not good for sitting at the couch doing nothing. I went to the hospital, as it was Friday, I had all weekend before I could get any real concrete answers. I spent that rest of the night in a hospital room thinking about what matters. This was the second time I had a brush with mortality. I can assure you, your life doesn't "flash before your eyes." Bullshit. What flashes before your eyes is what matters the most in life. It is amazing how clear things get when you think you only have a minute or two left.

After the first night, I suddenly remembered I had a USD/CAD trade on. It's funny, I didn't seem to care about it as I was falling to the floor. When you are that concerned, the value of the Canadian Dollar somehow doesn't matter as much. It shows you how little in this world truly matters in the end. I cannot imagine being on my deathbed thinking, "Shit, if I had only shorted the Euro more!" Amazing clarity these moments bring. Oddly enough, this little "distraction" turned out to be a great moment in my trading evolution.

Long story short, I was okay after all. Turns out I have a condition that is called Super Ventricular Tachycardia. Which isn't normally fatal, and is basically a shortened extra pathway for electricity to travel in my heart, causing it to beat oddly. It's pretty common actually. As a matter of fact, the doctor even said it might never happen again.

That trade? I made about 5% on it. Why? Because I was preoccupied with something more important. I also had a trade on when my mother passed away. I let it run, because quite frankly, I didn't give a damn about it. It made something like 9%. I learned that there is more to life than trading, no matter what the gurus will tell you. I also learned that if I don't mess with it - it will make me money more than lose over time. That's all I am trying to gain.

Did I need to go through all of this to learn? No. Did I have these episodes to learn the great secrets of trading? I seriously doubt it. I learned to value what's truly valuable. Trading can add to life, but it's never a focus of my life. It's been a much more pleasant ride since then. I remember I had a losing trade somewhere around the time of my mother's death as well. I can't remember the trade, and I don't remember how much I lost. (I had two on at the time.) Funny thing about that: I don't really miss whatever money I lost. I still miss my mother though.

Some lessons are a little harder, but needed to be learned somehow. After all of this, I learned to let go. Now it's not that rare for me to have a 300 pip trade. It's made trading much easier, and lucrative. But I would give it all up to have mom back. I guess it just comes down to what's important.

Funny, I just read over in the "About the commercial forum" about how I ruined FF all by myself, and should be banned and this thread shit-canned. If you only get one piece of advice form me that's helpful - let it be this post.

Like I said, any idiot can read a chart.

Chris

chris

life is about looking for some way we can contribute to the world and enjoy ourselves.

trading, as I think back, really is not worth so much emotions put into that.

it probably is no big difference with rest of the jobs and life,
we just do it according to the rules and accept what it happens,
sometimes it is good, sometimes it is bad, most of the times it just aligns the market average if we don't risk too much.

however it seems harder to accept loss than gain, that's really tricky of human nature...
by some means, trading is a mirror, we look into ourselves.

take care.

Chris,
Just wait, not long now till football starts again.....
Then you will feel the pain of florida yet again....

Ha ha,, Its here again chris..
you cant avoid it.... your college team is poor at best & state?????
well we all know the score there.....

Nice post Chris x