TraderT - My Trading Journey

Reading the james16 thread from the beginning, this quote really sums up trading:

"Remember what i said about not standing in the open with a shotgun, successful traders hide in the bushes with a rifle. A patient trader could wait for just these trades and be rich in a couple of years. You don't look for reasons to trade you look for reasons not to trade. By having that mindset you eventually reach a point that when you do pull the trigger the emotion is gone and you have confidence in what you are doing."

Source: http://www.forexfactory.com/attachme...1&d=1122064744


Thoughts:

No short entries taken on the Euro and Cable. The Cable started selling off in the Asian session, and didn't reach the retracement in the Europe hours that i was anticipating. Of course it did a classic 38.2% intraday retracement to the 1.6625 level before selling off, but hindsight is 20-20 and that occurred during the US session. The Euro too sold off early, though it did retrace up and is currently near the day high, helped by the S&P which opened down, but closed the gap-down.

Trades:

15-Sept USDCAD
Long 1.0830 (stoploss 1.0805) closed 1.08391.
Risk 1.16%, Gain 0.42%
Reason: Classic bounce off the intraday 38.2% retracement.
Trade went about 34 pips up quickly, before it was sold-down slowly. As i didn't want to let a winner turn into a loser, position was closed manually.

Note: Something i didn't mention earlier - i've started trading eMini S&Ps. My routine starts by drawing key support and resistance levels from the previous day, and as the opening evolves, will add minor S/R levels. At the moment i'm observing order book and watching price react to S/R levels. At some stage, i hope to be spot trend evolve and take more points.

Last week, ESU9
short 1036.25, close 1035.5 (+0.75)
short 1045.5, close 1047.25 (-1.75) (this was a trade that hit my market stop to the tick, before reversing for over +6 gain. nevertheless, entry was a bit premature. reminder to self: enter only at support and resistance!

14-Sept, ESZ9
short 1033, close 1031.75 (+1.25)
short 1034.25, close 1034.75 (-0.5)
short 1034.5, close 1033.25 (+1.25)
short 1037.75, close 1037.25 (+0.5) (this was during the lunch hour, when price was drifting sideways. watched the book order move and waited for price to move up a few ticks, protected by the 1038 resistance, before taking a scalp short)
short 1039.25, close 1039 (+0.25) (tricky tug-o-war between demand and supply. once i saw there was no sharp bounce off the resistance, decided to close position)

The cable finally sold off, but wasn't positioned for any trade. The euro is still holding strong, so will continue to look for short entry.

Spent the US session on the eMini ES, and am experimenting using 5 min Heikin Ashi candles. Hesitated on taking the opening short at 1047 as sell-stop was 1048. Ended taking 2 scalp trades after closely watching price action.

15-Sep, ESZ9
long 1043.25, close 1044.25 (+1)
short 1045, close 1044.5 (+0.5)

Great documentary - this market wizard trades without a chart and only based on sentiment!
Paul Tudor Jones Documentary

Trades:

15-Sep, EURJPY
Short 1.46403 (Stoploss 1.46877), closed 1.46877.
Risk: 0.8%, Loss 0.8%.

Rationale: Short entry i was looking for all week. At that point the Euro was hitting day highs, and the trade seems a force one. If it was intended to be a short at resistance, stoploss would need to be tighter. Was stopped out earlier today. Interestingly today's low on the Euro was 1.4641, which means resistance turned into support.

16-Sep, ESZ9
short 1052.5, close 1054.5 (-2) (this was the early entry made, without waiting for the next sell position to come to me)
short 1053.25, close 1054.5 (-1.25) (this was the original sell position i placed)

Rationale: Trades made in anticipation of a ranging day (near the pre-market high of 1053.25).

Thoughts:

Once again made mistake of picking a top. The trend is your friend, and if you don't respect it, you will be in trouble. All week my shorts on the eMini S&P have not been too profitable, as the trend was still up. There is no could-have, would-have, or might-have, absolutely no excuses. Early in the session i hesistated on taking the long on the bounce of the day low at 1048, and the subsequent higher lows and higher highs gave a hint of a possible uptrending day.

Observation in past week:

1. The indices tend to make a session low or high in the first hour, followed by reversal.
2. The first bounce of support and resistance is the best trade, any subsequent test of the levels need to be observed closely.
3. Stoploss should be kept tighter. For example, the last 2 ES short positions would be invalidated once price moved about 2 ticks above the day high, hence a tight-stoploss would be 1053.75.

Observations today:

1. Cable - break of wedge

2. Loonie - 4 hr reversal PB and outside bar. possible limit long entry between 1.062 to 1.063

3. Euro - classic resistance turns into support twice. possible trendline break and reversal

Late Thur's observations and how they panned out:

1. Cable - break of wedge resulted in a good 200 pip downmove.

2. Loonie - 4 hr reversal PB and outside bar, and daily PB. This was a reasonable PB, but missed the long entry as my limit buy at 1.063 did not get triggered. Price made its way to the next resistance of 1.072 and 1.075 resistance zone. Classic.

3. Euro - trendline broken, retested and held. Looking for daily close below 1.468. Opened a few shorts late on Friday, and partially closed them for a few pips gain, to reduce holding positions over the weekend.

Upcoming week plan:

Cable - see previous chart:
On the daily, the cable looks a bit oversold. My buy zone will be at 1.615-1.617, with strong resistance at 1.64 zone.

Euro - see previous chart:
Still holding short from 1.47172, will look to add if 1.468 support breaks and turns into resistance, based on price action and PB or BEOB.

Recent cable weakness has made some cable pairs look interesting, and will be looking closely for possible PB or BUOB reversals (4 Hr or Daily).

GBPAUD:
Hit a 13 year low of 1.8695 (previous low 1.8739)

GBPCAD:
Hit a 7 mth low of 1.7350 (previous low 1.7380)

21-Sep, EURUSD
Short 1.47172 (stoploss 1.475), closed 1.46493.
Result: + 2.07 R

Euro broke 1.468, before a lot of sideways movement. Broke 1.464 and touched 1.461 a few times, before a reversal near the US mkt open. Position closed manually when it stayed above 1.464.

Short 1.4685 (stoploss 1.474), closed 1.4698.
Result: - 0.236 R

Thinking of picking aonther top in the Euro, opened a short at 1.4685 (stoploss 1.474), however i manually closed it at 1.4698, upon realization that of the 1hr bullish candle, plus a 4hr BUOB forming with just under 1 hr left to close. Re-entering the trade without a good reason was a big no-no, but am glad i realized this and close it for a small loss. Will be watching PA before tomorrow's europe session.

The Cable did bounce off PPZ of 1.614-1.617, but there were no good short-term setups, hence no trades.

4 Hr Trades

Consider these to be demo trades since it's taken with Micro account.

Loonie, 4hr
Short 1.0764, Closed 1.072 (1st TP at trouble-area)

GBPJPY, 4hr (watching)
The only issue with this is the immediate 150 barrier

Trades:

22-Sept, ESZ9
Long 1065.25, Closed 1064.25 (-1)
Entered after a 5min PB with longish tail), price moved about 1 pt up, and to my disbelief, this immediately reversed. Had opportunity to close at BE, but watched price reverse down.

Long 1064.5 and 1063.75, Closed 1062.75 (-2.75)
Entered after price seemed to make a bottom at 1063, but alas, obviously it was not yet the first 30mins of trading.

Thoughts:

All trades were taken in the first 30mins of opening, which is obviously a violation of the pre-determined rules. As it turned out, the first 30 and 60mins of the trading session indeed established a session low (as of 1245 EST now). Went into the session expecting a ranging day (with FOMC on Wednesday), and the first 2.5 hrs turned out to be ranging between 1061.5 and 1066. On this note, it is quite clear index futures on a short TF may not suit me, hence will avoid touching the ES for a while, and concentrate on FX.

Back to FX...

GBPJPY, 4hr
Long 149.42 (stoploss 148.42), TP 150.4

Order triggered, before price reversed. Currently still in trade and looking iffy.

GBPUSD, 4hr
Watching the 4hr close (using Alpari), will be pinbar with potential if it closes below 1.634, with a rejection of the 38.2% retracement of the downmove from 1.67.

Edit: 4 hr closed at 1.6358, hence not a PB. Looking at the daily, the current bar has been very strong after a doji, hence the most recent trend is still up.

Trades:

22-Sep, GBPJPY 4hr
Long 149.42 (stoploss 148.42), TP 150.4, Closed 148.984
Result: - 0.436 R
Buy stop was just triggered. Position closed manually as there were 3 consecutive sideways 4 hr candles.

23-Sep, EURUSD 1hr
Short 1.4758 (sell stop below 1 hr PB), Stoploss 1.4785, Closed 1.47147
Result: + 1.6 R
Textbook pinbar showing 1.48 was resistance. Position closed manually.

Watching:

EURCHF 4 hr

29-Sep, USDJPY Daily
Long 89.984 (stoploss 88.15), still open.
Reason: Daily PB. Entered at 9am Tokyo time, 29-Sep.

Sometimes the execution is more impt than the result. Was eyeing the EURGBP reverse PB, but did not enter - the EURGBP has come off quite quickly, while the USDJPY has taken sometime to form, due to strong resistance at 90.

Hey T.,
yes, sometimes the opposite is true..
talking about execution, we can also conclude that choosing which pair to trade based on the chart dynamics (location, situation, S/R, etc) can make or break our bottomline.

btw, the snail & rabbit pace u mentioned above may also be related to relative strength of currency: (looking at some charts) eur seems a bit weak recently, while gbp strong/not so weak; usd & jpy seem to be strong so there is a push & pull between these two.

29-Sep, USDJPY Daily
Long 89.984 (shifted stoploss to 89.55 based on 29-Sep swing low), stopped out.
Result: - 0.237 R

30-Sep, EURUSD 4 Hr
Short 1.4576 (stoploss 1.4681), just opened.
Reason: 4 Hr BEOB and rejection of 38.2% retracement.

Hey supremeChaos,
Yup USDJPY is a tug-o-war. The lesson learnt from this was not to enter below a big round number 90. I did like the PB, and unfortunately did not move stoploss to BE.

Stopped out 1.4655 and closed manually 1.45721.
Result: - 0.358 R

Had a tighter stoploss for 1 portion, which was stopped out, and manually closed the other position today. Not good trade mgt.

End of trading week as i'm off for a short break, back on 5th Oct.

Trades:

5-Oct, GBPUSD 1hr
Long 1.59556 (stoploss 1.5917), TP 1.5975, Closed 1.5917
Result: - 1 R
Took a poor 1 hr pinbar which didn't bounce off a round number confluence, stoploss was hit within 2 candles. Poor trade on hindsight, but something to learn from.

6-Oct, GBPJPY 4hr
Short 141.85 (sell stop below 4 hr PB), Stoploss 143.35, TP 141.05, TP hit and closed.
Result: + 0.533 R
Reasonable bearish PB, not A+ trade, but i liked the long tail. Nothing much to say, TP hit.

7-Oct, EURJPY 4hr (see 1st chart)
Bearish engulfing outside bar (BEOB), but due to the size, i entered at 2 prices, the 2nd entry around 61.8% retracement of the BEOB.

Long 131.095 and 130.45 (stoploss 129.48), TP 131.4 and 132.35. Still open.

Note: was comparing between the GBPJPY and EURJPY to decide which to take. After watching carefully, the GBPJPY is much better as:
(a) double bottom on the daily chart at 139.7 (see 2nd chart - GJ on left, EJ on right)
(b) less overhead resistance (possible movement to 143-144), while the EURJPY has nearer resistance at 131.5

7-Oct, GBPJPY 4hr
Long 141.369 (stoploss 139.519), TP 143.4

Entered the GBPJPY too.

Trades:
8-Oct, AUDJPY
Short 79.873 (stoploss 80.203), stopped out.
Silly trade, expecting to be 4th time lucky for the 80 level to hold. Alas, this was not the case.

Update on existing positions:
GBPJPY - Long 141.369, Stop moved to 141.8
EURJPY - Long 130.45 & 131.095, Stop moved to 130.45 for both

Thoughts: tempting to close the trades after recovering from an overnight drawdown, but as a longer timeframe trader, you have to stay in the position and ride it as long as possible, especially when partial profits are locked in, or when it's a free-trade.