Your Daily Pip Goal?

Ah, what the hell. I'll toss in a simple post.

The initial question is a good one and you show yourself to at least be thinking about things. Good. Every new trader asks he same question. In fact, I will surmise that you have put together a spreadsheet showing how much you can make. I sure did. A few times.

The idea of goals is a great one. One poster put up the idea of tiger woods going to a tournament with a goal in mind - winning it. An that we should follow suit.

Goals are critical, but I disagree Witt every poster in this thread on what it means. If you really listen to Tiger he goal is not to win, but to play the shot onfront of himself extremely well. Winning is a by product of that single goal. Setting that goal and focusing on he process to meet that goal with every shot is what makes Tiger, Tiger.

People set goals to lose weight. And the vast majoriy fail. Sound familiar? Weight loss is a by product, not a goal. I'll let you figure out what the real goals are that result in real and permanent weight loss.

Onto trading. Is a pip count really what a good goal consists of? No. Because you truly have no control over it. The only thing you *might* someday control is youself - and that is the crux of the matter. People fail in droves because they do not master themselves. Trading is far simpler than what we know - but as humans we make it very complex.

So a great goal is to focus on the 'process' of being a trader. Find out what that means, and you have a shot at success. A slim shot, but a hell of a lot more of a shot than what you have today.

Start with Bill Williams Trading Chaos. Focus on the first part of the book. Trading occurs in your mind and no place else. Start there.

Well I think I'll chime in here too...
(1): I think pip or % goals are absolutely essential for trading. This is because each trade no matter how well you played must have an objective for you to measure. IMHO the secret is not in how or where you enter, it is managing the trade to further your objective for that trade. Thus if your goal is 2x the initial risk you must manage that trade well to make that objective. This means not trailing your stop too tight, nor too loose. It also means being on the alert for early signs of contrary market sentiment. Exiting is what makes your money...NOT entering.

(2): That being said a daily objective should not be influencing your decision to enter if you set up rules don't congeal. For that reason I am a hugh fan of measuring pip goals in the weekly or monthly time frame. Ex: If you want 10 pips/day, then by the end of the week you should want to see 50 pips profit and 200 pips profit by the end of the month. That may mean you make it on one trade or in 5 it depends on the market and your set up.

(3): Should you have a week or a month that exceeds your pip goal then you have a little flexability. You can stop trading for the remainder of that time period (and keep your extra profit), or continue trading but only risk that amount you have that is beyond your goal. Thus you are maintaining your goal while still advancing your account beyond your original plan. This is a win/win scenario. If you win extra...great! But if you don't win...you've only risked the extra you made in the first place and your original goal is still intact...again GREAT!

Also by measuring over the monthly or weekly basis, you can "smooth out" or average your goal so that if one month isn't up to your expectations, perhaps an earlier better month or the next month will average out the goal. This takes a big load off your mind.

(4): Having a pip or % goal also allows you a very practical and obejective way to measure your progress in trading. When you see your goal is being met or even a few pips extra, it takes a great deal of performance presure out of the equation and you can analyze your set ups free of that nagging voice..."gotta get my pips".

(5): Above all stay focused on the PURPOSE for doing any of this...that is increasing your account size. Each week you put even 1 pip more into your account is a successful week. Even if you are only making 5% on the year that is WAY better than what you will find at a savings account or a CD. I just one CD advertise their "High End Yield" CD at 1.5% annually. WOW! You can do better than that standing on your head putting on 3-5 pips in you account every week. Honestly...

Think about it...goals are good...goals are our friend. Goals bring definition to your trading, and allow you to measure your success

Hey guys thanks for all the indepth responses, this is a very informative forum with a lot of smart people.

Today I finally blew my first account up...oddly I feel like I just got babtized or something. My account was 3k and now is at $500. I read a lot of books that talked about certain psycological things that happen to noobs when they trade and I have experienced them, in fact I think I almost embraced them this once just to see how it felt so I could recognise them. Few things I went through:


1. Possum Trading..dont look and itll come back, on the other hand, sometimes I stared at a 5min chart and freaked myself out.
2.No Stop..., I got cocky on one trade I was up 500 and left for 30 min thinking it would never go down that much, came back and it was a negative 800. This then led to number 3.
3. The Freeze-I froze and just watched as my -800 turned to -1500.Boom. Half my account.Which led to number 4.
4. Revenge Trading-had to make that money back, wouldnt take profits, doubled down, cause it wasnt enough unless i could get that few hundred bucks more.

5. Looking at those small time frame charts. Those things mess with your head. I went back and looked at my trades and %80 would have been profitable after an hour if I didnt freak when the market moved against me a bit.


So, now Im looking to manage my $500, and I consider the $2500 lost my "tuition" to FX school. I think I have good ideas for trades after looking back but now I need to do the dicipline.

I dont think I will go with a pip goal because that will cause me to hold on to trades until I lose my profit, like I did here. Im not trading for a living so I dont need x amount every week, I just need to make small profits and not give it back. I know this wont work for everyone but I think it will be best for me.

PS. Im long the Euro right now if anyone wants a trade tip

dont give up



PS. bet on losing those $500?? I begin with $500 bet, what about u?

A daily "pip" goal or percentage goal is not essential at all in trading. If you rely on a daily pip goal, I doubt that will work out for you. I don't know of anyone that has a "daily" pip goal and is successful with that. A monthly percentage goal is another thing, but I think that can only be estimated after you are successfully trading for many months at least, and know what your method and trading is capable of without much pressure.

Good choice not to go with a daily pip goal.

Yak

if you continue on like you are - or take the bone head pip or percentage goal per day, you arescrewed.

Look at your own litany - your process failed. You cannot attain to success without that. And there is much much more. Most people on this forum are completely lost and you'd be making a huge mistake in listening to them. This is hard. If most fail, then most advice is a fraud.

Think about it this way:

Don't set a maximum daily goal, set a minimum. Move stop to daily minimum goal balance and take all the risk you want afterwords.

40 pips a day $10/tick is equivalent to $100K a year. (assuming 250 trading days) Break it into 4-10 pip trades or 8-5 pip trades. And sometimes you might catch 200-300 pips in one trade. stop trading, relax, take 5 days to a week off because you'd still be on target.

och,

i do feel for you, shame you had to lose so much money for your babtism. I initially went with a get rich quick scheme which compounded my way to millions from my initial 5K...oh within 18 months I'd hit the yacht status...Luckily I failed in demo.

I've been plugging away since 2007, had brief flurries of profitability, only to blow it all on a horrific kill you market day/week/month. Not experienced enough to handle either losses or gains.
Sometimes what you did, doesn't work right now, might work again, might not, so it's a constant be careful rule based game...So you claw back, increase lot size according to R/R and just lose it real quick or real slow on increase, (took so long to increase too...)

Thing is its a tough old game and I have to do the time to learn, what suits me, what doesn't. Its not about making a ton, it's learning when you are wrong/when you are right...and everything about why you were right or wrong. You can't do that with real matter money.

I'm still plugging, maybe I will, maybe I won't, on the plus it's tangible, and answer to every reason you took it up first off, on the minus its not...but it can be cheap and fun to learn.

Add to that this is a tough time for your babtism, it's a downtrend, but we've had the earth shattering click sell and it'll be alriight downtrend, so it's low enough to be fair price, so buyers trickle in, still only midpoint on major bull run. Sentiment wants recovery, yet nowhere is fundamentally sound, so we have nervous markets. Again. So, apapt, again...

cheers

weren't we talking about daily minimum goals.... not daily maximum goals. Who sets a maximum goal???? And does your formula take into account compounding?

and why are people saying to take time off when doing well?

lol

I just don't get it. I don't have goals, I just trade with the best money management and judgement I can. I get realistic returns for my effort and my goal is to get unrealistic returns for my effort. I couldn't tell you how many pips I made last week, but I know it was a lot of pips. I made some more pips this week and today I wasted some of them, like spilling a tube of Smarties.

I've seen loads of people on the forum set maximum goals.
Stuff like, "20 pips and I'm done" etc, etc.
People say that shit all the time.

Even the blue ones?

yea until they are down 40 pips, then its, "ok, 45 pips and im done..." lol

its ok to be satisfied with a certain amount of pips I guess... I just don't like the word "goal". the only goal should be to not lose... take what it gives. Of course, this is just my opinion, and from my experience, it's bad for me. Maybe others are different.

I have set amount of time per session, and a certain amount of sessions per day. I take what the market gives within those sessions. If it sets up how I like 5 times that session, I take them, if It sets up only 1 time.. I'll take it. I will never chase the market for a daily pip goal or limit myself. The only goals for me are sticking to my rules and plan, day in and day out.

Because you're more likely to enjoy it than when not...

I have an ideal daily aim of 1% (not pips as I can use differently sized positions) but if that day the market gives me 0,1, it's the same.
The goal is mostly to fix a certain limit when reached (not cumulative) so that day I can relax feeling that I did my job well... but anyway it's a trick of the mind... some days the market gives, other it takes. But in average I think that everyone knows more or less what is his/her own normal performance. So the aim is based on that, not the other way around.

Man

in this world there are people convinced with discussions and others with experience and also there are who didn't whatever the facts were clear or basic ...

save the energy for your job ...

Agreed, and btw, 1% a day is a realistic expectation. But I just don't like to make the goal 1% per day... some days give more, some days don't give any, so the 1% a day is more like an average from the 20% a month. I know I am good for at least 20% a month. That is not unrealistic at all, so I am completely happy with that.

1% a day for me is 5 pips, as I scalp with leverage set at 20:1. As a gain on my account, it starts to be a little more before I reset and up the lot size as a compound. I don't say that I HAVE to make 5-10 a day. And I don't say that I am only limited to 5 pips, because tomorrow might not give any. I just take the setups. Some days give none, some days give 50-100, who knows. I take some losses of course, but not many compared to the wins, and they are always limited.

As Real As It Gets..

30 pips.

20-50 pps