Ken's Continuing Successes with EO's system

We got a nice hangman on the 1H after GU tried to get above the weekly open and failed.. Waiting for a 15M candle to enter..

I'v come to drift more towards scalping myself and im seeing a lot more merits to entering of touches then waiting for candle triggers. Simply because its the location that creates the trigger its not the trigger creating the area. So entering with touch often gives a tighter entry with a smaller stop. This is pretty much the reason I wanted to have a lh on ej before doing anything as trading with the momentum just adds a lot of percentages to the setups especially when taking touches.

So trades as the 50 noodle with ppa or trading zone with ppa are becoming my favorite trades as they always presents themselves during a trading day, and the stop can be pretty small as well.

And yea Pippin was tearing it up crazy, when I have my first 2k pip week im buying champagne for everyone You still have some contact with him?

LOL no kidding, I would be ecstatic, Ken would be eating off of gift cards for a month

Also,

I hear you on this. In my mind, area always comes first, so I've been taking a lot of touches lately when there's confluence. When it's a little more uncertain though I've been waiting on a candle signal. I think it's possible to weave both together without making it too complicated -- take some touches, take some candles, just depends on how strong the area and how tight the stop.

Just try and keep focused a failed touch should have you in a great spot to look for another entry. That is one of the hardest thing for most people to do. Re-enter at the same level. I think it comes from the fact that we wait so long for price to get to our area of interest that in our minds eye we feel it can't be ready this soon .

Your touch entry like the first candle that reachs a area is normally the top or bottom . Even if we get a test watch the closes they are the key.

But never risk to much on a test you can even open with a partial then add more when you get a regular entry. it is the ability to manage your trading that you will find is the actual key to trading , Any entry can be handled right or wrong. Sime have even gone so far as to say a roll of a dice for a entry should result in the same losses or gains . As it isn't the indvidual trade that counts but how you handle each one.

Nutshell , cut losers quick and let winners run .

Ken,

I think the one thing I've really taken away from what you've written is look for another entry after a failed entry. I've been putting that to practice and it's stunning how many trades I make after a failed trade that do go positive, I just didn't have the correct entry on the first go around.

As for me, I'm done for the week. I have a few trades still out from another strategy I trade but I think my eyes are done staring at charts.

Yeah me too, may post another chart or two , but finished trading I think, took a little short off the gbp ( 4 hr triple top) made the days goal plus a few.

Look forward to seeing your charts if you decide to post them.

Either way have a good weekend.

Same here, I've had a very nice day overall and a good week, I don't want to get greedy. Plus the market has started to crawl..

I do still have a half position open on that GU trade from the touch of the weekly open. I had a nice runner on A/U from 0.9940ish but unfortunately closed it at +80 once it neared the weekly open.. looks like that was the wrong move, price is still going down.. I closed out E/J and never reentered, looks like that may have been the wrong move as well as it may continue downward.

EDIT: And if I had the testicular fortitude, I would short G/J.. I just can't find an area to backup that pin. But the candles look soooooo inviting..

Fibs and MA confluence we can live with

AS you can see from the above chart there are many many entries to be had. All those were with the trend add some Counter trend and even more. The only time I have a losing day or week is when i get frustrated at one particular loss and stop trading. the key to trading is to take the clean entries , If one fails take the next one . If your eyes are ok not even perfedt you should start getting a above 80% hit rate 8 out of 10 positive and some days even better. I did 3 trades today all positive think i had one loser this week.

It isn't i am any better than anyone else I just have learned what to see. Now to conquer ME.. That is hard copmpared to learning the mechanics.

Somwbody had a thread called the dance and I guess that is a good analogy of trading to be the follower ina dance is all we want to be. If youtry to lead your going to trip all over your own two feet.

Price does lead the way just learn to be ready to follow . IF you have to take baby steps so be it. I trade better risking less and feel a lot would do better also. Trade 1 % then build your account to what you want to make not try and make what you want to soon. I know that doesn't work for long ..

Everyone have a great weekend. Ken

Man I love your typos Ken

Have a great weekend all!

Here are a few random charts showing how the Prevous days levels come into plan on every pair. Like some of the MA trades 62 ema 1 hr touch , Sometimes it may not hit the area if th pressure is on for the breakout to get underway. But it almost always goes back towards the area close enough to get a position. And a tight stop other side of the previous days level.

then add some fibs or just notice the Zone.

Very good educational post, Ken

I have a few guys that post their trades else where . There is one in particular that always seems to enter on the wrong edge of consolidation . If you think price is going to go short after hitting a area. Then enter as high as you can if you think it will go long enter as low in the consolidation as you can.

It is amazing how many times you can enter , thinking you have got the breakout right on the nose , But it just goes back and stops you out only to truly breakout the next try. If you entered at the right spot closer to where a good stop would be you would be positive on each attempt to break those areas.

You have to see where price is in reference to our areas or lines. If the line is above , Enter as low in consoliation as possible if the line is above then enter as high . Just like in our Gump trading chart we were below a major double top or PPA area and price did break down. Or the descending triangle on E/J chart enter as high as you can ( Lower Highs) .

Does it always work No sometimes price will keep bouncing off a line till all the stops are taken out then go thru , But it normally will show it's hand as the candles will show. The rejection of the candles are opposite the way it wants to go.

I wil try and find some more examples and post a few a bit later . Time for a bike ride and breakfast here.

Enjoy your days of freedom from charts . Ken

Hello everybody,

I'm sure that there is no one here but I started my trading week today, just a few trades. Took one for a minor loss but I had a pretty good 35/50 trade on EJ.

Anyway, I'm rambling but wanted to say goodluck to everyone this week.

Hey, I'm on and trading as well. Thanks for the best wishes, and I wish you a good week also. I didn't get a long on E/J on the run up, but I got a short off the daily 35 thats covered and green. I also took a short off A/U but it's not covered yet.

I have EJ still running from the 113.6X touch (daily 35) but I closed AU wwaaayy too early.. left a lot of pips on the table. That would have been a great way to start the week. Oh well. GU is at a pretty key area right now.. I'm trying a reversal from 1.6116 but if it fails to hold then I'll close out and go short on the retest of the 1H 50/62/200 (they are all lined up)

Morning all,

Hope everyone is in good shape and ready for another trading week.

I spent some time thinking about trade management this weekend. It's been a bit of a problem for me for a while now as my entries have increasingly improved, my need/desire to extract as many pips from each trade as possible has grown. Personally I can't stand subjective trade management methodologies because too often you will be kicking yourself for not closing a trade soon enough only to see it come back and take you out or you will curse yourself for closing too soon and missing the biggest part of the move. This all leads to stress, annoyance and unhelpful self analysis.

So I’d prefer something that is more mechanical. Being grown up about your trading is being able to accept that you simply cannot and will not ever take each and every pip available on a trade. What we need to aim for is consistently taking as many as possible but with a method that absolves us for the responsibility of anything missed as we are just “following the rules”

Now I know that the ultimate goal here is to enter as a scalper but manage the trade like a swing trader off H4. As wonderful as a concept that is, I just don't feel in that place yet and actually, with average stops of 15/20 pips, if I can regularly grab most of a 100 pip daily move, man I’ll be more than happy with that for the time being. So with me being comfortable with that approach, I’ve come up with the following plan based around our moving averages and a mobile stop approach.


Trade Toward the M15 10ema with angle

Assuming no other major mas are going to be hit first, take profit at the 10ema touch (or just before) If you are underneath it and it has an angle, we must always presume a bounce off it. These are scalp entries only as we will be counter to the immediate trend and if it breaks the 10 ema, we can then look for a new entry in the same direction.

Trade toward the M15 35/50 mas with angle

If we have broken the 10 ema, and the M15 35/50 are sloping against the trade, we aim to take profit at these mas, whichever comes first unless any other major ma is in front of them.

Trade toward the H1 62 ema

In all circumstances, I will take profit at the H1 62 ema if there are no other mas between entry and the 62


Trade toward the H4 50 ema

This ma is hit much less often than the other but if we have cleared all other mas, I will take profit at the H4 50.


Now there are some caveats to this approach that are important. Firstly, an element of discretion still needs to be exercised. If price is absolutely flying toward some of the major mas, you may want to hold fire for a little while to see if it just bursts straight through the mas you were looking to take profit at. If it does and closes beyond, you can then look at your next ma as a possible take profit area. By and large though, these will be hard and fast take profit goals for me.

However, there needs to be a complimentary way to manage the trade between the entry and the ma but also if price is riding on top or beneath ALL the major mas, thus removing any possible target. If your entry is say 80 pips away from the next ma, you cannot assume that it will make it there. So to tackle that problem, I’ve been working on a way to manage it during it's progress to the target mas or away from all the mas if it’s cleared them.

Now we can always assume that we can use our ability to read the candles to judge if price is turning against us or not. The truth, of course, is that if we were that good, we'd be trading these pairs up and down all day without a problem or care. So to try and find a mechanical way of managing the trade without too much subjectivity, I’ve adapted a method I learned a while ago. I will be moving the stop up with each positive candle close in the direction of my trade. So, once I have a positive close, I will put my stop 2-3 pips underneath that candle. If I then get a close against me (so we have a bearish candle in a bull trade for example) then I do nothing and keep the stop where it is if it hasn't been taken. What I am waiting for next is a close higher than the high (not the close) of the candle that the stop is currently under. As soon as a candle has CLOSED higher than that high, we move the stop 2-3 pips under the new candle. Keep doing this all the way up to your targets or if you are above all the mas, until a retrace or reversal finally takes your stop.

I did some back testing and this approach will capture a good portion of most of the moves. You will always leave some pips on the table this way but in many cases, it looks like it will give you enough opportunity to capture a good many pips in a secure and logical way without you trying to second guess if a reversal is underway.

The exceptions to this whole methodology would be during consolidation where the mas are flat and we a bouncing around in a range. I personally don't even like trading this time but if you do, you would need to follow Ken's "gump trading" approach which has it's own trade management attached. Essentially at this time you are scalping up and down over the mas, not for the faint hearted.

I have attached this chart to show the most recent GU action on M15 and how we might be able to manage the trades this way. There are no mas on this chart so just shows the mobile stop approach. The blobs show possible entries and the lines are the stop being drawn on each qualifying candle.

I'll be using this approach this week but I wanted to share it to see what you guys thought and whether anyone has any ideas to improve it or whether anyone can see major pitfalls in this approach.

Happy trading!