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jwpdad's Journal

  • #1
  • First Post: Feb 21, 2013 1:06pm Feb 21, 2013 1:06pm
Hi, I have been a member of FF for quite a while but mostly lurking for a few years now. I thought I would start a journal here to help me be more disciplined and accountable in my trading.

My system is primarily Ichimoku breakout and reconfirmation based with additional considerations of price action and S/R. I have been tracking trades in series of 20 per the exercise in the well known book "Trading In The Zone" by Mark Douglas. Lately things have been going well, since using this system I have had 3 consecutive profitable series, although if I cleaned up a few mistakes it could have been better. I can't predict the future and have no idea if this will continue, but I suppose there's no time like the present to put this out there and see what happens.

I am going to keep things pretty simple here, will try to post live trades at first then may or may not continue in that mode or may just update each day or so. The explorer linked to this thread will keep a record of all the trades I have made in this fashion. Mainly I am trying to practice what I preach, at least in my head, to have patience both in waiting for the best entries and also, more importantly, to let the trades run to proper exit and not cut them off too early, however tempting it may be.

I have learned everything I am doing from Forex Factory, taking a little of this and a little of that from various parts of the forum to develop a method that fits my style and schedule. Hopefully these posts will help me to get over the hump to becoming a truly consistent trader.
  • #2
  • Feb 22, 2013 4:02am Feb 22, 2013 4:02am
Buy USDCAD @1.01898
  • #3
  • Feb 22, 2013 4:10am Feb 22, 2013 4:10am
SL 30 pips TP 100 pips
  • #4
  • Feb 22, 2013 7:45am Feb 22, 2013 7:45am
hi jwpdad, great result, may u brief simple about ur trading style, how u entry n exit, thankz ^^
  • #5
  • Feb 22, 2013 9:31am Feb 22, 2013 9:31am
.......h
to trade and code, keep both simple... no call to impress....h
  • #6
  • Feb 22, 2013 9:36am Feb 22, 2013 9:36am
Exit @1.02460 +56 pips net
  • #7
  • Feb 22, 2013 3:04pm Feb 22, 2013 3:04pm
Quoting jwpdad
Exit @1.02460 +56 pips net
OK, this is the first of a new series of 20, I will try to keep track in this fashion and see where it ends up. Nice to have a winner on the first one, but the big picture is what's important, there will be losing trades and losing days, no biggie.

I will try to post trades as I take them for a while, but my first priority is to make sure I get the trades entered at my broker accounts, so my posts here might be a little late sometimes.

I closed a little earlier than I might normally due to it being Friday, worked out in my favor today.
  • #8
  • Feb 22, 2013 3:08pm Feb 22, 2013 3:08pm
Quoting S.C.yeow83
hi jwpdad, great result, may u brief simple about ur trading style, how u entry n exit, thankz ^^
Thanks S.C.yeow83, since this is a journal thread and not in the systems section I am just going to keep things simple here. I am not going to get into all of the exact things I am doing, but what I will say is that there is a lot of good information on here and throughout the net about Ichimoku, I feel that whatever method a trader may be using, if they incorporate Ichimoku principles with it the results would probably improve. Just my opinion, but it helped me.

I typically take one or maybe 2 trades a day. For entries I look for breakouts or pullbacks and reconfirmations with the trend. I try to stay with the trade until one of three things happen: stop loss is hit (losing trade), take profit is hit (winning trade), or exit is suggested by consolidation or signs of reversal. I typically do not move stops to breakeven or do any other form of trailing stops or moving stops at certain levels. Sometimes that does cause me to lose on a trade that had been in profit, but it also gives the trade breathing room allowing it to possibly go to the full take profit which is usually about 3x the stop. In my testing I found that this is more profitable in the end, that's just me, many others prefer to move stops which is fine if that works for you.

I only manually exit if the trade is profitable or break even (maybe a 1 or 2 pip loss occasionally which I would consider breakeven). But if I might normally exit under certain conditions but the trade is negative I stick with it, hopefully another wave will move in my favor before closing the trade. Sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't, but overall having patience with trades will pay off in the end. I do allow myself some discretion on Fridays as I prefer not to hold the trade over the weekend, so today I did close earlier than normal, in this case it saved me 14 pips as I would have exited with +42, of course it is also possible that it would have moved in my favor again and cost me some pips, you never know.
  • #9
  • Feb 22, 2013 3:09pm Feb 22, 2013 3:09pm
Quoting hayseed
.......h
Thanks Hayseed, nice to see you stopping by, good luck in your trading.
  • #10
  • Feb 22, 2013 8:17pm Feb 22, 2013 8:17pm
Quoting jwpdad
Thanks S.C.yeow83, since this is a journal thread and not in the systems section I am just going to keep things simple here. I am not going to get into all of the exact things I am doing, but what I will say is that there is a lot of good information on here and throughout the net about Ichimoku, I feel that whatever method a trader may be using, if they incorporate Ichimoku principles with it the results would probably improve. Just my opinion, but it helped me.

I typically take one or maybe 2 trades a day. For entries I look for breakouts...
thank for feedback, are u the fulltime trader..^^
  • #11
  • Feb 22, 2013 10:15pm Feb 22, 2013 10:15pm
Quoting S.C.yeow83
thank for feedback, are u the fulltime trader..^^
I am not fulltime in that I do not earn a living from trading, I hope to do so someday. But I am self-employed and for the most part I am able to watch the markets throughout the day. I enter trades from 4:30 AM to 11:00 AM Eastern USA Time/New York Time. I live in the Eastern Time Zone in the US so this is what works for me, I was trying to start at 4 AM but that's just not realistic for me with things I have going in the evening. So I miss some of the London open, it allows things to settle down a bit then I can look for entires.
  • #12
  • Feb 22, 2013 10:48pm Feb 22, 2013 10:48pm
congratulation for the results . Hope the slope keep climbing
I will become the World's best at my own style
  • #13
  • Feb 22, 2013 11:21pm Feb 22, 2013 11:21pm
Quoting jwpdad
I am not fulltime in that I do not earn a living from trading, I hope to do so someday. But I am self-employed and for the most part I am able to watch the markets throughout the day. I enter trades from 4:30 AM to 11:00 AM Eastern USA Time/New York Time. I live in the Eastern Time Zone in the US so this is what works for me, I was trying to start at 4 AM but that's just not realistic for me with things I have going in the evening. So I miss some of the London open, it allows things to settle down a bit then I can look for entires.
Good luck bro, hope someday u will be sucessful fulltime trader..^^
  • #14
  • Feb 23, 2013 12:33am Feb 23, 2013 12:33am
Quoting Celente
congratulation for the results . Hope the slope keep climbing
Thanks, I see that you are doing great also. I read some of your journal thread and I would agree with the guy that said don't worry about the news. I trade technically generally without too much regard for the news, sometimes the news will help kickstart some volatility which is often a good thing, but of course sometimes the news sends things the wrong way. Most of the time though I think it doesn't have a huge impact. My backtesting was without regard to the news so I am doing the same with trading, if I am close to a profit target right before major news I might go ahead and close but otherwise I let it ride. The exception is that I do not trade at all on NFP Fridays.

This has been posted on other threads so it's not new, but I feel everything one needs to be successful in trading is contained in this song:

The Whipsaw Song by Ed Seykota

Among other things he does say to "stash that (news) flash right in the trash!" No disrespect intended to news traders out there, just that if we are trading technically we should be able to follow the method throughout the cycle of the trade.

Also in the song, when the drawdown comes, stick to the plan and pull the trigger. That is priceless!
  • #15
  • Feb 23, 2013 6:31am Feb 23, 2013 6:31am
Quoting jwpdad
Thanks, I see that you are doing great also. I read some of your journal thread and I would agree with the guy that said don't worry about the news. I trade technically generally without too much regard for the news, sometimes the news will help kickstart some volatility which is often a good thing, but of course sometimes the news sends things the wrong way. Most of the time though I think it doesn't have a huge impact. My backtesting was without regard to the news so I am doing the same with trading, if I am close to a profit target right...
thank you. For the news part, I just keep track of them, i dont trade them. i avoid trading during the NFP cause its very difficult to get the outcome of this event
I will become the World's best at my own style
  • #16
  • Feb 25, 2013 6:29am Feb 25, 2013 6:29am
Buy EURJPY @124.66, SL 35, TP 125
  • #17
  • Feb 25, 2013 9:32am Feb 25, 2013 9:32am
Quoting jwpdad
Buy EURJPY @124.66, SL 35, TP 125
SL Hit -37 Net
  • #18
  • Feb 25, 2013 9:45am Feb 25, 2013 9:45am
Sell GBPJPY @141.81, sl 45, tp 150
  • #19
  • Feb 25, 2013 1:21pm Feb 25, 2013 1:21pm
Quoting jwpdad
Sell GBPJPY @141.81, sl 45, tp 150
TP Hit, +166 Pips net
  • #20
  • Feb 25, 2013 1:43pm Feb 25, 2013 1:43pm
Quoting jwpdad
I typically do not move stops to breakeven or do any other form of trailing stops or moving stops at certain levels. Sometimes that does cause me to lose on a trade that had been in profit, but it also gives the trade breathing room allowing it to possibly go to the full take profit which is usually about 3x the stop. In my testing I found that this is more profitable in the end...
Today was a perfect example of this for me, turned out to be a very good day but could have gone the other way. The EJ trade was looking real good, then crashed to SL before I got an exit signal. Many would say, should have taken profit, I let a winner turn into a loser. In hindsight that is absolutely correct. But then the GJ trade, went nicely into profit, retraced significantly, then went on to the full TP. Had I been using trailing stops or locking in profits then that trade certainly would have been taken out. So I feel the overall +129 on the day is better than if I had moved the stops. I'm sure there will be some days in the future when this kind of thing goes against me, but in the big picture patience pays.

Many people seem to get hung up on wanting to never take any loss, never have a losing trade. And if a trade does lose, especially if it was in profit, then somehow it is a huge disaster. The fact is whatever happens on any single trade doesn't matter, if you have researched your method and found an edge, then applied your method and stuck to its discipline, all you can do is let the trade play out to its rightful end. There is no way to know for sure what will happen next.

Ed Seykota said that if you want to avoid whipsaw losses, stop trading. That is the only way to avoid them. If you're going to trade forex, then you have to be able to accept losses from time to time.
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