Extracted Thread (per thread starter's request)

That is a good CZ, you are starting to get more comfortable in spotting them by eye; this is a vital skill when following SSBO. IMO, your entry might be a little late and your positive results might have been luck as you might have caught the entry during "mid-breakout".

I wouldn't be TOO concerned about this at this point as you are still learning to SPOT the CZ. Once you feel comfortable spotting those CZ, my personal recommendation would be to move to your favorite pair, the one you feel most comfortable with and playing with the indie. I like GU for that purpose since it has been the most discussed in this thread. I also feel its behavior is relatively easy to learn from since it's often ranging around a certain area, as seen from the multiple Arc's of Revenge. From there, you should try to experience the "Entry" part of the strategy; playing with the buffers and Bars to close outside the CZ + Buffer, all the while aiming for a reasonable QTP.

Keep it up, your efforts will be rewarded.

Good post

And boom, sixth one in a row, third in forward testing mode; unfortunately, I missed out on both the CZ formation and entry due to lack of sleep . Going strictly for the QTP, this one offered a 1:1.82 R:R. Sure, the trade is still open per the indie, but as you will see in my analysis, I had 2 chance to get out of the trade profitably.

I’d like to take a moment and make a post-analysis of what I feel is going on with this pair, and with my trading approach in regards to it.

As has been discussed a few weeks ago, I had to work on my trade babysitting skills. Half an hour after entry, PA moved up to about 95 pips, tickling the second FIB retracement, which was a mere 10 pips away from QTP. A bit later, PA went to 103-104 pips (at which point I would have exited the trade).

From here, PA could have bounced back to the top of my CZ eating away all my profits (as I was writing this, PA did retrace back; I’m guessing there must have been some big news this morning EST time). Therefore, I have decided to follow Mer’s take on following retracements for T/P levels and trailing stops.

In order to keep this breakout a winning one rather than seeing it turn into a losing one, I would have moved TP to breakeven once 3 bars would have closed outside the first Fib retracement, I then would have moved my stop to the first Fib once 3 bars would have closed outside the second retracement. That would have secured me around 25-30 pips, if PA were to have bounced back in the other direction (Had I been too greedy and not gotten out at the 103-104 pip mark, I would have still locked in this 25-30 pips)

The next thing I wanted to discuss about my settings/approach is sustainability. I am fully aware that my settings are not “sustainable” and that the 105 swings are a “temporary” market condition. Thing is, with the 3-win streak I’ve just experienced, I could withstand about 4 losing trades in a row (which have not happened in the last 100-days). Suffice to say that such a losing streak would make me look back at my settings to gauge whether or not the market conditions have changed and that I should be revising my QTP in order to reflect more “current” market conditions. Combined with what I mentioned earlier, even if the indie were to show me 4 losing trades in a row, chances are I would have still caught a BE or a few pips off the first Fib retracement, given that price will still have moved out the CZ, just not the full 105.

Furthermore, I did notice that when CZs are much smaller (say in the 30-40 pips range) breakouts tend to be much less than the projected QTP of 105. Most likely, if market conditions were to dramatically change to a point that it would invalidate my current QTP, I’m pretty sure that the height of CZ would be much smaller than what I am currently seeing, which is in the 50-70 range.

I’m sorry if I’m making things too complicated for some or overboard, but to me, I need to understand what is going on. I’m not trying to control anything or make any projections; I’m simply trying to gauge what is happening. I know the motto; it’s so easy it’s hard. Nevertheless, I still need to have a plan of attack rather than blindly jumping in trades “because the indicator told me to”.

FYI

Picked up 30 pips on this nice break

FYI

i believe i have it now. great ind........ thanks fxhardand i have READ THE WHOLE SYSTEM

Jayf19,

I like your thought process. It's about having a plan, altering it as you observe things to fine tune it and then sticking with it over and over again. Nice post!

Few hours later; ended up as a loss per the indie.

Here we go again! Jay, we had this exact discussion just 10 days ago: post #5517 on Feb 19th, pg 368. And I had some follow-up posts as well, most notably post #5537 on pg 370. I don't know what you are doing, but stop calling it SSBO. Because you are NOT trading BREAKOUTS, or anything else which I have endorsed as far as I can tell.

Jay, check your PM's...

Hi all, I want to know if I could download the EA, as sometimes I can not keep track of and look at the screen escape me some good trades, to me past. I started moving the small box as recommended in the post 1 and I learned, I enjoyed good trades but would like the EA to when you can not be in front of the monitor, if I can not download it does not matter, it's okay, I just want inform me if possible. ¿? thanks, greetings.
Good trading.

Hi forexhard,
I have read the first 30 pages,
and will do exactly as you said.
Too easy [as you say]
I applaud you for your strategy,
[and vouch for you] for answering all those posts,
while not budging an inch from it
[I don't use MT4, so don't need the EA, but thanks anyway].
I would like to post my SSBO trades here from time to time.
After reading so many posts on your thread,
I have cured myself of ever wanting to start a thread of my own.
I'm sure you know what I mean.
Say no more!!!
Cheers,
U2

Back test on EU 15m:
Number of bars varied from 25 to 49 bars.
Pips per Break Out ranged from 51 to 126 pips.
[I left the long rectangles on the chart,
and would only use one in real trading]
Great strategy for trading the ranges!
Cheers,
and thanks again fxh

Ok, my last month of forward testing. What have I learned? SSBO works, I don't. What I mean is when I stick to the plan, I become a profitable trader. This week was very slow and yet I easily earned 130 pips today on 5 trades. I was also profitable for the month of Feb although I still have a habit of over trading and that got me in trouble one day a week where I lost most of my gains. This is the first week where I didn't have that one day of misery due to either over trading, poor money management or poor trade management. I felt that I finally was doing everything correctly. Now I don't know if that is because it was a slow week or I finally was disciplined enough to stick to the plan regardless of what was happening in the market.

I have been focusing on learning one thing at a time instead of trying to do everything in the thread. That has helped me a lot as I am adding components of SSBO as I gain confidence in what I am doing. One of the things that amazes me is how often the market will hit the QP and turn and run the other way on a recovery trade. Its like it has eyes.

Also last week was the first week in a month that I didn't have a new update to work through. I am not upset in the least, in fact I am grateful for all the work that FxH and Xux have devoted to my well being as a trader. Thank you.

My First post here. Tried multiple variations on the indicator and found that using low quality CZ's (4bar x 15 mins:25pips) with low QTP gives excellent results on the EUR-JPY pair.

Only thing is that usually, when I receive an alert, i would have missed out the actual entry price by between 5 to 15 pips. What I generally do is to put a buy/sell limit and set the QTP and SL accordingly, hoping for a retracement, though I believe that increases my risk.

mate go back to the start, read the thread and your answer will be found.

that looks like a better cz to me fexitrade, only I would have looked to enter earlier, like on the close of the first or second candle outside the cz box.

I understand that a lot of work and effort, I respect and read the thread where I left off and do the hard work, like you, see you soon, greetings and good tradig.
I apologize for my English, translators ....

yeah me to bro but thats not the ssbo method - 2 bars outside the buffer then go - mind you ive noticed that this rule is not strictly adhered to

i suppose its meant more for slow crawling breakouts but that sheer speculation.

Thats why its a discretionary system maybemaybe....

thanks for the feedback as always but for the time being im going to stick to 2 bars then go

maybe a rule of thumb ratio could be derived where if pa has moved x pips in this direction the 2 bar system can be overuled and 1 bar could be used instead