Multi-Lot Multi-Timeframe Position trading

I have to thank you again Grav. Closing some trades during the week on large daily candles locked in 30% rise for my account for September and gave it the funds needed to help with the 50% draw down on the 2 Oct when the market reversed in nearly all my trades. I then re entered on 3 Oct and that day finished with large candles in a lot of the daily charts so again I closed most of my positions for 800 pips and am currently back to 17% profit of that original 30%.

Yes this is it and thanks for the reply. You may find there is actually a lot of similarities afterall. Let me respond to each of your points in detail as I am really enjoying this discussion to date.

I do not use the indicators on my charts as my sign of when to enter and exit. I use them to confirm my decisions when I see price action suggest my timing of these things. I too have not had much luck with indis but over the years of testing I have found some more useful than others. Especially those where you can get a "peek" into current market sentiment such as what I use my 2 x stochs for. We know when the signal for stoch gets into overbought or oversold territory it will either immediately reverse out again or more importantly for me, it will signal a time of great support for the current action and price can go anywhere and with any amount of volume. My testing has found that should it stay in those areas for a few candles on the daily charts, it means the market supports the current trend is happy for it to remain overbought or oversold for a while. So I take it as a sign price will continue and rather strongly for a few more candles.

I picked the Guppy Group of Moving Averages a while ago as quick representation of a nice neat and solid trend. Yes I can see price moving up and guess there is a trend happening but with so many robots in the market now I am convinced there are a lot more short term trends than longer term than there ever has been and so I like to make sure the trend is established (all MAs in same direction and fanning out nice and consistently) and then a retrace that bounces off one of those MAs. This then tells me the trend is established and supported. But there is still a high percentage that fail to make a new high or make a single new high and crash on the 2nd retrace. Or there is no retrace at all and therefore it crashes my entry rules. So the 2 x stochs confirm the trend should stay in place after that 1st retrace and move towards a new high. If both my stochs are up into overbought I know its time to jump on. I dont wait for retrace because on a daily chart that could be weeks away such as that most recent trend on UJ that began 6 weeks ago. To enter I try for a good price. I drill down to the 2H charts and look for red candles. If a 2H candle closes red, AND the 2 stochs are in overbought or the black stoch is overbought or the 2 stochs are above 50% and pointing upwards I will enter the trade. I go back to the daily chart and use the most recent 2 candle low as the stop and this then allows me to calculate my lot size so only 2% of my account is at risk. This entry usually results in profit within the day as I am essentially entering slow the bottom of a wave on the 2H chart during a upward move on the daily chart. Seems to work for me so far.

My 1st position is a test also as it risks only 2%. If it goes well I use the same entry rules on my 2H chart to add. "Winners add to winning trades". Until recently I was waiting for my stop to go to BE before taking a 2nd position. But often in moderate sized trends you need a 3rd position before you are actually in profit overall. So after reading this thread a few times, yesterday when I re entered after some serious reversals, I added positions at every +50p and for 5% risk in each. So this morning when I close most of them due to large candles as you suggested I could lock in 1%, 0.5%, 0.75% and so on. They all add up nicely

As mentioned I now look to exit at end of day if that daily candle is massive in my direction. If I have time I will drop to the 2H charts and wait for signals of reversal such as red candles and black stock dropping or even dropping to below the overbought line. I used wait for that on daily charts and would sometimes lose 100p doing so. Drilling down I am effectively getting a jump start on what could be the retrace reversal in a few days' worth of price action but right at the beginning. I close all trades for that pair in profit and may a small trade for loss if I think the reversal may grow. Otherwise I keep the losing trade open for the long haul. Then the next day I look for re entry just like the original entry rules above.

By the way. I've only been trading live since mid September. Traded 2+ years prior on the same single demo account. So I am still new and learning and could be totally wrong on all my understandings so far

Glad to hear you were able to bounce right back from that dip in the USD MarshalMax. I've traded the Guppy and also several combinations of stoch. On one of my charts somewhere I still have a multiple stoch, where stochs of several different periods and colors are plotted in the same indicator window. It looks much like a Guppy in the indicator window. You can drag as many stochs as you want with whatever settings you like into the same indicator window.

The problem I've had with such things is if the trade goes bad, I'm not sure if I read the indicators wrong, or I need to make a change in my system, or change indicators, or it was just random motion of price. So, these days I trade a very simple minded system that I understand completely and I know works well over time. When things go badly, and they will sometimes with any system, this one is so simple I can either quickly see what went wrong, or chalk it up to the random motion of the markets that can't be predicted or traded for profit. That keeps my confidence level high in both my judgment and my system.

In the end, no two traders are alike and no two will trade just the same. That's what makes markets. Have a good weekend!

G

Thanks mate. Lets see what we can do with these crazy market makers next week.

These days, I'm usually swing trading. For the most part, I enter trades early in the week like Monday and Tuesday, hold them until I make 3 to 5% and sell them before the weekend. On some occasions I enter on Tuesday and my week is done by Wed. Often I'm done by Thursday. I don't mind holding just a little longer if I need to in order to make my numbers, and this week I held to Friday to make them, but I really like getting a new start every week. It sort of resets my trading so I don't get hung up in non-productive or consolidating trades for weeks at a time like most position traders would. If conditions require it though, I will hold trades over the weekend, but that's rare recently.

As long as I can make my numbers, and they are very aggressive by industry standards, I like that I can trade the way that suits me best. To get an idea of how aggressive I am, most of the worlds top money managers would be thrilled with making 30% return this year. The vast majority of them wont be able to do that. These are people who make millions each year managing other peoples money. My minimum range is 3% per week, and I either have hit it every week, or made up for the miss the following week. Run a compound interest calculator for 52 periods at 3% per period compounded, and you can see how aggressive my trading is. Run that same calculation at 5% and you can see my little secret (Shhhhhh). This stuff is very powerful. I call multi-lot trading "account dynamite". It can be a very useful tool to do great things, or it can blow up your account in in a wink.

I've spent a lot of time here showing how I handle winning trades here. Anyone who has read all this and looked over my charts should have a very good idea of what I'm doing. Next week I'll show how I handle losing and break even trades to complete the picture. Fasten your seatbelts, I expect it to be a wild ride.

G

Good stuff. I have done some swing trades in and out within the week but mostly positions trades of weeks.

Yesterday was a picture perfect Chamber of Commerce day here in Houston Texas, Energy Capital of the World. Today is also just beautiful. Going out to enjoy this great weather some more. Later, when I come back, I'll start scans. I'll try to post all trades this week, winners and losers. DON'T take my trades live. These are just for demonstration purposes. If you want to follow along, do it in demo. At the end of the week, our goal is to make our numbers, +144 to 240 pips. It's aggressive, so hold on to your hat, it's going be a wild ride. Gone out for a little last R&R now before the Asian market opens.

STEP 1: BUILDING A BASKET

Market is open, scanning for entries. Sometimes I'll come up with no possible entries. That's ok. I wait for the market to come to me. Today there are several.

I come up with 6 possible entries, all of which look pretty good. UCad, UJ, UChf and GN long, EU and AU short. 5 of the trades are strong dollar trades. The GN long is based on the recent weakness of the NZD. All 6 satisfy my trending requirements.

This is a rather large basket and I'd like to eliminate a couple as soon as possible, but there is no way to know at this point which will be good entries and which will be bad. It's even possible that all of these will turn out bad and the trade that makes my pips for the week may not even be on my watch list at the moment but will show up Monday or Tuesday. In the end, I will only need 1 to 3 good entries this week to make my numbers, but I'll take all 6 and eliminate the weak ones going forward.

All 6 trades taken with an 82 pip stop. It's a rather tight stop, but it's early in the week and there is no need to take too much risk at this point. The purpose of this stop is not to exit a weak trade. I'll do that manually after I decide which is weak. The purpose of the stop is to save my account from disaster should some random piece of news throw the market into a massive reversal. I've been in the market many times when that happened and too wide a stop or no stop at all is not pretty. If I intend to exit weak trades when they fall 30 to 50 pips behind, an 82 pip stop should do fine for the moment. Next scan will be in the middle of the London session, right at the open of NY.

STEP 2: PULLING THE WEEDS

I said in an earlier post that I thought I could identify a bad trade before it went more than 30 pips against me. That's pretty optimistic, but let's see how well I can do. The goal is to eliminate weak trades as soon as possible. I'll mainly use price action to do this. I'll glance at indicators, but indicators wont give me my money back if they are wrong. Preservation of capital is my goal at this point. So if a trade looks weak and goes around 30 pips against me I'll dump it. I might dump all 6 before the night is through and be trading a whole new basket by Tuesday. It's all up to the market. For now, all I can do is wait...


GN long is dumped at -34 pips. Of course, the instant I dumped it price turned around and headed back up. That's ok, I can always re-enter it later.

Since my remaining trades are all Strong USD trades, I'm watching the US Dollar Index chart on FX Street here: http://www.fxstreet.com/rates-charts/usdollar-index/

Hi Graviton,

Just wanted to say hello. I have read the thread, and it looks like just what I have been looking for. Will be following with great interest.

Best, AG

Welcome AlbinaGrande. Glad to have you aboard. Feel free to post questions or comments.

STEP 2 cont: Pulling the weeds

Five trades based on strong dollar is a bit much. I'll delete the weakest and save my capital for something acting better later. Dumping the weakest, AU short at -25.

Hi G.

Seems like EU and UJ are stalling. UJ has some serious overhead Resistance just short of 1.1000.

I am carrying over from last week a Short on EU, currently up 114 pips with a SL back at 1.2605. I am a little reluctant to add another position without more of a PullBack.

Best, AG

Yes, a typhoon is crossing over Japan and Australia market is closed for a holiday. Expect thin and erratic trading until London opens. Resting while the market straightens out.

G

YO! GRAV!
Nice to see you working a thread, always like your views. Must be bored, eh? It seems that wily USD not showing the love yet... maybe as the week goes on. I do tend to agree about strength there.

"Next week I'll show how I handle losing and break even trades to complete the picture. Fasten your seatbelts, I expect it to be a wild ride."

It may just what you need for your teaching plan, hmmm.

Needy

Entries should be coming soon but so far have failed to materialize today on my 2H charts. I was expecting GU, UJ and EU at least but good move earlier today now reversed in all and no good confirmations yet. Still watching and waiting.

Daily chart below shows uptrend still good so looking to the 2H charts for entry

2nd chart below shows 2H action and red vertical line is where the stochs began moving out from oversold to long price action. As you can see the 2 stochs did not get above 50% line and price action then reversed so no confirmation for long. I need the 2 stochs to close a 2H candle above the 50% line and be a long candle to enter.

EUR/USD looking like a likely candidate for a short a little later.

Hey Needy! Great to see you here. Yes, the USD collapsed early this week with profit taking. I'm down a little for the week. This is the reason to wait until the markets have had a turn at the price before taking trades. It's a good rule. Couldn't find any new trades yesterday, but patience is key, so I'm just now scanning for some more today.

Hope you are doing well. Welcome to the thread.

G

Hey MarshalMax. Yes, yesterday didn't give any entries. Reversals in the USD cost me a few pips. I was a little impatient to go long USD so early in the week and the market punishes impatience harshly. Entering ACad long now as it satisfies my requirements. Still performing my morning scan. One good trade will bring me back to even for the week, so just looking for it. Hang in there!

G

hello Graviton, can i just ask. say if im trading on a 30M Timeframe, how long can i hold on this particular entry i made?

and also you always mention 3% or 5% Profit. do you mean 5% of your capital?




Keith L