Using Balance and Unbalance to your advantage

Why can't he reply to his own thread? Other commercial members have their own threads in the commercial section, and of course they can reply to them. Is it because this thread was created outside of the commercial section? And if so, will he start a new thread to continue his thoughts? Just curious

Just out of curiosity I tried to respond to this as a quote...It appears the system will allow that...odd as my status has changed to "commercial member"...I cannot explain this.

However, I do not wish to cause problems here at FF and will comply with the rules they have clearly designated. I will begin posting on the commercial area as they have advised I must do. I am (supposedly) NOT permitted to comment on any forums (or start any forums) outside the commercial area. WHAT EVER!

I greatly appreciate those who have been following my posts and thank you for all those who have supported my threads. You may continue to follow my posts as long as you are not "disturbed" or "distracted" by the fact that I also offer classes to those who wish to learn in detail HOW to better see order flow and the price action it produces.

Apparently I am able to post here, however temporary that may be...so I will give this one last post...

Again to catch you all up, my status here at FF as been changed to "commercial member", which essentially means that I have or operate a trading related business for profit--duh!!

It also implies that anything I say can be suspect because I now have a proprietary motive to attract new customers, and therefore may say things that can be taken only in that light...commerce and NOT necessarily good trading. It as always been my assumption that we all here take anything we read with a "grain of salt", because we suspect the writing party may have an ulterior motive. Now, as a "commercial member" that motive has been extended to me because I also offer classes to those who wish to know more. I wish to help...that's all, and I believe I am truly passionate about assisting others, because when I do, I also learn.

As stated earlier I do not wish to cause problems and will confine myself to the commercial area as requested. It is...what it is. As such I am unable to respond to private messages, BUT in the commercial section I AM able to leave my email...so I will do that.

I wish you all lots of luck in your trading endeavors, and hope you will continue to support any new threads I start with same degree of enthusiasm I have seen. I have not and will not ask you for money to render an opinion which is all I have ever stated in any thread...opinion. I also thank FF for at least allowing me to post this final message so that you all do not think I "went dark" or just abandoned this thread. Good luck to all...see you soon.

Ah...I get it...this entire thread has been moved the the "commercial content" area of FF...I finally get it...I may be slow, but not completely stupid.

In that case I guess we can continue here on this thread as before.

THANK YOU moderator...I didn't think of that solution...great idea.

OK, lets try to recap on what has happened over the past week,

EUR/USD:
You may remember I was long just before NFP, having entered at multiple points where I anticipated a change in the order flow. The result was a stop out for a loss of approximately, 100 pips. However I have entered another long position which triggered during the NFP announcement. Stop is as you see here. Again the motive for this long was that I anticipate the order flow to remain "bid" after stopping out most of the longer term shorts two weeks ago. A look at the intraday chart shows the order flow is balanced and may even be "stuck" between a shorter term balance area in the 1.12-1.13 area. So we'll have to wait and see about that.


EUR/JPY: I think last I was able to post on this was that I had placed pending orders to sell. One of those orders triggered and price has moved my direction enough to move the stop to break even or slightly better. Over the past two days price has moved well in my direction and is currently positive 219 pips. I have placed another pending order for a retest of a balance zone best seen on the weekly chart. You can also see I drew a couple of trend lines on the weekly chart. For those of you who are "pattern" traders, and entered at the "breakout" of the pattern, you may or may not be getting dragged backward and can easily see that the first entry, would've had you positive instead of wondering if you made the right decision.


Gold: This market seems to have stalled a bit right at a balance area best seen on the daily chart. This is where the "true" test will come in to see if the sellers have enough volume to push price down through this area, and then down into the next balance area. I have moved my stop down to lock in a small profit and am waiting to see which side, buyers or sellers, have the volume to effect price the most.


USD/JPY: Price has resumed its downward trek and allowed my only one fill. That position is still at risk, but the risk has been reduced by 2/3. While Friday's price action did cause the price to close near the low of the week, today has seen the intraday charts balancing the order flow. This may simply be because the US market is closed today (Labor day). For now, this trade will be left as is

Finally, Kiwi:
I don't believe I was updating this trade before the change in my status. To get the best perspective on this trade you should look at the weekly chart shown here. You will see a balance area, where buyers and sellers kept each other in check for 5 weeks. Then sellers took over in a big way, stopping out all the longs. Price moved back up to retest the balance area, and found more selling, including me. The current position is currently 275 pips positive with 125 pips locked in. I am watching this closely to see if the intraday charts start to balance, and will adjust the stop as needed when I see that occur.


That's it for now...enjoy the rest of your day.

Just a quick update here on EUR/JPY:

Price moved higher and filled my pending order while I was sleeping. What you see here now is the aggregate of two orders. I have kept the stop where it is for now making the position at risk approximately 90 pips.

Update on EUR/USD:

The intraday order flow is sloooowly grinding higher. You can see on the 8 hr chart that a balance area formed, then buyers stepped in overnight, and retested the top of the balance area. Now new buyers are stepping in, but it is NOT the "whoosh" I was looking for. The lack of a more vigorous response, leads me to believe that the buyers aren't really convinced yet, as there may more more sellers above the current market waiting to transact.

I have therefore moved my stop in closer reducing the risk in this trade to just under 30 pips. Again...wait...wait...wait...

....and the market will move aggressively when sellers or buyers withdrawal from the market place (a withdrawal of liquidity). Nice thread gspajon

Hey Thanks Porkpie...its been awhile since we spoke, hope all is going well for you.

Hello all...a quick update on kiwi trade

It is looking close to stopping out...profitable but not as much as I was hoping for...such is life.

Good morning all, just beginning the day here in the US.

Here is a quick update (no screen shots today) of my positions:
NZD/USD: stopped out with 125 pips
USD/JPY: stopped out at -54 pips
Gold: still hanging in there with 419 pips currently and 130 pips locked on stop
EUR/JPY: dancing between positive and negative on this position...after second add in. Stop still in place at a risk of 135 pips
EUR/USD: currently positive with just 25 pips after being higher at 155 pips positive. The balancing on this pair is confusing to say the least and difficult to know what to do. The balancing has extended all the way out to the monthly chart. So, like the GBP/USD I may let this one sit for awhile before looking to trade it further. For now the stop is as last placed with a risk of just under 30 pips.

Lots for me to do today, and I got a late start...more later. Please don't be shy, I welcome comments or questions.

" "
Hello gspajon.....been a looker....lol...of the thread....thanks for the other time....anyway...i think you have a sound method...however i noticed something.....you let the market get a chunk of your pips back...maybe thats what i feel and might not be necessarily true...just my thought...i feel if you work on that aspect..or maybe you have....that the method would be better....

Hello Carbonado,

Your observation is accurate. All I can say is if for some reason I "knew" that the market was done running my way I would take the trade off at that very pip. However, I don't know when that point is. Yes, I do allow price to move against my position, because my goal on these trades is to allow them to run as far as they can. To do that I must allow the position to "breath" with the market flow. This means that at times price will turn against the position, but if the trend holds true, price will turn again and move in your direction.

Of course there is a limit to how much I will allow that to happen, and I normally manage the trade on a daily or weekly chart. Clearly had I moved the stop in tighter, I would gain more pips, however, If I managed the trade on a smaller time frame it would never have made it that far. So as with all things in trading you must find a balance.

When trading FX I trade larger time frames and try to allow a trade to accumulate as much as 500-1,000 pips. I trail stops along the way and am happy if the trade is a winner...no matter how small. When I am day trading on the futures market, I do set limits (1% per day) to my trade to make my pips and then go on about my day.

Therefore, for anyone there must be a plan with defined trading parameters before the trade is placed. All the trades you see here are meant to go as long as the market will allow...does that leave pips on the table? Yes it does, but I am satisfied with how things work out (usually) unless I manage the trade badly.

Update on EUR/USD:

I am trying to be as patient as possible with this trade. Order flow is balancing and that balance is seen now on all the charts I look at...intraday all the way out to the monthly. Today's price action has seen some buying come back in but still not enough to push prices significantly higher. The position is currently 94 pips positive and I have now moved the stop to just above break even to prevent losses. My theory is that this current balancing act is signaling a change in the order flow to a buyers market. While I cannot know that is happening until it actually does, all the signs are there...so with a risk free trade now, I'll just have to keep waiting.

Update on Gold:

this chart shows the very reason why I am willing to let my trades play out as to how the market will flow. This position is currently 533 pips positive and it appears there may be more left. However it has taken 4 days to see if price would push down through the latest balance area. Clearly sellers appear to have more volume in the market at this point...more importantly, anyone who was long in this market was probably stopped out today, driving my profit higher into the green.

I have left the stop where it is for now, and will move it down as I see the next round of buyers fail.

Hello gspajon,

Are you gonna upload a T.E demo/live in the near future ?
Thanks.

Forgive my ignorance. ..T. E. demo/live? Not understanding what that is.

TE = Trade Explorer. It's a feature on FF that allows you to show the details and performance of your trades. Some people have them, some don't.

Ah OK...once again thank you NorthTrader...perhaps I should ask for a FF dictionary so I know all these short cut terms.

Honestly, I'm not really into to the trade explorer thing for several reasons, the most important to me is that I have no desire to make my account public. Even if it is "protected" here...I'm afraid I don't trust it. If hackers can get to Sony's stuff, I don't think it would be too big a leap to get to the log in info here on FF...

Aside from that, I would rather not distract from the point of this thread. The point here is NOT to show what a great trader I am, (I am not), nor is it for bragging rights to attract attention from some heretofore unknown hedge fund recruiter. I make mistakes just like everyone else.

My point here on this thread is to show that once one learns HOW to read the order flow present in each and every candle, that information/Skill is extremely valuable to YOU as a trader, and gives you an edge over the guy on the other side of your trade. This not a "method" or "system" or what ever name you want to put to it...it is simple straight forward..."play the ball where it lies" trading. Once you learn how to "read" or "see" the order flow, you can adjust how you act to obtain any objective you wish...trend follow, swing trade, scalp...it is all up to you.

I am simply demonstrating the accuracy and advantage you get once you learn to see it. My success or failure overall, has nothing to do with it. My "stats" are relevant only to me in my particular objectives. I know people who use this to manage long term positions, and day traders that are scalping 5 pips at a time. It doesn't really matter, it is the same market and the same order flow.

I hope that answers your question metta87. Sorry for the ignorance. Happy to have you follow along and hopefully you will see the value here. Please don't hesitate to comment (constructively please) or ask questions or participate in any manner you like.

OK...last post then I'm done for the evening.

Follow up on Kiwi:

Here you can see that here I was stopped out and then the market turned and went right back where it came from...In my world I call this the "FU" stop. It is almost like a "crazy ivan" used in submarine lingo.

The price comes up just enough to take your stop as if to say, "No more money for you", then goes your way after you're out. I HATE this...but it happens to me alot...often this tells me I am trailing my stop too close or too soon...