The significance is just my laziness, lol it was a part of the initial post on CIEN so i just copied and pasted it cause i put them together originally. It just takes alot of effort to do a print screen look for the chart you want off of six screens, then copy and paste put it into paint and chop it up, im putting a good hour a day into chopping these charts up, in this instance i was just too lazy to do it again, sorry if the daily confused you, but it is meaningless, other than the fact that, the daily was the reason i wanted to be long CIEN that day. Guess you could somewhat make the case CIEN was breaking higher out of a channel where it refused to go lower, (IE setting higher lows, but thats not the reason why, and its not a good example of a channel, but it rejected going lower than 23, then went higher on earnings and tried to clear out the highs, so its setting higher lows higher highs.
Well... that makes me feel good..... cause I stared at those things for awhile trying to figure out what was the significance of that second chart....far be it for me to be easily confused and all....
LOL, if its any consolation im pretty confused myself right now. But i love the Seinfeld references, nice to see i know another diehard fan, this journal is now the shit posting journal for seinfeld references as well, for everyone else watching, and throwing out ideas, any time you can think of a good seinfeld reference for what you just did please post, i love them, lol.
"The Jimmy leg" Where's my buddy RRY? https://elitetrader.com/et/threads/need-some-help-with-a-numb-leg-and-foot.310067/page-3
Here is another example of a "Stuff" move where i read myself out of a position and didnt make jack shit, cause i thought the stock got stuffed at a certain level, i want to provide as many examples of losers as i can of winners so hopefully we can analyze how better to read these moves. But in this case on AAPL it sets up a pretty good example, i was in too early on the short side, (Which was my first mistake) think i started at like 155.34 and really wasnt commited cause it just looked like a choppy day, so i was saying i was going to stop out over 155.50, so i stopped out on it at like 155.54, but then it stuffed at 155.60, which was where my resistance line was so i re-entered short. Im always on the verge of either stopping out or adding at a certain level, if the move gets stuffed im adding, or else im stopping out, but when i see the stuff move im adding, so it stuffs at 155.60, and after that i re-enter the position. But then on the bottom side it stuffed at 155.30, it tried breaking below it, then held above and kept grinding higher, right before it made the inevitable move downward. I ended up getting stopped out for a scratch right before it went down a buck in this instance, but im always looking for stocks to get stuffed at certain crucial levels where i know people will be chasing it, so im always on the verge of either stopping out or adding more, depending on the price action at the exact price level. But if you look at that stuff move at 155.30 at the lows, and see it grinding higher in real time, and you eliminate what happened after, that move looked like it was about to grind higher, and on a stock like AAPL im used to it grinding higher, so it made sense, if it got stuffed there and moved higher, so ive just been conditioned to get the fuck out of there when you see that, so i ditched the short scratched it on the day and was done with it, cause all my spidey senses led me to believe it was going higher when it got stuffed at 155.30 when it tried to break down. Anyways, thats what im seeing in real time, thats how the battle went that day, if anything my mistake was probably not shorting it when that big red bar finally cut through the bottom of the move at 155.30, but i had already fought such a big battle that day to try to stay in that stock so i didnt want anything to do with it at that point. If it stuffs im adding, if it looks like its going to blow through im out. Anyways this is another example of a loser hope it helps, going through these charts has helped me somewhat, but i still need to figure out how to hold longer.
Out of curiosity, how do you know price is going to continue in order to get more profit from holding longer? This is more of a question rather than a statement. Your chart for this last post doesn't show, but even if we look at a previous chart you posted in this thread where you got out of your short for a profit, and yet it still dropped further, what was the indication that holding will be beneficial? https://www.elitetrader.com/et/threads/the-super-terrific-happy-hour.309621/page-33#post-4471029 I have always wondered about when people get into a trade and keep holding it, and win big, is it because they knew it was going lower? Did they perhaps just get lucky? Did they maybe trail their stop above the highs or lows and hence keep riding it? Likewise, did anyone know on Friday how hard the NQ would fall? Sometimes, although not lately, it has 100 point days, but Friday was over 200 points in that drop, and although there were lots of explanations as to why, there is never anything just before, or even during the event to guess at how low it will go. Saying all this, I think, its impossible to know. If you're a swing trader, then perhaps you can have a level from an hourly chart to use, some sort of obvious support or resistance that you think will be tested once it gets going in that direction, but the swing trader never knows when it will hit. He simply places his OCO trades and waits for one to hit. A day trader doesn't have the luxury of waiting for this multi day move, so he often has to use targets that through his testing work statistically most of the time. Now certainly the short could set up again after you exit the first time, but this makes it a whole different trade. If we consider that you shorted NVDA around 153 and it got as low as 146, does it make sense to always wonder holding for a $7 profit? This on most days wont work, and as day traders, don't we have to do what works on most days rather than waiting for rare events? I can tell you that for ES, my chart going into each day is 15 points wide from high to low. Sometimes price shoots higher, and I have to scroll it down a bit, but rarely do I have to expand it so that I can see more than 15 points from the low to high because we simply don't get this range. So if I was hoping for 10+ point moves, I would be waiting a long time because on most days, the trade wouldn't make to a 10 point profit and more than likely either stop me out at BE or for a loss before a generous target is reached. Now if someone can of course outline what they use to foretell which days will have killer wide moves, then I'm all ears.
This is a good question, and a fair question, and a knowledgeable question, and its something i always battle with my mentor whose a swing trader over, because in his eyes, hes looking at dailies for entries, while im reading 2 minute charts for entries, based on the daily. The thing is im always looking for a chart first off based on the daily chart,then a setup on the 2 minute. Then im looking at all the indicators/variables, then im making a decision, is it headed higher or lower? "Which way is this stock going?" "Does it make sense for the daily to put in a reversal or a breakout here?" "Does it make sense based on a catalyst for the stock to move higher here or reverse?" "Does it make sense based on the only indicators i follow (Volume, Support/resistance, 50 day, 200 day, VWAP, and price action) for this stock to reverse or move higher here. Obviously Ive shown that more often than not, I am very good at picking spots where its going to go my direction for a little bit, I.E. good at picking S/R levels, and capitulation levels. But way more often than not, i feel like im good at picking that direction on a short term basis BECAUSE i know where its headed on a little bit longer term of basis, but im obsessesed with nailing stuff with size, thinking im going to hit my homerun where its effortless. I think also with this journal ive had a tendency to try to size into shit way more aggressively thinking i need to do over a thousand bucks a day in order for it to look impressive, where as really your goal as a trader shouldnt be as much about trying to hit bigger winners as it should be about hitting smaller losers, when compared to your winners. I just see the numbers coming from the guys im close with, and my numbers are a total joke, so i make the assumption "Everyone must be on that level" When in reality more than 90% arent even making money. The best answer i could give is i have no clue if its going to keep going, i think i said this already once when propositioned with a similar question about why i scale out on winners. The thing is im really good at finding good entries, but really bad at finding good exits, once you get into a stock it becomes much harder to just put emotion aside and read it properly. So i know there is some way i could do it better, it doesnt necessarily mean hold everything, it just means hold winners a little longer, and try not to get so panicky on shit when it turns into a winner. It really is a fucked up mindset, but i feel like im more in control when im holding on too a loser, cause i know my exit point, i know my levels, i know my assumption in the tape, so i feel fine when im holding on too a loser cause i feel like im in control and i know my spots to double up and size in, or else stop out for a small loss, but i feel like the second i get a winner im like a GRANDMA at the slots, just desperate to get out and pay myself because i feel like i just popped two nickels in and managed to cheat the system, lol. I dont know why this is the way i feel but it is, it might come from the fact that ive had so much shit blow up on me over so many years, and i just have to many battle scars to make it anymore. The bottom line is that The people who can read an exit as good as an entry before they have a position are the ones who become legendary traders. If you can look at a stock, when you already have a massive position, and instead of saying "Here is where it might screw me" and change the mindset too, "Would i go long/short here if i didnt have a position" And if the answer is go long, you buy/buy out, and if the answer is go short, you sell/short. That is where the best in the business crush us mere mortals they can look at it like that and take their 70% edge to enter the position, then the 70% edge when they exit the position, instead of just piecing out of it at all the points that look bad. Good trades tend to work right off the bat, bad trades make you fight, when i look at all my best trades i nail the top add a couple times, then slowly exit, but it seems like any time i get caught in the middle and it turns into a fight i struggle to hold on too the winner after i put up the fight. Hope that answers the question. Next week, just as an excercise, im going to cut my size down to a couple hundred shares, and pick spots, and just try using a "Time Stop" I think on most of my positions my ideal hold time is about an hour and a half, based on some numbers i have taken. I.E. in an hour and a half the stock will peak if its going too, otherwise if its a loser just stop out at the original intended point. Ill see what the profit per share is, i just dont want to do it right before/after the fed.
I'm confused about this here. Are you saying your guys in chat make shit loads more than you? Or that 90% of them aren't even making money? I find that at ET, lots of guys talk as if they are hot shit, but we really, we have no access to their trade stats. Its perhaps not even all that important to see how much money they are making, but what are their win rates, and average wins vs. average losses. Most of stats I've seen center around the 1:2 ratio. For every $2 made, $1 is lost. Heck, even if you look up the stats of Lescor, you will see that for a profit of roughly 800k per year net, he lost about 400k. (those are very rough numbers from the back of my head, but its all in his journals if anyone wants to look it up). Anyway, so before going further, I'm curious about what exactly it is that you are saying about the guys in chat, and what stats they have. Did you ever consider that there might not be much to read? Each time I read your journal, I can't help but think that you are working too hard. You say you don't know how to read an exit, but in my opinion, if the trade you're putting on is a swing trade hoping to capture many dollars, then there is no exit. If it goes far enough into profit, of course moving a stop to BE makes sense, but then, it seems like it should either hit target or be stopped out. I mean if you really want to capture bigger moves, you cannot be analyzing each twist and turn along the way. The thing though is that you want to, which means you will never be a swing trader. (nothing wrong with that of course). Its obvious that after your entry, price will either reach some far off target eventually, or it will come right back to your entry and stop you out. But if you keep analyzing the route it takes to get there, you're getting in its way. Why wait till next week? Analyze all the trades you have posted in this journal and see what the outcome would be. See where the price is an hour or 90 minutes after entry, and figure out if holding all trades like this makes you more profitable. You will of course have some bigger wins, like those trades you showed today, but then you will also have a smaller win rate, with some of the trades where you took an early profit turning right around and coming back to entry for a BE trade, or even perhaps hitting the stop. My guess is that you will see its better to take early profits and just look for the next trade, especially since you say that you are very good at finding precise entries. I base everything I say on the fact that sometimes, looking for more info contained within the price action is a case of diminishing returns. Some trades will be home runs no matter how ugly it looks along the way and some won't. Sometimes all you can do is get into the trade, throw caution to the wind, and let it either get there or stop you out. If you're really good at seeing every twist and turn, then you almost have to be trading every twist and turn, which gets you away from holding for an hour in my opinion.
Im just going to compare this paragraph by paragraph since youve thrown alot out here. First off, yeah, they make more then me, i understand the stats, i understand account sizes, i understand everything, these guys just seem to be better at nailing a good market, and being able to make a huge chunk in one day, being able to nail a good market, something im incapable of. Also (You shouldnt say much about lescor unless you know him, he is a pretty legendary trader, one of the best people you could ever meet, and your numbers on him are not accurate.) Lescor is one of the best human beings you will ever meet on planet earth, a genuinely good person, the planet doesnt present you with many guys like that who genuinely just want to help. 2.) I think your right thats why im going to try it next week, the market doesnt give a shit about your two minute stop out, if you wanna trade dailies, trade dailies..... dont try to force 2 minute charts with size. 3.) I guess we will figure out if its better or worse next week, time will tell. Last but not least im really curious TT, think i know who you are but thanks for all the valuable advice, once again, i appreciate it.