MidKnight

Probed the near-term R once again before a large sell-off. Immediate trend remains intact. Has dropped deeply into the support area putting me in a position where I am not very sure if it will hold or not. I'm not game enough to do any serious longs in this support area and also not game enough to do any serious shorting unless we break this low from 3 days ago. In a bit of no mans land for me. Will look for obvious scalps predominantly or possibly some light shorts testing the low before yesterdays spike high in the 1.5660 area.

Two sides to every coin - well presented IMHO!

Strong move into the near term R. Watching this area closely to see if the near-term R will hold. If it does not, then the immediate trend will shift to up but I feel there may be solid R above as the immediate trend resets the strong move down since the middle of last week. I'm still happy to short below this spike high on clear signs of R being respected. I will scale out in 1/4ths should that happen. Above this spike high there will only be longs until we get up to the next area of R. I don't really have a good area to get long unless it goes back down some to test some S, so any longs that do happen are likely to be played as all in/out on deeper complex pullbacks should todays late day momentum continue.

Wooops, my bad Thales. Anyway, I have an alibi as I was counting sheep, just ask 'baaa baa'! Major and immediate trends for me remain down. The lower edge of the near-term R offered nice rejection showing to me that sellers are still very eager, but it dropped back down into the developing S zone (deeply though). Plan remains the same as yesterday pretty much. Shorts in the first zone but I want it above PDH unless it is extremely obvious. If get above PDH can be more aggressive with entries and scale-out in 1/4ths. Longs need to be on a capitulative move preferrably into the 1.54/52 area, should that happen I'll scale out in 1/3rds. Anything else needs to be very obvious and is all in/out style. Focusing on the edges of this range, absolutely nothing in the middle!

Hi Cory, Just a thought man, but if you are feeling that you are overtrading, drop some of those currencies and only trade 1 or 2. Currencies are quite incestuous IMHO. Since my initial exploration in this thread back in NOV, I have taken to only trading a single currency and it has been for the best, I feel. If you will recall, this was a hot topic of discussion on the RT thread. Even though it can be a bit boring at times. Despite that though, I get a better feel when just focusing on a single market. I know Brownie would disagree, but he has a lot more experience than I do, so it would take me some time to get to his abilities... :2cents: :bag of salt: With kind regards, MK

Hiya Cory, My apologies for my misunderstanding and your reply clears things up for me - thanks! Many warm returns, MK

I agree with sir Thales there bigtime. Treat the demo trading seriously. My only other comment, and take it for what its worth.....is that you seem overly focused on making lots of money right now rather than working on skills. I mean obviously you are working on skills, but in public, its mostly just about money or 'infinite yield'. This impatience is understandable since that is probably what attracts everyone to trading and it is usually the main focus of new traders. From my own experience this was a self-defeating mindset. I'm not suggesting aiming for high financial goals isn't good, but in the end financial results are the product of the skills. Focus on the skills and the money will come. I feel this is where ones documentation and attention should lie rather than with pnl. But you don't see many public journals on this stuff because it exposes themselves and is highly personal. But on the other hand, posting journal with pnl can be ego boosting. Absolutely zero disrespect intended Cory, I'm just jaw flapping and tossing 2 cents in the jar.... :2cents: Warm regards, MK

Heavy down day on Friday as breaking down from the previously strong weekly support at 1.5700 area. There was a good reaction from the initial probe, but once NFP came out it hammered that pretty hard. Their are two areas I will be happy to short as marked on the 60m chart. Shorts will be more aggressive to enter in these zones and targets will be larger scaling out in 1/4ths. Any longs will just be scalps unless we get a clear capitulative drop. If that happens I will scale out in 1/3rds. Not much to do but sell rallies and sell often.....

GL on the journey Cory. You mentioned this was going to be posting a game plan, but it looks more like a goal. Is this log intended strictly as your personal pnl thread in striving for the goal listed or is this more like a journal with details about trades, what one did right, what one did wrong, how can they do better etc.... With kind regards, MK

Thanks for the reply Thales. My query was really in relation to point #2 above. I am trying to enter trade ideas from the 60m or 240m charts as I generally can get a pretty good read on where opportunity will be, so it comes down to an order execution and management exercise after that. Trying to use a smaller degree to lower my risk and manage the initial trade. Figuring out how to manage the trade is proving to be 90% of the effort With kind regards, MK

No rush sir :yes sir: , I'm not trying to be demanding, just a reminder if at some point we could talk about this. With kind regards, MK PS: I hope whatever the family crisis was, all is good now!

Both major and immediate trends are down so any shorts are going to scale-out in 1/4ths. I'd consider it a gift it the market rallied back up to the market R zone, but the market rarely gives me a gift. I'll also be alert for shorts testing the 1.5820/40 area. No significant longs until we probe below that major weekly low of 1.5707. Any longs down there will be scaled out in halves. Anything else outside of those zones must be very obvious and is treated as all in/out with conservative targets.

I just want to echo what EJ posted above. You can of course use a DOM with a general purpose broker like IB to trade FOREX. I do this all the time using zerolinetrader. Makes it a ton easier!

Good reaction just slightly ahead of the R zone. I'll be selling the R zone again if we go back up there. Shorts are entered aggressive and scaled out less aggressively with 1/4ths. Will buy support level less aggressively and scale out in halves, preferably on a probe below 1.5833. Just looking at the weekly chart, this area has been very significant support for a long time, should it finally truly break the move down could be significant - I'm keeping that in mind...Anything obvious outside of the zones is scalp style all in/out.

Not much has changed since yesterday. The 'immediate' minor R is being challenged and I'll be looking for shorts within there. Should go higher, there is the previously mentioned obvious R at the lower range covering the majority of last weeks entire trading. I'll be more aggressive on shorts and scale them out less aggressively in 1/4ths playing for when the trend will finally re-assert itself. Unless something is brutally obvious, I won't do any long unless we go below Monday's trade, but preferably below 1.5833 on a probe. I'll scale out longs in 1/2s. Anything else is consider scalps with all in/out mentality.

That sorta came outta nowhere, thank goodness for the SL. Aussie just had a rate decision at that point and shocked with no raise. Market expected 25bp.

The markets are sorta idle at the moment so I wonder if I can toss a question at you? In talking about trading off various degrees, I think I have seen you mention that it is a mistake to enter off the smaller degree and manage it from the smaller degree (or was it manage from the larger degree?) with the intent of trading for the larger degree. You said something like most do that way and it is a mistake. I wonder if you could elaborate on that thinking? Cheers, MK

Hi Thales, Thanks for posting the reply about the leverage of the OIRCL experiment. I now better understand what you are up to. I hope my query wasn't perceived as interrogating or chastising, it was mere curiosity. With kind regards, MK

Good first reaction from S yday. Unless it is totally obvious, I won't be buying there unless it makes a new low, preferably below 1.5833. I'm keen to look for shorts in the immediate R and of course in the lower edge of that main R zone we just exited from last week. Shorts in the zones are scaled out less aggressively in 1/4ths, longs more aggressive in 1/2s, anything else is scalps (20-40'ish pips) with all in, all out.

I know a guy that trades a LOT of options stuff and a lot of his trades have this sort of a look to them. He will take a large theta positive option position usually in the form of short straddle or exotic no touch barrier. I've mainly see him do these with exotics so I'll discuss that going forward. The barrier is usually set to expire in something relatively short, like up to 2 weeks. He will then use the spot market to trade into his barrier, increasing size as it gets closer to hit. He never tells the details of why he is entering or exiting the hedges, but he usually gets very sizeable payouts from the hedge and the barrier expiration. I tried this type of thing about 3 years ago for a couple months with mild success. I did struggle with working my hedges in a consistent manner because it was against my bias for the no touch barrier. This type of trading probably needs maturity than I had at the time. Maybe a revisit is due soon! Is this the sort of thing you are referring to when you talk about 'short and long terms'? If not, I my apologies for the OT post.... With kind regards, MK

I disagree with that chaps, but that is OK. Trading is a probabilities game and as such the #1 job is managing risk. 'lucky' or 'unlucky' (half empty or half full), however you want to view it, is taken out of the equation if risk is managed with a proven method.

I asked this and stated the same thing about luck a couple of days back was never replied to. Breaking from my 'demanding' nature I decided to leave it alone, but since you brought it back up...... :helloooo: With kind regards, MK

Great thread here guys. Something I have recently started experimenting with is the idea of campaigning my with the trend trades. I don't define trend as conventionally as most do, and I'm also not suggesting that one only trades with the trend as I prefer to keep my mind open to opportunity. Maybe it is best described with an example. Lets say the definition of trend is saying UP. All the profits from long trades go into a campaign pool of which each trade gets sized with the base risk (ie. say 1%) and then whatever amount of the campaign pool one chooses, is added to this base risk. ie. base risk (1%) + campaign risk (50% of campaign pool) I have loose guidelines on when to 'reset' the campaign pool back to zero that is based upon longer term S/R and/or the severity of the trend and feeling like it needs to reset soon for a deeper pullback. Grey1 and DD made good points about risk and analysis of the trend. This is an area I have been putting great effort towards over the past month or so. This is sort of like adding to your winners. Keep in mind I'm experimenting with this as on an intraday position trading model with the odd swing trade. The results have been enormous when actually catching a trend. Again, awesome thread with great content thus far! With kind regards, MK

I know this thread is predominantly about real-time trades, but instead I would like to post my start of day game plans. Any shorts initiated in the R zone will be held with bigger targets and scale out less aggressively (using 1/4ths). Any longs in the zone on the 240m chart will scale out with 2 targets. Anything outside of those zones is strictly scalps with all in/all out. Ideal play for me is to short rallies into the R zone.

I agree with forrest on the above sequence. I actually posted comment about it, but noted later that he did finally get around to sticking with the theme of the thread so deleted the comment. I have no idea why he would have posted that hindsight stuff in the real-time thread. There are a couple of others that do it semi-regular here too IMO. 99.9% of the content is keeping with the spirit of the thread though.