notouch

Work-life balance is definitely very important. They place great importance on it in economically successful European countries like Germany, France and Switzerland. In the US and UK we have the attitude that the more hours we work the better which is not true. A French worker produces more in a 6 hour day than a British worker produces in 9. I try to keep my working day less that 7 hours and enjoy life when I'm not working. It's also important to take holidays. In Europe there's a legal minimum of one month paid holiday a year but many Europeans get 2 months. While traders don't have the luxury of paid holidays I think it's important to take 2 or 3 holidays a year to see the world and refresh your mind. I love traveling. It's one of the things that motivates me to make money.

Spot FX is totally different to futures. I agree in spot FX there are investment banks who can see the stops of their own customers. In futures on the other hand who exactly are these "Smart Money Professionals" who can see all the stops? The stops are held at the exchange and can't be seen by any traders.

Good trade. That trade repeated itself after the open. There was a test for supply under the pre-market low. A little bit of supply was found but then buyers came in which you could see with the positive delta and the large orders on the tape and then price took off to the POC.

Wow. You trade and you've never heard of ES?

I flicked through 'Master the Markets' by Tom Williams and thought it contained some useful points but overall I think VSA is more suitable for stock traders. A lot of the concepts revolve around market makers and their ability to see what other traders cannot see (stops and limits) but this isn't applicable trading futures on exchanges like Globex, ECBOT, EUREX and Euronext. We can see the same things that everyone else can see through the time and sales and order book so it makes sense to concentrate on that information instead of just focussing on volume and price.

Thanks. I must have missed that study when I was using esignal. I'm definitely going back because their data is more reliable than IQFeed and their charts are better than Investor/RT which is the set-up I'm currently using.

What charting package are you using there Z? That bid/ask study looks good.

It has been balanced over the past few days. It's been an MP trader's dream - breaking into value, revisiting the VAH and then going down to the VAL and then straight back up to the VAH.

Maybe if you admitted who you were instead of pretending to be a professional legal adviser people would treat you with more respect. You haven't been libelled you've been asked to remove content you had no permission to copy which is perfectly justified.

You are totally full of s**t. There's no such thing as "held libel". Libel is defamatory content in permanent form or broadcast. You can be guilty of libel but you can't be held libel. Held liable I think you meant. Surely a professional legal adviser would know that. I know a thing or two about English law so feel free to look that one up in "Law for Dummies".

Your literacy doesn't seem great for a "professional internet copyright legal advisor" and your legal knowledge seems even worse. The fact is that the author of a copyright work is the owner and you need the owner's permission to publish it. If you want to talk big maybe you should put away your copy of "Law for Dummies" and get some proper legal advice. Oh and learn the difference between "libel" and "liable".

Copyright is automatic on any written or recorded material. You don't have to write "copyright". You can do to scare people off but it's not necessary. Copyright laws are fairly uniform all over the world because of international treaties.

The tape can be misleading at times. There may be big institional offers sitting at a resistance level but on the tape all you would see is the offers being hit which would look bullish. Also a lot of traders take profit using a limit order. The most common order is probably a bracket order with a stop on one side and limit on the other to take profit. It's difficult to tell from the tape what is covering/liquidation and what is new orders. The way I see it, when the offers are being hit it just means the buyers are more aggressive - more desperate to get the order in because they're scared the price will run away from them. When the bids are being hit the sellers are more aggressive. What you're looking for is aggressive sellers at a resistance level or aggressive buyers at a support level.

It seems you like it but it doesn't help your trading. What you say about pit noise volume you could just replace with electronic volume and you have an indicator which is easier to read and more reliable.

Ben is a great guy but I find his service more off-putting than helpful. It's difficult to concentrate with some guy shouting at you through your PC speakers, especially when he's doing stuff like answering telephone calls. It's helpful to know what the investment banks are doing but most of the volume is through Globex not the pit so you'd be better off looking at the tape for large orders. As for pit noise this is mostly just locals shouting at each other and gives you much less information than looking at volume at the bid and ask or just tape reading. The "one of my top 10 locals is pushing lower" type comments seem great when the market then moves but half the time it doesn't. For those who find it useful how do you actually use it?

I know I can because I have for several years. Now you tell me!

It's the first time I've seen that Tick Delta in action live. I was impressed with the way you use it. I think it's superior to MarketDelta's Footprint in a way. It's easier to read so easier to trade with it. KISS. It has all the information you need in one place: total volume and delta. I wish there was a non-TradeStation version.

I traded the same move today. Price tested the point of control several times throughout the day. I was stopped out for break even about 5 times before the final one made a 60 point move down. It's difficult to find a good entry when price is moving above and below the VAL, VAH, POC and pivot points. I normally look at how strong the selling volume is if I'm planning to short so I appreciate your insights into low buying volume suggesting a reversal.

I watched "The Secret" last night and thought it was quite good. I woke up this morning and saw that my overnight YM short had gone from about 60 points profit to near break even. I had to go out but went out thinking positively knowing that as a result I would attract positivity. I returned stunned to find the position was over 100 points in profit. After the open this quickly turned into 200 points. I was convinced my positive thinking had led to the profits and more positive thinking would lead to more profits. So the position started going against me but I tried to remain positive. Well, you know what happened next. I'm laughing at myself now because I don't normally go for new age psychobabble. I'm sure positive thinking has a role in a trader's lifestyle but the lesson is make sure it doesn't turn into wishful thinking.

Price ended at the lower end of the value area and looks like it may open outside of value tomorrow. This in itself I believe points to weakness.

These 500 point YM declines happen about once every 4 years. It would be interesting to look at the profiles for the last time they happened to see if we can spot any patterns and clues about where YM is going next.

Having used it for a week now I don't think Investor/RT is a great piece of software. I can't believe all the problems I'm having with it. The latest issue is disappearing daily candlesticks. Maybe it hasn't been properly tested for use on a PC.

Perfectly legal. There's worse manipulation for individual stocks.

Listening to that made me remember that I've thought in the past about developing a strategy to take the opposite side of common losing trading strategies. We all know that a lot of traders will use MA crossover strategies on 5 minute charts and that these strategies are always losing strategies. A consistent losing strategy is just as good as a consistent winning strategy as long as you buy when the strategy is telling you to sell and sell when it's telling you to buy. It's difficult to find a way to incorporate that into a trading strategy though.

I read somewhere that most of the liquidity on the NYSE comes from automated systems and the percentage is growing on Globex and Eurex. That doesn't mean the market will be untradeable for discretionary traders although the nature of the market will change as it always does.