dalby

i use fundamental analysis when i am doing grain spread trades, but never with one sided positional trades.

today's gap was AWESOME. maybe i'm lucky but--- i faded it right down to the pivot then went long. i have noticed on a of gaps, that they will fade at least to some key reference area. on a lot of these up gaps, you can get a fade at least to that level. and of course, i agree about TICK (and i use advance decline as well)

"If you have a stop that is routinely being taken out and then the trade moves in your favor," if that is ROUTINELY happening, then i agree - the trade setup IS faulty. clearly, you should set your ENTRY where this "setup" places the stop cause if the stop is hit there constantly, then it moves in your favor, then THAT is where you should be entering. that's kind of self-evident a big part of my trading is knowing how retail trades - where they place their stops and entries because then i know how to trade - NOT like retail. after all, most retail traders lose money if u enter at price X, and price routinely takes out your stop at X-10, why not set your ENTRY at X-10?

i programmed the TTM squeeze for quotertracker. if you spend 5 minutes learning paintbars in QT, it's very easy all the ttm squeeze is is when the bollinger bands (20,2) go inside the keltner (20,1.5) - that's IN THE SQUEEZE and then the squeeze fires when it goes outside that condition is exceptionally easy to test for and write a paintbar for the other paintbar is merely the 12 period momentum i find the 5 minute squeeze EXTREMELY successful but i filter it (iow, i don't take every one that fires - only those that meet certain criteria). i also will not do a fade play short when a long squeeze is setting up, etc. helps keep me out of unsuccessful trades.

cause i don't have a daily goal seriously. i may quit trading cause i feel like it, i want to go work out, i want a nap, or whatever, but i don't like to set daily goals, cause i feel that for me, it's self-limiting. i think for some people its useful.

speaking of "when to quit" if i ever have 3 losers in a row - i quit. this is pretty rare (since most of my trades have over 65% chance of "winning" (where i lock in first target and move stop to entry) i NEVER double down after a loser. heck, i never double down EVER. i trade the same size or smaller (i will trade smaller sometimes after a few consecutive wins cause i know there is a chance that euphoria will be negatively affecting my decision making) i've also found that as a (generally) countertrend trader, that i am best quitting at 11:30 EST (if i am not in a trade) and managing the trade i am in once 1130 comes around with no additional entries. why? well, it suits my countertrend trading style, since the doldrums tends to be kind of floppy, and the last 1-2 hours of trading tend to be much more "trendy" and thus countertrend trades are less profitable and/or have less chance of success. i have certain rules to get around this, like certain setups i have are ONLY allowed during pre-doldrums.

i notice you reference TRIN levels right after the opening. imo, TRIN is useless in (at least) the first 1/2 hour. after then, i start looking at it. that's just my opinion though.

i hired a mentor, and i got serious about my trading. i turned it into a business, not a hobby. that did it

it isn't happening ANYTIME ever. like the other said, futures markets (unlike stocks) are both zero sum and symmetric. if they do not have equal access for shorts and longs, they cannot work. also, futures are important for commercials and they need equal access to shorts and longs. it will never happen

considering neiderhoffer blew out his own account (as well as others) selling index puts and trading asia, and IGNORING risk, i have little respect for him. it's not that i love or hate the book, it's just that i believe that he outs himself as a pompous know-it-all who doesn't practice sound risk management, which is a primary rule of trading.

also, emotions aside (which are a big reason not to increase size), even a cursory understanding of game theory/probability shows that larger size EXPONENTIALLY increases risk of ruin. iow (it depends on expectancy of your methodology but generally speaking), doubling your size can result in FAR more than a doubling of the risk of ruin. i look at it this way. size is something you EARN. just cause you have a 100k account does not mean you should trade 50 dow contracts

the answer is simple you must trade by RULES. once you are in a trade, you are naturally much more emotional. you are monetarily invested, thus you are emotionally invested. logic starts dissipating as does objectivity. you must have rules. this does not mean you cannot have discretionary aspects to your trading, but you should also have automatic aspects (like sell 1/2 my position at +x and then move stop to whatever). the vast majority of retail traders fail, and a hyoooge part of the reason why is that they trade emotionally. you can have the most robust setups ever, and impeccable analytical skills but if you do not have exit discipline, you will be doomed almost certainly.

d00d. deal with it. everybody on the face of the earth knows what a LINE chart is. it's not that frigging complicated. each time QT (or any program that uses a line chart) receives a new TICK value, it plots it by scrolling to the right, plotting that value, connected in a LINE to the previous value i can't teach a pig to sing, and i apparently can't teach you what a line chart is. i guess that's my failing (rolls eyes)

when i scalp the dow futures (which is how i make my living), i also do not use any indicators (in the sense of lagging indicators) i look for key price levels (potential support/resistance), and i watch the TICK, various related markets (bonds, ETF's etc.), etc. i have traded successfully when on the road using just a 5 minute chart, a line chart of the tick, and a list of sectors. so, it is DEFINITELY possible to trade without indicators. indicators are all (pretty much) derived from a formula applied ot a series of price points. thus, they don't give any more information than price does. they merely compile/compute etc. values based on price fwiw, i *do* use lagging indicators for longer term stuff. i find it very useful. i think the futures are too efficient intraday for me to get any value from indicators. imo, indicators are how the retail traders trades, and they (overwhelmingly) are losing money on futures. i want to trade as a professional, not a retail trader. generally speaking, this has been a means reversion market. i think at least part of the reason is that the market (which is merely the aggregate of all trader's actions) has adjusted to the profileration of screen based/arcade style traders, thus making these methods less useful . the market has to adapt, since it is all traders' actions. i have an edge. if most losing traders are using indicators, it follows that part of an edge is NOT using what the average joe is using all imo of course

the other guy is correct (as far as i know) - the QT line chart is updated once a second i read somewhere how often the NYSE updates it's TICK but i can't recall off-hand regardless, the point is that a classic line chart can show (basically) every value, whereas a line on close doesn't. i learned to trade using a line chart (didn't even know what a lineonclose was) of the TICK. so, i prefer it. it's what i'm used to. but that's tangential to the fact that it does provide MORE and MORE ACCURATE information than the line on close, since the line on close is like a derived chart. it takes longer intervals as a close and only shows you those values. it may appear less noisy, but when i scalp, i want ot see the noise. one person's noise is another's price action as for the 1tick chart being the same. it's not cause it does not (as far as i can tell by the picture) plot a smooth continuous line of the TICK value, which is what the line chart does.

as videos by carter, hubert et al recognize, TS's line on close chart does NOT show every value. for example, if tick spikes up to 1200, the line on close often will not show anywhere near that extreme. the OHLC will (or candle etc.) to confirm this - setup a line on close chart and a OHLC chart for the tick. compare and contrast see? the extremes are caught by the OHLC but NOT the loc chart the line chart (as opposed to lineonclose) does not give a closing value every minute (the line chart NOT the line on close chart). i don;'t know why u are assuming that. i never said it did, and i see no reason why you would assume that. it continually updates, as the tick does - just like the OHLC does (but of course it's a line chart not a OHLC so you can see the movement). that's the difference. if u set up a line chart next to a line on close, you can clearly see the difference. and like i said, the fact that the extremes on the OHLC chart are NOT represented on the lineonclose chart is proof enough. i think a lot of TS users assume (wrongly) that TS line on close chart is the way line charts work. that is false. that is the way line on close charts work. there is an astounding difference

cooter, is spot on. btw, quotetracker (besides having a line chart) also allows you to draw candles based on a fraction of a minute. there is no discrete minute interval required. i lurv TS, but the lack of a line chart is a drawback

i've never posted a single chart sorry is it that difficult to understand the difference between a line chart, and a line on close. sorry, if i'm running my mouth if you want to ignore me, feel free it's not that complex a topic. you should be able to understand it. engage brain. disengage rhetoric. hth

ok. pretty ugly and hard to work with though, since the 1 tick chart will scroll across the screen pretty quickly and still not serve the purpose im a late comer to ts. i use qtracker and investor R/T as well. i can't understand why TS does not have a basic line chart, but it doesn't the line chart is the only way to SEE a true tick hook, and the exact tick levels over time, since the pattern is "hidden" within a candle, and the line on close does not give each discrete value

how can u plot a 1 tick chart of the TICKS? there are no "trades" in the tick. i am not sure i grok that.

my "line price"? i'm not sure what u mean TS does not offer (as far as i know) a LINE chart it only offers line on Close. a line chart lets you see the exact tick readings, but in line format.

I have trained several other traders, as well as my personal experience, and one thing (from this limited "n" ) is clear: it is true that the emotional aspects of trading are much more difficult for most traders to master, and are the primary impediment to profitability for most traders. first and foremost, a trader should have a professional mindset. the things i list are not NECESSARY for success (because people vary individually), but for people having problems with discipline, they are often very helpful. the following apply to futures scalping/short term trading... 1) Treat your trading as a business. Because it is. Your trading decisions are business decisions. That mindset helps keep you out of impulsively trading/ 2) DO YOUR RESEARCH. 3) Have a plan, but have the flexibility to change your plan based on the price action 4) NEVER EVER EVER EVER move your stops WIDER than they were set upon entry 5) always set a stop upon (or before even) entry 6) trade a size that is emotionally comfortable for you & is small enough to give you almost no risk of ruin. just because you can trade 10 contracts doesn't mean you should 7) log your trades - reason for the trade, emotional state at time of trade, etc. 8) review your trades 9) be a professional 10) be a professional 11) be a professional 12) have a well defined ruleset 13) don't break your rules 14) have a trading manual 15) take profits out of your account and invest them in solid stuff (i like stocks like XOM JNJ BA GOOG BDX MO (i've had GOOG since IPO) etc.). 16) reward yourself for following the rules. 17) punish yourself for breaking them 18) try an audio commentary. you may feel like an idiot talking to yourself, into a mic, but it keeps you "in the moment", reflective, and calm that's just a beginning, but you get the point. if you trade index futures you are competing with other traders. be a professional, and take money from the amateurs. 7)

one of john carter's "thangs" is to watch MER (merrill lynch) and the brokerdealers (XBD) and the Banks (BKX) indexes to at least get somewhat of a hint of what institutions are doing. i think this is a decent proxy. i do find that when BKX and XBD are diverging from the dow, one or the other will give. it's also a rare to see a real rally sustain itself without heavily green XBD and BKX and the opposite for a selloff.

this is one reason NOT to use Tradestation for the TICK charting (i use TS, quotetracker, and investor RT) TS does not offer a line chart, only a line on close chart. thus, you cannot see the exact values for ticks. much better (imo) to chart ticks with a line chart vs. a lineonclose chart, because you get the exact readings (like you would with a a OHLC chart) but can also see the exact movement up and down

one of the drawbacks of TS is that it only offers "line on close' charts,not classicline charts. this is a disadvantage when you want to chart continuous tick readings, for obviousreasons. i personally chart with both quotetracker (which does offer it), and TS (and investor R/T for market profile). a line on close (vs. a line) will not show all readings, and i personally do not use it. i chart my tick via a line chart, and a candle.