Niko

And the 20 tick with some real time notes on it. I tried the voice recorder, but I just feel better writing my feelings in the chart so that I can relate them to the current PA at the time. I am not sure if this serves the same purpose as the voice recording method.

No trades today for me. But I managed to record some of my feelings, I actually ended up posting on the 20 tick chart what was going through my mind. at every moment during the session and placed "entry" marks on the chart of every trade that came to my mind but that was not taken. I included REVs and RETs into my analysis. 1.After the open as buyers failed to make it above 91 I started thinking about taking a REV, but taking into account the width of the bars I avoided taking that short, just didn't feel sure about it and decided to give the next RET a chance. 2. This trade I did place but it was not triggered and as prices rose rapidly above the mean I started to realize something was wrong with sellers so I decided to e cautious. 3. The strong rejection of 83 (prep level) meant that I had to make a decision about going long there (REV) or waiting for a RET to confirm. But I felt too anxious, I started thinking that by then 87 was the mean, and that I would end up trapped in a TR with a bad trade. But that really did not happen, at least not as dramatically as I imagined, as the long managed to be a couple of points in profit before reaching the top at 90. This is a puzzling part for me, when I took this trades in the past I ended up doing poorly, but then if a trend develops out of this move I end up missing the best entry opp. Perhaps if the range was larger (20pts) I would have considered the trade, but given the tightness my emotions were too strong to overcome fear of entry here. 4. After the LH at 90 and the inability to go lower at 83 my main thinking was "hinge on the making", so as soon as the ret at 945 formed I took the next downswing as a hinge BO, therefore I did not take it and waited for a RET. 5. This was very interesting to watch and feel in RT, I was not gonna take a REV off a LL but watching price in RT what crossed my mind around 9.:48 was the RET ship has sailed!! as I saw prices bouncing fast and making a HL in the 20 tick. I dont think I would try and take a trade like that in the near future, but it was very interesting to see how it happened. 6. The SL was broken and there was a RET above 50%, but I avoided this as there was no upside exploration above 91. By now I was pretty sure I shouldn't be trying to trade inside this mess, so the emotional load went down a lot. 7. Now it is clearly a TR between 91 and 81, but at the moment of this trade, I was thinking "this could be a hinge" and the action here could be the RET after the BO, but then I remembered that BOs have to bring company to the party in order to call enough attention and this was pretty much an unimportant poke above the SL of the Hinge so I reconsider my entry and cancelled the order. Had I left it intact it wouldnt have triggered. 8. As we were sucked back inside the TR I did not consider any other trade until we broke the DL, but here I was unsure, given what had occurred at 81, we could have a DB and I would be selling the DB so I decided to wait for an extra RET. 9. Price rose just above 81, but buyers failed to join, so there was no REV, then I started thinking this could be the RET, Here I Place the entry 1 pt below price, but as price rose I did not trail the entry, My reading was if I end up buying at or above 91 there is the risk of getting trapped inside the range so I better wait for a break. It was not triggered. 10. Given the inability to go lower, a REV could have been taken here, after all this was a DB, but then again, 10 pt TR is not really something I want to be messing with. So I avoided the trade. 11. The DB was confirmed by a HL, but also avoided it. My feelings were pretty clear at this moment, I was not anxious, because I had taken the decision of not trading until I saw some light. 12. Another HL, same conclusion. 13. Another HL, same conclusion, and this one was not triggered. 14. LHs inside the TR, I marked potential entries, but did not trade any of them. 15. Selling stopped at 50% and then price rose faster, this could have been a REV. 16. At 10:54 there was a strong buying push, I have to admit that by this time I was already thinking in closing shop and starting to write my journal so I was not paying that much attention to the screen, so I really did not realize we were exiting a hinge and that this one was the RET after the hinge BO. I was thinking more in " we did not clear the range and it is already 11:00 so what the hell". 17 Another RET just below the ORH, it worked just fine. But as I said, I was done by then.

Well, it surely is being important, buyers are pretty hesitant to jump in above 91.

So far, no trades, even though I said I would take the REVs, doing so in such a tight congestion is not something I feel comfortable doing. Until I dont see sellers interested below 81 or buyers interested above 91 I wont mess with this.

We are still in an uptrend, seems like some good news at 8:30 took us above PDH and so far traders have not been able to get above 91. At the time of the post, buyers are showing up around LSH at 87 and above 50% at 83. There has been no selling below 76 overnite. If we keep on going up today, we will have to rely exclusively on the PA in front of us. If we go down then 83, 76, and 62 will be my initial focus. Remember, you are supposed to take the trades until you detect chop and only then are you supposed to stop, doing anything else is just fear and fear has to be taken out.

I will join this conversation later, had to take my daughter to school and got late to work. Will finish my prep and focus on my trading.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. I cant say that enough times... I will do that, today I tried but did not manage to define what was emotionally going on.

Well, the same omissions as yesterday and the same results, a bad couple of trades in a great day. Here are the trades I spotted but did not take because I was not sure about them and the reasons that made me unsure (my fears). 1. That is the long I took, I think I would take it again if I had to, and the SCR, well that is something that can be reconsidered in these trades that just dont go anywhere after my entry, but for now, the 2 pts max loss will still be the parameter. 2. Here is where things are a little different, as my long went nowhere, almost like a dog, I thought about shorting, but I did not because, they have tried down already and failed and that would send me against the mean at 28 Then we made a LL and I started looking for opps to enter short, but the correction was way to deep and I just abandoned the idea of a short once we crossed 50% at 28. That is why even after the DL is broken and a LH appears I dont place shorts in the chart. As price falls to make a LL I changed my mind from trend day to a TC day, and avoided trading within it. 3. Traders failed to find buyers at the UL of the TC signaling weakness, and as prices fell below the LSL I decided to risk another short, I knew I was oversold and at 50%, but I thought we could just continue on the way down, but that did not happen and I got SCR. 4. Here is the Big missed REV, as we hit 35 (it was in my prep, I cant say I did not know), but I did not take it just because I am not taking REVs so far, but it was pretty clean and easy to trade. 5. Even if the REV wasnt taken a SL was broken and a RET came, if that is not enough, the tight DL that broke made a Dog (another reason to go long). I passed because it wast against the mean and we were still inside the TC. 6. TC UL (another SL) was broken and a RET formed, I did not take it because I was still below the OH, but it was clean again. 7. Just before closing shop at 11:00 and after the new up TC had formed a test of the LL of the TC occurred (RET) triggering another entry. This one I actually took in the demo account and is still open with a 26 pts profit. :doh: Just to clarify, the lines were not drawn in RT but are provided to show what I was "seeing" in my mind. Things to do better tomorrow. Take REVs. For now, no more, take it one step at the time. If it works, keep on going, if it doesn't take a step back and reevaluate.

Hehe, similar drill as yesterday for the long side, went down, tested 35 and jumped back up, still rising, but I missed the entry in the REV and did not want to mess with it after it. Took 2 trades 1. Long after making a HH and a RET (failed) 2. Short after making a LL and a RET (failed as well) Will gonna come back in an hour to run replay and make more comments and review about the day.

So after yesterday´s trend day traders finally stopped at 50 and then tested selling interest around 40 four times before realizing nobody wanted to sell and therefore taking prices higher, the 8:30 report seemed to have helped allowing some interest around 58, but there it stalled. At the moment, traders are around the 50% from 40 to 58 and so far the SH at 45 seemed to have provided buying changing the stride of the immediate trend. So, at this moment barriers to overcome are 40 and 58, we are currently in an uptrend so watch out for the DL. If we go above 58 there is nothing significant from the past to stop us and we will have to rely on PA alone. If the uptrend ends, then 40 could be important, then 35, 25 and 15.

Yes, I know I am not trading the extremes just yet. I wanted to be able to trade SLA with real money without too much of an emotional response. I think I am getting there and I will feel far more comfortable adding new elements as I move forward. I have tried the two approaches: 1) The stay in the trade and 2) Pure SLA, results will of course vary depending in what kind of day I end up finding. But I think is my current disregard of the extremes what is keeping me away from being profitable, and what ultimately makes the difference, as it did yesterday. Ok I will focus on my feelings as I see the opps unfold. And I will work on characterization.

I am trying to reach the point of emotionless when placing the trades, so far these RETs have been pretty easy on the emotional side, although I am aware that the trading session is not being efficiently traded. Thanks, I am aware of these, after last week I started this week very defensive. I will comment more on this on a later post, as I don't have access to charts at this time. Yes, I also realized this today when the HL at 14 showed up even before the line was broken. But for now, my interest is to execute flawlessly the low emotion trades so I can upgrade 1 setup at the time. I am gonna give this a deeper look, as in most of the extremes, selling was strong enough to create LHs. I am still confused on when to rely on AMT and when to rely on SLA, is easy in hindsight but in RT this morning looked very much like yesterday´s morning hence pushing me towards closing the long. Yes, this past week schedule has not been the best for me, but I will squeeze these activities into my must do for everyday so that I don't miss this important part of the review.

Had a family commitment in the early morning and couldnt post my prep. Here are the trades: 1. After they definitely decided not to go any lower a strong push through all the clutter of the OR put prices a tick above ORH, then came a RET that allowed an entry. 2. But this long was short lived and a HL formed just above the OR, I risked the short, but as soon as it failed I decided to SCR and leave the market alone. It looked very much like yesterday and we were still below 35 so..

Given that Db has provided us with a thoroughly detailed characterization guide why dont we use it and see what comes out of it. Lets start with the begining which is understanding and characterizing PM conditions for the NQ. We could choose date ranges so we can all contribute. For example one could start with Jan-Apr 2013 and the other start with May-Jun 2013, if we get 4 of us to put some hours into this, we would characterize a year very little time. Just my 2 cents. "If beginning with a day: How does your market behave overnight? Is it flat and listless? Or does it provide clues as to where buyers and sellers may be found? If there is a pre-market report coming up, do traders anticipate the results or do they lie in wait? Are certain levels tested repeatedly? Broken? Reset? Are prices trending upward or downward? What are the extents and durations of the waves? Does the pace change at any point? In what way? What effect does the change have on price movement? Are any nearby previous levels of supply or demand probed and tested? How? What is the result? " I am gonna be having trouble with my afternoon availability during the next 2 weeks, but I will take some hours here an there to do this. Lets see if someone else wants to join.

And the 20 tick perspective. I am also attaching the 60 min chart that I used during the session.

Although it wasnt a wonderful trend, the moves are cleaner than the ones we had over the past two weeks. We couldn't escape mean reversion today, as prices tried to get away from 25 they were pulled by "gravity" and went all the way to 35 where they had not been able to find any trades yest afternoon and couldn't either today. Two trades were taken: 1. As buyers came in strong at 15 (opp to REV at green dot) not taken and managed to mark a HH I waited for the RET and entered long, It was a struggle all the way to the top, but LSLs held all the way to 35 where we got our first LH. 2. Given that the DL had been broken and we had a RET from the LH I SARed the trade, but it did not go anywhere triggering a SCR. After that a hinge formed and then it was broken, but it came back in really rapidly forming a TC like environment, so I decided to stay away. as the TC was broken we were going against the mean at 25 and it was almost 11:00 so i decided to call it a day.

4 minutes for the open, buying pressure has moved prices out of the micro range and we are currently testing 17 from above. The 50% of the fall from 35 is 25 and as emini said seems like we are inside a hinge in the hourly.

Overnight, buyers let us know that they were really not interested anymore above 36, then it was the turn of their counterparties, but so far they ave not been able to get through 14, from a mean perspective, the mean of yesterday´s fall is 25, if we consider the distance from 36 to 25 (11 pts) and subtract it from the mean, if is a mean reverting day 13 should provide some buying and a hinge like figure will appear in prices. So according to that, a fall below 13 could be an indication of sellers resolve to get rid of their contracts. Anyway even if 13 is taken 07 still there so we will have to see if we can escape the gravity force of this mean or not. If not, then someone could be interested in trying up, in which case they have to break 40. In the meantime, and zooming in we are stuck between 15 and 17. I am gonna take some demo REVs with the real life RETs. and see how it goes.

Well, I did not do it, perhaps because of the same reason you had. But as you can see in the chart, after the trade is SCR price stalls, a LH occurs and price starts to fall again so even if you place your entry 2 ticks below that small LSL that occurs before the LH in the 20 tick you would have gotten in at a pretty good price. But in order to notice that, you need to be completely detached from your past trade, remember that you scratch to gather new info about price action, some sort of market research that allows you to enter with more confidence.

Great trading emini!

And the 20 tick picture.

Well, well, well. Some trend at last!!!. And it was both ways, although I only took the ride down and held as much as I could. After my premarket post, buyers made one last attempt to find bigger fools above 41, but failed and by the open selling was pushing prices below the DL. 1. So I followed protocol and waited for the RET, but this one was scratched as buyers kept on buying at the PM low. What happened next was decisive, as buyers failed to absorb offers above the 50% at 38 and the SL from 41 was still intact a new RET formed giving me the opp to short again, but I doubted as we were still above the PML and failed to place the order, something I would regret later. 2. Well, they definitely wanted to go down, the waves were clean, no more of that deep RET crap from last week, so as a new RET came I took it, but now I knew this one was not gonna be that easy and that my 2 point exit policy might be tested easily, so I decided to hold and wait for LSH to be taken out, I know I was riskier, but if I had entered at the level I was supposed to (3 points above) I wouldn't be worried for the trade until that LSH was taken so I decided to forget about my entry and just keep on reading price. After a small congestion that failed to even make a DT price kept on falling. Given what had occurred during the past two weeks I was expecting a significant move so I looked for reasons to stay in the trade and therefore did not care much about fanning in the line so that it would be to tight. That is why I ignored the DB at 9:53 I have seen these "gotcha" RETs before and I was not about to exit on it. By this 10:00 we were already (we as in Kp and me) looking for places where we could find significant demand. and that is when 14 showed up, it was the low of Friday and near the apex of the hinge from the 28th. But it was crossed easily and it was only until they reached 7 (bottom of the hinge and low of the 28th) that buyers finally showed up. And started pushing hard. But I was not really interested in exiting right away, so I decided to hold and see what happened around LSH that by that time was at 24 and was just below the 50% level from the top. The SL was broken but after that buyers stalled at first at 21, the first thing that came to my mind was to exit at 22, but then as I saw the way in which buyers struggled getting to 24 I decided that if 50% was not breached I wanted to give sellers the benefit of the doubt and allow them the opp to make a LL. But they couldn't, they gave up at 50%, so there was really not much of a reason to stay in the short so I decided to close above the SH at 18.50. It was already 11:00 and I had to be somewhere else, so I did not SAR the trade (that would have been a good idea worth around 10 pts.) I am still not comfortable exiting at important levels, that is something I really need to work on, as for example, exiting around 15 today seems like the way to go.

The grind up is still in place, the pattern of HHs and HLs within the context of overlapping bars in the hourly still present. So far we are stuck below 41 and above 34, seems also like we formed a hinge ON with an apex at 37. So lets wait for the opening bell to see where this ends up going. If we break to the upside, then it will be a world of wonder without many boundaries. If we break to the downside, there are a lot of areas where price got stuck on the way up that could provide demand. Lets see how this day behaves.

Game, great to have you here. What a great idea!

The whole week has had the same behavior, they try both ways and fail, then consolidate into some sort of congestion and then grind either up or down. Using my SCR criteria is impossible to trade under this conditions, but at least I give the benefit of the doubt to the opening moves as they usually are strong enough to leave you well positioned. Now regarding the trades, I think both were valid, I am not sure I should have waited 2 points in the red before closing them, but the entries were valid and therefore there is nothing to feel about them. In the other hand, I really think I managed to realize I was in a hostile environment and stayed away from it and that is a plus for me, as I usually ended trading the chop in the past. Perhaps if one was after a couple of points one could trade inside the TR, but I am not ready for that or even know if I am interested.