Subtle changes in trading behaviour during a winning streak.

robster970

robster970

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So boys and girls, today marked the end of a streak of winners concerning my gap trading of ES. The news took me out a 3pm bringing the run of 12 consecutive wins to an end.

What I'm curious about is not the statistical probabilites associated with the run/method/discretion, but primarily whether any of you boys and girls notice subtle changes in your trade execution when you get an extended run.

I found that once I got into this week:

a) I was looking for reasons not to trade to preserve the win rate
b) I was considering breaking rules by adding in discretionary exits instead of the normal fixed targets.
c) I could feel a mounting 'pressure' to perform and an increased sense of relief both from yesterdays win but more importantly from todays lose.

I found myself, forcing myself to trade today to maintain my trading method, despite some gut feel telling me that the likelihood of good news coming out at 3pm being small and not to open a position at 2.30pm for fear this may go against me.

Did I self -sabotage to maintain some sanity?
Did I ignore well honed discretion and risk mitigation to preserve my trading plan?

I think I'm curious about how the more discretionary traders on here deal with long winning runs with respect to their own trading methods.......

any takers on how you deal with this sh1t?
 
robster970 said:
So boys and girls, today marked the end of a streak of winners concerning my gap trading of ES. The news took me out a 3pm bringing the run of 12 consecutive wins to an end.

What I'm curious about is not the statistical probabilities associated with the run/method/discretion, but primarily whether any of you boys and girls notice subtle changes in your trade execution when you get an extended run.

I found that once I got into this week:

a) I was looking for reasons not to trade to preserve the win rate
Click to expand...
Can relate to this to some extent.
Mind you, don't some trading teachers encourage this attitude, partly so that only the best setups are taken, and partly to discourage overtrading?

b) I was considering breaking rules by adding in discretionary exits instead of the normal fixed targets.
c) I could feel a mounting 'pressure' to perform and an increased sense of relief both from yesterdays win but more importantly from todays lose.

I found myself, forcing myself to trade today to maintain my trading method, despite some gut feel telling me that the likelihood of good news coming out at 3pm being small and not to open a position at 2.30pm for fear this may go against me.

Did I self -sabotage to maintain some sanity?
Did I ignore well honed discretion and risk mitigation to preserve my trading plan?

I think I'm curious about how the more discretionary traders on here deal with long winning runs with respect to their own trading methods.......
Click to expand...
All sounds somewhat plausible.

The most surprising thing I have found, and this is not about trading as such, is that the more the account grows, the less I like the idea of taking money out of it. This is exactly the opposite to how I thought I would feel, back when it was a lot smaller. I just want to see it growing...like a little dwarf in LOTR or something, sitting on a pile of gold ... :) My precious!
 
montmorencyt2w said:
Mind you, don't some trading teachers encourage this attitude, partly so that only the best setups are taken, and partly to discourage overtrading?
Click to expand...

Never really considered this as augmenting what's already a fairly good strategy. Might give this one a bit of a think really. Overtrading is not really an option with opening gaps - they either meet my criteria or don't. It's discretionary exits that are important for this - if I'd have listened to myself, I would have got out about 2.55pm and taken 2pts. Alternatively I could have decided that I won't trade around the news but this would be counter-productive as lots of the 13:30 news that comes out often gives me clues on how to play the gap at 14:30. Interesting though.


montmorencyt2w said:
The most surprising thing I have found, and this is not about trading as such, is that the more the account grows, the less I like the idea of taking money out of it. This is exactly the opposite to how I thought I would feel, back when it was a lot smaller. I just want to see it growing...like a little dwarf in LOTR or something, sitting on a pile of gold ... :) My precious!
Click to expand...

This has already started to happen to me and the although I'm not compounding yet, it's only a matter of time. I basically decided about 2 weeks ago that I'll take money out until some stuff is paid off that would be nice, then leave it to just compound for a long time. I have a touch of the Gollum about me as well.
 
Robster,..
Never leave anything substantial in any one account,.always diversify, especially with todays climate.
And whatever you do, don't favor wins over losses,..mentally they should stack up the same (it takes away the fear factor),.and you'll start to enjoy the game as it should be played! : )
 
robster970 said:
So boys and girls, today marked the end of a streak of winners concerning my gap trading of ES. The news took me out a 3pm bringing the run of 12 consecutive wins to an end.

What I'm curious about is not the statistical probabilites associated with the run/method/discretion, but primarily whether any of you boys and girls notice subtle changes in your trade execution when you get an extended run.

I found that once I got into this week:

a) I was looking for reasons not to trade to preserve the win rate
b) I was considering breaking rules by adding in discretionary exits instead of the normal fixed targets.
c) I could feel a mounting 'pressure' to perform and an increased sense of relief both from yesterdays win but more importantly from todays lose.

I found myself, forcing myself to trade today to maintain my trading method, despite some gut feel telling me that the likelihood of good news coming out at 3pm being small and not to open a position at 2.30pm for fear this may go against me.

Did I self -sabotage to maintain some sanity?
Did I ignore well honed discretion and risk mitigation to preserve my trading plan?

I think I'm curious about how the more discretionary traders on here deal with long winning runs with respect to their own trading methods.......

any takers on how you deal with this sh1t?
Click to expand...

For you to ask this question, you have no knowledge about your plan's long term success, and to add to that your method is not robust enough.If your method was great , you wouldn't ask these questions.

We deal with this on the basis of

Trade like a mercenary guerrilla. We must fight on the winning side and be willing to change sides readily when one side has gained the upper hand. Sell markets that show the greater weakness, and buy those that show the greater strength.

If you are long ,go short if strength and odds change, buy more of strong instruments , sell more of weaker instruments if shorts hand upper hand.Only thing you get married to is your wife, everything else is flirting/ including sides in a war!
 
I saw this the other day:

"if you marry a position, you may not like what you wake up with the next day".


While not totally endorsing what lies behind the sentiment, it made me smile.
 
I think you've missed the point ODT. I understand the metrics of the gap play, based upon demo trading it for about 6months and now trading it for real for about 6 months now. Granted the stats are based on medium term rather than long term but nevertheless I understand it from a numerical and statistical PoV.

Th OP is asking for feedback from discretionary traders on how they deal with long periods of success, whether psychology creeps in and how they deal with it. This is about human factors and management of those human factors.
 
Thanks for all the replies guys - there is something in everything you've said. I just need to go away and think about the last 6 weeks really.
 
robster970 said:
I think I'm curious about how the more discretionary traders on here deal with long winning runs with respect to their own trading methods.......

any takers on how you deal with this sh1t?
Click to expand...

Manual traders have memory , mechanical traders do not use it, they follow mechanical rules and ignore the past.

Can you erase your memory and treat the next trade without any relevance of the outcome of past trade.If yes , you got the answer.

You may have a winning run of 5 trades or 15 trades,or even 50 trades ,what relevance has that to next trade?
 
You're right ODT - I realised after you posted that I'm being affected by recency. You, Hillary and Monty have all said this in slightly different ways.
 
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