Average number of trades per day

Hi,

I am trying to find out whether I have a tendency to overtrade. If you day trade Eminis, can you please indicate your average number of trades per day? Thank you.

I've often heard that there are 1-3 good opportunities a day in ES, but that would probably apply to those looking for at least 2-3 whole ES points per trade. A scalper might take twelve halves, a swinger one six and a Frugi minus ten :-) But judging by your past posts and skill at picking bottom/tops 2 to 4 trades would perhaps seem about right IMVHO?

Or, to be frightfully trite, you are only overtrading if you are disobeying your system, allowing impatience to conquer discipline or otherwise feeling an urge to be "in the market" depite a lack of obvious signal to be so.

I have a suspicion you're doing just fine as u are :-))

Maximum of 1 per day per market for me.

JonnyT

Over trading is when you are over committed and get a margin call.
Under trading is not being committed enough in order to take full advantage of the move.

Many thanks indeed.

Hi frugi,

I am trying to find out whether my strategy is right. For example, sometimes it may be more profitable to trade the pullbacks while other times it may not. By this poll I hope to figure out whether I need to adjust my strategy by comparing my number of daily trades with others.

matey my average is 3-4 per day counting a reversal trade as 1. if u count that as 2 it'd be 7-8

Hi clylbw,

Sorry I'm an idiot I initially failed to notice the poll above, d'oh!

Perhaps the poll needs to have more choices below 1-5?...don't mean to be rude.

A discretionary system is hard to pin down. You can choose to be nimble, for instance try to trade every pullback as well as following the main trend, or you can be supremely patient, taking one trade "per trend" as it were, and stick it out to the bitter end. The success of either choice will ultimately depend on your management of the trade(s) and the market.

But of course it is not as black and white as this. You are a skilled discretionary trader who will trade according to your view of the conditions. Sometimes your view will bring forth one trade, others three. You can't change the market but you can address the way you manage your trade(s).

Whether you are overtrading comes down to whether you are adhering to the rules that make you comfortable, relaxed, assured and of course money. Do not judge your trade frequency (which forms an integral part of your whole system, rather than being a separate "Am I doing this right" measure) by that of others. Trade frequency should be a natural result of your entry and exit criteria, risk, targets etc. rather than be judged in its own right.

Some adore constantly scalping for teenies, some love sitting on their hands most of the time and occasionally grabbing fifteen points. Some are clever enough to do both, if they are confident in their market interpretation and can adapt a system to conditions without breaking its principal rules.Your method and personality will determine your approach far more than we can.

Five trades a day it is then :-)

Really must apologise if any of this sounds patronising or brusque by the way...it's just me typing away :-)

Despite all my waffle, the result of the poll will be interesting - nice one clylbw.

Lynn,

I though that you had become a darksider and as such was not subject to the problems associated with overtrading ?

Also I agree with some of the above comments in that you have restricted the number of trade choices too wide in my view. For example everyone who doesnt trade will tick the 0 to 5 box and yet I would guess that most traders fit into the same category. This may give a false impression of what you are trying to determine.


Paul