ES - My Approach, My Way.

aversano

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I have been thinking on how to quantity what I do and thought of sharing thoughts with you guys.

I call my method market awareness, are they trying to push it up, push it down?who participates in this move? Are these short covers? Where are we in the move in relation to today? to pre-market? Does it look like buyers will close their positions? Are we heading to the previous settlement? is this a pull back? Does it look like this test will succeed? etc.. etc.. Usually it ends with: do I prefer to go long or short.

I lean on T&S and the DOM and watch how levels are cleared. I do pay attention to VPOCs that are generated during the day and use floor pivots as extended targets. My stops are sometimes 2,3 ticks which takes me out (too often!)
and then reverses but I won't hesitate and go in again with a clear mind as if it's the first trade of the day (that's what kills me but I don't believe in waiting, if you see it take it). More often I will choose to go in and move my stop loss to b/e as quickly as possible. If I get stopped, I move to the next hint.

How about a trading plan that includes one rule. Don't do stupid things.

I went through the cycle of being mechanical and basing my entries on bollinger bands (that was 3 years ago) My current chart includes volume both vertical and horizontal and my decisions are discretionary.

Do I really need to know what my expectancy is? or win ratio? Isn't taking good trades, protecting my capital and knowing when to quit for the day what's needed from a day trader?

Just kind of confused as what I do is against 99% percent of the literature out there. I do not have a plan. Fail to plan, plan to fail?

You probably ask yourself if I am profitable or not. I am but not as much as I think I should be. Consistent? not sure about that, I try to feel the market.
But I do feel that I know what I am doing, I trade with confidence.
There are days where I am in sync with the market and days that I am not.
But I do sometimes feel that I over-trade.

How do I quantify what I do? How do I make some sense out of it. I don't feel comfortable calling myself a trader that trades based on PURE feel with T&S and the DOM to confirm an entry. p.s. Commissions aren't an issue for me.

:?:
 
It seems that my thread is not attracting any responses so lets add a few spices to it.
as a discretionary trader who tries to read the market, judging by highs/lows (both for reversals and pullbacks) by looking at price. What would one say about adding an indicator just to cage that person. i.e. having bollinger bands and if I think that this is a pull back get in at a touch of the mid band.

placing stops and targets using vpocs and everything else I have learned in the last few years by watching price and the tape.
 
It seems that my thread is not attracting any responses so lets add a few spices to it.
as a discretionary trader who tries to read the market, judging by highs/lows (both for reversals and pullbacks) by looking at price. What would one say about adding an indicator just to cage that person. i.e. having bollinger bands and if I think that this is a pull back get in at a touch of the mid band.

placing stops and targets using vpocs and everything else I have learned in the last few years by watching price and the tape.

Are you on Skype be good for us to talk at time to time as I have a pretty similar system. My Journal is here: http://www.trade2win.com/boards/trading-journals/125294-mrkmcknz-screenshot-journal.html
 
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