forking mad

[forker]

Out of interest, what do you look for as a confirmation?

 

[rsh01]

So here is a question for anyone dipping their toes into these opportunities, did you catch either the usdjpy or gbpusd flip-flops? I took the usdjpy

Edit: they were over the last 2 days

I can see rejection of level, breaking of it, and then moving back through but not the final retest for the entry? Perhaps my levels not same as yours, even drilling down to H1 there's no clear retest.

 

[rsh01]

Out of interest, what do you look for as a confirmation?

HH/HL; LL/LH; pin bars into the level; bullish outside bars (vice versa); a retest of prev resistance becoming support eg similar to your stinger/continuation breakout; h&s; and a few other patterns.

Its still WIP. Hopefully I will be IT capable to post some charts up soon.

 

[forker]

Of the setups you find that retrospectively work, do you nail them 100 percent of the time or do you have occurrences where your sub time frame work doesn't work out?

 

[rsh01]

Of the setups you find that retrospectively work, do you nail them 100 percent of the time or do you have occurrences where your sub time frame work doesn't work out?

Def not 100%! My SR has increased from c50% to c60% in short while have changed but its difficult to gauge how much of that is down to trading smaller t/f as I have also improved selection process for picking setups, my levels are more accurate also. The aim is SR of 70%, I know this attainable.

My rr has improved slightly also overall (despite sometimes worse entry) as I manually stop with mkt order, based on lower t/f's (15-20 pips normally). I only have a few months of data so its hard to say with confidence what is down to low t/f's.

Downside is its a lot more concentration and time spent reading charts, this has meant I have missed better setups elsewhere on lower t/f, so I may reduce pairs I am looking at. With a cpl of more months data I shld be able to say with confidence what the impact has been, either way.

 

[forker]

I went through similar experience where I was spotting the right trades but my execution of those trades didn't align. Dropping the lower time frame work effectively fixed this problem. Something you could try is entering trades in parallel. One where you just operate off the higher time frame and one where you refine on lower time frames over a month and see which makes the most points. You going to need to adjust your risk on the higher time frame entries accordingly of course but it should be an interesting outcome

 

[rsh01]

That's a good idea, I have a demo acct so will do on that.

What is your strike rate?

 

[Aspen Trading Group]

Hi VielGeld

You raise an interesting point that I contribute to being the biggest factor in taking my ability to profit from these opportunities from moderately successful to achieving my goals. I spent over a year trying to refine entries on lower time frames and it didn't work out well. Logically, looking at lower time frames to obtain a better entry and reduce your risk is sound but in reality it adds unnecessary layers of complexity. For the sake of reducing risk and maximising profits I think it's no different than trying to catch massive trades day in day out. By reducing your stake, you can achieve desired results without over complicating the trading process. The flip side is slower account growth but it also allows you to sleep at night. That being said the stops I use are not fixed and range from 30 to 60 points. So to answer your question, I have been there, done that and have the Tshirt for time wasted.

Forker - in agreement with you. While we have had success with dropping down a couple of time frames to isolate a 'better' entry point, my own style prefers to simply identify the set-up, choose the stop-loss, pick a reasonable entry and let the trend work in my favor. Simple, and often times simplicity just sets better with me rather than trying to get too cute with the entry.

 

[forker]

That's a good idea, I have a demo acct so will do on that.

What is your strike rate?

Just to be clear I was referring to your strike rate corresponding to the execution of your setups. In other words, if you take 10 trades and with 6 of those trades the setup behaved as expected. 4 trades the setup didn't work. Of those 6 trades, is your strike rate 100 percent in terms of executing the trade without being stopped out or exiting early? What I am trying to drill down to, is the sub timeframe work causing failed trades when the setup was successful.

Last year my strike rate in terms of setups working was 73.2% and an 89% successful execution rate. I can't measure strike rate over the course of a week or even month because of the nature of the data. I can and have hit 16 successive winners covering 2 months of trading. In those 2 months I had a 100% hit rate. Other months I might take 3 winners and 3 losers. I should state that I very rarely have more losers than winners and I would certainly stop trading if I had 4 in a row. Something is wrong if I found myself in that situation. I these setups are very good especially once you have the nack for identifying the good ones from the bad ones - when you keep things simple you can get a good feel for the fine detail that others using complicated methods miss.

 

[forker]

Forker - in agreement with you. While we have had success with dropping down a couple of time frames to isolate a 'better' entry point, my own style prefers to simply identify the set-up, choose the stop-loss, pick a reasonable entry and let the trend work in my favor. Simple, and often times simplicity just sets better with me rather than trying to get too cute with the entry.

Seems to be a common problem amongst traders. I am sure some get it right but overall, for the sake of 1-5%,it's not worth it

 

[rsh01]

Just to be clear I was referring to your strike rate corresponding to the execution of your setups. In other words, if you take 10 trades and with 6 of those trades the setup behaved as expected. 4 trades the setup didn't work. Of those 6 trades, is your strike rate 100 percent in terms of executing the trade without being stopped out or exiting early? What I am trying to drill down to, is the sub timeframe work causing failed trades when the setup was successful.

Last year my strike rate in terms of setups working was 73.2% and an 89% successful execution rate.

Re your execution rate - so 11% wld have made money as expected but didn't cos maybe you had too small SL or moved stop to BE or whatever?

If that occurs I put that down as a loss affectively ie the setup hasn't worked cos I wldnt want a bigger SL as this wld screw my rr up. And I wldnt do anything differently as the lower t/f PA indicates to do that. It cld be smthg I add if I am missing a lot of trades in this way, or I compare to h4 entries running on demo.

I am trying to attach GU h4 chart from my phone, hope it works, arrow to where I am guessing of the flip flop is. But there was a big time gap in the rejection so don't think it is.

 

[VielGeld]

Hi VG

Do you define 'refine' as getting a better price?

I used to think this was the case, but have now worked out it may mean less pips for that trade. I drill down to get additional confirmation in price turning, which has increased strike rate (so far) as I am no longer stepping in front of trains.

Will have to review again at later date though. Reckon its worthwhile exercise for ppl to try at least.

Refine can mean more profits or less risk, or both.

You just get a better view of the important intra-day levels and this can tell you whether it might be better to be patient and buy/sell a little bit later. A bit of confirmation isn't bad, either.

For example, your setup went by 1.xx50 on Eur/Usd and the 50 is becoming a point of resistance. Then by experience I can tell selling here might be a good entry if the 50 is also a current point of mean reversion (MR). I was looking at a potential trade last night at around 7 or 8 pm EST. The level of 1.225 and its accumulation around there during the evening told me something was up.

But I couldn't tell if it was going down straight away or if it was going to pullback before dropping. The lower T/Fs can give clues to this, and I saw pretty clearly the start of a sell-off after the Draghi ECB comments. So looking at a lower T/F makes me go "maybe waiting a bit longer until it sets up right would avoid going through that drawdown".

Pic to show what I mean:



The trendline shows the very clear effect of the 50 level there. It shot up to 1.23 (a trade I took! ), then got ploughed and became resistance. Unfortunately, by lack of exp. I couldn't tell where it was going no matter what so I didn't take the trade cry. Anyway, the idea was it was either going to go up to about 1.227 (higher end of MR), or go down to about 1.222 (the lower end of MR).

Turns out I could have held all the way down to 1.217! Of course, I'm working during the day and can't monitor that stuff, so I would've put TP at 1.222 and it would've still been good for some 30 pips.

Stuff like this is why I like refining a trade... But it also made me forgo the trade. So maybe there's wisdom in just getting your price and letting it run and properly size bets to prevent drawdowns from hurting you...

------

All that said, a current trade I'd be looking at is for current price @ 1.2205 to go all the way to 1.225 because of MR. Given tomorrow is a Friday, it might just work out all right, but you never know, of course...

Anyway, this is what I see on the 30s (albeit zoomed-out a bit):



So you can observe that 1.22 is holding (somewhat, lol...). You could put on a limit order for 1.22 or take the trade now if you'd prefer with a SL of 1.217 (today
's low) and TP at 1.225 or 50 gain/30 lose = 1.67 RR.

... And that's how I look at trades and the lower T/Fs for confirmation/risk reduction. :cheesy:

 

[forker]

Re your execution rate - so 11% wld have made money as expected but didn't cos maybe you had too small SL or moved stop to BE or whatever?

If that occurs I put that down as a loss affectively ie the setup hasn't worked cos I wldnt want a bigger SL as this wld screw my rr up. And I wldnt do anything differently as the lower t/f PA indicates to do that. It cld be smthg I add if I am missing a lot of trades in this way, or I compare to h4 entries running on demo.

I am trying to attach GU h4 chart from my phone, hope it works, arrow to where I am guessing of the flip flop is. But there was a big time gap in the rejection so don't think it is.

That is a flip-flop and it met its first target. You can be more selective with these on the basis of their targets. It is a fantastic range setup BUT don't deny yourself good trades because the first target doesn't yeild 100 points. I would take every 50 pointer day in day out over selectively taking only 100 pointers. The 50 pointers are more frequent and often hit their 2nd target which ends up being around 100 points. It is vital you take the first target, the second is a bonus.

The 11% refers to trading mistakes not setups failing. It's important to differentiate because classifying a mistake as a failed setup doesn't reflect the setup failing, it reflects a problem with my execution. The type of stuff I classify a mistake is early or late entry, early or late targets, managing stops, and trade sizes.

 

[VielGeld]

Hope you don't mind a bit of an addition to my previous post...

I decided to take that trade I was talking about there. Here's the pic of my screen:



So basically you can see the accumulation there on the 5m and 30s where price is forming a base a bit below 1.22. You certainly don't see this on the 1h chart where all you get is a single red bar. To me, that isn't sufficient to put a trade on.

Of course, MR can go both ways. Lots of air under my price on the 5m, so it might well retrace the whole thing.

However, price just shot up a couple pips seconds after entering, which is another thing I look for. If it does that, then I believe I waited until just the right moment to put on the trade.

Here's the pic to show what I mean since it happened while typing this up:



So in this sense, I believe my "refinement" to be beneficial! :cheesy:

(Until I post that this trade was an utter loser for wtv reason and so am I. )

 

[VielGeld]

(Until I post that this trade was an utter loser for wtv reason and so am I. )

Last post out of of me on this particular side-track.

What happened:



So yeah, big loser, which I managed into smaller loser. I suspect the MR I saw on the 5m was against me, and I should have been more attentive to that.

Nevertheless, it shows that refinement can get you a good price on both entry and exit if you're tuned in to it.

Now, as for whether it makes you more pips than foregoing the lower T/Fs... Gonna see about that.

 

[forker]

Range trading

An essential skill for all traders is range trading. I would be mentally and financially down the sh! tter without it. Focusing on catching big moves is like cutting your manhood off to spite your wife (metaphorically speaking of course). I thought I'd share a beautiful chart with you all that shows flip-flop setups catching enough points to keep that kitty healthy. Unfortunately BT Decided to disconnect my line with someone apparently taking my number over even though I didn't authorise it. So I can't highlight the setups as I am using my mobile. I am sure you can see them though as they are very distinctive.
One thing I should point out is the central price pivot, flip-flop trades are mini price pivots. If you think of them like that, they become easier to grasp.

 

[hgh]

not start yet. but looks very good of this post. hope to learn something here and try to keep money at first stage.

 

[forker]

When my Internet is back up (hoping for the 24th) I will post more content.

 

[VielGeld]

So would today's (this week's) Eur/Usd action on the 4h count as a stinger?

Price hit a low around 1.205, shoots up to ~1.215, back down to 1.213 which was roughly previous high on Tuesday, then roars up 200 pips to 1.23+.

Sound like a stinger by your definition?

 

[forker]

It is and I must compliment you for picking this one up. It's not easy pickings to the untrained eye. I didn't take it because I was long eurgbp from the day before with half a position still open. The euro setup you talk about is a shining example of the explosion that so often takes place. Did you take it?