What do you do when you're in a trade?

[bbmac]

that wasn't the question, Doh !!

The first step for a trader is making analyzing. Analyzing the fundamental and/or technical before opening position. What is fundamental analyzing? Analyzing macro economic of a country related with the pair I will trade

 

[DionysusToast]

For me, once a trade starts moving in the direction I want. I like to walk away from the screen for a minute or two. Grab a glass of water, have a pee.

For some reason, this seems to help me manage trades better. Gives me a sense of detachment. It's just a bit like a trading 'nervous tick'. I certainly can't recommend it because it sounds dumb even to me.

 

[Michael8667]

This is why a DEMO is so different.

You trade on a DEMO and you sit there with no feeling looking at your trade and don't really care.

LIVE accounts go a little different. You enter a trade and feel like every trade is a battle for your life.

 

[DionysusToast]

I agree that demo and live trading are indeed very different. I think demo trading is pretty much a waste of time.

Perhaps that's why live trades make me want to pee.

 

[Michael8667]

I agree that demo and live trading are indeed very different. I think demo trading is pretty much a waste of time.

Perhaps that's why live trades make me want to pee.

When I went from DEMO to LIVE I was literally shaking and it was only one ES contract. My stop was $62.50 away but still I was shaking!

 

[bbmac]

And that's exactly what understanding an edge and what it is/isn't and then the experience of implimenting it profitably over a sample (s) can help to prevent...because these such emotions are potentially desctructive.

As an experienced trader I do not feel that every trade is '...a battle for my life...'

G/L

....
LIVE accounts go a little different. You enter a trade and feel like every trade is a battle for your life.....

 

[Michael8667]

And that's exactly what understanding an edge and what it is/isn't and then the experience of implimenting it profitably over a sample (s) can help to prevent...because these such emotions are potentially desctructive.

As an experienced trader I do not feel that every trade is '...a battle for my life...'

G/L

I got told by my mentor, a relatively successful trader. (Not a genius who turned $2000 into $10,000,000 in 1year like most mentors people seem to have on here.) That being able to detach yourself from the value of money is key.

However I still think it is every man for themselves and what works for one might not work for the other.

Especially in psychology in which we are so much apart.

 

[robster970]

For me, once a trade starts moving in the direction I want. I like to walk away from the screen for a minute or two. Grab a glass of water, have a pee.

For some reason, this seems to help me manage trades better. Gives me a sense of detachment. It's just a bit like a trading 'nervous tick'. I certainly can't recommend it because it sounds dumb even to me.

Nope - I do this too when I know I am in an excitable state.

 

[wackypete2]

If I walk away from the screen I can't use my mental telepathy to "will" the price in my direction! It works too, you should see how mental I am!

Peter

 

[coopster]

Not really an issue during the trade for a momentum trader. Finger hovers over the Exit button.

The waiting for me comes when the market isn't doing much and the scanners are quiet. I still have to be vigilant though in case something crops up. No playing Halo for me.

Otherwise i'm filling the downtimes by documenting my trades in MS Access or refining scanners etc.

 

[DionysusToast]

Coopster - I'd be very interested to see what you've developed to document trades in Access....

I've not really come up with any way of doing it I'm happy with.

 

[Chartsy]

i swing so just check it every few hours

 

[nunrgguy]

Coopster - I'd be very interested to see what you've developed to document trades in Access....

I've not really come up with any way of doing it I'm happy with.

I built something a long time ago in Access. The main problem I came across, and why I don't use it, or any variation of it was that is quite a deep application that did rolling calculations on the trade database w.r.t realised r:r etc. The equations were pretty long and you have to quite a lot of 'circular' stuff in the code. It gets very slow very quick.

 

[iota]

Set and forget. Check in every so often.

Put an alert on for targets, and then one or two beyond targets either way so if it moves exponentially in either direction I know the loud *ping* means that went better|worse than I expected.

 

[DionysusToast]

There are many different personality types in trading.

There is a bit of a myth that you need to be a zen like trading master in total control of your emotions.

This is not at all true. I know a guy throws fits when he misses stuff and makes everyone around him miserable. Next day he'll be nice as pie. He's definitely got some issues but I suspect that's why he trades 10s of millions of dollars.

By comparison, I guess my needing to pee isn't so bad.

 

[coopster]

Coopster - I'd be very interested to see what you've developed to document trades in Access....

I've not really come up with any way of doing it I'm happy with.

It's nothing special. Strangely took forever to set up but that was from knowing nothing about MS Access and having to write a couple of modules to get it to work more effectively.

It's also still in the early stages. I'll develop it a bit further and let you know. Knowing that someone is interested in it is potentially an inspiration to get on with it.

Half tempted to go over to MySQL as it is a bit more robust i think. You probably know more than i do.

Send me an E-mail or PM if you like so we stop crashing the thread.

 

[DionysusToast]

Coopster - I'd be interested if I could put in the trade data but also notes and images.

I was using a forum I set up to do it - it's a perfect format but of course you get no metrics from it.

There's a few products out there but I couldn't find one that appealed - they were too mathy for me.I got the feeling none were written by traders.

I'll have a think & PM you...

 

[forker]

I wrote an app in .Net that uses access to track and statistically report on various setups i was tracking. It could save screenshots and everything... Not sure where I put it since I have no need for it anymore... Will look around for it if anyone is interested

 

[coopster]

It gets very slow very quick.

I use it to enter trade data (in a form) and the data is available to manipulate (with queries) as i wish. I just haven't done it yet. Daily totals is as far as i've got.

For the trading statistics etc. This is acceptable to be slow i think as it is not sometihng you need to do every day. The reason i am sticking with it becasue once i've eventually done the setup, i can interrogate the data and produce reports on any time period without having to do anything. Type in the start and finish dates hey presto a lovely report full of pie charts, ratios, averages, screenshots etc for my performance. No further work required.

OK, i'll stop the Off topic chat.

 

[brewski1984]

I am currently still in a trade right now. For the last hour I have been curled up in a ball, sucking my thumb and praying for the pain to go away. Now I'm back to around breakeven! I'm only posting this because I am hoping that if I don't look at the chart then magically I will be in profit. I have included these as rules in my trading plan so it's all good.