Are you a successful intraday trader?

[Seabiscuit1968]

Hi,

after four years of unsuccessful trading I am getting close to the conclusion that it is not possible to make money consistently trading intraday at 1' 3' or 5' on futures such as ES, ER2, YM, etc.

I spent hundreds and hundreds of hours, trading and studying. I have been able to code on TradeNavigator profitable strategies to trade stocks and futures extended but nothing that works and produces profit, with a respectable drawdown, intraday.

I do not believe anyone can do it till someone will prove me the opposite.

I would be really pleased to talk to a successful intraday trader.

Thanks

Massimo

 

[trader_dante]

I do not believe anyone can do it till someone will prove me the opposite.

I would be really pleased to talk to a successful intraday trader.

Massimo,

I trade hourly bars. It is not exactly the 1, 3 and 5m TF but it still qualifies as intraday trading and I am consistently profitable.

I use price action, S/R levels and Fibonacci for the most part.

I do personally know some traders from this board that profit on the markets and TF's you mention. However, whether they will come forward I do not know.

You will often find that those who really make the money keep in the shadows

 

[JTrader]

sub H1 is tough going, what with news releases & the resulting eratic price action etc.

 

[nine]

Short timeframe has the same requirements as other timeframes.

Find a setup (and logical exit rules) that is profitable and then trade it. Noise can be an advantage - one man's noise is another mans opportunity to fill at a much better price. News - know the times and don't trade into news and don't trade after news if the shock creates too much volatility for your strategy.

The challenge is in emotional management and discipline because the time for decision making is shortened and thus logical planning is less likely. I don't know about systems based short timeframe trading as mine is discretionary and despite my programming skills I've never figured out how to program a really good looking setup.

 

[fibonelli]

Massimo,

Magari il mio italiano fosse spedito come il tuo inglese.

A couple of points from someone who is finetuning a method that has a positive expectancy taking all unfiltered signals (based on empirical evidence to date).

1. Is your trading method truly suitable for the 1 to 5 minutes timeframe, or would it work better on a higher timeframe eg 30m, 1hr etc?
2. Are you truly comfortable trading these very short timeframes and of having to make very quick decisions?
3. Have you analysed the reasons for the losing trades?
4. How many of these losing trades was because your stop was too close?
5. Are you following your trading rules in terms of entry, stop loss and exit as written down on a sheet of paper?
6. Do you trade the economic news annoucements? Do you often lose money doing these trades?
7. Have you backtested your trading strategy across a range of stocks and futures contracts? Was it profitable?

Ti auguri buona fortuna.

Fibonelli

 

[Trader333]

sub H1 is tough going, what with news releases & the resulting eratic price action etc.

For forex trading, (in my view), trading the news is a good way to make money.


Paul

 

[FXSCALPER2]

You should be able to tell whether you cannot do it or it cannot be done. In forex, you will find that it is the former. This is true whether it is said by a successful trader or not. In other words, did you actually have the knowledge and experience to trade and (more importantly) were you prepared to take the risk and trade whenever there were good opportunities? Did you take tiny profits all the time and you were taking occasional relative big losses? Were you able to take advantage of the occasional big moves once you are in a trade?

The question in most cases is whether you have what it takes. It ain't easy.

 

[black bear]

Your only as good as your next trade

Short timeframe has the same requirements as other timeframes.

Find a setup (and logical exit rules) that is profitable and then trade it. Noise can be an advantage - one man's noise is another mans opportunity to fill at a much better price. News - know the times and don't trade into news and don't trade after news if the shock creates too much volatility for your strategy.

The challenge is in emotional management and discipline because the time for decision making is shortened and thus logical planning is less likely. I don't know about systems based short timeframe trading as mine is discretionary and despite my programming skills I've never figured out how to program a really good looking setup.

Nine

Good post again Nine,

Yes I am , by others standards I would guess JUST About

I will go with this and comforting to no that my lack or limited IT skills are not that important.

Always thought it may be a disadvantage or weakness doing everything manual

"The challenge is in emotional management and discipline because the time for decision making is shortened and thus logical planning is less likely."

The only way I can describe it at the moment is ~ trained instinct

Instinct trained with in excess of + thousand pieces of information you have worked through, collecting and discarding till you are happy with whats left.

Demo then Live then Demo practice till your almost a robot and emotion removed or dampened down at any rate. You need a bit IMO

Decision making and planning for me are done way a head of entry intra day.

months ago in fact = hours of practice and watching TWO MARKETS ONLY

If its not there on a day or week even, I never force it I never try to force an entry if I do not see what I am looking for, what am I looking for :?:

Something my instinct tells me is correct,

Just for you TD you attemt a kill at close range and select the one that won"t put up a fight

If I am all at sea = no trade NEVER, I would rather slit my wrists than take 2nd rate entries these days.

If I find more I will tell you, if you no more PM me please

Andy

 

[trader_dante]

Just for you TD you attemt a kill at close range and select the one that won"t put up a fight

LOL

 

[Jack o'Clubs]

Temperament has a lot to do with it. I know several intra-day traders who make very good money, but I also know that my several attempts at it have not been universally successful Why? I get bored looking at a screen waiting for set-ups and so either find my attention wanders and miss opportunities (usually because I'm reading / posting to this bloody forum ), or I rush into things that aren't perfect, because I've got fed up sitting there with no action. So, I'm happily reconciled to being an EOD trader/investor which seems to suit my style/temperament much better. I can work intensively for a couple of hours a day going through the previous day's action, prepare my trades and then go off and do something else. So horses for courses, but just because one's personal experience of a certain style isn't great, doesn't mean it won't work for anyone else.

 

[jayjay121]

im going through the same predicament.

Im 29 been trying to learn this game since i was 21 and still not consistent, getting better all the time, but not consistent enough to make it full time yet.
I believe im getting closer all the time, but if i do make it as a trader it will go down as one of my greatest achievements. I honestly believe trading can be easy once you have done all the system testing and traded it for a while until fully confident, i just have not ever reached that stage yet. I will not give up simply because i believe i was born to do this and have now come too far, but what i would say is that in hindsight i believe there are easier ways to make money in life other than intra-day trading.


jason

 

[EUR/DOG]

Hi,

after four years of unsuccessful trading I am getting close to the conclusion that it is not possible to make money consistently trading intraday at 1' 3' or 5' on futures such as ES, ER2, YM, etc.

I spent hundreds and hundreds of hours, trading and studying. I have been able to code on TradeNavigator profitable strategies to trade stocks and futures extended but nothing that works and produces profit, with a respectable drawdown, intraday.

I do not believe anyone can do it till someone will prove me the opposite.

I would be really pleased to talk to a successful intraday trader.

Thanks

Massimo

I am not a great supporter of intraday trading but if you are so keen on it then perhaps you may try a method that was utilised by Biagio Spinelli who won Top Trader Championship in Stock category in 2005. He was trading through the broker called Directa (I assume you live in Italy) and achived +68.05% in three months scalping Italian stocks. The strategy goes like this: The Italian stock index MIB40 directly follows the Dax index, if you can watch the Dax index carefully, as soon as it starts to rise or decline, you can buy or sell the most illiquid stocks on the Italian index, and then have a good edge in anticipating a move. In the even you wrong, it is usually easy to exit the trade at breakeven.

 

[Seabiscuit1968]

Hi Jack,

talking about set-ups have you got some very good one for future intraday trading?

Thanks

Massimo

Temperament has a lot to do with it. I know several intra-day traders who make very good money, but I also know that my several attempts at it have not been universally successful Why? I get bored looking at a screen waiting for set-ups and so either find my attention wanders and miss opportunities (usually because I'm reading / posting to this bloody forum ), or I rush into things that aren't perfect, because I've got fed up sitting there with no action. So, I'm happily reconciled to being an EOD trader/investor which seems to suit my style/temperament much better. I can work intensively for a couple of hours a day going through the previous day's action, prepare my trades and then go off and do something else. So horses for courses, but just because one's personal experience of a certain style isn't great, doesn't mean it won't work for anyone else.

 

[tradermoe]

Hey Massimo,
I know exactly how you're feeling as I have felt the same for quite a long time myself.
Is this all a facade? Were there any true Consistent traders out there? Are there any methods that truely work? Well for years I never found anyone who could prove to me or show me consistent gains using there methods until recently. Just a couple of weeks ago one of my friends introduced me to a chat room where moderators would demonstrate there multi point trades intra day making consistent gains daily. I couldnt believe it so I decided to try them out for myself. They luckily have a free demo room for a two week period. After just a few days of witnessing phenominal trades being called live, I couldnt believe my eyes. I was truely greatful to finally have found some true consistent traders that had all use the same method day in and day out for consistant gains. Take a look, its for free and if you agree with my conclusion you can thank me later Good luck to you ...here's there link and I can get you in contact with there developer and moderator if you want. I truely hope this helps you as it has me. Take care and keep your chin up.

 

[leovirgo]

Hi,

after four years of unsuccessful trading I am getting close to the conclusion that it is not possible to make money consistently trading intraday at 1' 3' or 5' on futures such as ES, ER2, YM, etc.

I spent hundreds and hundreds of hours, trading and studying. I have been able to code on TradeNavigator profitable strategies to trade stocks and futures extended but nothing that works and produces profit, with a respectable drawdown, intraday.

I do not believe anyone can do it till someone will prove me the opposite.

I would be really pleased to talk to a successful intraday trader.

Thanks

Massimo

Dear Massimo

In my experience, we still need high TF, say 30min, 60min, in order to trade at 1,3,5mins. I wasn't succesful in the beginning due to two factors- no viable system & no discipline. But I now have an intraday index trading system with two components- one for trending days and the other one for range days. See my equity chart attached which is for range day trades over the last 12 months, $1 represents 1 point for dow. It has about 100 trades, and the other strategy, i.e, trend day strategy has eighty trades. So my strategy has no more than one trade per day. And the good thing for me is that it is fully automated. I use my own market leading indicator, cycle analysis and support resistance. (I don't use Fibbo or wave count.)

 

[TWI]

For me when working intraday it is important to have a bias to go with the flow of the higher timeframe and approach the trade from the point of view of exits rather than entries. Know your outs and make them consistent.

 

[poster]

I my self has lost a lot in Intra day in March after making profit in February. But now I am back to my usual basics and have started towards making my loss in March to break even in April and then turn in to profit. I lost about $ 2600 in March. But now I am back. I was more greedy, after having successful February and taking in to mind that June, I may call it as vacation. Alas! learned my lesson and back to my original strategy and playing conservative rather than aggressive. I am trading DJIA Futures and S & P Futures. Tried my hands in Forex, but lost and so back to DJIA & S & P Futures. I wondered, every time I traded, I put a stop loss of 30 points, which kept hitting in case of DJIA and stop loss of 12 ticks for S & P which also kept hitting. And after hitting, it went in my direction of Trade. Could have easily made money if my stop loss didnt hit. But thats how it gets you. Now I am back to my original 40 points stop loss for DJIA and 16 ticks stop loss for S & P Futures, and trades are turning favorable in April. I would like to know what is the good stop loss for day trading, I mean how many points or ticks. i generally scalp 10 - 20 points in DJIA and 4 - 8 ticks in S & P with stop loss of 40 points in DJIA and 16 ticks in s & P. Am I right??? Since there are many good intra day trader on this forum, please advise.

 

[Pat494]

I i generally scalp 10 - 20 points in DJIA and 4 - 8 ticks in S & P with stop loss of 40 points in DJIA and 16 ticks in s & P. Am I right??? Since there are many good intra day trader on this forum, please advise.

Just my 2 cents worth but I think 16 points stop loss for S&P is too many. 4 is usually sufficient. Depends a bit if you jump back into same trade direction if you have just been stopped out.

 

[brutusdog]

I my self has lost a lot in Intra day in March after making profit in February. But now I am back to my usual basics and have started towards making my loss in March to break even in April and then turn in to profit. I lost about $ 2600 in March. But now I am back. I was more greedy, after having successful February and taking in to mind that June, I may call it as vacation. Alas! learned my lesson and back to my original strategy and playing conservative rather than aggressive. I am trading DJIA Futures and S & P Futures. Tried my hands in Forex, but lost and so back to DJIA & S & P Futures. I wondered, every time I traded, I put a stop loss of 30 points, which kept hitting in case of DJIA and stop loss of 12 ticks for S & P which also kept hitting. And after hitting, it went in my direction of Trade. Could have easily made money if my stop loss didnt hit. But thats how it gets you. Now I am back to my original 40 points stop loss for DJIA and 16 ticks stop loss for S & P Futures, and trades are turning favorable in April. I would like to know what is the good stop loss for day trading, I mean how many points or ticks. i generally scalp 10 - 20 points in DJIA and 4 - 8 ticks in S & P with stop loss of 40 points in DJIA and 16 ticks in s & P. Am I right??? Since there are many good intra day trader on this forum, please advise.

you will need a very high % of winners to losers with a stop twice the size of your target.

 

[DaxDestroyer]

Yes, I am

It must be difficult to earn money, because if it were easy, no money would be there to be earned

What often makes the difference is discipline as most set-ups are commonly known.

And btw the most successful guys just tell you about their secret openly.

Here a quote of Paul Rotter:" I just do the opposite of what everybody else does."

Don't disregard it, don't laugh at it!

Think about it and you find success

BUT, PLEASE Not all of you, because I had to change my approach again