Hi All
I ve been following pivots for 3 years on the spot euro /dollar.
In the last few months (this year) they have been very impressive in calling turning points .Today being a case in point.I use Metatrader charts (free ,which agrees with my presbyterian character), and just point the mouse to yesterdays bar when i haul my rear out of bed in the morning.
The pivots are calculated 0000 to 2400 hrs GMT.
My strategy is to determine the daily trend and wait for a pullback to a pivot level(maybe the PP or S1 .I use a 15 MIN chart to look for confirmation.Typically double and treble bottoms appear at these levels and the odd triangle.Some days the support has come in before i have got my rear out of bed and ive simply missed the best level to get in.In hectic markets the pair spikes down to the support level and turns on a sixpence.
If ive got in at a good level i dont look at the short term charts at all.I believe that this is a pointless exercise and allow the thing to go up the page with very loose stops.My intial stop is 20 pips away from a natural support area on the 15 min chart and beyond the pivot determined suppport . When the market gets to R2 and stalls then its time for a cold one.
Clearly all is reversed when the daily trend is down.Just sell rallies to the pp and RI.
Have a look at today and it will be clear.
The biggest problem is to define the daily trend .Is it a buy day or a sell day.
I use a average which is attributed to a Canadian trader called Charles Drummond.He has got a course on the net which sells for 5000 dollars which is far above my budget for R+D.I got this from his free stuff( the first lesson of 30 odd is free).
He uses a 3 day average of the high ,low and close to determine the daily trend and it been great for me.Drummond calls it the PLdot.Its a three day average of the h ,l and close plotted one day into the future.If the dot is below the bars the trend is up,if above the trend is down and if in the middle of the bar the trend is neutral. This may seem very basic but it keeps me on the right side of the daily trend and allows me to go both ways in a sideways markets.Try it and see.
Again if you plot the last few days on the euro you should see exactly what iam talking about based on todays action..It means that you need just 3 days of high , low and close data and 15 min data of today to become successfull.
I am on about 65% hit rate but my wins are much bigger than my losses and most of the poor performance is due to my own weakness.I am much more proftable when i find support in a upmarket say and just leave the market to do what it has to do.
I hope this makes some sense.
UOTE=fort2w]Pivots may be calculated from midnight to midnight - good going into London session; others I've heard of also use 5pm-5pm since that's when many market makers close their day; set up a spreadsheet to show you both & see which work
I've found they track well on non-big-news days[/QUOTE]