FTSE unlucky for me the 13th

[mitchy39]

Hi all, just wanted to see if anyone else got there fingers burnt or for the lucky ones who caught the high rise today.
Chatting to two friends of mine who also spread bet thought it was going to go down all three of us lost a tidy sum. I have only been SB for 6 months however just recently seem to be losing far more than I am making & that seems to be the case for my two friends , one has now been doing it for the last 6 years. For me it seems to be a head thing I am cutting my profits short & letting my losses run,, the opposite on want i want to do however I set my stops but sometimes feel to keep in the position I expand my stop position only ever max about 100 pts. For the more experienced of you out there do you go more than this or am I being foolish putting big stops and letting my positions hit them. One friend of mine goes with 20 pt stops but he feels he is also getting burnt out too quickly. Hope some of you made big today unlike me who is feeling very annoyed with myself today.

 

[wallstreet1928]

Sorry to hear my friend,

I trade the FTSE 100 with 20/25/30 stops !!

sometime I scalp with 10 point stops !!

but yes, today was a roller coaster and the rally was unexpected given the bad news from china exports overnight and standard chartered sent the banks down!!

I was short initially but switched to long and eventually broke even for the day

 

[Shakone]

From early July, the FTSE is up about 20%. It dropped in August, but the trend is still up. It sounds like you went short and got burnt. Why go short? What is telling you to go short?

I think your 100 pt stop is huge, but i trade intraday. If you're playing this daily, weekly or monthly, then I guess that is reasonable, but intraday 100 points for the FTSE is too large,

 

[valutist808]

seems that all stock indices are posided to reach the year highs based on QE expectations .. .but what next ? what will do the markets after reaching highs and the QE will be almost priced ?

what do you think ?

 

[mitchy39]

seems that all stock indices are posided to reach the year highs based on QE expectations .. .but what next ? what will do the markets after reaching highs and the QE will be almost priced ?

what do you think ?

I am finding it hard to read the markets at the mo, my head tells me one position my eyes another. However I believe the market (FTSE 100 daily cash) will reach the 6000 mark by the end of the year. However on the other side any financial scare from a large organisation has the ability to put the financial markets into armageddeon. Interesting times ahead.

 

[mitchy39]

From early July, the FTSE is up about 20%. It dropped in August, but the trend is still up. It sounds like you went short and got burnt. Why go short? What is telling you to go short?

I think your 100 pt stop is huge, but i trade intraday. If you're playing this daily, weekly or monthly, then I guess that is reasonable, but intraday 100 points for the FTSE is too large,

Thank you for your reply I am still quite new to this & only been spread betting on the FTSE daily for 4 mths, I have tried shorter stops & scalping the market however get burnt out quickly on my position, may be I try to be too greedy & take too much profit.
Working full time i find it safer (well sometimes) to have a large stop in place however just lately seem to let my profits run short & losses run all the way too my stop which when are a 100 lose quite a bit of money, enough when i'm betting £10/pt.
The annoying thing sometimes (I try to chart the market & yes you are right the trend is bull & my eyes said go with a buy but my head went sell) guess it did not help went buy the day before set a stop of 80 pts droped a 1pts below my stop & then climbed up the rest of the day to 15pts above what I brought at. Guess this is spread betting....I have always thought with time I will get this just I don't as every body does not want to burn too much money. I do not find it helps with a trial demo account as I seem to make alot of money on that its just when it comes to my own money it becomes all different.
Excuse my ignorance is intra day (in & out the market daily?)

 

[Mr. G]

Mitchy - doesn't sound like you have your rules down. Maybe you do and you jsut didn't mention them. What makes you take a trade? How do you define you entries and exits?

 

[mitchy39]

Mitchy - doesn't sound like you have your rules down. Maybe you do and you jsut didn't mention them. What makes you take a trade? How do you define you entries and exits?

Mr G, I am still quite a novice (4mths) & know there is alot to learn, I find it very interesting reading this forum & digest how other people trade. I do go with plans however find it very hard once my trade is open to then stick to them. Mainly when I am in profit the greed takes over & I want to wait for that extra point rise.....& when in a loss rather than cut & run I wait & more often than not all the way until my stop blows out albiet sometimes at 50 pts sometimes at 100.
What makes me trade ...I enjoy it (not all the time, losses do not help) however I feel espicially while I am only doing a £1/pt it is not breaking the bank. This is a learning curve, while doing a demo acct for 3 mths I made money so thought I would trade for the next 6 mths at £1/pt to see how i would do. However now struggling to understand why my trades are 70% of the time losing money. I define my entries & exit by using the charts on the SB platform usually plotting the last 3 months.

 

[Mr. G]

I know what you mean mitchy. I think we have all been there. That's why defined entry and exit points work as they take the emotion out.