Breakouts

In the light of Tomorton sharing his frustration regarding the tediousness of this journal I will no longer post my new orders and adjustments of orders. I am regularly changing orders as patterns are invalidated and to make the most of my available margin. The reason I posted them up is because I am not screen watching and usually not at my desk to make a post when an order is filled and posting them after the fact violates the code of conduct around "live calls". However having thought about it I don' really care.

Long USD/CHF.

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There's a lot of tosh posted about posting live orders. Also account details and suchlike. I never post live orders and rarely post what trades I am in, even long-term stuff. What I do advocate is posting up details of a strategy in advance so people can see what you intend to do. If they're any good they will be able to see whether it could make money or not, they shouldn't insist on live orders or audited accounts etc. This is just what you've done, Keep doing what you're doing.
 
Short Bitcoin

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2020 Week #12 Review (Balance: 23,317.69 , P/L: +£1,127.93 / +5.08%)
Summary

  • Not been posting trades this week because reasons.
  • Short on Bitcoin stopped out. I realised I don't like continuation patterns, I like these patterns to appear as the price is bottoming out after a decline. Added rule not to take continuation patterns.
  • Exited Soyabeans a day early due to volatility thereby breaking my exit rule, left money on table. See chart.
  • Decent win on Bitcoin Cash but got out hour early, breaking my exit rule, and missed it crashing.
  • Trading the DAX was a dumb idea in hindsight but it met the criteria so it was a trade.
  • Should not have taken simultaneous position in Bitcoin when had correlated position in Bitcoin Cash. Have added new rule to approach.
  • Traded new markets such as Natural Gas and Soyabeans which operate different hours from forex and I need to get a handle on them if I continue to trade them.
  • Wondering how safe my money is with IG in these turbulent times.
  • Need to be consistent with exits. I gained by exiting my Bitcoin Cash position early and left money on the table by exiting Soyabeans early. Exiting arbitrarily does not help prove approach works.
  • Good to end week with a profit especially considering market conditions, however with inconsistent exits I feel like I am playing roulette.
Trades
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Analytics
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Charts
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2020 Week #12 Review (Balance: 23,317.69 , P/L: +£1,127.93 / +5.08%)
Summary
  • Not been posting trades this week because reasons.
  • Short on Bitcoin stopped out. I realised I don't like continuation patterns, I like these patterns to appear as the price is bottoming out after a decline. Added rule not to take continuation patterns.
  • Exited Soyabeans a day early due to volatility thereby breaking my exit rule, left money on table. See chart.
  • Decent win on Bitcoin Cash but got out hour early, breaking my exit rule, and missed it crashing.
  • Should not have taken simultaneous position in Bitcoin when had correlated position in Bitcoin Cash. Have added new rule to approach.
  • Traded new markets such as Natural Gas and Soyabeans which operate different hours from forex and I need to get a handle on them if I continue to trade them.
  • Wondering how safe is my money with IG in these turbulent times.
  • Need to be consistent with exits. I gained by exiting my Bitcoin Cash position early and left money on the table by exiting Soyabeans early. Exiting arbitrarily does not help prove approach works.
  • Good to end week with a profit especially considering market conditions, however with inconsistent exits I feel like I am playing roulette.

Trades
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Analytics
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Charts
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View attachment 276480

Annoying situation with the text formatting which I have been unable to rectify.
 
I shall be resuming this journal in the near future. I have changed the exit criteria which is going better (although still tending to exit early leaving money on the table e.g. I should still be in US Crude as I type this). I also made the cardinal sin on a Gasoline trade thinking I had a "perfect setup" and widened my stop taking a loss for 3.6 times my initial risk.

Account balance now stands at ~£26,000 and I have made a withdrawl of £3,900. April was a good month.

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I made some unsuccessful experiments with options.
 
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I shall be resuming this journal in the near future. I have changed the exit criteria which is going better (although still tending to exit early leaving money on the table e.g. I should still be in US Crude as I type this). I also made the cardinal sin on a Gasoline trade thinking I had a "perfect setup" and widened my and taking a loss for 3.6 times my initial risk.

Account balance now stands at ~£26,000 and I have made a withdrawl of £3,900. April was a good month.

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View attachment 279295

I made some unsuccessful experiments with options.

Missed off the offending Gasoline trade

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Currently long the DAX and Gasoline. I got stopped out on a false breakout on DAX yesterday so this is second attempt. It did occur to me that it may not be a good idea to be initiating a position the day before a bank holiday, there is only one way to find out.

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I am going to update the rules on the first post shortly.
 
A few changes to the strategy

1. Replaced timed exists with targets. Target set at top of triangle + triangle height
2. Entry now set at top of triangle + 15% of triangle height rather than 20%
3. Stop now set at top of triangle - 5% of triangle height rather than 10%
4. Removed references to First Strike as my strategy no longer resembles it
5. I am now risking £1,000 per trade which on current account balance is 4%. This is too big but I am comfortable with the size for now. As my account grows the risk will remain fixed and decrease as a percentage with the aim of getting down to 2 - 3%.
 
Currently long the DAX and Gasoline. I got stopped out on a false breakout on DAX yesterday so this is second attempt. It did occur to me that it may not be a good idea to be initiating a position the day before a bank holiday, there is only one way to find out.

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I am going to update the rules on the first post shortly.

DAX moved to BE. Stop on Gasoline is already at BE.
 
Faced with an interesting dilemma. The DAX trade is looking strong, however I just noticed that there is a huge gap (see red zone on chart) sitting between my target price and I. The reason I missed it must be that I neglected to check higher TF. My current thinking is:

1. My stop is at BE so unlikely to take a loss
2. The momentum is strong,
3. I am having a decent month so far and it's still early so plenty more opportunities to come
4. It is not the close of the gap which is an obstacle, the open (correct term?) seems to offer less resistance.
5. "Gap open" was penetrated on previous attempt.

I am going to go for it, I may change my mind before next weeks open.

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Faced with an interesting dilemma. The DAX trade is looking strong, however I just noticed that there is a huge gap (see red zone on chart) sitting between my target price and I. The reason I missed it must be that I neglected to check higher TF. My current thinking is:

1. My stop is at BE so unlikely to take a loss
2. The momentum is strong,
3. I am having a decent month so far and it's still early so plenty more opportunities to come
4. It is not the close of the gap which is an obstacle, the open (correct term?) seems to offer less resistance.
5. "Gap open" was penetrated on previous attempt.

I am going to go for it, I may change my mind before next weeks open.

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View attachment 279566

Difficult result to take to be up of £2K and come away with nothing. When I woke this morning I could see the price was reacting to the gravity of the gap and I had an urge to close which I ignored as I wanted to stick to my plan. I considered tightening stop (not really in my plan) but decided against that as I reasoned that a retracement would need space.

So with hindsight if I am up £2K on a trade and suddenly realise I am in close proximity to a gap and the price is reacting to it the correct course of action may be to take the money.

Edit: 11,000 is also a significant round number so given the confluence of these two factors it was risky to remain in the trade (easily said with hindsight). I am adding an item to my checklist to check for significant round numbers.

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