The Trading Journey of Lurker

[lurkerlurker]

LL,

I get the feeling you are too tight with money. Not saying you are stingy or anything but you need to have a little bit money and excellent money management system + DISCIPLINE. However, you've got the have some money and be a little riskay with it.

I wouldn't go into a trade and then take 1 pip or 5 pip profits. (Unless it's FX 1min trades I know some people do it). In this game especially if you are a starter learning the ropes. That is bad strategy imo. You give 5 pips to your broker and take 1 pip and sweat for your self. Doesn't add up.

Here is a potential money management program for you - ( Just an idea )

Put £1K in there for starters. This should be money you lose. Consider it history. Why have you taken your £240 out of CMC. Is it 5% interest on 240 really worth the fuss. This tells me a lot about your psychology and whilst it's good to value money - on my approach given you want to trade it's very tight. Too tight.

I transferred the funds because even if I were to find the perfect system tomorrow, I couldn't rely on myself to implement it. I need about 1 week break from real trading, maybe more, in order to put my losses behind me. The losses have come thick and fast the last week, so I need time off from live trading. Furthermore, it will most likely take me 2 weeks to devise a system I would risk capital on. Inflation is 3%. Why leave £240 in an account at zero growth? A withdrawal request takes three lines of typing. A deposit is the same. Even if that money spends 10 days in my bank, it is earning more interest there than zero.

When you go into battle you must first prepare your self to die. Then you truly start living. You can't expect to hunt and not be hunted. It's all about pscyhology. You want to win a lot but not lose at all. Don't mean to sound arrogant but that's purely me and my approach. Fear of losing money will hold you back from making it. Also the thought of having lost it will wreck you for future trades if you are chasing what's no longer yours etc etc. It discolours judgement.

Anyhow,

Risk 2% - 20pt limits should give you 50 plays on your £1000. ( I think 10 pts is too small and 30 pts for your capital may be too much - but it's your call. 20pts is just my rec)

This means at two bets a day should give you 1 months capital assuming you don't make any money and all your trades are losses. I must confess most people take years of trying and learning and hence you can understand people losing £000s of pounds at say £1000 p/month pop.

You must know what is the cost of your actions before you commit your self.

Expect and be ready for worst possible outcome. In one months time you will have lost £1000 on these risk margin of 2%. Once you come to terms with that you can start to trade.

When I fix up a system which works on paper, I guess I could absorb another thousand trying to trade it.

I'm assuming if 50% of your calls are right you should make some pips. Remember markets can go up or down. Two choices. If you don't stick to your plan ( as we all don't sometimes ) market moves sideways and you get whipsawed well you'll be out quicker than a month. I'd guess you should have 2 months training to get up to speed.

This was a setup sent to me by t2w blogger 'CYOF'. Really great helpful guy. It's called system expectancy. On a spread sheet put all your trades - losses - wins and amount etc.

ie Average Win / Loss / Number of trades.

AW = 10.79
AL = -5.14
W% = 51%
L% = 49%
T = 400.00


Expectancy= 232.24


This will tell you how much your average loss and wins are as well as number of trades.

Everyday end of day update these. You can see immediately if your Wins are > Losses.

Obviously if these stats aren't going in the right direction you need to address your system or actions - as you are doing. But you must know this informtion.

You'll have a weekly factual report on your trading.

1 You need to ensure AW rise.
2 ALosses fall.
3. Your Win / Lose % ratio moves positive.

There are people out there who win 30 - 40 calls and lose 70 - 60 % of their bets and still win over all because they let their winners run and cut their losses early. ( I'm still trying to master this one ).

I used to do that at end of week. I don't know why I stopped. Perhaps when I started having losing weeks!

Finally, I feel guilty in that when too many people give you too much advice and perhaps some conflicting or contradcitory you may get over loaded. At the end of the day do what you think is right for you. What works. What yyou feel happy doing.

There is a lot of information to absorb, but knowledge is power. The differences of opinion are quite interesting also. One person thinks I should stop this as "futures trading isn't for everyone". Another thinks I should ignore trading for a week (without saying why), and you think I should commit another grand to this.

Interesting probabilities.

I think I should put the £240 back when I have a system with positive expectancy on paper. That gives me 7 bad trades. That is at least a week at 1 trade per day. If I lose £20 a day consistently for 7 days, adding more capital won't help in the short term. If that happens, then I need to go back to the drawing board before committing even more capital. Which means more paper trading, and more psychology work.

Thanks for the advice though - it is likely I will need another thousand or so before I can start turning a profit.

 

[lurkerlurker]

Volume

I have been reading some articles on this site, and came across one titled volume analysis. A very interesting read. I am aware of relationships between price and volume. To what extent am I being disadvantaged by the lack of volume information while spreadbetting?

Does anyone know of a good cheap or free YM realtime quote source?

Perhaps it would be better to look to trading the forex, which as far as I know does not have volume information.

 

[jacinto]

jacinto, while I appreciate your comment, there is more chance of me taking your advice if you explain your reasoning a bit more. Get what exactly out of my system? No posting? Have I offended anyone?

Are you just suggesting I ignore everything trading related for a week? Why a week? I have nothing better to do during that time than learn more about trading.

I am interested in your proposition, but am not sure what is in it for me.

sorry lurker,

i will explain. I think it is excellent your determination to succeed in trading. I think, however that the losses are too embedded in you system (mind) to allow you to know what to do.

That is what I mean, nothing else. Regarding to posting, no you have not offended anyone, but it is also something you need to get away with if you are to get things of the system (mind).

Dont know if I explain myself correctly.

You need time for you, time to know where things went wrong, and how to correct them. And what I mean is not on a trading method, its on the captain of a ship that is not making the right decision due to being "too emotionally involved".

right, I promise this is my last post for a week. Really got to go.

all the best. catch up in aweek.

j

 

[firewalker99]

I have been reading some articles on this site, and came across one titled volume analysis. A very interesting read. I am aware of relationships between price and volume. To what extent am I being disadvantaged by the lack of volume information while spreadbetting?

Does anyone know of a good cheap or free YM realtime quote source?

Perhaps it would be better to look to trading the forex, which as far as I know does not have volume information.

That article is from Sebastian Manby, he's a follower of VSA, well known by the books of Tom Williams. You can download an extract of his book for free (http://www.tradeguider.com/dlpdf.aspx) Volume can give clues, that's true, but if you are still searching for ways to define your system you probably shouldn't be trading. Also if you want to incorporate volume in your trading, definitely switch to a higher time frame. I made the mistakes when I first started trying to analyze volume on a 2-min time frame and it got me completely confused. My advice: you should only take notice of volume near important price levels (support and resistance primarily).

But there is no need to act on volume or even use it... a lot of traders complete ignore it. If you have your signals and your indicators and can create something around that, why look at something else? I have my indicator: price and if I were to look at Bollinger Bands, MACD, Stocastics, etc... I would be getting completely confused by all the contradicting signals. Remember: KISS.

 

[ceydababy]

Volume.......

That article is from Sebastian Manby, he's a follower of VSA, well known by the books of Tom Williams. You can download an extract of his book for free (http://www.tradeguider.com/dlpdf.aspx) Volume can give clues, that's true, but if you are still searching for ways to define your system you probably shouldn't be trading. Also if you want to incorporate volume in your trading, definitely switch to a higher time frame. I made the mistakes when I first started trying to analyze volume on a 2-min time frame and it got me completely confused. My advice: you should only take notice of volume near important price levels (support and resistance primarily).

But there is no need to act on volume or even use it... a lot of traders complete ignore it. If you have your signals and your indicators and can create something around that, why look at something else? I have my indicator: price and if I were to look at Bollinger Bands, MACD, Stocastics, etc... I would be getting completely confused by all the contradicting signals. Remember: KISS.

FW I totally agree with you. In my experience (limited) I have read about volume but never incorporated it in to any of my systems, mainly because it is not available on a SB Account.

I am of the opinion you could read up on any element of TA and the guy who is using it profitably is going to sing it's praises. Does it mean that you must incorporate Williams % indicators or Stochastic oscilators ?? Nothing wrong with using them, but I personally don't find them useful and couldn't make money with them. However, I am sure there are people using these profitably.

Don't take this the wrong way, but you appear to be grasping at straws, looking for the "magical" indicator that is going to cure your losses and turn you in to profit. I know this because I have been there too. All I can say you will search and search and you will never find this magical indicator....It really DOES NOT exist.

I keep saying this but I think you need to run with something at your skill level. This is what I eventually did, I was looking at FIB Retracements, Pivot Points, Stochastics, Combinations of different oscillators and eventually decided to go back to basics. As my skill level increases I will try and develop my systems. But the KEY is to have a system you FULLY understand, therefore you have CONFIDENCE when opening a position.

I have only been doing this 12 months and really don't claim to be an expert trader, I am just trying to drill home that if you keep over complicating, you are going to keep losing money.

Good luck with the new system......but really remember the 3 magic words...SIMPLE SIMPLE SIMPLE.

 

[lurkerlurker]

Thanks ceydababy. I'm really not looking for the holy grail indicator. The question about volume was a bit silly - I've had profitable weeks (and even a month) without volume data.

 

[lurkerlurker]

Blame it on Commissions

Just done my books of all trades ever taken since December 2006.

The following is rather illuminating.

My total loss: (£1,509.76) //Ouch

I've calculated the difference between the spread charged on the contract with the SB firms I have traded with, and the price charged by offshore hedging SB bookies (for example TwoWayFutures). TWF has a spread of 0.5 on the FTSE/Dax, 1 on the Dow, etc.

Difference between TWF spread and spread paid: £1,868.00

Taking into account the difference between the stake size (£pp) between the full future, and the sizes I have been using while spreadbetting, my account would be floating around breakeven had I just traded 1 lot of the full future from the beginning. (for this calculation, I had YM at £2.50pp)

At the very least, if I had been able to trade paying only the market spread, I would have a net positive pip total. I guess that makes my trades "right".

Straw Poll - setup costs in parenthesis. Should LurkerLurker:

1) Stick with CMC at £1pp until a decent profit can be made slowly over time (£Free, high commissions)
2) Open an IB account and pay the tax, make the spread instead of paying it (£2,500)
3) Open a TWF account and pay a spread of 1, not pay tax. (£5,000)

 

[firewalker99]

Straw Poll - setup costs in parenthesis. Should LurkerLurker:

1) Stick with CMC at £1pp until a decent profit can be made slowly over time (£Free, high commissions)
2) Open an IB account and pay the tax, make the spread instead of paying it (£2,500)
3) Open a TWF account and pay a spread of 1, not pay tax. (£5,000)

I can't decide which option is the best for you, but I would advice not to open any new accounts until you have thoroughly backtested and papertraded your system. The numbers will tell you how profitable your system is, and perhaps thén you can make a decision based on those numbers.

 

[firewalker99]

FW I totally agree with you. In my experience (limited) I have read about volume but never incorporated it in to any of my systems, mainly because it is not available on a SB Account.

... All I can say you will search and search and you will never find this magical indicator....It really DOES NOT exist.

... But the KEY is to have a system you FULLY understand, therefore you have CONFIDENCE when opening a position.

...but really remember the 3 magic words...SIMPLE SIMPLE SIMPLE.

And in turn I totally agree with you
I filtered about the best sentences of your excellent post ceydababy, I hope you don't mind me re-iterating this lurker, but it's really important stuff.

 

[firewalker99]

Trading Journals

I think these excellent posts are an obligatory read for anybody opening a journal, or in the process of journalising:

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/showpost.php?p=202729&postcount=5

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/showpost.php?p=202765&postcount=8

Articles on psychology and journals (Brett Steenbarger):

http://www.trade2win.com/knowledge/articles/general_articles/making-trading-journals-work-for-you/

http://www.trade2win.com/knowledge/articles/general_articles/when-trading-journals-dont-work/

http://www.trade2win.com/knowledge/articles/general_articles/improving-your-trading-performance/

It's a holiday weekend so I thought I'd give you some reading materials to study

 

[zigglewigler]

Without going into the specifics of yours, new traders tend to develop complexity into their trading systems as a response to fear.

You haven't yet delt with your emotions after loosing, so you go away and re-tweek, adding something that would keep you away from losses.

Trouble is, complex systems use indicators etc as an excuse not to take a position, your subconscious is telling you that you need to be out of the market, because being in can often cause pain.

You have to learn to take the blows without emotion.

There are plenty of systems out there that work, there is no need to develop your own, until you have the ability to apply a system rigidly fully accepting the risk of loss, you'll always struggle. Development is easier than application.

In addition, the Dow is a poor choice especially if using SB's. The S&P 500 would give you a better bang for your buck.

If you have the funds, trade futures.

 

[lurkerlurker]

Without going into the specifics of yours, new traders tend to develop complexity into their trading systems as a response to fear.

You haven't yet delt with your emotions after loosing, so you go away and re-tweek, adding something that would keep you away from losses.

Trouble is, complex systems use indicators etc as an excuse not to take a position, your subconscious is telling you that you need to be out of the market, because being in can often cause pain.

I finally recognised that, and wired my money back to my bank and decided to paper trade for a little while.

You have to learn to take the blows without emotion.

There are plenty of systems out there that work, there is no need to develop your own, until you have the ability to apply a system rigidly fully accepting the risk of loss, you'll always struggle. Development is easier than application.

Thank goodness for that. I was hoping that someone would come along and tell me I don't need to look at this blank page trying to think about how to formulate a trading system. Could you please point me to a Dax/YM/ES/Z system which works? A few I could choose from would be better. When I am satisfied as to what system works best for me, I can backtest and paper trade for a few weeks.

In addition, the Dow is a poor choice especially if using SB's. The S&P 500 would give you a better bang for your buck.

If you have the funds, trade futures.

I'll look into spread, volatility, and margin for the ES vs the YM for my SB accounts. I don't anticipate returning to SB for very long. See my earlier post (SB markup paid > total loss). The tax man can **** off for now though - I'd consider trading DMA through a SB wrapper with one of the offshore SB firms which hedge. 1 point spread on the YM.

 

[lurkerlurker]

I think these excellent posts are an obligatory read for anybody opening a journal, or in the process of journalising:

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/showpost.php?p=202729&postcount=5

http://www.trade2win.com/boards/showpost.php?p=202765&postcount=8

Articles on psychology and journals (Brett Steenbarger):

http://www.trade2win.com/knowledge/articles/general_articles/making-trading-journals-work-for-you/

http://www.trade2win.com/knowledge/articles/general_articles/when-trading-journals-dont-work/

http://www.trade2win.com/knowledge/articles/general_articles/improving-your-trading-performance/

It's a holiday weekend so I thought I'd give you some reading materials to study

And I read this a few minutes after I ask you for comments on and additions to my reading list (on another thread). I need to stop this. Since I stopped live trading, I've been reading trading stuff and posting on these boards for 19 out of 24 hours every day. I've still got a pretty bad head cold, so I am sleeping about four hours in the afternoon. I am in constant discomfort due to sinus pressure, so can't really get back to sleep. I'm spending every day all day glued to my monitors or slumped over a trading book.

I am getting used to it though. It is somewhat of a juggling act reading all these books and websites, trying to take in the advice and recommendations offered on this board, correspond with other members (my daily PMs are increasing exponentially), and work on testing a system. I'm just glad the markets are closed now, so I don't need to observe the charts in real time also.

Thanks for the journal article links. What I am about to do, and this may be of limited value, is to post the last complete statistical analysis of a weeks trading I have. Interestingly this is from my best trading week, beginning 23rd April, and comprising 4 days of trading. I note that Brett Steenbarger recommends the use of some metrics to evaluate performance over time. Hopefully I should be able to figure out what I was doing right then, compared to what I have done wrong since.

 

[lurkerlurker]

Statistical Summary of a weeks trading

Summary of Trading Activity: Week Beginning 23 April 2007

Contracts Traded: Index Futures
FTSE 100 Future
Dow Jones Industrial Average Future

Equity Futures (June Expiry)
Prudential Plc
Rio Tinto Plc
Standard Chartered
Vedanta Resources

Total Trades: 48
Winning Trades 39
Losing Trades 9
Losing Trades % 18.75%

Gross Profits: £ 1073.00
Average Profit £ 27.51

Gross Expenses:1 £ 333.00
Average Expense £ 6.93
Expenses / Gross Profit 31.03%

Gross Losses: £ 395.00
Average Loss £ 43.88

Fund Performance:
Days Traded

5​

Capital Invested

£ 500.00​

Net Profit

£ 345.00​

Gross Return

135.60% (per week)​

Net Return

69.00% (per week)​

Average Daily Profit

£ 69.00​

Lowest Daily Profit

£ 40.00​

Balances:
Opening Balance

£ 500.00​

Closing Balance

£ 845.00​

That was the week I turned £500 into £988, then lost some before the close on Friday (chasing £12 incidentally - one of the stupidest things I had ever done*). Still, not a bad run for a novice spreadbetter. The win:loss ratio is above what would be expected for pot luck. My goal is to recapture that kind of performance, and the confidence that comes with it. I have no idea how I managed to **** that up, but I managed to give back all the profits. I note looking over it again that I tend to trade quite a few FTSE contracts. Perhaps I should go back to the FTSE for awhile. The spread is certainly a lot less than the Dow.

I've just realised something about that week. That was the last week I traded with TradIndex as far as I remember. I had opened up a CMC account in search of tighter spreads. I made £43 with CMC, and have lost money consistently ever since! Correlation does not imply causation, and using TI instead of CMC is not a solution to my problems. Perhaps it was not the firms themselves. When using TradIndex, I generally relied on price from their charts, S/R from their charts, and a free yahoo quote feed (which gave OHLCV) imported into the wonderful AIOTrade (formerly Humai Trader). After I moved to CMC, I've been using more indicators in a trade than is healthy...

Perhaps grasping at straws here. Perhaps posting a summary, stats, and a full trade history for a week will help. If anyone spots anything of note in this data, please feel free to share.

Another pet peeve with CMC - no copy and paste of trades. Oh, and a daily statement an accountant would probably puzzle over for a few minutes. (the first statement I got, which showed longs and shorts valued against the closing price scared the hell out of me as I scrambled to confirm I was flat at just after midnight!)

* - that week, I had only put on 2 trades Monday night. The extra 12 represented a round figure of £1000 as an equity balance, doubling my funds in a week, making a living wage in a week, etc. I chased the last £12. Silly silly silly. And I don't know if anyone could post a YM chart for Friday 24 April, but my open loss did run up to almost £300 (or was it just over £300) before I was able to settle at ~-£150 at the close. And yes, I'm pretty sure I once had an opportunity to get out at £-40-something loss after it had run further against me, and I didn't take it. If someone could stick up a chart for that day I'd appreciate it.

Something else has just dawned on me. I don't think I've made a profitable day or week since. I've been scared in almost every trade.I've taken profits early and refused to define a loss. I think babysitting that open position with a three figure loss for 4 hours one Friday afternoon totally destroyed my confidence. It's all coming out now!

Looks like this post is useful after all!

Comments please

 

[Baldwreck]

Lurkerlurker
Hoping I've understood the stats correctly - your average win is £20.83** net and your average loss £43.89 albeit this is a very small statistical sample. But if representative, it means that you will have to maintain a success rate of 67.8% just to break even. I'm not an SB but (others to comment please) to gain a success rate of much more than 60% would be pretty phenonemal in which case your present stop-loss/take profit position is almost bound to fail. Hope this does not sound negative.

**of course firewalker99 below) is correct that the average net win is £18.97 - in which case the success rate required to breakeven increases to 69.8% - that says it all.

 

[firewalker99]

...

Let me put those results together in a small summary:

W/L: 39/9 = 81,25% winning trades
P/L: gross profits - expenses / gross losses = 740 / 395

Average winner = 18,97
Average loser = 43,89, ouch!

All the other numbers are of lesser importance.The above are basically what you need to analyze your system. How much of my trades are winners and how big are those winners?

These are my comments:
- 48 trades in one week on 1 instrument is a lot! that's almost 10 trades/day... basically that's pushing it imo

- your win% is excellent, actually 80% wins is astounding! unfortunately 5 days isn't a representative sample.

- your average loser is way too big; unless you can keep up with that 80% win ratio you are going to have to do change some parameters of your system, because a couple of bad big losers will diminish your account rather quickly

 

[lurkerlurker]

Let me put those results together in a small summary:

W/L: 39/9 = 81,25% winning trades
P/L: gross profits - expenses / gross losses = 740 / 395

Average winner = 18,97
Average loser = 43,89, ouch!

All the other numbers are of lesser importance.The above are basically what you need to analyze your system. How much of my trades are winners and how big are those winners?

These are my comments:
- 48 trades in one week on 1 instrument is a lot! that's almost 10 trades/day... basically that's pushing it imo

- your win% is excellent, actually 80% wins is astounding! unfortunately 5 days isn't a representative sample.

- your average loser is way too big; unless you can keep up with that 80% win ratio you are going to have to do change some parameters of your system, because a couple of bad big losers will diminish your account rather quickly

My average loser can be worked on. I lost in a few bad trades. I let my losses run way too far (for example around £150 late Friday afternoon). The wining trades...that is the hard part. I've asked around, but I'll ask again. Could you (or anyone else who reads this) post 1 min candle charts for each day of Z and YM trading covered in that spreadsheet? I'd like to reevaluate my entries and exits on indices for that week. The equities were nice trades, but I'm not bothered about reviewing them (or spending any time trading equities!).

Thank you for your complements of my results. Unfortunately as you surmise, it is not representative of my trading. It is the type of performance I strive for. I agree that 10 times a day is a little frequent to be in and out of the market, however I think the results speak for themselves. The losses are a result of lax stops, poor money management, and averaging down. With better money management, the system would be less profitable but would require a lower win % to break even. When (if?) I move to futures (or futures hedged SB) I will have less commissions / slippage / spread. I'd look to trade less regularly, but I don't think there should be a hard and fast rule for this. Yes, three trades is better than 10 (less commissions, stress, etc), but in a very choppy market the only way to have a good day is to buy the support and sell the resistance 10 points from each other on a 5 point SB spread, picking up +3 per five minutes due to bad fills.

Also, thanks for correcting my fuzzy (5am) math on the Win/Loss etc.

Follow up discussion strongly invited.

During that week, I felt almost no stress while trading. I didn't go overboard with excitement / gloating about the profits. It was more like "oh, just took £50 out of the American markets - time for a little lunch and a cup of tea", or "oh dear, lost £10 there - where is my next trade". Occasionally there was a "did I just make £70 in ten minutes!?" but that faded fast (usually as I gave a little back).

 

[Paul71]

Hi LL.

Hope your having a good weekend so far. Ten trades a day is fine! Why should it not be?

Trade how you want as long as you feel comfortable with it.

You seem to be asking for advice that you already know.

Just keep posting the trades matey. It's good for a person to post trades, a person starts to realise quite quickly to cut out bull and post decent stuff...or not bother.

I'm going to start posting more trades with you guys on the Dow thread, and wether they are right or wrong, i am starting to realise the 'self help' issues of posting trades and comparing with other traders and their comments.

It's not a competition, you can learn a hell of a lot about your own psychology and trading, and hopefully sculpt yourself and your style into something that you are happy with.

Just keep posting, reading and thinking. Re-adjust to suit.

Good evening, LL.

 

[firewalker99]

I've asked around, but I'll ask again. Could you (or anyone else who reads this) post 1 min candle charts for each day of Z and YM trading covered in that spreadsheet? I'd like to reevaluate my entries and exits on indices for that week.

Unless somebody else is first, remind me to post those on Monday.

I agree that 10 times a day is a little frequent to be in and out of the market, however I think the results speak for themselves. The losses are a result of lax stops, poor money management, and averaging down. With better money management, the system would be less profitable but would require a lower win % to break even.

If the only reason your losses are so big is not following your rules (changing stops, averaging down, etc), then you need to write down what your losses would be according to plan. A follow-up post with those numbers would be interesting to compare. If it's really the case, then you might as well have a very good system on your hands.

During that week, I felt almost no stress while trading. I didn't go overboard with excitement / gloating about the profits. It was more like "oh, just took £50 out of the American markets - time for a little lunch and a cup of tea", or "oh dear, lost £10 there - where is my next trade". Occasionally there was a "did I just make £70 in ten minutes!?" but that faded fast (usually as I gave a little back).

Why didn't your emotions get in the way that week? You already seem to have a lot in place, yet I read another recent post of you where you asked for help on other systems. It seems like you could already have a good one of your own... if the numbers you have posted would show up to be consistent over an expanded time period.

 

[lurkerlurker]

Firewalker, I'm reluctant to post what ifs. You can see for yourself the final trade for the week on the Dow contract was averaged down to a silly amount. If you look at the chart, you'll see I sat around through a major price move against me, paralysed. If you really want to know what the system would have done with better money management, it would have taken a 1 trade loss of around £40 on the last contract of the day. The averaging down would not have happened, and a position would never have been allowed to run £300 into the red, before exiting near the close at £-150.

Scratch 2 of the 3 losing trades on Friday afternoon, and remove £110 of the loss. That is probably the closest result you will get to the "true" performance.

Why didn't my emotions get in the way? If I knew that, I'd have no problems, but here are some guesses.

I was thinking about taking "some" money out of the markets depending on what they offered (no profit targets)
I spent hours each night reading charts for the instruments I wanted to trade, and doing fundamentals on the equities. When I entered my trades I was confident in the outcome, and fully prepared to be stopped out.
When I had losing trades, I ensured the loss was acceptable and then simply ignored them until the evening review.
I exited when I felt the market had told me "enough". I did not get greedy (or fearful of losing profits - I simply covered)
My order execution was pretty spot on, and fairly automatic. I did not sit and think about putting in orders, I just did them.
After the first few trades, the possibility of closing the week at a loss was pretty distant. I never risked more than the weeks profit on a trade. Even at the end of the week, I had not risked £488 on the bad trade. I felt that whatever happened, I would learn something and the only thing I could lose were profits (not really my money in my mind at that stage). I now understand the importance of protecting profits, but much like when you have a breakeven stop, you are left with the possibility of scratch or profit instead of profit or loss, and you feel more secure about the trade. For those who are not total masters of their emotions, that is just the way that it is.

Just some ideas. When you can trade without emotions interfering, why is that? Confidence in your system, or something else?