I cleared my mind from the morning’s bungling, took a deep breath and watched the FTSE again for a clear setup. I saw three with two of them being winners of +10 at full size and one was breakeven (well, + 0.5). The FTSE account is now up 10% for the day. I had an exhausting day, but here are the trades:
3 good trades on the FTSE
I had a long bias on the FTSE today and the market kept going lower. I took five long trades and I should have taken short trades. It was obvious to me the market was going lower, but ego got in the way (again) and my desire to be right cost me money. I lost 13.5 points on the FTSE at 50% size, so not a big losing day, but a damn good lesson.
5 trades on FTSE
Very close to being a winning day, but ended up losing. See the video for reasons.
Chart
-10 ticks on the Russell
Video
I am looking for a UK broker to allow me to trade the FTSE future direct market (if you know of a good one, message me). In the meantime I am using the bucket shop IG Index to place spread bets. I entered a trade this morning on the open of the FTSE, short at 5650 with a 10 point stop. I got stopped out at 5660. Rather than getting annoyed with that, I stood back and looked at what the market was doing. It was apparent that it tried to make two pushes up and was failing around the 60 level. The European and US indices were all heading lower on heavy volume, so I hit market again at 5657 short and a failed second push higher. I left the trade open with no target. After 15-20 minutes I reassessed, and the position looked good (in my favour), so I kept it. I then placed a limit to buy back at 37 to give me 10 points net profit on the day. I increased my spreadbet account by 10%.
2 trades on the FTSE-100
Pay attention to your ego. My ego tried to take control of me today, I am working hard to try and suppress it, but it’s not easy. I was going to write this blog post and omit the first trade, but then I caught myself. This blog has been 100% open and honest for the whole time I’ve been writing it, but my ego tried to assert itself. Luckily, I spotted it and decided to continue with my open and honest journalling. Today on the first trade I just got the timing wrong, the trade idea was good, so I re-entered when the market failed to push past 60.
Had 2 winners in a row on my live account, then stopped for the day as my daily target was hit. I did take another trade on my simulated account which was a winner too – that’s shown in the video below.
Chart
+22 ticks profit
Video
I went live today and I decided not to share my trades, but then I thought that I need to be accountable to an audience, so I’ve changed my mind and have decided to post my live trades. Notice that I stopped trading after my target for the day was reached (22 ticks). There were some nice trades in the afternoon session, but I didn’t take them. A short under b27 was nice (Breakout Pullback short), as was a limit sell at the top of b38 (Pullback to EMA in a bear), and possibly under b47/b48 – although that one was a little risky.
Chart
+22 ticks profit
Video
I went live today on the Russell 2000 Futures. I’m not going to post my trades up here for a while, maybe never again unless I have to go back to sim again. I had a good first day with 4 trades taken, 1 loser and 3 winners. I also had a winning trade on the Bund using an hourly chart method.
I’ll post back in a few weeks and let you know how it’s going.
UPDATE
I have decided that I do need to be accountable for my trades, so will continue to post them up here. Being accountable for my trading makes me stop taking stupid trades and forces me to trade to make money rather than trading for fun.
Managed to escape with +2 ticks profit (breakeven if you deduct commissions).
4 Trades, breakeven day
Video
Nice easy day to trade today, although I didn’t trade much. Took 2 trades on the TF.
Chart
2 trades on TF
YouTube
I was watching some videos by Joe DiNapoli over the weekend and one thing he said really struck me.
Trading is a counter-intuitive event.
I recommend you watch a video interview of him here: http://www.youtube.com/user/fibnodes/videos I experienced that today in my trading. I explain why in my YouTube video below the chart.
Chart
-22 ticks
YouTube video