I had a very strong trading session early on, first selling the pop in the market when the durable goods order came in better than expected and earning four handles. Then I scalped a little bounce four 1.5 handles, then another short earning 1.5 handles.
Then there was a small loss trying long again.
Then another win on the short side, 1.5 handles.
Then three failed attempts at another short when I noted yesterday’s low holding. The market lost its structure, buyers were holding their levels, yet I was pressing shorts. I need to avoid this type of trading. I gave back ¾ of my daily gains going from big ass titties to all that work for peanuts.
Any advice from the experts on how to break such trading habits is appreciated. Otherwise I have to dig out these trading psychology books and do some introspective over the weekend.
I’m going for a short walk and then addressing these stocks. It’s bounce mode there could be some long opportunities.
If you enjoy the content at iBankCoin, please follow us on Twitter
Not an expert by any means.
When trading e-minis though I sometimes limit myself to “x” number of trades in a trading plan.
I pick my price levels or ranges and limit the trading to 4 trades or 6 trades. No more than six though.
If I lock in decent gains on 4 trades..I don’t even bother with the next two trades. In essence a 6 “trade day” becomes a “4 trade day” and I just enjoy whatever gains there are.
Regardless if I could have made more. And of course I am happy if I would have lost money.
Basically its a way to stop myself from becoming greedy.
That’s interesting. It certainly would have worked today. Thanks for the suggestion!
What you have encountered today was what I had been going thru in the past trading e-mini. Until you change the trading methodology to a more longer term (intra-day) with a wider stop to capture the underlying (and mostly hidden) trend, you will continue to deal the same ordeal you are facing today.
The only way to win in e-mini is to trade the opening range breakout which will require quite a large stop compare to what we are used to.
You may not win everyday; but with a good system, you can win in the long run.
Unfortunately, not too many people can stomach the volatility giving the larger stop. Hence my decision to stick with stocks.
However, I was fortunate to know a professional who traded the large SP500 future contracts successfully. He traded in huge volume and had amassed huge fortune that he enlisted his sister to help with the donation to charity.
He had attempted to teach me his skill but I was young and dense in my head; so I couldn’t comprehend his system. He actually had a very elaborated system that identified ALL possible resistances and supports using fib, pivot points, prior days and overnight key points, etc.
I lost touch with him when he gave up trading to travel around the world before he bite the dust.
In summary, what I learned from this guy is that in order to win at e-mini on a consistent basis, we need to capture the intermediate trend for the day,not the hours (or minutes); otherwise, whip-saw will eat us alive.
What make it so hard in holding the e-mini for a longer stretch is that you don’t have any fundamental conviction to help you weather the volatility. With stocks, at least, you have the “story” to help you hold on to your conviction that allow you to hold on to the stock just long enough to see the trend thru.
You see, when the e-mini has a big trend day starting from a neutral open, we usually don’t know until the day is over; meanwhile, most of us who attempt to trade the e-mini will be whipsawed to death by the end of the day. But for those who trade the underlying trend using the opening range breakout, they walk home with the big win.
Hope it helps.
My 2 cents.
interesting concepts Zen, thanks
I noticed that the ego is most prominent when day-trading the e-mini. Our ego get a lot of kick out of picking intra-day top and bottom. And the most damage will occur when the ego get pissed off at being wrong too often. Revenge trading is always around the corner…
Cheers!