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Is it your strategy or you???What is your strategy? If asked, could you explain it to one of your friends or family members? More importantly, does it make sense? Is it clear? Teaching or Sharing your thoughts & methods leads to a deeper understanding of the content. If nothing else, speak aloud and hear your reasoning out of your own mouth before taking a trade. My current strategy is to take a defined structure from Swing High to Swing Low or Swing Low to Swing High and use it as the basis for my analysis. Naturally, the structure will indicate a trend, and I would need to decide if that trend is in alignment with or contrary to the broader market. Either is fine, but this distinction is essential when assessing targets and risk. I have to constantly remind myself that I don't know what the market will do. Since I don't know what the market will do, it follows that I should be open to changing my mind and also safeguarding against my ignorance. With this being said and firmly in mind, there are three levels that I like to pay attention to. They are: Breakouts of previously established key levels. The .618 Retracement & 1.618 Extension (current and previous structures) Between the .786 & .886 Simple enough. I'm sure that your strategy for entry can be explained in layman's terms as well. The issue typically doesn't lie in the analysis it lies in the trader's ability to follow said analysis and follow it consistently. Does this sound relatable? You spend hours or maybe even days conducting your analysis, waiting for the market to make its move and give you some indication of what might happen in the near future. As time passes, things seem to become more clear, and you see your opportunity coming. Sure there are a few unexpected movements that happen along the way but that's just how markets move. Price approaches your entry but not yet. Hell, it may not actually reach the level at which you established as a good entry. So you enter early and let the candles fall where they may. If you have fixed stops, now your levels are thrown off. If you don't, then any concept of risk that you had in your mind has been altered and you now bear the task of making mental adjustments to compensate for a completely different trade. Because that's exactly what it is, a completely different trade, with new numbers, figures, distances, R&R ratios, and new implications of risk. The market moves in your favor, possibly even nearing your predetermined target. If it's a fixed number of pips, then that number has changed. If it was a fixed target then your projected profits have changed. This may not seem like a big deal but for beginning traders who are establishing their system, this means everything. Every decision you make against yourself has future implications on your equity curve, but also on your confidence and understanding of what you are doing in the market. In order to be consistent and profitable in the market we must learn to trade in a consistent manner with a strategy that will prove to be profitable over time. The market continues to move but it has taken a sudden turn against you, whatever profits you had are quickly erased and price action now edges toward your stop loss. You've been stopped out only to learn that if you had been patient at entry and kept your original strategy in place, you wouldn't have been stopped out, and price action would have ultimately gone in your favor reaching your target. The point of all this is to illustrate that we unconsciously make changes to our strategies as we are deploying them. These changes have a compounding effect on the outcome of our trades. Even if you are made a winner by these changes you've made, you will have reinforced a bad habit that will undoubtedly lead to many losses in the future. There is power in understanding the unique set of tendencies and preferences that make you the type of trader you are. If you continue to ignore this, you will rightfully take your place amongst the other 90% of failing traders. When you start to pay attention to your own uniqueness and figure out what concepts, ideas, strategies, tools, and methods resonate with you, then you will be on your way to developing a system that you can trade consistently. Losing is a part of the game. You may as well lose in a manner that produces feedback that can be learned from. Are you losing because your strategy needs adjusting or are you losing because your psychology needs adjusting? It should be stated that any given trade, from start to finish, can be, and typically is, more nuanced than what I've just described. Its simplicity should not overshadow its intent. The chart attached to this post shows that there are multiple opportunities for entry for mine and, quite possibly, your strategy. All a trader needs to do is be patient and allow the market to tell you what it is doing. Along with entries are maintenance and exits. Targets are just as important as entries if not more so. Your unique perspective as a trader will heavily impact the decisions you make in all three phases of trading. Levels of Development LLC is providing this material for this site and any other related sources (including newsletters, blog post, videos, social media and other communications) for educational purposes only. We are not providing legal, accounting, or financial advisory services, and this is not a solicitation or recommendation to buy or sell any stocks, options, or other financial instruments or investments. Examples that address specific assets, stocks, options or other financial instrument transactions are for illustrative purposes only and may not represent specific trades or transactions that we have conducted. In fact, we may use examples that are different or the opposite of transactions we have conducted or positions we hold. All investing and trading in the securities market involves risk. Any decisions to place trades in the financial markets, including trading in stock or options or other financial instruments, is a personal decision that should only be made after thorough research, including a personal risk and financial assessment, and the engagement of professional assistance to the extend you believe necessary.
BLACKBULL:US30Education
by LevelsArchitect
EURAUD End of Day StrategyIntroducing an End of Day (EOD) strategy that can cut down the amount of time spent at the charts. The indicators look complicated and anyone who says you should aspire to naked charts is correct. However, for this strategy, automating the process as much as possible lends itself to having some filters, triggers, etc. Managing the trade is done manually and two positions are initiated at the start of the trade. With an EOD strat, you don't necessarily need to worry about the fundamentals that happened during the day, as all of the news is priced into the last candle that closed. I would stress that selling low to buy lower and buying high to sell higher is the aim of this strat and that you should be aware of previous swing highs and lows.
Short
by Macrobriefing
Trend change for GBPNZD❓Earlier on this evening UK time we had a buy alert for GBPNZD Is the trend changing for this pair? Trend trade identified and entered. Working 45M timeframe on this strategy. Trade details can be found on the chart in printed label. All the TP values same in label as that's what I'm aiming for on this strategy. Trade box is tracking the trade. Want to know how I identified this trade you know what to do. Thanks for looking Darren🙌
Long
by pow_removetheguesswork
1
📖 STEP 3 to MASTER TRADING: WHAT’S YOUR TRADING EDGE? 📖The topic of trading edge in the market is highly underrated, in my opinion. That’s why today I propose to discuss it, and I hope it can help you to shift your perspective on this matter. So let’s think about this together. What parts does your trading edge consist of? 🟩 THE BIG FILTER For me, the first part of any trading edge is its filter. So your trading system tells you very clearly when you should NOT be in the market. It protects your capital - both $ capital and emotional capital - from poor market conditions, and low-quality and low-probability setups. And what it actually means when you execute your edge is that most of the time, you will stay out of the market. 🟩 YOU WILL “MISS” THE MOVES That’s really tough topic for many of us, me included because very often you’re looking to enter the zone, but the price can either turn right before tapping into it or tap and doesn’t give any confirmation for entry. And that could be very emotional. However, the fact is simple - such “missed” moves are also part of our edge. Why? Because if you tested one set up, one pattern, and you know it’s profitable the way it is, then you need to execute it the way it is. Keep in mind, when I say profitable, I don’t mean crazy profitable. Today, with access to prop firms, we need a very low % of profitability to earn for living. We can scale the $ amount relatively easily if we are profitable consistently. So again, we don’t need every move, and we don’t need the whole move. We just need some part of some moves - and a good edge will make consistent profits out of this. And only then, if you want, you can tweak, refine and step by step make your system even more profitable. 🟩 THE PATTERN This part is actually your entry pattern. Notice again, this is just a part of your system, not the whole system. If you really understand this, you’ll be much more relaxed in the market. This part should include a written checklist for your entry - just like a pilot has a checklist before his flight. A checklist, in its turn - is a part of your trading plan, it’s the essence of your trading plan. You will refer to it before every trade. 🟩 MANAGEMENT, LOSERS AND BREAKEVENS When you executed your edge in the market, now you need to manage the trade accordingly, based on your checklist. So take partials, accept breakevens and losers. If you entered into a high-quality setup, which turned into a BE or a loser - it’s the part of your system, and usually, it doesn’t make sense to overthink it and try to find flaws in your system. But that’s flexible, and of course, you can analyze what happened, and maybe even find something to tweak, but very often a loser is just a normal loser, and breakeven is just a normal breakeven. 📖To recap, any edge will include: 🔹“missed” trades 🔹trades, where price didn’t tap into your entry order just a bit 🔹trades where you were stopped out for several pips and price then went to profit (if it repeats constantly, maybe consider having a bigger stop loss) 🔹full TP 🔹partials 🔹losers 🔹breakevens 🎁If you’re still here, here’s a BONUS trading hack for you. Ask yourself and try to answer honestly this question: “During all the time I’m trading, what is the maximum amount of days in a row, when I followed my rules to the T, honestly?” You will be surprised, but the usual answer is 3-10 days. Yes, people can trade for 2-3 years, but never manage to follow their rules (whatever they have at the moment) for at least a month in a row. It all leads to catastrophe, of course. Thank you for your time! If you want to see more educational materials, please hit the BOOST button and leave your comments below. Dima
FOREXCOM:XAUUSDEducation
by Yelli_trades
7
STEP 1 to MASTER TRADING: Hindsight trading. Train your eyes.A common mistake that traders make after learning any kind of trading setup is jumping into backtesting using a replay tool, or even live trading. However, if you think about it, trading is very much about pattern recognition. And when you force yourself into live trading without a proper understanding of what your patterns look like, most likely you’ll need much more time to succeed. A different approach and much more effective would be using hindsight, that’s when you see what actually happened. During this process, try to find at least 50 high-quality setups, that represent your trading system. So you actually see everything that happened and find situations, where your edge played out, document it in your journal. That’s great training for your eyes and brain. You don’t need to guess, you will not feel anything, because you already see what happened, you’ll notice that sometimes your edge, your system doesn’t give you entries and price goes without you, sometimes, you’ll see a loser or a breakeven after your entry, start to get used to this, as it’s all part of your system. After that, you'll have a much better understanding and vision for your setup - and that could be the time to try some backtesting and forwardtesting. I’ll talk more about a different kind of backtesting in future posts. Meanwhile, take care, send your questions, and comments, will be glad to chat with you. Dima
Education
by Yelli_trades
1
EURUSD SO PREDICTABLEThe INTERBANK Algorithm Price Delivery System has engaged the Macro Software and is reaching for Buy Side Liquidity BSL. It has 60 Pips to range therefore the snipe at the bottom was your trade. Once price broke the Morning Zone it was open SNIPE Season. 2AM look for a Push into the extremes for one of our key set ups for a SHORT Snipe. TIME & PRICE are the only indicators a Sniper needs because those two produce excellent and accurate Market Structure. Far Superior than simple SR lines. There MUST be a narrative to your trade set up or you don't have one. You're just chasing after the wind. As always NEVER over Leverage Trust your Trade Set Up. Have Fun!
TVC:DXYLong
by Master-Jedi-Trader
AXP - FUNCHARTS - American Express MusingsNote: Funcharts are interesting charts I have found that offer a potentially unique perspective on a stock. Sometimes I’ll throw something out there that you might find controversial or wrong headed. If that’s the case your 2 cents worth is most welcome. So much for stock selection, American Express ( AXP ) was the first stock on my list, even above AAPL , and here I was thinking my list was in Alphabetical order, of which my offsider will be quick to point out that I should be using a Mac, not a PC... moving on, What is the best way to trade American Express based on the Technical numbers? There are two tests I run to determine the best way to trade. Firstly let's run the numbers on long term trends. I used the Supertrend Strategy for this. Adjust the inputs so we use a length of 50, thus smoothing out the ATR volatility and then use an ATR value of 6. In layman's terms this means we are running a 6 x ATR (chandelier) trailing stop. When price closes below the trailing the test generates results for entering short trades, and when price closes above the trailing stop the test generates results for long trades. Refer to the performance report below (and be aware there is a drop down menu on the strategy name to flick between the longer term trend following system and the shorter term mean reversion system). Also, make sure you view the Performance Summary, not Overview, we are specifically looking at the comparison between long and short trades. The first test - Taking Long Trades in line with the trend (when price is above the blue line) made money, 274% to be exact with profitable trades 38% of the time, meaning the win:loss ratio at 2.67 had to be favourable, which it was. But wait going short into a down trend (selling when price is below the red line) lost big! 322% to be exact, so historically you made (slightly) more money buying the big pull backs, as opposed to the breakouts but the drawdown was bigger as you get stuck in losing trades. However, what this is really saying is more money was made from Buy and Hold on AXP (historically), as opposed to breaking the market into an uptrend/downtrend regime. The second test - Let's now look at the short term. Again we will use the Supertrend Strategy, this time we will use 3 periods for the ATR length and 1.5 as the ATR factor, thus looking at very short term trends (sub 30 days). Further I have flipped the signals so it buys into a short term downtrend and sells into a short term uptrend. Use the Performance Summary below (not Overview) to take a look at Long Trades and Short trades, the strategy name is Supertrend STRATEGY (with STRATEGY in uppercase, not lowercase). Here buying the dips made money but not much winning 66% of trades with a profit factor of 1.18 (low) so buying short term dips was sub optimal. Looking at selling short term rallies however was very poor, you lost money. If you went short a rally (in the short term, when the close crossed above the supertrend trailing stop and exiting when it crossed below) the resulting loss was 147%. It therefore made more sense to enter long AXP in line with the short term trend, as opposed to entering early and buying the dip. Nonetheless, the result in the short term wasn't staggering either trading either long or short. Given the results were not great on a daily chart either way, I changed the chart to a weekly chart, after all, if you are following so far, you would have seen that AXP was (slightly) better as a countertrend strategy in the longer term. Running the same strategy as in the second test on a weekly graph the results improve significantly, going long on a dip made 172%, winning 82% of the time. That is a great setup, in fact pretty good as a stand along trade. But if you want to run stops and manage risk, rather than being stuck in losing trades for a long term, you could use the week chart as a setup, and then enter in line with the short term trend on a daily chart using the second tests strategy above... Overall the conclusion is you should use a mean reversion strategy (buy the dips) on American Express with a weekly chart, but use a shorter term trend following system to trade it on a daily chart . Where are we now? Well it just so happens that on a weekly time frame the stock is in buy territory according the the Supertrend STRATEGY and on a daily chart is pretty close to a short term uptrend... Did this make sense, let me know if you have any questions!
NYSE:AXPLong
by andrew.gibbs777