OOPs I’m talking rubbish here, sorry for clutterring 
Sorry if I am out of place here, but personally I don’t think you were talking rubbish at all.
Your (now edited) comment about the spike that made the candle look like a pin was extremely valid - not necessarily because it was “right” or “wrong” but because it demonstrated the extremely important principle that we should always evaluate what we are looking at!
All these things, whether they are lines, candle formations, patterns, MAs or any other indicators are only the tools and job aids that we use in our work. You, as the trader, are the master craftsperson that uses those tools. It is not the tools that make the difference it is the person that is using them…
At least thats what the pie man always said to Simple Simon…
1 Like
Simon,
You’re becoming one of my favorite people. 
Happy trading everyone!
Vickie
GPipster,
Thank you for the tip-off. It is appreciated. In all seriousness, I would love for people to feel free to point out if I have made an oversight like that if it’s going to keep me from losing money! As a side note, I did catch my own error, as I posted in JSeymours journal thread a couple days ago:
[quote=“cndlstckchic, post:98, topic:116275”]
_Now, I want to apologize a little here - because I think that I may have influenced you to get short in USDCAD because that was one of the trades that I was doing ‘well’ in (before yesterday anyway) - and in retrospect I should have waited to enter it myself. Here’s why: I was trying to figure out today why CAD was not behaving as I expected it to, and I looked back on my journal and my own top/down analysis…and I noticed that I started with the weekly chart. I should have started with the monthly. Here is the USDCAD monthly: _
chart did not copy over…refer to her thread if you would like to see it
This clearly shows that price was rejected hard last month from dropping below the level we are currently sitting at. There is actually a zone of support here that we are trying to drop through. So, when I had my trade ‘stair-stepping down’, I thought I had already broken through support and was in the clear and that it was about to drop, especially after I had that pin bar on the 4hr chart - that is usually a good signal. But now I see it differently. I still think that there is stronger bearish pressure, but I am stuck in the zone.
[/quote]
Thanks for that Simon, and that wasn’t the bit I was talking about actually, it was the figures.
Ok that spike, As I posted in reall time I was paper trading at the time and went from £12 down to £350 up in a single second, without intermediate prices. Now 1800 is a 31.8% of the entire upswing and I think what happened was this - CPI figures ? the price rose a little but we were at a little below 1810 having been as low as 1804, so I think there were masses of buy orders in the market - from shorts who would cover if it came back up and from longs, looking for a successful re-test. It was great experience being in it in real time and trading it for £700 (even if it was only paper money). The spike was back where it started in 2 hours and I suspect a lot of people lost real money because of it. The fact is that what looks like a fairly decent pin-bar indicator was in fact just a small indecision doji. The pair finshed at 1821 or thereabouts, so the 31.8 has not quite been tested, but in practice, there seems to be no real appetite for pushing lower. That may change on monday when people are looking for new trades, rather than getting out of existing ones on a Friday, but my (Paper) money is going on a reversal, stop at 1726 and the long I already have running I shall raise the stop-loss to 1726 (My entry price) so that will now be a Trade without a loss, which will help !
Further support at 50% 1775 and 61.8% - 1750.
So the intention is now two bets running, with loss possible only on one. The trade is not conditional, it will be made at or around 1820 if I can get it.
For those of a more esoteric nature, I see something on the 30 minute bars which I don’t think refers to “price action” as required by this thread, but to something I was quite a believer in for a couple of years. It requires further upside, unless contradicted at a higher level, if my reading is correct. It also means the price cannot retrace more than 50% of the impulse if my memory is correct 
[Edited to say, I got a buy at 1.18149 - ]
umm… if you are talking about my thread, the proper adjective should be his 
This weekend, over at JSeymour’s trading journal - I discussed my plan of action for USDCAD.
I don’t want to rehash all of that here, but basically I decided that I will exit the trade unless I see a strong bearish move today at market open (since my trade is already positive, if it is bearish - I figure I will let it run). Here’s a link if you’re interested in continuity of the discussion to understand my thinking:
Even if it were, EURUSD is like what 60% weight on that index? I don’t really use it much…
Oops! I’ve been wondering, so I tried not to use any pronouns. Guess that one slipped out! Well, now I know…
1 Like
No worries, I get that a lot with my first name being Jesse…
1 Like
What as in Jesse Livermore ? - That’s a great place to start - but he committed suicide when he was “In control” and didn’t have the Adrenaline rush any more - “reminiscences of a stock operator” - much like “BUZZY SWARTZ” you might not “Like” him very much - but who cares ?
Wanted to share this gem: All credits to Clint, who has been here helping traders for years…
Well guys, what to do about this USDCAD trade? I still feel that it’s bearish, and I’m in the black on it - so I feel like sticking it out until it gives me signs of turning north. That two candle pattern that I circled (bull candle followed by bear candle - same size) often portends that a nice move is about to happen. We’ll see…
Alright, so update on the trades. USDCAD moved up last night and hit my stoploss (which was moved in to positive territory - so not a loss), still not what I was hoping for. Definitely could have done better on this trade if I had set a 1:3 risk/reward ratio. I was attempting to capitalize on a downtrend by pyramiding my trades - but this trend was not stable and price moved against me. With this in mind, I also closed out my USDJPY trades. I feel like a fresh start, and although I have seen the pyramid trading idea turn small accounts into large accounts relatively fast - you do need a solid trend going to make that happen. So, for now back to the 1:3 (or more) risk reward approach.
As of Friday, my account was down 4.4%, and today after closing out these three positive trades it was up 8.9% - for an overall net increase of 4.6%. Here is a screen shot of how those trades played out:
USDJPY
USDCAD
2 Likes
[quote=“cndlstckchic, post:54, topic:116648”]
still not what I was hoping for. Definitely could have done better on this trade [/quote]
Yet another important issue that you raise here, CC, albeit somewhat indirectly.
Many forget, or maybe don’t at first realise, that just getting the direction right is not the only factor in trading, in fact it is only one of many.
Pyramiding may be one way of gaining a big boost out of a trade, whereas others may choose to enter with a large position and scale out as the price moves. Some build a position as the price moves with them, other add as the price goes against them. All these alternatives may go right or horribly wrong. It all depends on whether we call the market right or not. These are all based, not on when the move starts, but how long it continues for - and that is impossible to know beforehand. But there are sometimes signs that things are maybe not going according to anticipation that should always raise a red flag.
Optimising our results depends perhaps far more on our exit strategy than on our entry point. Risk management may give us provisional levels for target and stop levels but these, of course, should always be refined to the nearest logical levels based on our chart readings.
But actual position management, especially exit strategy, is maybe the hardest area to control, but makes all the difference in terms of P/L.
Or what do you think?
1 Like
I absolutely agree. To be honest, this is not the 1st time that I have encountered this problem, lol…I’m guilty of trying to get the most that I can out of a trade and sometimes that leads me to holding on longer than I should.
That thread by @Clint that I recently posted above discusses this issue as well.
Shhhhhhhh, it’s a secret. But this is a rangy market right now, very hard to pyramid 40 pips, if you add at lets say 32, well its only 8. You know that in true pyramiding you use only your current profit to pay the margin for another position, just in case, it might help. Oh did I mention it is a rangy market and trend traders will be hacked to pieces.
The Ever Playing The Ranges VIPER
Not to be argumentive Viper, but that seems like a blanket statement. On what time frame and what pairs are ranging? Surely not all of them. For example the USDJPY trade that I just got out of is clearly making lower highs and lower lows…
Well, nearly.
Your sequence went a bit wobbly for 6 weeks in the middle there which would have spoiled your cycle for a while.
1 Like
Hi no worries, but, it is my observation that you are using a textbook definition of trend, and trying to shoehorn recent price action into that definition. On your chart, 10/02/16 - 12/25/16 is a classic, swing traders trend, you can Pyramid it, and you can even let it get a little old and still make a profit.
However since ummmm, lets call it the second week of Jan 2017, it moved into a downward sloping channel, it’s not really sloping it is more like slumping, with a massive amount of chop in between. The chop can be seen by the long tails and wicks, when you see that on this fractal it is chop.
So if one were to draw some lines on this, tops and bottoms, and since it is kind of slumping down, you take shorts on the high side, you could probably preset them, and leave the longs alone. Right now one would be 2 weeks late to enter a swing short.
Oh one more thing, draw a level at the Dec top and the Aug bottom and I think you will find that the price has been floating up and down around the mean of the multi week high and low.
The Ever Enlightened VIPER
1 Like