Hmm. This is interesting. Will have to look into this!
My work load is reducing and I will have more time for trading, so should be getting back to this in the coming weeks. I’ve been trying out something new with varying degrees of success. When it goes right, I make a lot of money very quickly, but I’m not mastering the exit time of a trade very well.
Trading the DAX. No indicators, no TA, no fundamentals. It’s a day trading strategy and usually only in a trade for a few hours, but could extend.
I watch the price at what I deem to be key times of the day. These are times that I’m determining that turning points usually happen (with the exception of news). I then go the same way that the price is moving with quite a large lot size. Typically using up 50%+ of my margin (30:1) in one trade.
The idea is trying to catch a big move quickly so I can set a stop loss in profit. It gets stopped out way too often, so I’ve started leaving it a little while to get a bit of breathing space. Then set the stop loss at a few pips profit and set an 80 pip trailing stop. As the price continues in the direction, I open up more positions to try and lock in more money. If price continues to move, I win more, if it reverses I win overall.
A big problem I’m having is that the price will turn against the move and either get stopped out, or I close it because I think price will change, but I’ve seen how big the win was and it’s dropped quite a lot. I then get carried away and try to get back in to catch the retracement/reversal/continuation, but the market isn’t at one of my times to enter. I need to handle this much better, and the rewards will be much better. I also need to get better at setting TP. Often the price goes pretty much where I predict before reversing, but I didn’t set a TP in the hope that it would continue and I’d make more money. That has cost me quite a lot of potential profits.
The downside is that I forgot to set a stop loss when the market was trending up. It swung down very fast and I lost a huge amount in one day when I was busy with work. I shouldn’t try this whilst at work, especially when I don’t have a stop loss in a good place.
Graph below shows yesterday’s results (% gain) when I had a proper day to try this. The circles show where I was entering trades at the wrong time, either because I’d been stopped out with profit or trying to get in on the move that hadn’t started yet (too early although I did get the direction correct in the end).
I think there’s potential here, I’ve had several days with good performance. I just need to time entries better and recover my ridiculous loss. 30% in a day is probably in my top 10 days. The day before was good too and could have been much higher if I got out at the right time.
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Should probably add, the system that I was listing currencies as buy/sell is not working right now. Pre-covid it was very reliable but with all the chaos in the world and huge daily swings in direction/momentum it just isn’t catching it on the weekly timeframe. Maybe when the world settles down again I’ll try it again.
Day trading is more fun anyway 
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WOW!! Great job!! That sounds like great progress! Keep up the good work. It looks like you’re certainly putting in the work.
Looks like you’re doing a really good job! well done
This morning I posted this on Denis’ thread. I hope some others were joining and enjoying the move today
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Some losses at the start of the week trying to force trades when the market wasn’t moving much. If I was sat in front of the PC, these could have been profitable but whilst at work is always goes wrong. Need to control the need to trade when I know it’s not a good idea.
End of the week a very different story, the breakout that I predicted on the DAX came through and got 2 lovely moves over 2 days and the week ends with 5% profit.
The big question for next week. Is that move a bear trap, or is it the start of an uptrend. I’ll wait for Monday morning and try to catch whichever way we’re moving. The chart looks like a change of direction to me, although a retracement is probably due early next week before moving higher.
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I had the week off work and decided I would try and spend some time on my strategy with a bit more money in the account. I started a new account and transferred what was in the other over so it was about double the size.
Day 1 - Caught a really nice move that peaked at about 18% of the account size. Unfortunately, I ignored my policy of closing good trades before America opens, and it reversed back to chop a lot of that away. Had a few losers trying to get into a big trade, but that’s normal. My winners are much bigger than the losers.
Day 2 - Today. Bit of a strange day. I woke up and the charts told me we’re going down today. It did, had a nice move but it reversed and then sat in a bit of a range with higher lows. Then America opened, carried on moving slowly up and then suddenly the sell button got pressed. That was a nice win, but it was a short move. Lost a little at the end with the retracement and closed before picking the kids up.
2 positive days, and could have been a lot more positive had I timed my exits better. I want to let the winners run, but I need to learn when the market is going to retrace and get out before. Account is up 6% and I will be withdrawing every 20% until all my money is back and then see what I can do with whatever is left.
It’s a holiday the next 2 days in the UK, so not sure what that means for the DAX. I might be leaving it alone for the week.
At the end of last week, I decided the DAX was too choppy day to day to get good returns so I switched to some trending markets in the Forex markets. Very happy that I did. Took the CADJPY long and had several days of big moves. As my win got bigger, I was adding to the trade size and eventually came out with a very large win about 80% of the account starting size I think.
Also had some good results from AUDUSD short and GER40 short after I got out of the CAD trade.
Mostly happy today that when price went against me, I’d been getting out and taking the loss only to see an hour or two later that I’d have had a big win by staying in. Today I sat calmly watching the drawdown increase happy that they were definitely downward moves and I just needed America to open for the move to continue, and it happened to have a nice win rather than loss.
Account has increased 97% in 10 days since opening. I highly doubt it will continue anywhere near this way, but I can now withdraw my cash and trade with the profits. If I could do just 20% of what I did this week consistently, then I could quit my real job. But the markets are rarely this trendy.
As for next week, looks like short on stocks and USD strength will continue. For CADJPY I think a retracement down to 103 or 102 looks on before it pushes new highs in a few weeks.
I set this account up on myfxbook if anybody wants to track it. I won’t be showing anything in monetary terms, I’m not here to boast about money or feel small because people have more. Spreadbetting Forex Trading System by Forex Trader chesterjohn
The second week was going very well until I think the Friday when I was really busy at work and the markets went against me. Annoyingly, by the end of the day they had gone back to where I would have made a slight profit, but I couldn’t know that so got out before the loss was too big. It was big enough already!
This week has a profit of about 13%. Not spectacular, again could have been better, but 13% on that account is more than I get paid for my job, so happy enough with that. I was in a cave yesterday so didn’t place any trades, but the market followed the pattern I often see of Monday, Tuesday and Thursday go in the direction the market is moving with Wednesday and Friday as retracement days. I would have been long DAX if I did anything, and would have had a nice return, but thought the risk was too big with me being in a cave and not able to check with my dislike of stop losses.
Markets appear to be shifting, JPY is strong so the long term trends are off. Will this be a retracement or a shift, we’re certainly risk off, but the yen hasn’t cared about that the last month or so.
Frustrating week. From a really big win to a really big loss made up from revenge trading and not being able to leave it alone when I knew better. Must have more discipline or else the profits will be gone in no time. Been watching some BBC documentaries on institutional trading and retail trading, really interesting and can see that they’ve all done the same thing.
I’ve put more money into the account and aiming to increase the pot to buy an electric car when my service/MOT is due in late September. Who knows if I’ll make enough to achieve that, but I’m looking forward to a challenge. One thing I really must do is walk away when I’m up even if I think it might go up more and walk away when I get that big win.
I make it roughly 50 trading days until the MOT is due. 5% per day without compounding would get me a pot 6 times what my most expensive car ever has cost, so let’s see if that’s possible.
Had a horrible accident with my hand, so will be out of work for a while. I guess this is a good chance to see what I can do with a decent sized account.
Day 1 - tried to trade from hospital bed on phone. Drugs didn’t help. Rolling progress -7%
Day 2 - lovely moves yesterday, got a big result, could have been bigger but wanted to keep my discipline. +25%
Nothing permanent I hope. May your hand get better soon,
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Unfortunately it is permanent, but only 2 fingers. Thank you for the message
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Oh man sorry to hear. Was it the right or left? Also was it during work? Hoping for your speedy recovery!!!
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Thank you.
It’s my left, weak hand fortunately. It was doing DIY at home. It’ll be a long recovery with several operations, but I’m already itching to start physio and get on with it.
Day 3 - got a nice move on EURJPY early on, but it moved against me to lose today. +16%
Day 4 - AUDJPY and some DAX and DOW wins. +22%
Markets are looking more risk on. Have we found the bottom, or will the floor fall away again tomorrow?
How’s recovery going? Hope all is well!
Doctors say it’s healing well, but long way to go yet. Thank you for asking.
Not posted on here because I took a break. I was very down about my hand and basically just gambling out of boredom and depression. Lost a lot of money so took a few days break and picked up on Monday. Last 3 days have been very good, but not cancelled out the ridiculous things I did yet. At least my head is in a better place now
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I’ve taken a change of tact and going for a longer term move. The bearishness looks to be done to me, so I’ve taken a buy on the DAX looking for a move up towards 15000. The swap will be a bit of a bleed, but as long as there’s no big down candles I will do very well.
If more bad news comes out, then I’m toast. But for now it doesn’t seem to be getting worse and the gold divergence from silver has stopped, which would often proceed a bull market