Since I am on the topic of Key Support and Resistance, when I was watching ICT’s thread it was very confusing for me because every single day you will see someone trying to make a trade using his tools…why?
I don’t believe they are even looking at key levels…yeah sure it could be trading at an institutional level, but if price didn’t turn at this level on the daily chart with a big reaction…it’s not going to work at this level either even if his concepts all line up perfectly…so why trade everyday…ICT has obviously stated many times he wants us to only trade once a week…
I use to read their trade setups they think will work out for the following days, but I started to realize what level are the keying this off of, usually there wasn’t any level at all…to me it’s all about these levels…
I NOW first look for key levels on daily and above before I even think about following the method ICT has given me, without these levels the rest of the rules mean absolutly nothing…
at least this is what I am starting to see and realize…
Nice trade on Friday Piphanger! this is like a piece of Jade in your hand, the more Jade you feel the more of an expert you become.
so much better seeing this side of you rather than the frustrated side lol
“take a look at your daily chart on January 13th 2012…put a level acrossed your chart at the low of this day…Now take a look at May, 23 2012…see how it sliced threw this level 2620 like butter?..now once it does this you sit on your hands and wait for price to reach back up for this key level and test it as now resistance which was once support…”
Since everyone is back from a Holiday Break, I cut risk to only .5% on this trade. I also cut it to .5% because I knew I wouldn’t be able to manage it today at work and it wasn’t a very good setup as we didn’t have any Divergence but still within the Trading Model plans.
We had a Judas Rally up during LO KillZone which I put a pending order to Short at 5996, 4 pips below the 5700 level because I wasn’t sure if it would get there. I also had a pending order on the Fiber at 2580 but as you can tell never got up to this level.
GMT R1 was located right on 5700 and this level if you look back on the daily chart was a key level to watch. I wasn’t to sure about this level since ICT never said anything about it and this is also why I cut my risk back.
At this time we were in OTE on 1HR Chart and I just let the pending order do its thing while I was at work. We were overbought on both Stoch & Percent R but NO Divergence.
I believe this trade is to my rules of my Trading Model. There are a couple of things I don’t like about it but as you can see it worked out just fine.
I wasn’t able to close this trade at 1500 GMT, also because of work, so I just let it run for today. One thing I was thinking about this trade which doesn’t go with my plan, if this trade worked out I believe we might have the high of the week. I’m in the trade management mode now and going to watch this trade into LO tomorrow. If we get another signal for my plan tomorrow or Thursday I will try to add to this trade. If I see a Judas lower or anything indicating bullish trades then I will pull the plug on this puppy and take my profits.
I was looking at that cable this morning. Traded short into the judas swing as it was still going up. I need to learn more patience. Closed it all out before work. It looked choppy and right after a holiday I thought it might be a Z day. The big drop surprised me.
We had an OTE form right before LO KillZone for another short this morning…This short did not agree with my plan so I didn’t add to my position, just letting the trade run it’s course…
I am going to manage this trade and try to shot for fridays 1500 GMT…I will keep you updated…
TalonD, I will get back to your question tonight when I get home from work so I can post a screenshot of what I was looking at/for to happen today…So I haven’t forgotten about you…
[B]Trade Update: +170 on first entry & +74 on second entry[/B]
I just wanted to make a quick update that I am still in my trade from yesterday at 1.5696 at +170 pips…Today I seen another OTE for a short come in at 5600 which I entered another trade and we are currently at +70 on this one. I am still thinking we are going to be down all week, but I’m managing this trade to watch for any possible reversals at which I will get out. If tomorrow we get another short I will enter once more and that will be the last entry.
I know the second entry was not in line with my rules, but I am going with the momentum of my first trade and wanted to add a little bit more to it since I only entered with .5% in the first place.
This has been by far my best trade I have ever taken and I am very happy with how I am managing it and how much I have picked up on the markets so far by just backtesting ICT’s rules he has given me.
If I keep this up hopefully I will be out of the red in no time.
I will update again later with screenshots and more information.
Hey Piphanger… I’ve been following the thread and your situation for a while and stuff, just wanted to chime in and add my 2 cents… Firstly, congratulations on your recent wins, i noticed Friday and the last couple days, made some solid pips!
However… Now i’ve been debating not doing this because i dont want to get stoned for it but i think it should be said lol… Bare in mind im not trying to judge, just offering thoughts from one student to another…
I noticed on Friday, and also you mentioned today that the trades you took - although profitable, didnt match your rules. This i think is a big flaw. I realise that up until this point, your trades have all worked out and really earned you some good pips, but you’ve acknowledged yourself that you broke your own rules from your own strategy to enter the trades. It was acknowledged on Friday, and also today. My question is, what would of happened if either one of those trades didnt work out? I think we would have been in a situation ICT highlighted which is simply that your going to feel even worse if you make a loss on it. I actually think its a bad thing that your making profit on trades which your entering by not following your rules, because psychology, it gives you a feeling of acceptance that breaking your rules to make a trade is ok.
On the other hand, i think if you had broken your rules, taken a trade and got burned on it and it reflected on your account, that pain and frustration would have given you the feelings needed in order to learn from it, and make sure you dont make the same mistakes again.
The last few weeks i took a hit to my account which built up to around -6%. Granted, it was a big hit on my account, but i think if i didnt take that hit and i actually profited from it, i never would have really learnt that its so much better to trade with the trend.
Anyway, my point is, i think these little slip ups which make you take trades outside your rules, and the psychological reassurance that it is becoming ok will only force you down a path which will make you break the rules again and again and it will seem acceptable.
My reason for really raining on your parade here - as i know your doing well, is actually because i want to see you make it. I know you’ve had a real tough time recently, but i just dont think that this habit of breaking rules will lead to anything good…
Again, dont take this as bashful, i sincerely am happy your making pips, just a little food for thought from my end…
I just want to say that I know I have gotten carried away with my trading a little bit this week, but this has to do with not enough time this week at work to manage my trades. This is why I cut my risk to .5%.
I believe my entry on the 29th was withing my guidelines of my Trading Model. I did say I wasn’t to happy with the trade since we didn’t have any Divergence but that doesn’t mean my Trading Model is broken, I am still able to trade since my entry was with using 1HR OTE. So I believe everything lined up on this trade.
I do agree that I didn’t trade this on the 29th very well because I couldn’t look at my charts at work. I just had to let it run and let it do it’s thing until I got home from work. This is where my discipline started to slip and I do agree with anyone that says so. I then went into management mode and started to manage my trade like a hawk and wanted to test my skill a little bit to see how well I could do with this, since you know the trade was already in way more profit then I should have been. To see I took it as a learning experience since They couldn’t take away what I would of already had if I closed it at 1500 GMT.
After looking over the charts and once we broke through the 5640 key support level like butter and then went back up to it to retest it as resistance, i thought there was a very good likely hood of us testing the 5600 key support level during the LO. So I just held onto the trade until the following morning. I noticed we were not overbought on either pair which scared me when we slammed down into 5600 before LO which looked like a judas, but we ended up cutting through it like butter, if you zero down on the 5M Chart you will see a small OTE that formed right before the LO KillZone and small judas rally up. This was all they needed for the day to start their run down.
We started to run back up into the 5600 level which I placed a pending order to short to add .5% to my original trade. I left for work and just left it at that. I know this is against my Rules but you just have to do what you got to do to make trading work around a day job. This OTE lined up perfectly with MS1 and 5600 Key Support level which we have great confluence and I know it was below the asian range low, could of gotten a better fill at 5610 which was the 79% level.
One of the major reasons I took this risk without following my Trading Model to the T, because I was thinking if we do bounce off the 5600 now key resistance level today then we will fall like a rock because we don’t have any other key support levels until about 5300 area. This is what I was thinking at least.
thank you both for watching my thread with interest. I do appreciate both of your questions and support and helpful information. To TalonD…yes by looking at my calendar again NFP is this Friday…I thought it was next friday…
SanJ I do agree with a lot of your post and I was thinking today even before you posted that I need to do some major work on discipline if I want this to work and stop getting a head of myself. I keep wanting to drift into other tools and other concepts of ICT’s because you know I have them drilled into my mind and I can’t get them out.
To everyone I totally believe my trading has change for the better. I recently took a whole week off of work to study ICT’s concepts and do a massive amount of backtesting. Most normal people would of probably been sick by all the backtesting and studying I did over that week. I truely believe it has helped me for the better.
Keep watching and see how this trade ends up…
One thing I am very impressed with was I started with an account of $2500 and over a long period of time I knocked it down to 1800 were all of you know I went on rage. Since last friday I was still at this $1800 account. The trade I took on Friday and the current trades I am in know have brought my account back up to $2230 which is very close to my breakeven of $2500. I hope I can keep a solid head on my shoulders and keep this run going.
Best of Luck to Everyone!!!
P.S. Don’t mind those other pairs in my Order Entries…They are other trades I have been starting to take this week but don’t follow ICT’s plan…Just something I am testing out on the side…
Keep knocking them out! When you’r hot you’r hot! “Let your winners run”. That includes your winning streaks not just individual trades right? great job!
Thanks ICT for taking the time to guide me in the correct path…I would of quit if it wasn’t for you giving me a Trading Model and pushing me to keep going…I appreciate all you have done for me…I take back any negative thing I said about you while I was in rage mode…:57:
I chickened out this morning on this trade…every place I thought it would turn lower and thought we had a judas up…I was wrong everytime…I pulled the plug on these trades…Which is hard to do since I know we are probably going to be heading down as soon as I do…
First Entry: 5696 to 5520 = +176 Pips
Second Entry: 5600 to 5520 = +80 Pips
Now back to finding the next setup, but not until next week…
Excellent results man… Try not to think too much about what you’ve left out in the market…
I could have easily taken another 100/150 pips this week by letting my trades linger, but didnt have the confidence for it so keeping strictly intra-day personally…
Be happy with the profit you made (because it is a large one), and forget about whats left on the table - after i close out a trade for the day i close up my charts to stop myself seeing if i missed anything…
Theres always another day, with another entry to grab pips again…
I chickened out from holding onto my other trades, but seen this forming and it finally happened during the NYO Session. After this trade I am done until next week and I am going to take a break and clear my head. This week has been amazing be it luck or what have you…I know I need to be more patient and stop taking so many trades during the weeks, it’s just so hard to do when we are in this massive down move and my Trading Model tells me to only look for Shorts.
Cable Profit: [B]+90 Pips[/B]
Fiber Profit: [B]+55 Pips[/B]
[B]H1 Chart of Cable & Fiber[/B]
[B]The Valid Trade for my Plan was on both Pairs[/B]
Day of Week is Thursday.
Resistance Level from Higher Time Frame at 1.5500 and 1.2400 Institutional Levels.
Hourly Overbought Condition on Stochastic & Williams percent R.
Judas Swing Up into Key Resistance during London Open.
Here’s a thought. ICT told me to pick a direction, long or short, so I picked short. (same as you). But what if we had only been looking for longs the last two weeks. What would have happened? Would the rules have kept us out of loosing trades?
