Ok it is the deviation setting that i needed to adjust, default was .5000% on mine. Thank you! I was getting so annoyed last night.
There are hourly 4 hourly daily weekly etc. etc. pivot points and on the FXCM’s trading station you can pick which pivot points you want plotted, you could plot all of them if you wanted but i think the most relevant ones would be the ones that the majority of people use, i think i read some where is the 4 hour or daily?
Someone please correct me or shed some light if you could.
Yes I’ve toyed around with other timeframe pivots. I am following pip-siphon’s method as closely as I can, and I’m pretty sure I read that he observes the Daily pivots. Also, I think it’s really nonstandard to use anything but Daily… so unless someone specifically states otherwise, I always assume Daily.
Trading pip-siphon’s method has almost more opportunities than I can keep up with on the 1min chart. Usually if I need more action, I just draw more trendlines.
After giving it some thought I’ve decided to give Syphon’s method a try once more.
I used it for about two months previously. My goal was 1% a day but like Crash, I was averaging around .40% a day. That in itself was good enough to get me very excited about it. But then one night I got stuck the wrong way against a quick moving trend. It completely reversed on me and I scaled in about 4 or 5 times. I was in that damn trade for about 4 hours. In the end I had to cut it off. The trade had gone so far against me it was just time to let it go. Lost 14% that day. That was a downer.
After that loss I should have taken a few days to regroup. Instead I got back in and had the mindset of getting it all back asap. For a week I again averaged about .40% a day. Until I got stuck on the wrong side again! Negative 12%!
That’s when I said **** it! And stopped using that method.
Looking back though, I feel that a big mistake was letting it go past 2%. If I would have cut the trade at 2% then I would only have a drawdown of 4% total. That’s not even loss, because I would have still been overall positive from the previous 2 months of trading.
Since then I’ve been doing a lot of work with scalping the NY session using momentum and breakouts. And I see that there are a lot of opportunities to use Pip Siphons method here. So I’m going to incorporate his method with my own for a month and see how it goes.
Few changes though…first, it’s the NY session. So more momentum trades than S/R in ranges (though I will trade those too). Second, I’m only allowing 3 scales max. Third, each trade will risk 2% max. I will cut it off if it hits that point.
One thing I’m expecting to like is the amount of time waiting during scales. NY session moves much quicker than Asian so I’m expecting my scaled trades to take up to 15 minutes, for the most part, rather than 30-90 minutes like they did in the Asian session.
Welp, I’m sorry to report back that I’ve not been having a very good time here since moving to a live account I’ve hit the max drawdown 2% on two separate occasions, which tells me that something is definitely wrong.
I’m going back to the drawing board to refigure and rethink. I don’t want to go back to a demo account, but I think I will drastically cut back my units on the live account so it is literally just pennies and not monopoly money (for the psych benefit).
I think I might need to simplify my charts. I’d like to get a basic method working before I add all the “helper” levels I think. I should be able to be successful at naked trading first, and then add the other stuff as a supplement.
The #1 thing that is a problem in my mind is the scaling into bad trades. I need a definite criteria to know when I should take a loss vs. keep scaling. I need to study these better and see what clues the price action gives me. I’m ok with taking the loss (though it is uncomfortable) but I need to find that “gut feeling” to tell me to get out vs. stay in.
A good book 'trading in the zone" by Mark Douglas was recommended to me that I’d like to pass on.
As for going live, pennies will teach you just as much about your reactions/emotions as a dollar. I have been trading on my live account but with only 100 bucks and i can say this much that my trading changed quite a bit from demo to live.
But i couldn’t agree more KISS method, no matter how much research I do on indicators or trying to add them my notes show that i continually do worse the more complex i try to get or when i try to add. Its a balance for me to have enough information to feel comfortable but not to much that i have contradictions across the board.
My biggest problem still is trying to establish solid rules that i stick to. But I feel, and my notes show it, i do better when i just trade and just try to “breath” with the market as the analogy was discussed a few pages back. But for long term a solid structure, that has some openings for interpretations, is key.
Wow, I have been looking at this system for like two hours now, and for the most part I can’t say I understand it. Can someone please explain it to me a little better, I mean, like I saw the list of the indiactors and all that but, when I put them on my chart they dont seem to mean a whole lot to me. Maybe I’m missing something. Can someone explain to what exact indiactors we’re suppose to use, with the time frames, and maybe how to make the trades off of them, like an example trade from a real time chart or something. Any help would be welcomed. Thanks.
Thanks everyone for their contribution, this is a great thread. I have a question about Oanda that perhaps someone here knows the answer to. I’ve been watching some scalping videos and noticed that the strategy he is implementing had him hedging, and buying lots against a few short positions moving against him. I’ve noticed in Oanda, when I try to hedge, it just subtracts from the position I already have open. Does Oanda allow me to open positions against each other and have them operate as separate trades?
Thanks in advance. I’ve learned a bunch reading this thread.
As far as i know, no, you can not open a trade opposite of the trade position you are in. If per say you have a short trade on at 100 units and then try to enter a long trade at 50 units, it will reduce your original short trade of 100 units to 50 units. Basically you would have closed out half your trade. Other then that if you can hold a a long and short trade simultaneously using Oanda i do not know about it.
So I’ve been trading Pip-Siphon’s methodology for few weeks and have been successfully pulling in almost 1% every time I sit down to trade. It’s been great and I appreciate all the insight. Sometimes I feel like I’m getting lucky… or maybe I’m getting better at it! Time will tell.
It’s been mentioned throughout this thread the skill of pulling info from the ticks. Pip-Siphon mentions watching them “like a hawk,” if I may quote you. I understand that it’s very discretionary and that there are no hard and fast rules. Can you, or anyone who feels they’ve got a better understanding, explain a bit more about how they extrapolate if a S/R will hold from the tick data? Or really any info regarding what they look for in the tick data, when, and why? Do you watch and see that the pippettes form their own triangle patterns or any other common chart patterns? Or if a price ends up sitting stationary for X amount of time compared to the slope of the move to get to that S/R? Or perhaps I’m way off base!
Anymore detail into this discipline I think will help help lead me on the path to better understanding.
Thanks so much everyone! Trading is truly an art in its own way and the challenges are what keep me interested! oh yeah… and the money part, haha.
It’s been mentioned throughout this thread the skill of pulling info from the ticks. Pip-Siphon mentions watching them “like a hawk,” if I may quote you. I understand that it’s very discretionary and that there are no hard and fast rules. Can you, or anyone who feels they’ve got a better understanding, explain a bit more about how they extrapolate if a S/R will hold from the tick data? Or really any info regarding what they look for in the tick data, when, and why? Do you watch and see that the pippettes form their own triangle patterns or any other common chart patterns? Or if a price ends up sitting stationary for X amount of time compared to the slope of the move to get to that S/R? Or perhaps I’m way off base!
On the off-chance that this thread is still semi-alive:
I read tick charts the same as ‘normal’ charts. Same patterns: triangles, head and shoulder etc.
S & R can be seen by ticks not going over or under certain levels.
Upward and downward trends with reversals LL, HH, LH, HL - same as normal.
Top and bottoms with reversals, time to enter in opposite direction
Sharp rejections, versus more blunted, drawn-out ones.
The challenge is to anticipate the moves, can only be done by pattern recognition as the result of loads of chart time.
Hey ikdent, welcome to BP. I see this is your first post.
This thread was very inspirational to me and I highly recommend you read it a couple times. Lots of good gems in here from pip-siphon.
I think you are right, knowing when or where a SR level will hold is discretionary. I’m not exactly sure what pip-siphon meant when he said he watched the tick chart like a hawk. The indications he gave were that he was using Oanda and MT4. MT4 does have a tick chart but I’m not sure it’s very reliable (I could be wrong about that).
I agree, patterns are everywhere and on every timeframe.
On this method, I think the chart-time is accelerated naturally because you are in and out of the trades so fast. For that reason, you get to see the pattern setups occur over and over very quickly.
Personally I trade on the 30sec chart and have found the “pauses” in price action to be very telling. This is the type of thing you can only get from watching it in realtime. I should explore the tick-charts a little more though… that’s something I haven’t done yet.
I am also following your journal and am quite impressed with your thoroughness and willingness to answer questions patiently.
I use only MT4 and have found the tick chart very useful, it provides detailed information on price movement that is often hidden in the ‘summation’ of the 1 minute candles. For example three consecutive 1 minute candles might have identical wicks, but the tick charts might reveal quite different patterns, like a sharp rejection, a flat top or bottom or a series of peaks/troughs.
I hope you have the opportunity to have a look at the tick charts in detail. Unfortunately there is not a lot of information on tick chart patterns available that I have been able to find.
I am interested in the pauses you have observed on the 30 second charts. I have noticed these on the 1 minute charts too. Do they signal reversal or continuance in your opinion? I read somewhere on a scalping thread that as soon as they see a pause they exit because the direction is uncertain, i.e. a 50/50 chance of any direction.
Hi ikdenk,
yes I will plan to pull up the MT4 tickchart soon. I like to introduce new variables like this in my trading. Sometimes I don’t really know what I’m looking for, but then it materializes.
The pauses I’ve noticed on the 30sec chart are another example of something I wasn’t really looking for. You can see in several places that I’ve traded where it seems that I’m catching bottoms or tops. The only explanation for this is that I sensed a pause and made a quick risk-decision to pull the trigger.
Reversal or continuance… hmm… well it’s definitely a resistance area but I’m not sure if indicates what will happen next. I think I would agree that generally speaking, if I’m in profit and it pauses, I’m usually getting out. If I’m waiting patiently for a setup to develop then I will SOMETIMES pull the trigger early on these pauses (one pattern I’ve noticed in a series of waves… price will frequently make a lesser and lesser peak on each successive wave, so you can’t always expect it to return to the level it did on the previous wave. The pause can tell you when price is about to reverse in this situation).
THought i’d throw my thanks in for Pip-Siphon. A good thread and a very interesting method. I’ve sat down on demo with it and have made consistant profits of around 0.2% per trading day. It is however very tiring, and as you say you have to watch what the screen is doing at all times.
Any further updates from anyone on how they’re doing (now) months down the line, how are the profits / trading method looking. Any changes to the way that Pip-Siphon completes his trades?
I began trading like Pip-Siphon about 6 months ago started out great then horrible. Once I got over the greed and gain patients my returns have been positive and consistent. However everyone will developed their our interpretation of Pip-Siphon’s method, it just a matter of finding what works for you.
In a separate thread Crashtriple asked, “Just interested…are you still trading this method? If not, why? If so how have your results been thus far?”
I’m no longer trading Pipsihon’s method. I’ve dedicated myself to scalping the NY session going for small amount of pips using higher leverage.
Using Siphon’s method was great at first. I was averaging around .3% - .7% a day. However, like Dusk the time finally came where I averaged into the wrong side of a trend and ended up losing over 12%. This same process repeated several times. I’d make lots of small wins and one huge loss to mess it all up.
Really, it came down to the emotional/psychological aspect. Had I bailed at 2% loss as I was supposed to, everything would have been fine. But as I researched other methods I found that emotionally, I much prefer quick in and out trades for a small amount of pips with small stops. Even on my good days with Siphon’s method I was never comfortable with averaging a trade. I always felt like I was going into debt when averaging, hah. And that’s something I can’t stand. I feel much better with my current method because every trade feels “fresh” and beholden to no one but myself. Might sound strange, hah, but it’s what feels good to me. Can’t post my blog address here but it’s in my profile. Feel free to check it out.
I do believe that Pipsiphons method is valid though but like any other method, really have to work on your emotions and discipline.
thanks for the reply, i feel “scaling” is a very dangerous tool if placed in the wrong hands. Like yourself and dusk i have had the same experience of many many smaller consistent gains and then a very few, but very large, losses.
Couldn’t agree more about the emotional/psychological aspect!
What time frame were you trading and approx how long did you attempt Siphons method?
That was a downer.