Split my position into two halves again. Wanted to take full TP at 15760 (Daily Pivot S1) but sadly it didn’t reach this level so I am walking away with 14,55 points.
Not my best day. I should have stopped after second SRS entry was stopped out. Had a really nice trade in the end but lost -23 points overall.
Traded the DOW with 5% of my normal position size to show myself once more that I can trade disciplined. Made 63 points and decreased my loss of the day by 2,92 €. Not much, but I gained confidence in my abilities again.
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+15,94 € today. It’s ok. I could have made 10 € more, but I wasn’t willing to let profits run because I lost yesterday. Now I am on track again!
Very hard earned 5 points today. Could have made more but I reduced size on my last trade, entering only with a 50% position.
I end this week with 33 points profit. I had a bad day on Wednesday and it took me Thursday and Friday to recover from it. I hope next week will be better.
But in terms of relative profit I am very satisfied. I made 77 points in two weeks. In the future I want to risk 1 % with every 10 points. That would mean 7,7 % in two weeks.
Don’t want to be too critical, but when your losses are bigger than your wins, it’s not a good sign. Not saying you can’t win, because a really high win rate will keep you profitable. But a run of losers can hit you hard that way
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I like the layout of your journal, is this on Google Sheets?
Also, do you know anywhere I can find a good journal template I could use?
I’m not keeping a journal at the moment but do understand why its important so hoping to start soon!
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The statistic is a little bit false in that regard, that I journal partial profits as an individual trade. The win rate, too. Don’t know how to journal partial profits in a better way. Didn’t thought about that when I created the spreadsheet. Maybe I just delete the average profit caluclation completely.
I calculated the average win manually with 8,2 €. Its like a 1/0,8 RRR. Thats not too bad considering I didn’t had a runner yet. I think I can raise that to 1:1 or even better.
No it’s Open Office. I just made it myself. When you need help with that, just ask.
I’m already an advanced user of Excel as I use this in my day job, but want to use Google Sheets for this as it’ll be on my personal laptop as I’m tight and don’t want to pay for Excel!
I sure I can make one similar to yours by copying your cut and pastes, I only asked for a template as I was being lazy!
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Around +10 points. There was a lot more on the table today. Tom made 42. I closed early because there where too many topping tails on the 1m chart and I thought it would reverse. After it pushed higher from that, I tried to get back into the uptrend two times but this time it reversed.
I still have to learn to let profits run a little bit longer. I could have moved my stop loss up instead of closing the trade. But I had to make a decision within seconds. I shouldn’t beat myself up too much.
the number of trades per day, the size (0.05 - 1.00), this 25/50/100 stuff and when you determine to exit trades - all seem inconsistent.
inconsistent data will make it harder to see if your strategy works.
“I still have to learn to let profits run a little bit longer.”
Learning to hold longer isnt precise enough.
In my opinion, what’s important, is your strategy, not your subjectiveness. In my opinion we as traders should take ourselves out of the strategy as much as possible.
Price ran off without because you failed to make the right decision. I would feel bad too. Now implement a safeguard that satisfies all outcomes so that this never happens again.
But! I made money today 
Maybe decision making is your edge.
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Thats the plan. To be consistent in my subjectiveness.
I admit, that for others this may look like pure chaos, but I never made such regular money with my old 1:2 RRR. I only had two losing days the past two weeks, It feels much better, than my old approach at the beginning of this journal.
And that my mentor consistently makes more points than me? It bothers me a bit, but that shows me, in what regard I have to improve.
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Bet your mentor didn’t make more than you today! What a shocker Tom had. It does my confidence no end of good, because no matter how bad I trade I ain’t as bad as Tom was today!
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Hello guys, I wanted to give you an update.
Based on Johnnys post you might already suggested that I was having a hard time:
And that is true. September was an awful month for me. But I hopefully learned from it. I took the time to study my past approaches to trade indices. I studied Tom Hougaard approaches, too. Tried to understand why he is so much better, even when we are losing.
Here are some of my conclusions:
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Most of my previous approaches involving around trading breakouts of some sort.
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I hate losing on a previous winning position. So I like to move my stop loss quick.
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A lot of breakout trades are retesting their breakout level and I get stopped out for breakeven or a loss.
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It is better to delay the entry and enter with the retest and maybe even for a better price.
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Because the retest has already occured, the breakeven stop should be save - if price is trending.
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Now what I want to do in the future is anticipating support and resistance and buying/selling right into it.
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This is kind of what I did with my intraday swing trading strategy, but the stops I target are breakeven stops of breakout traders.
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I backtested this manually for 2023 on 5m charts. The results are outstanding, but of course I don’t know what the 1m chart looks like (don’t have the data or charts saved).
This is todays session. I had one breakeven trade.
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I missed my prefered trade but still made a quick 15 point profit.
Edit: Pretty proud of this entry 
I am satisfied with the last week. I started changing my approach based on the research I did last weekend. This new trading style has made a small profit. It combines a few concepts that worked for me in the past buying low and sell high, trade momentum at the open etc. The best thing about it is, that it isn’t mechanical at all and is purely based on priceaction.
But maybe I have to learn not to be overly strict with my entry on this strategy? Yesterday I missed a huge trade by 2 points! I even could have added to my position. So it goes.
I made myself a promise and I won’t focus on the numbers so much anymore. Because when things go south I can’t make rational decisions anymore. I still have to trade live, because I trade way more aggressively and precise on a demo account, resulting in huge profits. But I have to learn to do this consistently on a live account. I always start with a winning period, but in the first though phase I lose my touch and taking profits to early to make up for the losers, etc.
That means basically, that I won’t share my lot size anymore with you and I won’t journal my monetary returns daily in my private spreadsheet either. I just trade and focus on a trade execution that I can be proud of and see where it leads.
People who read my interview here on babypips know that I don’t work at the moment. My employer called me and wants me to come back. They made me an offer, that I can’t refuse, because I will be able to work from my home nearly everyday with reduced hours. That means I can trade the DAX and then start working. It lifts some pressure from me. I hope that this way I will be able to trade more consistent. I will start working again in January 2024.
Regarding my “mentor” Tom Hougaard: He had a bad September, too. We were getting stopped on nearly every trade. But he was able to add to his few winners and still lose less than me. Something I couldn’t do because I was in the red and my mind didn’t let me sacrifice this few winning trades for a potential higher profit. Tom showed a winning mindset I don’t have yet. This is something I want to work on. If I think that price can rally higher (like on my missed trade yesterday) I will sacrifice unrealized profit to make more on this particular trade. But I won’t do this every trade. The small scalp yesterday is a good example for that. Price already did what I thought and this was only me trying to still make a little bit on this, before I quit trading for the day.
Why did I stop trading his setups? Well first I have to tell you that Tom isn’t trading them consistently either. If he thinks, that something else is better for the day, he will trade outside of his setups. And generally he is right. This is really frustrating as a learning trader. He sometimes tells us, why he did what he did and that we should learn to make decisions for ourself. And he his right. His setups are mechanical setups. He makes them profitable because he doesn’t trade them, when he thinks they are going to fail and when they are right he adds to them.
When he trades his setups and he takes partials, or moves his stop loss, or adds to his position, it is very distracting when you are in the same trade like he is. It prevents me to build up a winning mindset myself. So I first want to work on my mindset and maybe then I trade his setups again.
Sorry for this very long post. Nobody will read it anyways. Have a nice weekend.
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Keep going with your strategy and mindset it is not easy as you say to follow someone else. I have followed Tom for a while now and have learned so much from his channel and training resources. I think that developing a trust in any approach is key as then you are not conflicted when it comes to pulling the trigger. Something I am still working on as well as trying to let profits run. You will get there just trust yourself and trade in a way that you are comfortable.
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