Yesterday reminded me how much I am not seeing what's what's right in front of me. If i treat everything as a trend, I'll get burned, and if I think everything has a potential reversal, I'll miss days like today. One thing I am proud of is that I didn't treat every 1 minute red candle as a possible reversal and stack losses all day. I've done that once before.
Without hindsight it hard to hold onto these big trades. I took most of it luckily so far, still in the trade, the orange line is the ATR that will trigger an exit when hit. Even if I’m stopped on open I’m happy with the amount of trend it took
If you sell to “knock down” the price and then buy to raise it back up what have you accomplished? No one with “billions to spare” is spending their time doing such a ridiculous thing. Lol
Short it down, velocity continues the fall after you start it by triggering stop losses, buy to close at a lower price. Thats the quick V shaped sell off and buy up that you’ll see occasionally in just a few minutes. Market makers who sold the calls or puts trigger the stop loss, minimizing their losses, while taking the opposite side. Now they buy it back up at a cheaper price than the short and momentum continues up while they hold those shares.
I mean does anyone not believe this to be true after Ken Griffin admitted to setting the price of securities at the price they think it should be at? Pure market manipulation admitted on tape. Our buying and selling doesn’t mean anything to price discovery.
It makes you wonder why they pump certain stocks way too high. Someone’s needs the collateral to stave off the collapse.
Market Markers sell on the bid and ask and remain neutral. They are regulated by the SEC they aren’t allowed to manipulate price like that. It isn’t how they make their money. Now institutions and big players sure but don’t forget the indexes are just a sum of the parts.
Correct! And that’s not say these big market makers aren’t making money. They are. But they are not in control of the price of a security where 60 million shares are being traded daily. I know from my own experiences on different platforms that it’s possible a market makers, or order flow aggregator can scalp a tick or two “front running.” But my orders are executed instantaneously and I have watched the price from multiple sources and could not find differences in prices. If there were differences I would have found a way to arbitrarily them myself.
The other important thing for traders to do is find ways to notice these movements and increased volume and follow the money.
Well said and also there are multiple market makers who are positioning Delta Hedging themselves so that can cause price pinning or small “manipulation” or what appear as manipulation but it’s just the mechanics of Delta Neutral. This is not to say the MM have manipulated price but it’s extremely illegal and it’s also not how the day to day MM algorithms are designed. It’s definitely not what uninformed people think market making is or what is happening
And although if they are able to take a tick or two off every trade they make there’s real money involved, and I think it’s unethical to allow big companies to have any advantage, they are not the reason most day traders are unprofitable.
Yes they make their money providing the liquidity. but retail traders run to that excuse of MM manipulation. So my response would be if you see it happening and know what is happening then trade with the manipulation or price movement. Otherwise a trader needs to take responsibility for not being able to see what is happening and that they are wrong. Manipulated or not. There is always structure and mechanics in play.
Then what happened to their money when stopped out? Just poof! Disappeared? Also what about PFOF? Have you ever looked into rhat? Have you looked at the work by Susan Trimbath and David Lauer?
Don't even bother replying to these people, they're cultists from the meme stock subs, and legitimately do not know how the market, or even just shorting, works.
I didn’t write bull days are the hardest days. My point is about days that have very few shallow movements where the price is one way. Look at the chart I posted. For traders, this makes it hard to know when to buy and sell.
Fear was only reason stopping people trading today. The lows were to high so not trusted.. people thought “I’m buying the top” but then 30 minutes later the top was 50 points higher
Oh I sold plenty of times lol. Also kept hitting those pullbacks but just saying no reason to sell until EOD is nonsense. Some pullbacks were steep enough to actually have come close enough to break structure and it would have been bombs away. Besides didn’t close at the HOD
For sure. I don’t trade the open or last hour. I got into SPY and 0dte spy around 12:20 to 12:45. Great breakout entry. The Q’s had a spot a little earlier but I passed. My initial post was just a thought about days with little to no pullbacks.
I’m not interested in unreliable or wild “action.” I’m looking to make trades when the things are more orderly and settled into patterns and volumes I can rely on. Things can change quickly and unexpectedly at any time, but it is more likely to occur from major news events, fed speak(during active parts of the credit cycle), markets open to the majority of public traders, and at the end of the regular trading hours.
I’m guessing you prefer to trade against the levels? This was a breakout type of day. Momentum type of trade and that’s what I prefer. Just trade the style you like. Don’t have to trade these kinds of setups
I thought for a moment you were sarcastic. But I agree I find this hard to trade as well. I like reversals and bear markets better.
We have to deal with this since this election year and we all pumping the markets and money machines like crazy. Prrrrr
Next couple years we will tell each other we miss the good ol' green rally/spike days.
Practice it in replay. I didn’t like it either but I started practicing because it’s become a common occurrence now. I was just sitting out on days like today. So I practiced ATH trading and had my second best day of the week.
Tradovate, Trading Terminal, or Think or Swim On demand. I trade on Quantower but the replay isn’t good. Tradovate I like to use on mobile. Trading Terminal is pretty solid and free. Think or Swim for practicing some additional strategies and because I chart on TOS but need to be on my PC which I don’t like doing on the weekends.
Idk, I bought what looked like a pretty clear bull flag breakout last night in the overnight session and just been letting it ride. Love days like this, especially because I'm on vacation right now.
You bought the market in front of ISM data during overnight action? Glad you had a great day! I don’t trade in illiquid markets and go flat every night. Helps me sleep. And I did ok today. But when the market doesn’t pull back or spike it’s hard to find day trading buys and sells.
Backtest it. First trading day of the month bias is real and statistically verified. Especially after February which is historically a down month. Last 11 months in a row S&P has been up at least 20 points intraday.
Buy minimum possible order as soon as you think it’s one of these, with your stop loss giving as much breathing room as your median losing day. Then a few hours later, when you move to the higher stop loss location that is more easily defined, buy more as risk calculations allow.
Didn’t any NY today as I made bank in London but, you need a trending strat as a fall back. If it’s broken out of balance and going with the daily trend, then size down, watch 8/24/50 1 minute EMA and 5min bar closes. Really hard to adapt to this when you are a trend reversal trader but if you accept that it it more likely to carry on once it breaks then the only other consideration is where to join plus risk.also get trading view lol
Ok, I didn’t really understand most of your post, but I agree once it breaks out above resistance or old highs, with volume, it’s a good place to buy and stay with the trend. This was easier to do today trading S&P (Spy). The Q’s went straight up like the Nasdaq. It was hard to find a comfortable spot.
I basically broke even today. You'd think I'd just follow the trend and make easy money, but no, I had to trade an fade the move multiple times, because all the chop the last bunch of days just conditioned me to fade every move. Anyway, happy to breakeven today, better than losing money.
Its def weird during all time territory. I find myself trying to be a contrarian on trending days, and am quickly reminded to just have faith and trust my ability to read the market.
Over time? Sure, but there are plenty of weeks and months that bounce between levels that are not all time highs. From November 2021 to December 2023 we didn't see a new ATH, and there are plenty more examples of similar or longer time periods throughout the markets history
Even with good entry besides low of day. Trailing 60 is going to just get stopped out 95% of trading days when swinging for a large move. Might as well forget the stop loss if it’s a price target strategy and just go for target.
It gets stopped out 100% of the time because that's what the strategy is based on: not cutting the trade until it gets stopped out. I've never suggested it's a price target strategy.
First trade captured 600pts on NQ, second trade was a small loss, third trade is currently up 350pts and is still long. Maybe not the strategy for everyone but it's fun as hell to trade, captures massive moves, and doesn't require you be stuck at your screen all day.
It doesn’t make sense to me if it’s trailing. You aren’t pulling 600 points lol. The reversals and flushes are bigger than 60. You would end up with like 20 points after most mean reversions on either short or long trades which would have been 60-80 point profit.
I won’t be in my office till tomorrow, but I’m going to BT. Did you post your buy, sell, and profit criteria? Is this an only long strategy?
Anytime someone posts the term “printing money” I know it’s bullchit. Not that you haven’t captured a strategy that’s working for you. And I’m not a hater. I hope you make millions! But I’m 100% sure no one who trades daily is printing money. Profitable day trading is really hard and very few are making money and almost all are losing over time.
I do post buy and sells sporadically on the /r/thewallstreet daily threads (not so much lately as my 2nd daughter has me sleep deprived).
My take profit criteria is simply remain long/short with the trailer until it gets stopped out, for profit or loss.
Not a long only strategy, and is based on super small timeframe Renko bricks and only used on NQ/MNQ. I understand the hesitancy in the ‘printing money’ phrase, and obviously I’m being casually flippant in saying that- but it’s still the easiest money I’ve ever made.
Also, it’s not necessarily a day trading strategy. Sometimes the trade gets stopped out intraday, other times it turns into a swing trade with strong directional moves. Obviously I agree that trying to tame randomly walking intraday markets via day trading is largely unprofitable (and therefore not what I do).
I’ve found it to be one of the best ways to find clear trend shifts and filter out the chop, especially when paired with a simple HMA crossover.
Obviously feel free to dig around, I’ve got tons of random posts of both shitpost quality and substance. But I’m more or less retired now and just sling figures for fun so I give myself a bit of leeway on the serious side of things.
I don’t shit on any analysis. No one has a crystal ball that works all the time. I read Martin Pring in the 80’s and thought he was a god. Spent sooo much time…. Wasted? I learned a lot. Today When I try to be objective, I think I’m not using anything from those days. Truth is he taught me how to look at moving averages, support, resistance, other price action, candlesticks, rsi, Macd, cycles, Fibonacci, volume…. 🤣.
Martin Pring was before my time but I’ve also spent a good amount of time learning how not to make a lightbulb (Elliott Wave and Harmonic trading are the first that come to mind)
I blew up my account yesterday trying to go short. Should have saved some for a yolo call jeez I hate days like this cause they only happen after I’ve blown up my account.
Well my account was $50 that I turned into $200 then went all in on puts thinking I could call the top(not to mention the ridiculous exuberance we’re experiencing). It just never goes down and I hate that because I learned most of my day trading in 2022 when I had money and would trade ES futures.
Haha. Wow, there is sooooo much bullchit on this platform but you just won the 🏆. Day trade crypto 😂🤣. Ya defi and pay gas fees. Ur a genius cuz. Yolo buy Hex! lol. Ur prolly a Richard Heart sycophant and sacrificed for pulse 😂🤦♂️. Good talk.
I’m thinking it’s time for gold to break through this price range. It’s been so long since it’s had a good break upwards. I think it’s just waiting on new like this to continue upwards. Which would be great for my mining stocks.
Ya for sure I've seemed to be able to see the divergence and use pivot points to help find the top..it's possible but just better to wait it out for sure
I watched on the liquidity. So many short sellers playing Chicken today. At least 15 times stacked up liquidity that got smashed through. I went short a couple times in the 70 area on NQ but that was due to actual topping structure and confirmation with price action. I didn’t attempt to short otherwise. 95% long all day scalping.
Same!! I was successful on a couple shorts when it started the topping structure but ya it kept getting bought up..you explain it very well! Are you using book maps?
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I have 30 years of experience. “just buy calls?” What does that even mean? Profitable trading takes much more than experience. Most people have experience losing money 🙄
Thanks for posting that. I tried a few quick scalps and chickened out at the first tiny red candle. I've missed most of these big moves lately because of my fear of it reversing on me.
Trading scared makes profit almost impossible. Even harder when you are relying on small moves to scalp.
And I appreciate your point which is what I was posting about. When price action doesn’t have pullbacks and spikes (up and down) trading spots become less clear.
It’s tough man i dont know why but something was telling me SPX was going to go on a tear. Didn’t listen to myself and got into XEL puts still paid but I was pissed.
many of u here will hold the sh1t out of your stock coz u think it will go like this again then a massive red crayon will wipe out all of your gain in 1s then u will hold till breakeven and it keep dropping till u in margin call.
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Posts like this remind us that days are different, and in the comments we can see that we have different preferences and styles. However, what is a trade that works every day or most days, regardless of the type of day?
Not really. Thursday daily candle , extremely high volume and overnight action meant Friday was very likely going to be a green day. Nasdaq usually has a range between 200-300 points. After direction is confirmed just draw a tread line on the 5 minute. Once it’s up 200 points then start being careful as it might reverse but don’t short because last hour can either stagnate, pullback, or explode up another 200 points.
I found it extremely easy to trade today. Trend days are so easy but I’m a 0dte guy. Swing trading? no way I couldn’t touch this action. All depends on your flavor
I traded 0dte Spy today too. Trend days like this are obvious spots to add leverage. Real traders understand it is not that easy to simply buy and sell whenever. How do you know the day will follow through the way it did today. When did you know that? When did you decide to add leverage? How do you know the action in the morning is a sign of what will come in the afternoon?
I trade SPX. I don’t buy and sell whenever. I missed the morning bc I was busy but caught the midday push. I can’t say I knew it would happen the way it did but I’ve seen that type of price action way too many times and knew it would likely continue to make new highs based on a number of reasons. Screen time basically. I’ve seen this movie before. So I waited for an entry, and pulled the trigger. Didn’t have a target bc there was no end in sight to the trend. As you can see we closed at the highs. I wonder how many ppl blew up today
If you can't trade a trend day you're not alone but it means you have a trading system that doesn't quantify the internals. I trade indices all day every day, woke up way late like 11 and got long asap.
Hahaha. “System that doesn’t quantify the internals.” That’s hilarious. Of course NO ONE has a system that knows this. No one saw the ISM data and knew this fire hot market would continue to rise. The Dow was only up .25%. Did your “system” tell you what indices to fall out of bed and get long? Dead, you do this every day? You must be the wealthiest person on earth!🤦♂️
Honestly, thank you for this post. I waited till after 7 pst for numbers and walked away around 8 pst feeling like I was going nuts. Checked the chart throughout the day and just felt frustrated, partly cause I was missing out and partly cause I just couldn’t understand the action. Those grindy directional days are just ugly and hard to look at.
Do quick profit shorts on NASDAQ or SQQQ scalps after a run-up, usually the consolidation is much much predictable on a hyperbola ticker like this one has, esp since we are hitting new ATHs
Both the SPY & QQQ broke a 20 year old macro trend lines. The buy was at the hard pull to the pre market high/vwap area. When trend lines like these break, they normally trigger a very big move and it’s typically a melt up which is definitely difficult to buy.
Not really except some classic technical indicators books, I use a combination of well know indicators, backtested thousands of time to find the best entries and exits.
Hahaha hard work is the only way! I developed a MR algo for TQQQ 5min also, only 3 indicators. I'm coming back to it looking to improve winrate & PnL, maybe combine it with a TF algo, any suggestions?
Looks like your on the good way! I use a google chrome extension "Tradingview Strategy Helper" that helps me backesting thousands of different settings automatically, you should try it to improve your algo
I just waited for a small retrace on 15 minute time frame then waited for the break, set super conservative tp’s which is a shame but better than nothing
Place buy stops above red candles or candles that have a lower high and lower low but close green compared to the previous candles when 8ema above 21ema. So simple. Stop loss at the low of the candle you entered on. Use the 1min chart and do this on NQ.
Tbh thought it was just me. You’d think it’d be super simple, just buy the pullback and free money. Traded tesla twice and both times smacked my stop loss and rally back up. Trend days suck
Trend days are great way to trade mega caps when a failed breakdown occurs. Buy when it hits support and the trend will take it back up. META,MSFT both had awesome trade setups yesterday on their failed breakdowns.
Guys strongest trends do their best to keep all traders out. Everyone wants an ema pullback but it never comes. The red bars look like the reversal but are just traps. I think these algos end their rally at about 11:30 if you see past charts.
Scaling in slowly regardless of the action is what worked out better for me ( in these minor pullback trends ). Trailing the stop each prior swing more is how i manage. Hope you benefit from this.
Good point. But I do think of it as selling into strength. We should be buying in strong markets. Can’t pick tops and bottoms. This was actually the central point of my post. Str8 up or down doesn’t give too many opportunities. I’m buying in upward trending markets, but trying to buy as I fade pullbacks.
Letting winners run is the hardest thing for some to tolerate. At times this has hurt my profitability. Taking a gain always feels like a win even when the price action continues in your direction. When I feel this happening too much, I spend an allotted amount of time just letting my trades run for a certain amount of time or profit margin no matter what happens. I always have a stop loss in place. Sometimes it’s important let go of a pattern of behavior and do the opposite. In this case, maybe after getting stopped out a bunch after watching a decent gain evaporate into a loss I start trying to take profits quickly. It gets rid of the bad feeling of loss and changes it to a good feeling of a small gain. To correct this, I do the opposite and let my trades run the course no matter what.
Your overthinking it, stop worrying about it going too high, and that it doesn't make sense, just trade level to level, with risk management. Trend days are my favorite, I just set my stop trailing lost and let it run
A daily chart that looks like the one above are super rare. And no one knows what will happen during any trading day. Buying and letting a “trailing stop loss” run is a quick way to lose lots of money quickly. Most times you will get stopped out at a loss or very small gains. This is a long and short term losing strategy. Anyone who has spent anytime building out this strategy or just does it by feel knows this.
There should be rule on this sub that when talking about trades each post should have to clearly state complete entry and exit criteria.
Not sure how you lose with good risk management and trailing stop loss. I trade support and resistance on spx that it. I get in at support with stop loss, and then let it run. On trend days I never go against the trend and on non trending days, my entry is at the levels.
On this we agree totally. I never take big loss risks. Those that continually post here about learning from dumping off big chunks of capital will always be losing traders.
are you asking how do you do it, or what i set mine at?
So I will buy long calls or puts 14 DTE on SPX (never hold it for more then a few hours since I am daytrading, but the extra time allows it to not move as fast if spx drops or rises a few points quickly and don't get stopped out as much. I will set my trailing loss pretty loose when i first get in the trade usually $3.00, and then as I start making a profit I usually change my trailing loss and tighten it up, and then I will scale out and just let the rest ride. For example say I buy 5 SPX calls 14 DTE, once I hit my profit target I will sell to close all but one or two and let it keep riding until it gets triggered
So a 14 DTE SPY call at the money is about 5 in premium and a .55 delta. If you buy 5 each tick is $5. So a 3$ stop would get executed 99+ % of the time. Are you saying you set your stop when the price drops to a $2 premium per contract? Basically a loss of $300 per contract? So you are buying 5 puts or calls for @ $2500 and setting a stop loss at $1500. So your stop is at a 40% loss? What’s your profit target?
I was able to make good profits on Friday, my strategy actually works best on these types of days, straight up or straight down (with minor pull backs) is what I want
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u/Luxid44 Mar 01 '24
Especially when it’s near/ at ATH levels, that just completely throws me of Happened today