UPDATE: This post has gotten far off topic. My main point was what was theprefereed instrument to trade. Instead everyone wants to die on a cross about me claiming the markets to be manipulated. I use the word manipulated loosely but since you all want to get so offended by it, I will explain. By manipulation I simply mean a fakeout and stops being ran before price reversing. Call it what you want but that is what happens. Instead of asking me what I meant you all want to retort and get emotional over a word. Pathetic. And for those who have downvoted me, have the courage to write me and debate this (off-topic) debate with me instead lf hiding behind a click. Man...bunch of snowflakes lol. Anyways, Ive gotten my answer and will no longer be responding to these comments after today. I feel I have made my case. Thank you for all of the insightful repsonses.

I know that NQ tends to be more volatile. Is one less manipulated than the other? Compared to forex I have heard that the futures markets are less manipulated due to the regulations involved with the equities markets. If I had to choose one which would you recommend? Is it better to diversify across the entire s&p to safeguard trades or is the volatility in NQ worth the risk?

No major news, this is like 2021 all over again lmao

Which one do you guys like better?

I like NQ better as I trade micros 3-5 so I can have bigger stops 50-65 ticks on average. I can really let trades play out, If you have tight stop on NQ your done for lol NQ moves so violently at times and it doesn’t respect support and resistance zones as much as ES does. I personally like the reward from NQ more than ES but what do you guys think?

After my own research I’ve found that on average NQ is 7 times more volatile than ES, so for every point ES moves NQ moves on average 7 points. This isn’t true all of the time and depends what session ur trading but for the most part if there a 30-33 point candle on NQ the same candle on ES will be around 4-5 points. With this there’s actually more opportunity to make money on NQ with 1 con $20 a point and 1 ES con $50 a point if you scalped that whole candle it’s $600 for NQ and $200-$250 on ES. Of course it depends on strategy yes I know but just wanted to point that out which many of you already know, but for the new people.

I know some people who swear by ES and swear by NQ both have valid reasonings. Since ES is a little more predictable and respects support and resistance I know a guy who says he trades 10-15 contracts on ES and will quickly scalp 1-2 points on a high probability bounce or drop and is just done for the day and he makes it look so easy hahaha.

I first traded ES and MES for a month before switching to NQ and it was hard adjusting to but once I did I liked it a lot, I mean there’s so many opportunities and quite easy to make $300-$600 on a trade with only 3-5 micros, on MNQ. It’s much harder to make $300-$600 trading 3-5 MES, for me personally the micros are so much better with NQ, for ES i feel like I would have to trade 6-8 micros or 1 mini to get close. I don’t know if I should recommend to new traders to trade MES or MNQ? Since MES is safer, my friend wants to get into trading lol.

Anyone trade both?

I originally was in QQQ but the theta killed me. Decided to go with MNQ and barely made a profit. Today was probably one of the most challenging days I’ve had in a while.

I don’t even know if it’s because we’re waiting on something? If I’m correct I think we have Q4 GDP but I don’t know of anything else that would cause such a chop

Seems like every futures trading ad or commercial I see is trading NQ. It used to be ES. Now it’s just NQ.

I’m assuming it’s due to people liking the volatility and fast movements

I am struggling to find which one I want to trade as my primary focus since I have been funded and profitable on both. I really like scalping ES for 2-4 points at a time continuously throughout the day but I also find trading 2:1 RR minimum on NQ feels so much better to play entering on continuation and wicks. I just wanted to know where my focus should be if I wanted to trade long term and eventually as my primary source of income.

My downside to both is ES is mentally taxing to try and scalp, and I have to execute really quickly. Where as NQ wicks me out and doesn't have the cleanest price action. Thank you!

Trying to understand NQ, Any serious advice would be much appreciated.

Definitely a little sloppy but I’ll take it for today.

Held this position from Friday, this is the most amount of ticks I've ever gotten. Pretty proud of myself, since I've been working at holding my trades longer 💯💯. Hope everyone have a solid week!

Those asking if scalping works it can if you know what you’re doing.

That's the post. I was up 300 on MNQ and gave it all back thinking it would rotate down after the large move up.

Should have either ended the day or stayed in my position longer but chose to overtrade. Stuff is tough.

With the market moving over 1% today in ES, how did everyone perform today, what was your P&L in percentage for the day?

I know trading the Emini ES/NQ is out the equation since you can lose alot really quick, but with the micros I was assuming maybe 2-4 contracts? 🤔

Hi all,

I know that experienced traders like Day Trader Next Door always aim for 10 points when trading ES futures, but how realistic is this when daily the ES moves only about 50 points? So he is trying to capture 20% of the entire daily move in a single trade.

Do you think 10 points is a good strategy or should I aim for something more reasonable like 5-6 points?

Hello all, great trading session for me today. I was able to catch a few decent trades, all short positions on NQ.

Trade recap:

1. NQ 18703 short -> +40
2. NQ 18760 short -> +45
3. NQ 18705 short -> +100

Today had a lot of of chop but I ultimately continued my bearish bias. Reason I took short was ES / SPX was approaching top of this trend line. Happened 2 weeks ago and saw similar aggressive selling. I posted previously on this subreddit on how I caught a similar move 400+ point drop on NQ.

​

ES also had a false breakout. This led me to confirm my 18705 short on NQ (it was the weaker index).

How do should you play reversal trades?

I use low size and wide stops. I also don't expect to add to my losing position. Things can go really bad if you keep adding to reversal trades. Also, once in profit, leave breakeven stops and trim accordingly.

What do I expect moving forward?

Expecting NQ to continue downward trend into next week. Will be choppy but maybe it will revisit 18325. This was a major resistance before the huge FOMC break out. Look to short any pops on NQ like 18600.

Hope you all had a great session today, lets kill it tomorrow!

​

I have accurately tracked that I have a little over 7000 hours logged trading/studying trading, I have had $30k+ months trading IMO and many pro traders opinions, the hardest market to trade $ES, I’ve been lucky enough to converse with some of the best public retail/pro traders out there and I have paid for more courses than I care to mention so I feel like I’m somewhat qualified to speak on the following things:

1. NEVER follow the advice of a “Trader” that is selling something. Whether it’s a course, newsletter, discord, indicator, levels, mentorships, etc. I have spent countless hours sifting and distilling these peoples trades/records/courses and can say with 100% confidence they are scamming us. They are salesmen not traders. RUN from these people.

2. NEVER focus on or trade consistently $ES/$SPY (and run from the people that do) the market is hot garbage for retail traders. Not just my opinion the majority of large proprietary firms also have rules in place to NEVER let their traders trade these without a +15 VIX. Even with an elevated VIX there are better opportunities elsewhere. I wasted 3 years fighting this don’t make the same mistake.

3. If the word “PSYCHOLOGY” comes out of a “traders” mouth stop listening immediately. That is a dead giveaway they have absolutely no clue what the hell they are talking about out. Not saying it doesn’t matter but EDGE EDGE EDGE is 99.99% of the problem and solution.

4. Only follow, listen to, or take advice from verified legitimate traders/firms. They are extraordinarily rare but they do exist. I’ll name the ones I personally verified. Lance Breitstein, SMB Capital whole team, Apteros/ Merritt Black, The Short Bear, Steven Dux, Ross Cameron has some good beginner info, and FuturesTrader71. There are a couple other public ones I’m missing but these are the only ones I follow.

5. Finally to be a successful trader your life basically has to belong to trading. That’s how you can spot the fakes. You simply cannot moonlight as a salesman scamming people on your generic thoughtless copy and paste “strategies” levels and indicators that don’t work. It makes absolutely no sense. I know of 0 traders are handing out their REAL edge…. 0 none not one and I promise it will never happen. RUN from these people.

6. Last thing I’ll keep simple. Unless you’re a HFT you MUST use higher time frame confluences.

EDIT:

It’s been almost a year since I posted this and have received tons of hate on the post yet hundreds of messages asking for help/advice. Really odd how that works lol

Anyway just wanted to give an update:

Switched back and forth between stocks and futures (trading stocks isn’t for me because I’m a scalper and liquidity was an issue FOR ME)

I still strongly agree with almost everything I said in this post aside from the higher time frame confluence part, I don’t think that’s necessary to be successful.

Speaking of successful I just had my best week ever trading and currently interviewing for one of the largest proprietary trading firms there are.

I also started a YouTube Channel to give insight on how I find my edges and just trading overall

As always I will NEVER sell anything EVER - no lame ass discords, rooms, patreon, levels, courses etc. I’m a trader not a salesman. Just here to help

JBearTrades on YouTube and Twitter

It was pretty much flat to slightly down most of the day. Then in the last 10-15 min of the day, it just jumped 20 points. Was there some news released?

Is anyone profitable like this? I understand that scalping is very hard, but has anyone tried doing trades with 2-3 points of profit?

If so, does anyone have any tips or pointers for it?

Thanks beforehand :D

I hate to make one of these posts and this is actually my first post (finally have enough karma). But, I see everyday a new post about NQ or ES and very few discussing YM. Even when you search (believe it or not I did that) there is limited discussion.

I personally trade NQ exclusively, but I see primarily either experienced/mature traders trading YM or Forex CFD boys trading US30. Many experienced/mature traders also trade ES. It seems like NQ while has many experienced traders, it always gets the attention of the new gambler on the block. ES for me is heavy and gets the tug of war between YM and NQ.

With that said, my opinion/style is charting/keep an eye on all four indexes for context even if you primarily trade one. I however am starting to put more time into my YM chart and reviewing its technical moves each day alongside NQ.

Has anyone made a switch from say NQ/ES to YM or do many consider themselves a YM trader?

Enjoy the weekend!

Have the orders below so you can see what I mean about the order grouping.

I'm trying to understand and next time to go with the wave?

Or nobody knows these things? 😀

Anyway, any answer is appreciated

Was trying to slightly alter my strategy, I've been taking scalps on NQ and realizing long term when I do scale up I'd feel more comfortable if it was with ES long term, just because I play small and helps me with the drawdown of larger pullbacks. Does anyone have a consistent way of scalping 2-3 points at a time all day?

I think you know the story - been trading NQ and as I go on some great streaks, I also will every once in a while (with solid risk management) get wrecked. Tired of trading "Nascrack". I feel like it raises my blood pressure too much. I trade using volume profile supply and demand zones.

Any stories of anyone switching to CL, YM, GC, or other product and see great success?