May Monthly
Its been a very productive month. Ive changed the way I go about my LT business and it has 100% improved performance. As always theres issues and thats what I made my other LT post going more in depth looking at winners and losers and finding the commonalities. The biggest notable thing in my trading is less stress. Finally playing to my strengths and trading like it, I am not giving stocks a chance to prove me right. I enter the trade where I expect to be right. If I am not. I exit. No time to debate it and wait and sit in a red trade waiting for it to maybe turn green. It literally feels better to trade like this.
Last week I talked about being in flow with the market. It was amazing how I could sense I was in that other worldy state just watching the tape go back and forth. I could feel the pressure or the lack of it. When I saw the buyers or sellers I was able to go with the flow and add more as it confirmed my ideas. Another reason I feel this more is because I have started using blogspot for my report cards. I can keep the tab open and whenever I have a trade idea/trade I right away start typing it out, what I saw were reasons for entry. And I follow the stock, I type everything I see as the trade develops. This has helped me a ton for a couple reasons.
1. Time saving. Dont have to do everything at the end of the trading session because I did it live.
2. Consistency. Always good to have a routine that makes sense to you.
3. Ingrained processes. Before I start the day, I know that I want to do X whenever the stock gives me the signal. When I type it out before/during the trade I reinforce what it is I am trying to do, as well as what I should be seeing. It helps me run for the exit earlier whenever I dont see what I want.
Last month I did not to many review/reports. I wanted less effort being spent on it and I just wanted to trade. So I really dont have anything to compare too. It took a few nasty red days for me to start feeling the need to type everything out again and Im glad I did. Found a new and improved way to do it and using this platform for it is very helpful. For report cards, as well as any other ideas I had.
I am also changing the stocks that I trade. So quick recap of my career. I started off trading gappers. Then breakouts on daily charts. Then FANG and highbeta names. Then just FANG. Then FANG and some beta names. Then FANG, beta names and the most popular stocks in there industry/sector. And now ive come full circle, back to gappers, FANG and high beta.
SMB ringing in my head. I want to be like a trader on SMBs desk. They come out with vids/blogs all the time and I watch/read every single on. And everytime it gets less and less 'surprising.' I can only watch the same content everytime before I already know what the video is going to be about.
You are only as good as the stocks you trade. Its about time I started trading the good in play stocks. I dont leave anything up to discretion when I plan the trades. I look at the chart. I see the levels/zones. I want to trade off of them if they come in play and give me what I want. So simple. And every trade recap a guy does on there is just that exact same thing. So now Im doing it. And I like it a lot. And I expect to keep doing it for the rest of my career. Why? Because thats what the best traders do. They take the best opportunities the market gives them.
I did a good review of my LT trades this month and found a lot of important info. The main thing that separated the winners and losers was how price was interacting around the HTF level. If I want long, the things I need to see are
1. Holding above the HTF level
2. Failing to stay below it for very long.
3. Above vwap.
Those are the main ones that I need before any entry. Added bonuses are
1. Failed breakdowns
2. Volume cues
3. Tape cues
4. TL breaks
Price action is king. If I want long, the stock has to prove it wants long too. How do we tell if it does? By the price action. If it failed to hold under HTF level, got back above and is holding it. Failing breakdowns back into the level. I think that stock wants to go higher.
NUMBERS
The numbers this month are awesome to look at. Not because I made money but because of comparing winners and losers and numbers around that. just about everything positive, is double what the negative is. From avg win to avg risk to avg loss. Avg MFE vs Avg MAE.
Look at my LT analysis post for more info
+704$
118/314 38% WR
Compliance 83%
182 breakeven
85 full -1R loss
39 more than -1R loss
Avg win +39$
Avg loss -20$
Everything is better here compared to last month.
My winrate is down. Theres a few things.
1. Because of new entry style, there are some trades I am taking super low risk simply because its in an area that I want to be involved at. Regardless of location. These trades are my early entry trades and I want to be in now for fear of it not giving me a better opportunity to get in. Of course if it does, thats where I put the majority of my risk on, not necessarily adding more as it moves in my favor.
2. There is still some cognitive dissonance in my process. I flat out do not have enough trades/data to come full circle here and know 100% what it is I want to do. With more time, more trades, more exp, ill figure it out. But right now I know I want to enter trades how and where I am.
3. Because of lack of process, I still end up settling for less in some trades.
Now that ive done my LT analysis some of these problems will be fixed now that I have a clearer understanding of what I should be looking out for.
COMMON GOALS
1. Getting aggressive. You cant stop me from adding when I see it start moving my favor on the tape. I love doing this because when IT DOESNT move in my favor after entry, I only had 1/4 risk on and I take the tiny hit.
2. Getting involved. Missed a lot of trades. How do I not miss them? Come up with a plan on what I need to see before getting involved, then once I see it, get involved.
I didnt really have too many goals this month. I wanted to spend most of it just trading my LT strats so that I had a better idea on what I wanted to do with them. And I did exactly that.
COMMON PROBLEMS
1. Not being involved.
2. Too big at open.
3. Not getting back in. More often than not, my big picture ideas do play out. Its my trading that starts little, turns into either that big idea, or it gets stuffed quickly, then I abandon my idea, not recognizing that it can still play out. Im not wrong, im just not right yet.
4. Outside of trading problems. Sleep, not getting up fast enough, not going to bed early enough. Sleep is probably the main outside of trading problem I gave myself this month.
5. Feeling lost. Some days are just hard to trade. Nothing makes sense. Those are the days I need to be SUPER patient and recognize them quickly. Usually I do by noticing how frustrated I am. It is ok not to trade. If it does not make sense to trade, and things are not going my way. Why make it harder on myself. Why put the risk on, if the risk is not favorable.
6. Taking too many more than -1R trades. Sometimes it just happens, sometimes I am too slow. Sometimes I just ignore it and wait for whatever reason. 2 can be prevented. Majority of the time its me not putting my order in and taking a bigger hit than necessary.
BEST TRADES
Clean and sexy. So clear. Holding levels it should be. No room for debate the stocks show clear signs of weakness or strength. This is also a lot of screenshots, I usually dont have this many good trades to post but this month had a pretty good number.
My worst trades I wont bother with. Mainly because I didnt have a single super red trade that crushed me this month and thats also a first. Risk management has been on point this month, very happy with that.
Its pretty unfortunate that some of my biggest R wins came off of such tiny $$ risked. Its part of the reason I needed to trade these more to get better at it. 3 of my trades accounted for +30R and +250$ from only 25$ total.
FINAL THOUGHTS and GOALS
1. Come up with LT process. I got all the info I need now to have a concrete plan.
2. Come up with process for LT re entry trades.
3. Keep getting aggressive. Get really uncomfortable in those trades that I see it. Deal with the risk.
4. Find more info on Early Entry trades
5. Research more on Time and Trading. This is a weird spot in my head. Ive felt for some time now there is a huge area of trading and time that I am clueless on. There are things that im missing and it feels like such a big area of expertise that I need to get better with.
6. GET BACK TO THE GYM. Things are opening up again thank god, back to the program.
This month was great. Such a good learning experience and feel like I made a lot of progress. Very excited to see what June has in store for me as a trader.
Last week I talked about being in flow with the market. It was amazing how I could sense I was in that other worldy state just watching the tape go back and forth. I could feel the pressure or the lack of it. When I saw the buyers or sellers I was able to go with the flow and add more as it confirmed my ideas. Another reason I feel this more is because I have started using blogspot for my report cards. I can keep the tab open and whenever I have a trade idea/trade I right away start typing it out, what I saw were reasons for entry. And I follow the stock, I type everything I see as the trade develops. This has helped me a ton for a couple reasons.
1. Time saving. Dont have to do everything at the end of the trading session because I did it live.
2. Consistency. Always good to have a routine that makes sense to you.
3. Ingrained processes. Before I start the day, I know that I want to do X whenever the stock gives me the signal. When I type it out before/during the trade I reinforce what it is I am trying to do, as well as what I should be seeing. It helps me run for the exit earlier whenever I dont see what I want.
Last month I did not to many review/reports. I wanted less effort being spent on it and I just wanted to trade. So I really dont have anything to compare too. It took a few nasty red days for me to start feeling the need to type everything out again and Im glad I did. Found a new and improved way to do it and using this platform for it is very helpful. For report cards, as well as any other ideas I had.
I am also changing the stocks that I trade. So quick recap of my career. I started off trading gappers. Then breakouts on daily charts. Then FANG and highbeta names. Then just FANG. Then FANG and some beta names. Then FANG, beta names and the most popular stocks in there industry/sector. And now ive come full circle, back to gappers, FANG and high beta.
SMB ringing in my head. I want to be like a trader on SMBs desk. They come out with vids/blogs all the time and I watch/read every single on. And everytime it gets less and less 'surprising.' I can only watch the same content everytime before I already know what the video is going to be about.
You are only as good as the stocks you trade. Its about time I started trading the good in play stocks. I dont leave anything up to discretion when I plan the trades. I look at the chart. I see the levels/zones. I want to trade off of them if they come in play and give me what I want. So simple. And every trade recap a guy does on there is just that exact same thing. So now Im doing it. And I like it a lot. And I expect to keep doing it for the rest of my career. Why? Because thats what the best traders do. They take the best opportunities the market gives them.
I did a good review of my LT trades this month and found a lot of important info. The main thing that separated the winners and losers was how price was interacting around the HTF level. If I want long, the things I need to see are
1. Holding above the HTF level
2. Failing to stay below it for very long.
3. Above vwap.
Those are the main ones that I need before any entry. Added bonuses are
1. Failed breakdowns
2. Volume cues
3. Tape cues
4. TL breaks
Price action is king. If I want long, the stock has to prove it wants long too. How do we tell if it does? By the price action. If it failed to hold under HTF level, got back above and is holding it. Failing breakdowns back into the level. I think that stock wants to go higher.
NUMBERS
The numbers this month are awesome to look at. Not because I made money but because of comparing winners and losers and numbers around that. just about everything positive, is double what the negative is. From avg win to avg risk to avg loss. Avg MFE vs Avg MAE.
Look at my LT analysis post for more info
+704$
118/314 38% WR
Compliance 83%
182 breakeven
85 full -1R loss
39 more than -1R loss
Avg win +39$
Avg loss -20$
Everything is better here compared to last month.
My winrate is down. Theres a few things.
1. Because of new entry style, there are some trades I am taking super low risk simply because its in an area that I want to be involved at. Regardless of location. These trades are my early entry trades and I want to be in now for fear of it not giving me a better opportunity to get in. Of course if it does, thats where I put the majority of my risk on, not necessarily adding more as it moves in my favor.
2. There is still some cognitive dissonance in my process. I flat out do not have enough trades/data to come full circle here and know 100% what it is I want to do. With more time, more trades, more exp, ill figure it out. But right now I know I want to enter trades how and where I am.
3. Because of lack of process, I still end up settling for less in some trades.
Now that ive done my LT analysis some of these problems will be fixed now that I have a clearer understanding of what I should be looking out for.
COMMON GOALS
1. Getting aggressive. You cant stop me from adding when I see it start moving my favor on the tape. I love doing this because when IT DOESNT move in my favor after entry, I only had 1/4 risk on and I take the tiny hit.
2. Getting involved. Missed a lot of trades. How do I not miss them? Come up with a plan on what I need to see before getting involved, then once I see it, get involved.
I didnt really have too many goals this month. I wanted to spend most of it just trading my LT strats so that I had a better idea on what I wanted to do with them. And I did exactly that.
COMMON PROBLEMS
1. Not being involved.
2. Too big at open.
3. Not getting back in. More often than not, my big picture ideas do play out. Its my trading that starts little, turns into either that big idea, or it gets stuffed quickly, then I abandon my idea, not recognizing that it can still play out. Im not wrong, im just not right yet.
4. Outside of trading problems. Sleep, not getting up fast enough, not going to bed early enough. Sleep is probably the main outside of trading problem I gave myself this month.
5. Feeling lost. Some days are just hard to trade. Nothing makes sense. Those are the days I need to be SUPER patient and recognize them quickly. Usually I do by noticing how frustrated I am. It is ok not to trade. If it does not make sense to trade, and things are not going my way. Why make it harder on myself. Why put the risk on, if the risk is not favorable.
6. Taking too many more than -1R trades. Sometimes it just happens, sometimes I am too slow. Sometimes I just ignore it and wait for whatever reason. 2 can be prevented. Majority of the time its me not putting my order in and taking a bigger hit than necessary.
BEST TRADES
Clean and sexy. So clear. Holding levels it should be. No room for debate the stocks show clear signs of weakness or strength. This is also a lot of screenshots, I usually dont have this many good trades to post but this month had a pretty good number.
My worst trades I wont bother with. Mainly because I didnt have a single super red trade that crushed me this month and thats also a first. Risk management has been on point this month, very happy with that.
Its pretty unfortunate that some of my biggest R wins came off of such tiny $$ risked. Its part of the reason I needed to trade these more to get better at it. 3 of my trades accounted for +30R and +250$ from only 25$ total.
FINAL THOUGHTS and GOALS
1. Come up with LT process. I got all the info I need now to have a concrete plan.
2. Come up with process for LT re entry trades.
3. Keep getting aggressive. Get really uncomfortable in those trades that I see it. Deal with the risk.
4. Find more info on Early Entry trades
5. Research more on Time and Trading. This is a weird spot in my head. Ive felt for some time now there is a huge area of trading and time that I am clueless on. There are things that im missing and it feels like such a big area of expertise that I need to get better with.
6. GET BACK TO THE GYM. Things are opening up again thank god, back to the program.
This month was great. Such a good learning experience and feel like I made a lot of progress. Very excited to see what June has in store for me as a trader.
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