7-15-2013

Pre Trading Notes:

1.  Focus on failed 2nd entries.
2.  If in a range you can have a trend but make sure you are trading on the right side of the trend.  If price has bounced off of resistance then only look to take short trades in the trend until it reaches support.  If price has bounced off of support then only look to take long trades in the channel until it hits the resistance level.
3.  Draw your lines and trends, better too many than not enough. 

Post Trading Notes:

I am extremely please with how I traded today.  I drew the correct overall trend line and I had the correct S/R areas drawn which made trading so much easier today.  I could see the setups and whether or not I wanted to take them.  Today was another slow grinding day.  One way to get better is to really focus on where I want my 2nd lot exit to be located.  I am getting stopped out too much on my 2nd lot.  A good example of this is my 1st trade where I should have used the end of the measured move as my exit but I was greedy and had it by the upper trend line.  I could have had another 1.50 points. 

Mack's Notes:

Another slow low volume choppy day.
If there is overlap in the bars when you are looking for a 2nd entry then he likes to drop a limit order to get a better entry price after the 2nd entry signals.
You don't want to go long after price has made a big move up and has hit resistance.  You want to go long after price has gone down and hit support.

If you find yourself hoping and praying that price will come back then you know you are on the wrong side of the trade and need to exit immediately.  If you find yourself getting frustrated and having losing trades then get up, go take a break and come back and re-evaluate what price is doing.

Trades:

1.  8:51 - 2nd entry long off of the lower trend line.  Should have gotten out where the end of the 2nd leg of the measured move was located.  Was getting greedy and tried to get the 2nd lot at the top of the trend channel.

2.   9:43 - 2nd entry long off of the lower trend channel and the EMA.  Got in 2 ticks better b/c the signal bar was a doji. 

3.  12:25 - 2nd entry long off of the support level.  My 2nd lot was one tick below the next resistance level and by the upper trend line. 

4.  2:46 - Failed 2nd entry long off of the EMA.  If live I would never take this trade so close to the close of the day so I shouldn't do it in sim.


Missed Trades:

1.  8:24 - 2nd entry long and a failed 2nd entry short off of the EMA.  (My data was messed up from not loading so in skewed my EMA)
2.  9:06 - 2nd entry long off of the lower trend line and looking for the 2nd leg up.
3.  10:21 - Failed 2nd entry short and a short trap off of the EMA.  I was going to take this but since it was so close to the resistance level that I wanted to wait and see what happened with price hitting off the level.