Trader Sam

Hey folks,

Decided to change locations again, moving over to Tumblr this time, more features, easier, more of a Facebook/Twitter style update so I don't have to have a big post everytime, so my newest post is here, also a new name of  "trade my way" which means it will be about my journey to becoming a professional futures trader at a prop shop, meaning trade my way there, to success. Thanks for your support and I hope you join me at the new address.

 

Here it is: http://trademyway.tumblr.com/

Hey folks,

Just letting you know I'm still here alive and kicking, had my first interview with the prop shop in Sydney that I'm hoping to get into, things seemed to go pretty well so apparently I'm waiting to hear when I have to go back for a second interview, but haven't heard anything as of yet, fingers crossed, wish me luck! So things here have been a little quiet as no doubt you have noticed, but I haven't really had any reason to post, I don't really have that much to say, I'm not going to post random things and pretend I know what I'm talking about, if I don't know then I don't know, I'm going to post on what I do know, and what I have seen with my own eyes and my progress of becoming a professional futures trader.

Other than that, just been reading a lot, bought a new batch of books on the markets, getting into more of the real life stories, instead of the usual cliche crap that is the norm with most trading books, I like to read about real stories, whether its bust or boom, actually its probably better if its a bust story, I find reading about real accounts is a lot more helpful than reading "Cut your losers, let your winners run" in other random BS books. Reading about the failures of others and the successes is much more helpful to me I think, know what the traps are with our minds etc. What caused the problems and so on, makes it more practical to use in my trading and myself.

Also been trading on sim a lot too, well, when I can that is. My internet setup isn't the greatest as I'm a little out of town, the speed is okay, its just the download limits per month is not that great, so I usually run out half way or three quarters through the month so then I can't trade for the rest of the month until its reset, which is a pain, but I guess it gives me plenty of time to read, study and review some more. It turns out that I have traded about 6 days in the last month, it feels like a lot more, but that's what it is, I have a nice system going now of recording myself, thoughts etc. which seems to be helping, definitely feeling more confident and on top of things than I have in the past, over the 6 days of trading I have made about $17,250 scalping 5 contracts on the Bund, no losing days as of yet, finding some nice patterns and trades that I can use now(in the markets and in myself), more and more so, feeling more comfortable trading the way I am. It makes a tremendous difference when you gain that confidence in yourself as a trader, I know it's only sim and I can hear you saying "Sim means bugger all!" and that is probably part true, the emotions are different trading live, but I have traded live before so I know what it is like, hence why I have tried to make sim trading as realistic as possible, and it has most certainly helped. I feel quite confident in my abilities now, which I wasn't before(when I actually was trading a live account, even though I made money everyday until a server error). Sim is extremely helpful in finding patterns and setting myself up with the routine of it all, also concentrating on the trades and not the money is something that is extremely important, knowing that if you cut this loser off immediately you can jump back in and make it back, no need to hold and hope. I feel more like I'm hoping and fearing at the right times, hoping when I'm in a winner, and fearing when its going against me, instead of the other way around. Besides that, sim is the only thing I can do at the moment in my circumstances, so its definitely better than nothing, as it is still live market data I'm watching, and the markets are most certainly the best teacher.

Even though I have gained much confidence over the recent months, I never want to get to that point where I think I know it all, where I think I can out-smart the market, as that will be the point when I will get a swift kick to the gonads and be brought back to Earth. I believe no one can "know it all", it is a never ending learning curve, constant learning, adapting, changing.

And I love it. Be in touch soon.

Decided to put my head down and get stuck into trading as much as I can, even though I have my normal day job, I'm going to try and learn as much as I can about reading the order book and try to take as many trades as I can to gain experience. 

I was told by a trader in London about the best way he thought to learn the patterns and so forth, he gave me this advice:

 

• Make at least 150 trades a day, the more time you spend in the market, the faster you will learn, eg. making 100+ round turns instead of 10 giving you 10 times the amount of experience, he also mentioned about one of the best traders in the Bund said once that the best traders are the traders who can stay in the market all day and still come out on top. 
• Record everything - Winners, losers, what happens when the market does X or so and so says Y, then write 5 positives and 5 negatives from the session and a debrief, then come up with a goal for the next day's trading. 
• Don't worry about the dollar side of things, just make the trades(simming, but probably applies well to live trading too!) and concentrate on seeing people instead of numbers. 

So, these things have been my goal, and I hit my first one the other night, I made over 150 RTs in one session, trading a 2 lot, I did 330 trades or so, big bonus being that I ended up for the session too which I was pretty pleased about! Boy, did it fluctuate though! At different points throughout the session I was down over $1200, brought it back to +$1200, then lost it all back to $0 again, then worked my way back up, I got pretty whipped during the quiet times in the session, I was trading mostly European stuff(DAX,Bund) and there was a really dull hour or so around my Tea time, which saw the account take a hit and a half! But it doesn't matter, I shouldn't be concentrating on the dollars anyway, but I was happy to think that after all that trading I was still in the green. It's a LOT harder than I thought it would be to make over 150 RTs a day, particularly when you don't know all the patterns you are supposed to be looking for, but another good point I was happy about is the fact that I had a LOT more losers than winners, yet still ended up making a decent profit for the session, the old cliche cut your losses, hang onto your profits rings true once again, I never used stops, I just exited out by myself after 3 or 4 ticks(most of the time, biggest loser was 8 ticks or something), so that was another positive I could add to my list! 

Some of the negatives included having a lazy spell, times where I would wander off, physically and on the computer, start browsing something else and not concentrating on the markets, another negative was focusing too much on the dollar side of things, a few times I found myself not wanting to make a trade(or forcing myself to trade) to not go below a certain profit number(or above it), like if I was up $698, I would try and force a trade out to get it above the 700 mark.......because it looks better, stupid huh! And vice versa, wouldn't want my loser to go below 700 so I would make foolish decisions, like holding a loser for a little longer hoping it would come back. But I can't expect to be a perfect trader and probably never will, no one is! This is all part of it....and I'm loving every minute of it, bring on Sydney(hopefully!). 

 

Something else I might mention, is a bit of a fun thing, some of you might even be in it too. Global Futures currently have a world wide trading contest on, the prizes aren't anything amazing, I think it's an Apple iPad for first place, everyone gets a $50,000 simulated account to pretty much do what you want with on the main futures markets(ES, T-Note, DAX, Crude, Gold etc.). I haven't really put much effort into it, I thought "what the heck" and just put some random positions on after checking the charts for each one, we are allowed to trade a 5 lot max for each instrument, so thats what I did, traded a 5 lot going long and short on everything I am allowed to trade, not really paying much attention to it, its over a 2 week period that started last monday and finishes this Friday, checked to see how I was going last night and what do you know, I was 8th out of 1100 traders with a current profit of $74,000. Can't complain, the leader was on $95k at that point in time, I was pretty happy with that, not that I put any effort into it, but still, never know what might happen between now and the end of the week! I'll be happy to get into the top ten, out of 1100 traders world wide participating in it, I'd be thrilled with anything above 20th place! It fluctuates all the time so the results are always changing, but it will be interesting to see what the winner can end up with by Friday. The highest that I have seen myself was 3rd, back on day 3 or something I think, on the podium, you ripper!

Anyway, enough from me. Over and out! 

Ok, I've decided. I'm going to get a gig at Propex(most likely) in the next intake in a few months, been speaking to a few traders and everyone is all for it, it will give me years of experience in a few months and allow me to swing a big line, I'm very excited, I know there's still a bit to do, I have to actually get accepted but hopefully that shouldn't be too bad with my experience and desire! It's what I have always wanted to do, so I might as well just do it, its a big change as I live many hours away from Sydney at the moment, but that is what is neccessary to become a professional Trader, and so be it. I will be one as this is what I've wanted to do ever since I've known about it. 

My main concern was what my family and friends were going to do/say, but they are fully supportive of me, which is great, so bring it on! I have to make up a Resume and a few things first, so in the process of doing that now, I can't wait, new city, new life, dream career hopefully all going ahead. Wish me luck! 

Wondering about whether to apply at a prop firm or not, a lot of traders have said to me that it's a good idea. But I'm just not sure how I am going to survive when I have to live in a different state on no money while they "teach" me their ways. It will be fine once I get going and probably never be an issue again, but I wonder how that first period goes. The only ones I can think of are in Sydney, which isn't exactly the cheapest city to live in! Propex are in Sydney and they are having another intake for May 2011, I would like to do it, they also have an online method you can use and then possibly get a spot on the floor once that is done. 

I think I would rather be learning on the floor though, I have a contact who is trading at Propex in Sydney, and he says most of the learning is from the experienced traders on the floor moreso rather than the training itself, which would be fine by me, I'd rather learn off a "been there done that" experienced trader than out of some sort of booklet or something. 

The things I'm worried about is: 

1. Making such a big move away from my home everything(state, work, family, friends etc.) 

2. Trying to survive on no pay for the first few months.

3. Finding a place to live....a pay for it. 

4. Actually getting in to the program.

5. If it is actually worth it, I'd love to learn the ropes properly, from a firm that does it professionally and has done it for years, and to talk and watch experienced traders going at it, or if I might as well just stay here and keep doing what I'm doing, maybe the fact that traders there are more likely to succeed is simply because of the fact they are swinging a big line, that is someone else's and they can afford to make the mistakes that are required to keep going(that would normally bust us). 

But then again, if its going to teach me everything I need to know, I'm not even sure if I need to know anymore, I would be interested in more on the global macro theme, I think I'm more interested in actually seeing what firms/traders like that actually look at, do they read blogs, newspapers, which markets do they check, whats their daily routine, do they have a goal for each day etc. If its going to fast track me to becoming a full time successful trader, then I'd be there with my ears pinned back(expression of excitement all you non-Aussies! I don't actually want my ears pinned back, that would hurt, plus there'd be blood everywhere and it would probably distract the whole group because they'd be like "Hey WTF MAN, HIS EARS ARE GON....oh no wait, they're just pinned back", mmm things could get nasty). 

Hey folks,

I've decided I'm just going to post my results at the end of each week instead of posting on random things that don't really need posting on, I don't see the point and I don't feel knowledgeable enough to be of any use to anyone yet, please let me know if I am of some help or not, but at the moment I feel as though its a waste of time posting on my blog about random things.

So from now on, I will post my results from the weeks trading on Fridays(actually probably Saturday because I will be trading Friday night). I may also post about new posts at Enantiodromia too.

There are already a million blogs, most of which are rubbish, so I thought why add to them. There are guys out there who know much more than I do about the global macro theme etc. Even though I don't believe it helps my trading at all so it doesn't matter. But that is the best use for a blog, other than teaching like Motorway does on his blog. Other than that, its probably a distraction for me anyway, as I'm coming up with ideas about crap to post on rather than concentrating on my trading/skills/markets.

Please feel free to ask any questions if you have any, I'll still be here, just not going to try and make up stuff to post on, but just let my trading do the posting. I guess you could say I'm going to post intrinsically from now on, only when I need to(results at the end of the week) rather than trying to find something to post about every day etc. for the sake of it.

Trade well.

Wow, if you're listening to any business radio then you probably know what I mean, Zero Hedge has reported that EU Chief has said "Catastrophic events in next few hours" and "US believes partial meltdown has occured"
 which caused the market to go insane and drop nearly $2 in a few minutes, there wasn't one column above or even NEAR 20s in duration, FAST! Quite bold statements to say considering the state of the markets in the last couple of days. It's not that big a move, but it was the speed of it, to fall that far that fast, amazing. No wonder people lose money by the time they get on the move!

Sure will be interesting to see what happens in the next few hours.

Discovered an interesting book yesterday "Psychology Of The Stock Market". It's an old book first published in 1912 by Ticker Publishing, and also the author G.C Selden was an acquaintance of Richard D. Wyckoff, he mentions in the PREFACE....

"THIS
book is based upon the belief that the
movements of prices on the exchanges
are dependent to a very large degree on the
mental attitude of the investing and trading
public. It is the result of years of study and
experience as fellow at Columbia University,
news writer, statistician, on the editorial staff
of THE MAGAZINE OF WALL STREET, etc.
The book is intended chiefly as a practical
help to that considerable part of the community
which is interested, directly or indirectly,
in the markets ; but it is hoped that it
may also have some scientific value as a preliminary
discussion in a new field, where opportunities
for further research seem almost
unlimited. G. C. SELDEN.
New York, May 28, 1912.".

I am in the process of reading it now, but thought it might be of interest to those who follow RDW. I believe there can be a fair amount learn't to improve your trading if you read about the psychology of trading, not necessarily about yourself(although that can have its impacts too) but more about others, the different time horizons of different traders, how the "mob" react at certain points, like when I mentioned about going short CL when I started hearing people talking about longing it etc.

Its EASY to become hooked in and tricked into a trade, PATIENCE is a key thing in my opinion, MOST of the time I find that if I were to wait a little while longer before entering AND exiting trades, it would be better. Moves are made where you think that this will be it, when you're not in the moment, like now when I'm writing about it, it seems absolutely ridiculous to think that I could be sucked into a trade, just wait for the right things to happen and enter right? Not so easy. Not only that, but the fact that when you do enter, often too early, it comes back against you(where you should be entering if you waited), puts pressure on you and tests you out whether or not you can hold, its no wonder really why people get so hammered in the markets, most people pretty much are always on, or thinking about being on the wrong side. VERY easy to get whip-sawed.

I think it helps my psychology using P&F for trading, because of the clearer picture that it paints, it gives me defined areas where I can place orders/stops etc. I can see where the most dominant parts of turning points are.

On another note, check out Scaling Part 2 on Enantiodromia. I also ordered RDW's books in physical form yesterday, which I am pretty excited about, I know you're probably thinking you can get them all on the net in PDF form for free, of which most I have. But I really wanted them in physical form so I can read them anywhere and to have a bit more secure copies around(never know with computers and websites, might crash etc. lose everything). I find I take things in a lot better when I'm reading an actual book too, rather than from a screen.

Something might come of this. Will have to keep watching. Has been pretty negative up until now.

Here are this weeks results. made about $3k, so far. That was only trading 2 nights though(and a few little ones tonight) as I have had this stupid problem with IB not loading the prices so I couldn't trade, seems to be back to normal today though so will trade tonight. Anyway, quite happy with this week, my management was better than previous weeks which is a big plus. On a lighter note, I have a new quick profit record, did a trade earlier where I got 20c or so in 13 seconds, you know those ones where you seem to pick it just right at the right time? It was one of those, jumped in, shot up instantly, got out, collapsed back where it was straight away, weird!...but good ;-)

9 winners, 6 losers. Avg win > Avg loss.