MANUAL TRADING. The search for the Holy Grail. - page 3
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Here is what my manual trading performance has consistently looked like for much of the past three years before I started my system on MQL5 three weeks ago. It was this performance that captured the attention of the great futures trader who then became my coach:
i think you dont say the truth. First i cheked you history trades , and its not true you have a 30 pips stoploss, sometimes you have more than 200 pips stop loss, and then you accumulate positions which is letal in a tredning situtation.
The MAIM wekenss of your system is:
You are using a an antidendency strategy which wokred well for the last month due the slowdown of the super eur trend which took place from november 2012 to feb 2013. You will blow up your acccount in the moment a new trend emerges, as you are betting consistently against the trend.
in your first post you say you lost 100k , that is a lot of money. Your signals are based on 150 usd account, isnt that wierd?
Yes. And it is beyond weird that I am here at all.
I was decimated by that 100k+ loss and almost lost my full-time job and my house and my marriage because of how it impacted me emotionally and financially. And I am sure that I was much less than great dad to my 5 daughters too.
I am only now barely scratching my way back. It has been a nightmare. When I said I was stupid, that was a big understatement.
I just thought about this the other day... If someone came to me now and said,"I want to become a trader" I would advise against it--unless...
My posts here are to help those manual who are already committed to trading and improving themselves as traders.
I think you are selling a very stupid story and your posts should be banned, lost 100k story(with a 50 usd account and opening positions of 00.1 , doughters story, years of commitment story , desiere to help others...all this is crap.
So in one month you grew your 50 usd account to 140 usd? by trading manually..so you stay in fornt of the computer for one month to make 90 usd? and you are pretending to help others? and who will help you? you make 90 usd a month..
Onlysolo: i think you dont say the truth. First i cheked you history trades , and its not true you have a 30 pips stoploss, sometimes you have more than 200 pips stop loss. I m going to tell you what the wekensses of you system are.
You are using a an antidendency strategy which wokred well for the last month due the slowdown of the super eur trend which took place from november 2012 to feb 2013. You will blow up your acccount in the moment a new trend emerges, as you are betting consistently against the trend.
Thanks for the post.
I can see why you say I am not speaking the truth. I used the word "consistently" again, and it got me in trouble. I should have said "often." Because I have been experimenting with lots of different stops and position sizes. However, me most successful systems before I found MQL5 had those parameters--until I blew them up because I did not follow my own rules--as I have been explaining.
And that is what this thread is ultimately about--learning to follow our own rules.
In the posts on my system page I actually discuss the change from a 200 pip stop loss to 30 for the USD based pairs and 50 for the JPY based pairs. And I am happy to say that I have not broken that commitment since I stated it publicly.
As far as my strategy goes, you may be right. I may blow up my account if I am not careful. Most of my trades have been against the major trend--because I believe it is reaching exhaustion. And I do realize that this strategy is a risky one. But to me right now staying long equities and short USD at these levels is the riskier game. This is why I am really only trying to trade intra-day swings and why I look for only small consistent gains.
Gurich, I think I understand the % margin recommendation, but I am not sure.
I see that % of equity may be less meaningful than % margin because two traders could be employing different leverage. But I am not sure of the nuances as to how this helps me personally with my goals. Please say it again using some specific numbers if you'd be so kind.
I currently am revisiting my daily PIP goal of 50 pips with a max of 3 simultaneously open positions. My plan is to increase the size of each trade gradually as my balance increases. I am now at about $200 and I have decided that it is time to use .02 lots per trade. At $300, I will use .03 lots per trade. This way it is very easy for me to keep track of the position size I should be using, and to not scare my "passengers."
The big signal site only allows fixed lot trades by the subscriber and the follower adjusts the size of their trade accordingly. I see pros and cons in both methods.
p.s. Thanks for using my own race car analogy. That was fun. But we must continue to be careful in the forum and be very general so all may benefit and no one system is promoted. I think you were adequately cryptic in your previous post. Keep it up.
Take this example:
Suppose you trade only with USDJPY. With a leverage of 1:100, you require $1000 USD to buy or sell 1 standard lot. That means it requires 100,000 USD (from 100 * 1000) margin to trade this pair. If you earn $1000 out of your trade, you made 1% profit on margin used. You keep trading with 1 lot size until you have made a target, say, 10% of this margin (10,000 USD). When you have made that 10,000 USD after trading 1 lot over a period, you change the lot size. I wouldn't double it, so let's say +10% here as well. So new lot size is 1.1 lot (110,000 USD margin). Next target: 11,000 USD profit. When achieved, next lot size increases by another 10% and becomes 1.10 + 0.11 ~= 1.20.
The last trade with any of the lot size here would be the redline on the tachometer, the margin used, with the redline almost being the sign of safety and progress (even though at this moment the equity curve will be a little flat — not the profit against margin curve though! — and at every lot size increase, you return to best previous equity curve). This redline period will be when you will be sufficiently safe because you have an increased equity, but risk remains same as when you didn't (until next gear). All this assumes that you consistently (over week/months) make profits, with ups and downs.
This strategy is helps me measure my real performance over a longer period. Equity % is manipulated with leverage, though definitely the end user wants to take that home (or doesn't).
I think you are selling a very stupid story and your posts should be banned, lost 100k story(with a 50 usd account and opening positions of 00.1 , doughters story, years of commitment story , desiere to help others...all this is crap.
So in one month you grew your 50 usd account to 140 usd? by trading manually..so you stay in fornt of the computer for one month to make 90 usd? and you are pretending to help others? and who will help you? you make 90 usd a month..
It is a story of stupidity for sure, but the story itself is not stupid. While it may seem pretty unbelievable to you, and you have accused me of lying, what I have told you is all true.
95% of traders out there go through very similar things that I have, and I am truly trying to help them. I am trying to help them not be as stupid as I have been when they get tied up with their emotions while trading.
My motivation for opening this forum thread was genuine. My system was not mentioned by name for 10 or more posts and I am not the one who did it. But speaking of my system, please read the reviews I have gotten and see that at least a few subscribers really feel like I am truly trying to help them.
Now--how am I living on $90? I am not. I am a very active real estate agent in my city, and I closed many deals in 2012. But I love to trade in the mornings. And the bigger picture (which must be obvious to you by now) is that like the others in the signal marketplace, I intend to ask for compensation soon. I have 200 subscribers now, but I hope to grow that to 2000. I intend to nicely supplement my day job. I think that there are enough MT4/MT5 users out there that there could potentially be tens of thousands of potential signal followers on this site and we all will benefit as we give our clients good value for their hard-earned money.
This forum thread is about dealing with the human side of trading. I'd love to get more input on this topic from all you manual traders out there. Just because you may be new, doesn't mean you don't have valuable insight. Speak up!
I wanted to report on my setback yesterday. It was an emotional day, and I did NOT handle it well. I had little sleep, I spent too much time on this forum and so missed the main setup of the day, and was dealing with a challenge to my integrity. I should NOT have been trading when I did. I was not careful and lost four big trades in a row. That is not like me. I was actually surprised at how I felt after, and the bad feelings stayed with me the entire day. Today I got three good trades in a row after a good night's sleep and a reminder that I only had a 12% draw down and I could certainly recover from that. Fortunately, I kept my position small because of the big movement in the market, but I must also remember that an big down-draft days in the market most EVERYONE is being emotional and things will overshoot the norms all the time.
As a trader, you usually have to be your own coach. Step back and talk to yourself. A trade journal is a great way to do this. STOP trading when you feel emotional or have more than 2 bad trades in a row. Ask yourself--"What is the market trying to tell me?" Remember that NO trade is sometimes the best trade. Remember that beautiful trees, like beautiful trading accounts, take a long time to grow. Don't rush it.
Take this example:
Suppose you trade only with USDJPY. With a leverage of 1:100, you require $1000 USD to buy or sell 1 standard lot. That means it requires 100,000 USD (from 100 * 1000) margin to trade this pair. If you earn $1000 out of your trade, you made 1% profit on margin used. You keep trading with 1 lot size until you have made a target, say, 10% of this margin (10,000 USD). When you have made that 10,000 USD after trading 1 lot over a period, you change the lot size. I wouldn't double it, so let's say +10% here as well. So new lot size is 1.1 lot (110,000 USD margin). Next target: 11,000 USD profit. When achieved, next lot size increases by another 10% and becomes 1.10 + 0.11 ~= 1.20.
The last trade with any of the lot size here would be the redline on the tachometer, the margin used, with the redline almost being the sign of safety and progress (even though at this moment the equity curve will be a little flat — not the profit against margin curve though! — and at every lot size increase, you return to best previous equity curve). This redline period will be when you will be sufficiently safe because you have an increased equity, but risk remains same as when you didn't (until next gear). All this assumes that you consistently (over week/months) make profits, with ups and downs.
This strategy is helps me measure my real performance over a longer period. Equity % is manipulated with leverage, though definitely the end user wants to take that home (or doesn't).
Great! I like this post. Thanks to share TalonTrader.
Me myself has spent countless hours developing auto trading system and just 1 year ago venturing into EA. I suffered countless of failures, errors and lost a big amount of my money. But still I don't give up, each failure teach me a new thing and I always come up with a new idea. Sometimes (or oftenly) manual trading is greater than Robots, especially the experienced "old-ways" traders out there. And YES patience is the key. And YES, many of those big mouthed "gurus" always speak about their great system and always profitable, and selling those system by being Signal Provider, and it ends up not as expected.. It's better to trust our own trading system isn't it ? It's quite easy to build a 55% winning system but with low profits (< 20% a year), but it just not worth the risk, especially on the long run.
Your 1-2% daily profit is GREAT (REALLY REALLY GREAT), but I thought you should test it on real account for at least 1 years to see whether it gives you consistent result or not. A "straight-ascending-consistent-long run" profit line is what i seek for all these years.
Once again, thanks for your sharing. It gives me a new hope to keep on going.
I wish you a good luck on trading, and on your REDLINE.
Regards,
JHG