Day Trading Grains Futures

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Viewing 15 posts - 46 through 60 (of 64 total)
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  • #206212
    geosing
    Participant

    @smilingsynic said:

    Bennett’s blog. Updated daily.
    http://12oclocktrades.com/blog/date/2012/04

    Bennett has not updated the blog since April 26, 2012. Hope he is okay.

    #206219
    ultramarine
    Participant

    He’s still there. Look on home page for trading diary February 2013

    #206220
    geosing
    Participant

    Well, duh! I was using the posted link without thinking…. Gotta be mindful, as the Buddha taught. Thank you for setting me straight.
    The correct link: http://12oclocktrades.com/new-home/other-articles/blog

    #206221
    geosing
    Participant

    Reviewing the Bennett TradeOnAuto Performance for 2013, Beans trades have been difficult, it seems. Down 2K in January and almost same amount so far in February. About 10% each. It is faring better with the SPI trades. Beans has been volatile, so it may be an outlier period for the auto trader system. Not sure I will ever be able to trust auto trading software, no matter how well the rules are arrived at. I will leave the ‘botting” to Mr Chan. 🙂

    #206226
    geosing
    Participant

    Nothing to do with grains, but some traders expressed frustration engaging with the straight up market without much of a pullback. Been there, done that – including repeatedly going short at supposedly resistance points only to get stopped out. Today’s market was one such. I illustrate YM which is what I trade among the indices.

    First – yesterday was an inside day after a wide range day and a narrow IB day. Therefore break out of either low or high was something to watch for.

    The Open was an Open Drive variety, in which the market makes a momentum move within the first few minutes. That a sustained move was in the cards was known by the bullish TICK and rapidly advancing NYSE A-D line. In such cases, I wait for the first pause, which comes sooner or later. This is usually a small triangle, a bull flag or a rectangular consolidation. B/O from this consolidation is a low risk buy (for bullish setup).

    Today it was in the form of a bull flag immediately after breaking out of previous day high (13900). Low risk because you can put a stop just under the consolidation range. It also helps when LC comments in a timely manner (“Gunning for Dow 14K” & ” +1K tick printed. 05-06 likely.”. You can see this spot where I have marked “TD Top”. The +1K TICK resulted in a 10 point bump and the divergence got a 28 point pull back – the biggest one and only one of the day.

    The chart below is a 1 minute chart – what I call a combo chart, which I trade off of.

    It displays 1 minute bars, Cumulative $TICK (summation of 1 minute closes of $TICK) and 50 period moving average. I use 45/50 period MA for days like this, 90/100 period MA for normal days.

    CTICK_YMCombo_130227a.png

    MoMo designates Momentum Move – the Open Drive. MML is the ledge, pause of the move. Even though I used to trade this, I formalized and internalized this set up based on the excellent book by Michael J Gutmann – The Very Latest E-Mini Trading – (I hope LC will review this book because I found it extremely useful and very practical – especially because I was already using many concepts/set-ups which he formally defined in the book.)

    http://www.amazon.com/Very-Latest-E-Mini-Trading-2nd/dp/1452889325/

    Another method of entry for trend days like this is to buy the breakout of the First Hour Range (aka Initial Balance). Today this entry was the same as that of the MML entry.

    Once entered it is just a question of managing the trade and try to hold on at least till 3pm or some well-known targets are reached to book the gains. I monitor the Cumulative TICK and A-D and the price behavior like a hawk for signs of reversals or weakness.

    Simple, just not easy.

    #206227
    geosing
    Participant

    You can either trade add-ons or if you miss the initial entry and internals are very strong, you can enter on retracement to a moving average in the small time frame charts (1 min or n-tick charts). I usually use 45 or 50 period moving average with a 1 minute chart. You can see in the chart below how the MA provided unfailing support till the EOD. I usually make scalp add-on entries and did so 4 times today. With Cumulative TICK “unequivocally bullish” (a term used by Gutmann), it is best to forget about the short side, no matter how extended the price looks. Many traders get burned by wanting to short such a market, thinking that long entries are riskier.

    CTICK_YMCombo_130227b.png

    #206228
    geosing
    Participant

    @geosing said:

    Another method of entry for trend days like this is to buy the breakout of the First Hour Range (aka Initial Balance). Today this entry was the same as that of the MML entry.

    Looking at my trades, I misspoke. IBH Range Extension was an add-on trade, as today’s IB was a wide one. But this could have been the first entry – market provided nice ledges and stop loss points – but scarier trade as the IB range was 97 – about the same daily range of the previous day. I had to resist the tendency to close the longs and try a short here. 🙂

    #206233
    geosing
    Participant

    4 nice trades saved the month for the SPI netting 12.5% for the year in Bennett’s Auto Trading blog, but Beans, as he says “continues to be a drag” – down 20.3% for the year.

    #206236
    Lawrence
    Keymaster

    I am sure I have the 1st edition of the book. Will check to make sure I also have the 2nd edition. I do not want to write an outdated review. =)

    #206237
    geosing
    Participant

    @Lawrence Chan said:

    I am sure I have the 1st edition of the book. Will check to make sure I also have the 2nd edition. I do not want to write an outdated review. =)

    Mr Gutmann expanded on price patterns as a separate component of the set-ups – I think it is a definite improvement over the first edition.

    #206348
    geosing
    Participant

    Have you had a chance to look at the Second Edition? Your opinion will be greatly helpful. Thanks in advance.

    #206349
    Lawrence
    Keymaster

    My bad. I have forgotten about book. Will look it up this weekend.

    #206350
    Lawrence
    Keymaster

    Geo, I don’t have the 2nd edition myself. Will see if I can hustle one from a friend this week. =)

    #206351
    geosing
    Participant

    That will be great. Among all the published literature out there, I found this work the most useful and practical for day trading the futures, as it is specific to those instruments. He keeps it simple. Combination of STOPD levels and a small set of set-ups from this book (IB range expansion for example) has helped me a bunch in planning trades. I still screw up execution some times, but the planning helps in the performance.

    If you happen to see this, I have a new problem. I have to trade the markets to generate cash flow, but I am unable to trade fixed hours. (I am the home caregiver-in-chief dealing with a life-threatening situation). I considered money managers, but don’t have the right psychology to let someone else manage my income. So I am trying to trade as and when I can – which means it can be a couple of hours any time during the session. Do you think a scalping strategy can be developed for this situation? I tried trading forex in the wee hours, but found it too taxing physically. So I am looking at hit and run scalps for a few ticks. Also experimenting with swing trading S&P using SSO/SDS instead of futures. Some kind of auto-trading bot is another idea. Any input will be most welcome.

    #206352
    geosing
    Participant

    Just saw that used copies of the out of print book is being offered at 350/400 dollars!!! How do they price these things? I had Toby Crabel’s book which I threw away, only to find 4 figure prices in Amazon Marketplace. Yet some titles are available for one cent! Crazy market place. Need STOPD for the used book market. 🙂

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