Thursday 30th September 2004
I've done a little analysis on the most recent 5 trading days which is the period where I've been entering and exiting more aggressively. Far too soon to draw definitive conclusions but I noticed a few interesting points:
Total trades 40
Wins 18 for 158 (av. 8.8)
Losers 16 for -39 (av. -2.4)
B/e 6
This gives an average profit of just three points per trade, or two if one point is allowed for commission. However, this does give an average daily profit after commission of 16 points over the five days, which is not great, but not bad for me either. The margin between success and failure is very very tight though and therefore anything that can add a tick or two on average to each trade will make a big difference in the long term.
To that end, I also noticed that many of my losing trades and virtually all the break evens went a few points to the good before I exited. Because the average loser is currently just -2.4 I am going to experiment with some different targets today. I will take one off at +3 to see if, over time, this could be a low risk trade to cover some of the costs. I'll take a second off at +6, out of curiosity. I'll run the third as per normal. I'm also going to see how far each trade runs to the maximum point before I get an exit.
Weird opening - Dow futures down 80, Dow index barely changed. Somethings wrong. Whoosh, then suddenly the index is down too. Merck drug withdrawal.
10:02 1) S 10061 on TLB down from below 100 ema but got a really late fill at bottom of two big down bars.
10:08 EXIT b/e (plus 1 at +3). Market seems strong despite big gap down.
10:17 2) S 10065 on next TLB down as still below 100 ema.
10:28 EXIT +4 (plus 1 at +3, 1 at +6).
Sideways in narrow range - will wait for a clear move. Doh - next TLB down at 10:30 was a winner (+3 and +6 both in the bag before TLB exit at +3).
10:45 3) S 10062. Took the next TLB. Moved straight against me then back into the money.
10:51 EXIT +3 (plus 1 at +3, 1 at +6).
Too slow for next entry short at 10:54 which was a much better winner going all the way to LOD without any stress. Sods law. +3 and +6 would have been quickly in the bag. Exit would have been at 11:08 for +15.
11:33 4) S 10044. Moved nicely for +3 and +6 then pulled back to b/e. Then down again but bouncing off LOD.
11:42 EXIT +2. Leaving a double bottom with triple PD on RSI.
In view of that, and a feeling that lunchtime trades are not going to well for me, I'm going to stop trading for a while.
OK, I found that really tough but today at least it seems to have been a good decision. Market broke out of range at 13:30 then gave an excellent long signal on TLB after first pullback (around 10050) but I missed it (and there's the disadvantage!). Looking for longs now.
Really struggling to find a place to get back in. Perhaps the break was not a good idea for this reason alone.
14:17 5) L 10065. Chased a big bar after a TLB back up which is usually a really bad move. Never went into profit at all.
14:21 EXIT -4. No +3 this time.
14:41 6) L 10052 on TLB after retrace to 100 ema. Took a while to get going then shot up.
15:02 EXIT +22 (plus 1 at +3, 1 at +6). Forced the exit a little and if I'd been braver I could have gone a bit higher.
Didn't get the reversal down so no more for me.
+32 from 6 today from runner, also +11 from 6 on the +3's and +20 from 6 on the +6's. So the core runner did best today but the +3's added a bit to cover costs and the +6's performed quite well. I'll keep this going for a few days to see how the results pan out.
+190 for September. Not bad but certainly not great. The second half was better than the first half. Let's hope October has a bit more movement.
