Hours and Days

[Helenqu]

Hi Mike,

CTS (Contemplating Trading Stategies) is my board on TMF. A bit quiet at the moment as I'm busy doing rather than thinking. All the FOFLS trades from the beginning are there. Here is the link:

http://boards.fool.co.uk/Messages.asp?mid=7537162&bid=51315


If you want a shortcut to fofls though this is the site that Marathonchap maintains of all the trades. It's not earth shattering so don't think it's a grail, it isn't

http://www.helenqu.co.uk/FOFLS/FOFLS.htm


I post the FOFLS picks for the next day on CTS on the evenings when they occur. I suspect if this drop continues there will be a a new one tonight.


HTH

 

[sifts2win]

Ta again !
Good luck in your trading.

 

[BeM]

Speculation and Day-Trading

Hi,
Recently I just entered some real trades (spread-betting) for the first time and some of you know that, reading my previous posts.
It's very much true that it's very difficult to make some money trading in short intervals spread-betting because the spread-bet companies anticipate the moves ahead of you and go above or below the market price depending on the market moevements, so the only way to make something out would be to catch at least movements above 0.15%, or even higher for those instruments that have wider spreads. Maybe they do this in order to survive, it's their business and they warn about it, I have nothing against them.
What I realized, with my real money, was that it's a mistake to think in a speculative way in very short intervals, like minutes or hours. However this was my approach. I was trying to speculate the movements of the day. Many of them were coming true, but the problem was that when they were wrong I wasn't only losing a small amount, I was losing almost double what I had thought of, not only because of the spread but also because of the price adjustment of the s-b company.
So I reached the conclusion that if I want not to waste my time and money trying to speculate the daily movement of the market, I must think days, weeks or maybe months. Probably the same thing would be true trading in the real market, but less harsh.
Probably the only way to day-trade is indeed to analyze the movements of the stocks or the markets and to be happy with small gains. I don't think this is a realistic way of making a fortune unless in very exceptional cases. The true way of making a fortune, and sometimes losing it would be to think a bit wider and speculate about the longer image.
Thanks!

 

[sifts2win]

Bem,
that's one of many ways of looking at. There is lots of useful stuff about this in all the links on this site. Sb is good for learning 'cos u can trade really small and learn all the fakes, traps, failed breakouts etc. without being killed.
It's obvious that there's a whole host of traders and trading styles out there and u just have to find your niche. Read Helens stuff about trading futures on 1 minute charts. (ok if slippage, commission is really tight).
I believe the only way to sb is to anticipate the moves before they have moved the spread. Extremely dangerous as you're trading against the trend ! Shortly I will post my theory if I can find a way to upload the charts.

I am looking at using reversals at certain times of day on the Dow / FTSE confirmed with closes outside the bollinger bands on 5/15 min charts and then waiting for the price to start to settle down. I then place a stop 35 points away from last price high/low and hope for the reversal. This of course means if you're wrong you've lost your dough in minutes and the wide stop means smallish bets. If I'm right you can then easily manage the trade as you're in right near the start of the move and can lead to some nice 200-300 pt gains on the day.

Just what I've come to discover after 2/3 years of trying everything else. I would add I haven't started trading this system yet and of course you must add in support/resist, fib levels etc. Oh and pivots !!

 

[Helenqu]

Hi Mike,

I don't know if you have come across JPWones spreadbet system for the Dow? It works, I tried it but decided I didn't want to have to fight the bias to trade In fact it was very isntrumental in moving me to futures.

Here is the link to Johns site:
http://212.38.89.86/spreads/

 

[sifts2win]

Helen,
No I haven't heard of it but I will definitely have a look. If it works why not ?

Thanks again. It looks like I'm going to keep looking and testing. There has to be one way I can master after all this time !

 

[BeM]

sifts2win,
What about this method.... no matter what method you have, just think that you don't make money, you don't lose money but "chips", who cares about chips! Anyone can trade "chips" emotionless, but how can one think that their money are called "chips"! Tricky!