Post your P&L

[trader_dante]

Update for Friday 12th Feb 2010 trading + rolling trade financing for weekend (something for the weekend Sir...?). (Not all Thursday night financing is shown, so not quite contiguous with spreadsheet previously posted, but it's not far off).

China helped, as did the European pantomime in Brussels. You can't see the entries, but as each individual trade is £1/pip, you could work it out. Some were cut for small profit, effectively scratch, when they were clearly going against me, with a view to a better entry later. Empirically, wins are almost always bigger if I let my original limit close it instead of closing manually...although maybe there would be fewer wins if I never closed manually.

Still essentially Bearish EUR/USD. EUR/JPY, cable, gold (short-to-medium term, then long-term bullish).
Hoped to close most positions before long US weekend, but didn't quite manage it.

Monty,

It looks like you are rolling Cable, Euro and Euro/Sterling short?

If you are bearish Euro/Dollar and bearish Euro/Sterling why would you be short Cable?

 

[FXTrend240]

Monty,

It looks like you are rolling Cable, Euro and Euro/Sterling short?

If you are bearish Euro/Dollar and bearish Euro/Sterling why would you be short Cable?

Don't forget, these are exchange rates, yes they are inter-correlated, but only to a certain extent.

GBPUSD, dollar has posted some nice GDP data, meanwhile the UK, oh,well 0.1%, thats pretty pathetic. So money flows and pounds made into dollars to invest in a better and perhaps higher yielding currency than itself. Also, a good way to hedge himself, in other words-economics. USA is recovering as evidenced by nice GDP, what we want to see next is consistent GDP growth and quite high inflation, then risk appetite, so that:
1)inflation is high enough for the FED to raise rates-raise in rates attracts investment
2)since there is risk appetite, investors care more for the high interest rate more than the inflation.
3)There is confidence in the US economy to perform and give incentive to people to continue to hold dollars.

 

[Prawnsandwich]

Thanks. It's not quite that though. Did you spot the 1050 out? There was some glitch on a trade - wierd spike in Gold and suddenly I was £1050 up, and I thought it was my birthday. (I'd seen it go to about 450, then suddenly it closed and I was 1050 up. Well, I knew it was some kind of error, and I assumed they'd correct it which they did the same night. I very mildly complained, saying I thought it should have been a successful trade, and either they should have given me what I should have had (a few hundred maybe), or some kind of compensation. They were polite and said it was their mistake, but no compensation. I didn't take it any further and was just glad they weren't putting me on dealer acceptance or whatever (or don't seem to be so far). That was a wild day among several news-driven wild days lately. I've been a bit lucky on those days, but it wasn't all luck. I've probably taken more risk than would usually be deemed acceptable in this forum, in the attempt to get to 10k. Maybe I'll relax a bit then. I have been consciously reducing risk lately and trying to be a bit cleverer in my entries, but in volatile conditions, I don't think you can be too exact about entries. While I wasn't too exact about entries, I was very sure about overall direction, and just stuck with it, and with the exception of the EUR/GPB, it's been about right. Well, if I go very quiet within the next few weeks, maybe you'll know what's happened

I think I may have put a bit more than 2300 in actually. It was in dribs and drabs. I've only taken £250 out myself so far. Trying to build the capital up, but I will have to take a bit more out soon.

Thanks for your interest.

Again from a quick look it appears that the actual losses are negligible over the three months - vast majority are generally less than £1....which is something else on an account that has grown c. 2000% in the same period....

Mind sharing your method ?

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Mont'y's weekly update - Re: Post your P&L

Weekly update from last week. (I never intended to post daily - not sure what anyone else is doing), but will try to post weekly. I haven't included all trades. I can only easily download the whole trade history, and it would be tedious to separate out the last week's trades, and OTT to post the complete history every week, so I have just posted a daily summary in a spreadsheet, and a screenshot of the most recent transactions. The final total should tie up with the spreadsheet, but if it doesn't it may just be fingertrouble. You'll just have to take my word for it that it's not cooked up. It would be more trouble to cook it up than to trade it, for me at least.

I withdrew £250 on Monday morning as planned, and had a fat finger error, not as planned, later that day, which caused me to lose £242 (closed 3 temporarily unprofitable trades in cable, instead of the larger of the two profitable ones (closed them all in one go). Must say this threw me, and trading was a little subdued the rest of the day, finishing about £163 down.

Things picked up in the middle of the week with the UK finance deficit, the IMF dumping gold, and the Fed Discount Rate announcement. Of course I didn't know about those in advance, but being bullish on USD, and bearish on the GBP (and EUR and gold), I was positioned to take advantage (not as much as I could/should have been on Thursday (Fed)). Today, Friday has been very quiet. The only two decent results were actually in the small hours, and were set up Thursday, and are really part of the rise in USDX after the Fed announcement.

As for method, it's hard to say. As already said, it's mostly fundamentals (for direction), a little bit of TA/price action for entries, and a bit of instinct/experience. As I'm still relatively inexperienced (just over two years I think), that last bit probably lets me down more than anything, e.g. in sloppy entries. Not that I am too worried about entries; in this I am partly influenced by De Toit (Bird Watching in Lion Country). I don't trade the way he writes about - not even sure I understand it exactly, but I am in tune with his philosophy of relatively low leverage, not agonising about precise entries, scaling in, and a few other things which I will leave you to read about. (I'd probably get shot down if I went on about them here, as they are a bit heretical). Having said that about low-leverage, I am conscious that I was over-trading and therefore over-leveraging quite a lot in previous weeks, and this week, I consciously tried not to do that. As it was a slightly quieter week anyway, that helped.

Essentially (this week) I've just been selling into every major (and some not so major) rallies of EUR/USD, EUR/JPY, GBP/USD, and Gold. (I've left oil alone ... don't seem to get on with that, although it should have been possible to trade that as well).

The least successful have been EUR/JPY (although goodish wins when they work). Have to think about / keep an eye on those in the future.

Dabbled with EUR/CHF, and USD/CAD, but wasn't really concentrating on them and didn't do very well.

There were, or should have been, some opportunities in AUD/JPY, AUD/USD, and USD/JPY, but I seemed to have my hands full, and didn't really pay them sufficient attention.

If anyone here has studied De Toit in any depth, and wants to get in touch for a more detailed chat by PM or email, please feel free.

 

[DionysusToast]

OK - just thought I'd check the IB account. Pretty useless compared to TS.

First - it doesn't appear to show the trade time or date. Second, it doesn't show actual profit in cents - just position P&L.

So - we are left with this:

Not much info at all. I am sure it wouldn't stand up in court. Orders were entered this morning before I went to the comedy club - but it seems such details are far too trivial for IB to put on the page for some reason.

I need to read the TWS manual...

OK -seeing as Mike is playing, I thought I'd give an update on this trade. It's nothing more than a play on the market direction. It's a few different instruments but I consider it a single trade. With the market getting jittery over the FED announcement, it came off a little last night. I'm still holding it though as I am still bullish.

I still have reservations over posting all activity for a period as it's the trading equivalent of showing someone your payslip. On the other hand, I don't think anyone's coming after me for $1300.

Note - P&L is yesterdays P&L - so this came off $138 yesterday. Unrealized P&L of $1,352 is total P&L so far.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Hi DT, well, since you are playing, and since I am trying to get into stocks/shares a bit, would you mind explaining some of the headings?


Just the less obvious ones. Bid Size and Ask Size ... what units are those, for example?

I have very rarely traded shares, and only then on a spread betting site, and I imagine the terminology is a bit different.


TIF? Last Dest?


I guess you hold your positions a bit longer than Mr Charts. for example?

 

[DionysusToast]

Mike - I have a number of accounts. This is one I use for positions I keep a little open longer. I do this because it's entirely possible I'll be long something long-term but short it day trading.

I also use different brokers just in case one dies on me.

On this pic, you can ignore the second row of headers as I have that data switched off.

So basically position = position size. These are small positions, only about 100 shares each.
Market Value is current value - so currently $40K in the trade.
P&L is todays P&L on the position (todays action).
Unrealized P&L - total P&L so far.
Avg Price - my entry price.
Last - last price (in this case Fridays close).
Change - change today.

In terms of bid and ask size - that's in 100 share lots. So bid size of 100 = 1000 shares.
Spreads are a little crazy as the market is closed.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Monty,

It looks like you are rolling Cable, Euro and Euro/Sterling short?

If you are bearish Euro/Dollar and bearish Euro/Sterling why would you be short Cable?

Sorry, didn't see this. Did I say bearish Euro/Sterling? If I did, that was a mistake.
Oh, I think you are going by those rolling trade finance messages? That's definitely a Buy for EUR/GBP.

I had a long position EUR/GBP which went sour, but (out of obstinacy) I refused to cut.

I am definitely bearish cable, bearish Euro generally, and bullish USD. I'm not sure what I was thinking when I took that EUR/GBP trade, but I now think of EUR/GBP as a kind of special case. In terms of volume (according to the International Bank of Settlement reports), it is tiny compared to EUR/USD and cable, so theoretically, it should be driven by those two.
Unless I suppose there are special economic factors affecting either the Eurozone only, the UK only, or the two of them together, which don't affect the US very much.

At the moment, I'd say I was neutral EUR/GBP. I think it it is in a funny place actually, and am waiting to see what happens. Since I am slightly more bearish Euro than the GBP at the moment, I think it may ultimately come right down again, before ultimately going up, when the Eurozone sorts itself out, and the UK doesn't. If I am awake when it gets to its next proper swing low, I will go long again, and maybe it will one day catch up my other long (keep missing it though).


I usually don't cut my losing positions early. I know that is the accepted wisdom, but in this respect, I go along with De Toit. Maybe it will kill me in the end, but, so far it has worked. (Helped by relatively low leverage). What I do tend to kill are trades that start out in my favour and then reverse sharply. I usually try to kill them just before they go against me, ie. for scratch or trivial profit. Then look for a better entry, or just forget it. It just depends though.

I would say that I only hold on to a position if I think on fundamental grounds it is the correct direction. In this respect I think this is something like the way you (TD) trade, i.e. I don't mind being underwater for a good long time if I have faith in the trade at some level. Like you I don't move to BE, although unlike you, I don't seem to succeed in holding on for the longer trend. I usually close when I think I've good a good enough profit. I am learning to hold on for longer, and as I said before, if I leave it to my limit orders, I usually end up with a bigger profit than if I close manually. I know you don't believe in limits though ("they limit your profits"). In a volatile market though I find them essential (for me).

Another reason I haven't cut that long (underwater) EUR/GBP position is that it serves as a good reference point, also as a reminder (of what not to do, perhaps... ). And now it's a very small proportion of the account, so that's not so much of a consideration. I've taken other long EUR/GBP trades in the meantime, within that range, usually for less than a day or so.

Don't trade like this at home kids ...

 

[oildaytrader]

Re: Mont'y's weekly update - Re: Post your P&L

Weekly update from last week. (I never intended to post daily - not sure what anyone else is doing), but will try to post weekly. I haven't included all trades. I can only easily download the whole trade history, and it would be tedious to separate out the last week's trades, and OTT to post the complete history every week, so I have just posted a daily summary in a spreadsheet, and a screenshot of the most recent transactions. The final total should tie up with the spreadsheet, but if it doesn't it may just be fingertrouble. You'll just have to take my word for it that it's not cooked up. It would be more trouble to cook it up than to trade it, for me at least.

I withdrew £250 on Monday morning as planned, and had a fat finger error, not as planned, later that day, which caused me to lose £242 (closed 3 temporarily unprofitable trades in cable, instead of the larger of the two profitable ones (closed them all in one go). Must say this threw me, and trading was a little subdued the rest of the day, finishing about £163 down.

Things picked up in the middle of the week with the UK finance deficit, the IMF dumping gold, and the Fed Discount Rate announcement. Of course I didn't know about those in advance, but being bullish on USD, and bearish on the GBP (and EUR and gold), I was positioned to take advantage (not as much as I could/should have been on Thursday (Fed)). Today, Friday has been very quiet. The only two decent results were actually in the small hours, and were set up Thursday, and are really part of the rise in USDX after the Fed announcement.

As for method, it's hard to say. As already said, it's mostly fundamentals (for direction), a little bit of TA/price action for entries, and a bit of instinct/experience. As I'm still relatively inexperienced (just over two years I think), that last bit probably lets me down more than anything, e.g. in sloppy entries. Not that I am too worried about entries; in this I am partly influenced by De Toit (Bird Watching in Lion Country). I don't trade the way he writes about - not even sure I understand it exactly, but I am in tune with his philosophy of relatively low leverage, not agonising about precise entries, scaling in, and a few other things which I will leave you to read about. (I'd probably get shot down if I went on about them here, as they are a bit heretical). Having said that about low-leverage, I am conscious that I was over-trading and therefore over-leveraging quite a lot in previous weeks, and this week, I consciously tried not to do that. As it was a slightly quieter week anyway, that helped.

Essentially (this week) I've just been selling into every major (and some not so major) rallies of EUR/USD, EUR/JPY, GBP/USD, and Gold. (I've left oil alone ... don't seem to get on with that, although it should have been possible to trade that as well).

The least successful have been EUR/JPY (although goodish wins when they work). Have to think about / keep an eye on those in the future.

Dabbled with EUR/CHF, and USD/CAD, but wasn't really concentrating on them and didn't do very well.

There were, or should have been, some opportunities in AUD/JPY, AUD/USD, and USD/JPY, but I seemed to have my hands full, and didn't really pay them sufficient attention.

If anyone here has studied De Toit in any depth, and wants to get in touch for a more detailed chat by PM or email, please feel free.

Euro yen can be choppy , least profitable for breakouts.Never found an automated strategy to work for euro/yen.You can use this info.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Mike - I have a number of accounts. This is one I use for positions I keep a little open longer. I do this because it's entirely possible I'll be long something long-term but short it day trading.

I also use different brokers just in case one dies on me.

On this pic, you can ignore the second row of headers as I have that data switched off.

So basically position = position size. These are small positions, only about 100 shares each.
Market Value is current value - so currently $40K in the trade.
P&L is todays P&L on the position (todays action).
Unrealized P&L - total P&L so far.
Avg Price - my entry price.
Last - last price (in this case Fridays close).
Change - change today.

In terms of bid and ask size - that's in 100 share lots. So bid size of 100 = 1000 shares.
Spreads are a little crazy as the market is closed.

Bid size of 10 = 1000 shares? (10*100 ?).

Why are there numbers on both the bid and ask side ... as though you had both bought and sold shares ...? Sorry if I am being really dense here. Different world.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

Re: Mont'y's weekly update - Re: Post your P&L

Euro yen can be choppy , least profitable for breakouts.Never found an automated strategy to work for euro/yen.You can use this info.

Thanks. Actually, choppy can work in my favour, since I'm not really looking for breakouts.
Just sell (at the moment) the high of the "chop" and try to get my limit right to take profit at the bottom of the chop, or a part of the chop anyway.

Not as bad as GBP/JPY which I find very unpredictable, admittedly with very good moves. I just don't bother with it at the moment.

 

[DionysusToast]

Bid size of 10 = 1000 shares? (10*100 ?).

Why are there numbers on both the bid and ask side ... as though you had both bought and sold shares ...? Sorry if I am being really dense here. Different world.

The numbers with black background represent the market & is not related to my trades.

So - that's the last bid & ask you are seeing. Nothing to do with me.

 

[montmorencyt2w]

The numbers with black background represent the market & is not related to my trades.

So - that's the last bid & ask you are seeing. Nothing to do with me.

OK, sorry. Just not used to these proper trading platforms, let alone stocks and shares.

So, it's just me and DT then is it? Just like that Auction all over again.

Funny, I could have sworn I read this somewhere....thought my memory was playing tricks, but no, there it is:

So roll up and don't be scared.

I'll start tomorrow with a screendump of all positions and P&L at the end of each and every day.

 

[trader_dante]

OK, sorry. Just not used to these proper trading platforms, let alone stocks and shares.

So, it's just me and DT then is it? Just like that Auction all over again.

Funny, I could have sworn I read this somewhere....thought my memory was playing tricks, but no, there it is:

LOL

I was put off after someone tried to insinuate I was using the thread to advertise a mentoring business so I thought I'd start posting my P&L when I'm on a losing streak.

 

[DionysusToast]

LOL

I was put off after someone tried to insinuate I was using the thread to advertise a mentoring business so I thought I'd start posting my P&L when I'm on a losing streak.

I reckon I'll be able to beat you to that, too !

 

[charliechan]

There is a lot of bullsh*t statements made on this board.

I see some members claiming that no one can make any money using technical analysis.

I see some members claiming other members strategies are worthless.

I even see some members claiming that no one can make any money full stop.

I see a lot of members making calls that are, on balance, good but giving no evidence they actually traded their own call or managed it in the way they called.

So perhaps it would be a good time to resurrect this old thread I started.

As I stated in the first post,

The benefits of the thread are:

- It will, over time, seperate (at least among those that post) those that can make money consistently from those that can't and put a stop to endless arguments concerning whether money can be made and who is making it.

- If you want to prove that your system or strategy works then you can do so by showing the performance of the account that trades it. This would be particularly good for vendors.

- It gives others a chance to benchmark their performance.

So roll up and don't be scared.

I'll start tomorrow with a screendump of all positions and P&L at the end of each and every day.

so son, 'roll up, and don't be scared'. several other members have posted their pnl since your post. you have said you will do so as well (several times), BUT HAVE FAILED TO DO SO.

i dont give a toss if you are a vendor or not. i can tell from your arrogant stance you are not humble enough to be any good as a trader. this is hardly the crime of the century - everyone starts somewhere. but, seeing as you position yourself as some sort of authority here, i think you should follow up on your promise. come on, show us all what big balls you have.

currently, i think you are just another ego. with as many posts as you have in such a period, it would seem that you spend a lot of time talking, but little time doing.

surprise me.

:clap:

 

[charliechan]

p.s. and before you ask me to post mine, dont bother. i dont see what anyone will learn from a string of numbers (with some dips ), and my ego doesnt need boosting from anonymous people (with all due respect).

 

[trader_dante]

i can tell from your arrogant stance you are not humble enough to be any good as a trader.

And I can tell from that sentence right there that you've never been around any good traders.

But you might have read "Trading in the Zone" once?

 

[charliechan]

lol

still waiting......

 

[D70]

so son, 'roll up, and don't be scared'. several other members have posted their pnl since your post. you have said you will do so as well (several times), BUT HAVE FAILED TO DO SO.

but, seeing as you position yourself as some sort of authority here, i think you should follow up on your promise. come on, show us all what big balls you have.

currently, i think you are just another ego. with as many posts as you have in such a period, it would seem that you spend a lot of time talking, but little time doing.

Trader_Dante,
He has a point, does he not??
You could be all hot air.