Barney's Ballsups

[barney]

More crappy trading

Traded well early .... traded like a :homer: late

I put Homer to bed and brought out this guy:nunchux:

I had the bias correct most of the night on the GBP/USD but got into a bit of "Entry" trouble again and took a bit of heat for a while. Scaled in at the appropriate moments and traded out of a minor pickle. Better night all round.

 

[barney]

Briefly turned "W"-ish a while back, but now looking like a super ball bouncing over the edge of a cliff!

That's short flavoured strategies and QE for you! Definitely a challenging mix!!

Yeah Index Shorts have been a risky proposition. The Dow is starting to look like it sat on a red hot poker 12 days ago

 

[dlineinvestor]

I put Homer to bed and brought out this guy:nunchux:

I had the bias correct most of the night on the GBP/USD but got into a bit of "Entry" trouble again and took a bit of heat for a while. Scaled in at the appropriate moments and traded out of a minor pickle. Better night all round.

Good spotting on this trade, buyers were there after each pull back and each one was a higher low. A sign of micro trending. In this case it would be advisable to place a stop under each p/b low and let the market take your position to where ever it wants. In some cases setting a stop like this and letting the position run is psychologically hard but it's easier than selling and "trying to get in higher. You were onto a good thing. Well done !

 

[barney]

Good spotting on this trade, buyers were there after each pull back and each one was a higher low. A sign of micro trending. In this case it would be advisable to place a stop under each p/b low and let the market take your position to where ever it wants. In some cases setting a stop like this and letting the position run is psychologically hard but it's easier than selling and "trying to get in higher. You were onto a good thing. Well done !

Thanks "D" ....... The general gist of the trade was good but I still skewed a lot of the entries unfortunately. Keep working at it

 

[cynic]

WHODUNNIT!!!

Was it:

A) Professor Plum in the study with the candlestick?

or

B) Reverend Green in the library with the rope?

or

C) Colonel Mustard in the ballroom with the revolver?

or

D) Mario Draghi in the ECB with promises of another trillion EUROS worth of QE?


So who was it? Who murdered my DAX shorts?!!!

 

[barney]

How about you list your myriad of self destructive mistakes.
Ill bet there aren't that many---a myriad Id say is 10+
I think you'd be surprised by how few they are.
Then post how you intend to over come the list.

In my view---Unless your developing a System based upon conditions and variables---past history is of little value.
You NEED TO KNOW how to implement and how to trade any hint given to you.
and YOU NEED TO KNOW in the NOW not how it panned out last time or last year!

For every time you see this set up (Double bottom or Double top ) It will fail more often than not.
HOW do you trade that---a failure?
How do you know when to hang in it when it corrects at some point?
How do you know when to exit.
How do you know when you should be hitting it a more.
How do you know when it should be placed on a watch list and not traded.
How do you position size it.
How do you set your stops--if any.

Apologies for not getting back to this sooner Tech.

I started to write a short novel on my failings as a Forex trader, but thought, I don't need to bore people with too much detail ..... On that note, the short story is fairly simple ..

I am the classic "disorganised" trader .....

I trade discretionary, but without sufficient experience to be successful.

I constantly take poor entries; either too soon (trying to pre-empt reversals with no justification other than a gut feel), or too late (FOMO trades)

Most of my other bad habits are just derivatives of the above poor entries. ie. Impatience, Impulsiveness etc.etc.


What is more important than the above problems is how I intend to fix them. The solution is really pretty straight forward ...

I have a lot of trading "concepts" which I have developed/discovered over the last 12 months. Some have looked really interesting, but because I rarely write anything down, the ideas have never been optimized ........... so,

I intend to turn my concepts into systems which can be traded via a set of rules and therefore evaluated with some accuracy ..... ie. Draw up a Play book of setups, both Pattern based and Range/Time based, and either back test or at least eye-ball test them to some depth.

With the above in mind, hopefully I can add to the thread in 12 months with some positive progress and substantially less ballsups

If nothing else, your gentle jab in the ribs has "woken" me up a bit, so lets see if I can actually go to the next level and create something worthwhile out of it.

Cheers.

 

[Trembling Hand]

If nothing else, your gentle jab in the ribs has "woken" me up a bit, so lets see if I can actually go to the next level and create something worthwhile out of it.

Its always MORE or LESS.

Less. You can try to improve by concentrating on not doing what has caused you problems or,

More. You can try to improve by concentrating on doing what has been rewarded. (an idea, a hunch, a time, a setup, a system from these).

One takes massive energy and leads to procrastination and lack of motivation. If you are repeating something that doesn't reward you with more winning trades than losing trades it is serving some other 'need'. Impulsiveness is normally spoken about as lack of discipline when its probably lack of a proven path yet still needing to do 'something'. Trying to smash a square peg in a round hole while not breaking anything becomes a house of cards (nice mixing of metaphors! ) Sooner or latter the energy required to stay on track will lapse with disastrous results.

The other gives you energy and sucks you in and enables you to do heaps of work without even noticing the time flying by. It adds to you rather than takes from you.


MORE or LESS.

I always choose more. :grinsking

 

[tech/a]

Just to add a little to my and T/Hs post.

I find when writing things down I find a common thread.

80% of that which is wrong will come from 20% of what you do.
80% of what you do right will come from 20% of what you do.

Just concentrate on your 20%

Known as the Perato Principal.

 

[barney]

Its always MORE or LESS.

Less. You can try to improve by concentrating on not doing what has caused you problems or,

More. You can try to improve by concentrating on doing what has been rewarded. (an idea, a hunch, a time, a setup, a system from these).

One takes massive energy and leads to procrastination and lack of motivation.

If you are repeating something that doesn't reward you with more winning trades than losing trades it is serving some other 'need'.

Impulsiveness is normally spoken about as lack of discipline when its probably lack of a proven path yet still needing to do 'something'.

Trying to smash a square peg in a round hole while not breaking anything becomes a house of cards (nice mixing of metaphors! )

Sooner or latter the energy required to stay on track will lapse with disastrous results.

The other gives you energy and sucks you in and enables you to do heaps of work without even noticing the time flying by. It adds to you rather than takes from you.


MORE or LESS.

I always choose more. :grinsking

Gold, thanks TH ..... You've pretty much described where I've been, where I'm at, and where I need to go in a few sentences ...... Have you been studying psychology in your spare time That post will get the benefit of a drawing pin and a spare bit of wall

Impulsiveness is normally spoken about as lack of discipline when its probably lack of a proven path yet still needing to do 'something'.

Nailed me to a tee ............ back to the cave to start fixing that!

 

[barney]

Just to add a little to my and T/Hs post.

I find when writing things down I find a common thread.

80% of that which is wrong will come from 20% of what you do.
80% of what you do right will come from 20% of what you do.

Just concentrate on your 20%
Known as the Perato Principal.

Cheers Tech ...... Duly noted

 

[dlineinvestor]

Hi Barney,

Here might be the reason everytime you buy the markets turns on you ...

The corruption of the world’s biggest currency dealers has been laid bare with regulators imposing fines of £2bn on five major banks for rigging the £3.5tn a day foreign exchange markets

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/nov/12/banks-fined-record-2bn-foreign-exchange-rigging

On another note : Waiting for a "play/plays that you know work at least 60% of the time is what it's all about.
If you can remember this before taking a trade. "On the other side of this trade is going to be a professional trader or institution that wants to take my money. "Is this really one of my best plays ? Yes pull trigger No wait for the right play. I think a "quick check list before taking trades will help create a proper thinking pattern to keep one out of trouble. I mean really no one is in a hurry to fail right ? So take less trades and do what all the pro's did when they started. Develop that play book.
A beginner trader is always advised to wait for that "one good play. This is soley to build confidence. It's never about the money when first starting out. What makes money is showing "patience to wait for it"
Hence one of the main reasons most starting out fail.

 

[dlineinvestor]

Hi Barney,

Here might be the reason everytime we buy and the markets turn on us ...

The corruption of the world’s biggest currency dealers has been laid bare with regulators imposing fines of £2bn on five major banks for rigging the £3.5tn a day foreign exchange markets

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/nov/12/banks-fined-record-2bn-foreign-exchange-rigging

On another note : Waiting for a "play/plays that you know work at least 60% of the time is what it's all about.
If you can remember this before taking a trade. "On the other side of this trade is going to be a professional trader or institution that wants to take my money. "Is this really one of my best plays ? Yes pull trigger No wait for the right play. I think a "quick check list before taking trades will help create a proper thinking pattern to keep one out of trouble. I mean really no one is in a hurry to fail right ? So take less trades and do what all the pro's did when they started. Develop that play book.
A beginner trader is always advised to wait for that "one good play. This is soley to build confidence. It should never be about the money when first starting out. What makes money is showing "patience to wait for it" Money is the by product of proper trading
Hence one of the main reasons most starting out fail. I have to apply everything mentioned here to myself past and present. Every time I break my rules it's ouch time ... lol

Barney just to correct some "grammar and add to the above
"You can do this mate

 

[barney]

"On the other side of this trade is going to be a professional trader or institution that wants to take my money.

I think a "quick check list before taking trades will help create a proper thinking pattern to keep one out of trouble. Develop that play book.

A beginner trader is always advised to wait for that "one good play.

Hi "D" ..... interesting link re the Banks.

Documenting a "play book" is definitely on top of the list.

I've been in the "trial" stage with this micro FX account so rather than wait for trades I've been machine gunning it until the last couple of weeks mainly to get quick feedback. Definitely a lot more selective on my larger account which has been positive over the last 12 months.

Interestingly enough my best trading is usually after I've butchered the micro account for a couple of hours then suddenly realise why I've been stuffing up .... swap to the bigger account and generally do ok

Its like playing guitar .... I've been playing for 40+ years, but that 15 minutes of warm up time is the key. The flexibility/dexterity is increased exponentially for that relatively small time frame .....

Trading seems very similar in process to me, but I'd like to knock the "warm up" time down to a reasonable time frame

 

[barney]

Its always MORE or LESS.

Less. You can try to improve by concentrating on not doing what has caused you problems or,

More. You can try to improve by concentrating on doing what has been rewarded. (an idea, a hunch, a time, a setup, a system from these).

One takes massive energy and leads to procrastination and lack of motivation. If you are repeating something that doesn't reward you with more winning trades than losing trades it is serving some other 'need'. Impulsiveness is normally spoken about as lack of discipline when its probably lack of a proven path yet still needing to do 'something'. Trying to smash a square peg in a round hole while not breaking anything becomes a house of cards (nice mixing of metaphors! ) Sooner or latter the energy required to stay on track will lapse with disastrous results.

The other gives you energy and sucks you in and enables you to do heaps of work without even noticing the time flying by. It adds to you rather than takes from you.

MORE or LESS. I always choose more. :grinsking

Where are we .... 7 years later ,,,,, and TH (Trembling Hand, is still my Hero ... Thank you my friend.)

I know TH is no longer a registered member of ASF , but if he happens to read this post, please message me!

I believe I owe you a carton of (insert your most favorite/expensive ale!!)

His message above was basically .... Do what you are "good" at and stop trying to do what you are crap at (even if you think you are good at it!) ...ie. Play to your strengths.

For others, I'm just reminiscing (I'm old, lol) so please disregard my unintelligible ramblings

 

[barney]

ps Thanks Frog ... You are a legend ....

Hope you and Mrs. Frog are still doing ok after the Vax etc.


Also thanks DF