My personal 4 minute mile

[1pipatatime]

Hi Everyone,

This is going to be a journal for reviewing my trades at the end of my trading day.

What worked, what didn't work etc.

I'm a scalper who sometimes lets the trades run locking in profit along the way.

I'm only interested in what I call high probability trades.

I have to be present to my impulse to push the trade tooooo far and be ready to deal with this situation when it arises.

I will share my trading results profit/loss after each session.

My intention is to average 30 pips a day, being aggressive on the compounding early on and once the game is on the way, rolling the compounding back.

The game is to trade the EUR/USD or AUD/USD pairs and see how much I can generate by the end of Feb starting with 1 mini contract.

Since I will be trading a new strategy for me, there maybe some adjustments along the way to the system.

The reason for the game is to buy a house for my new family which has inspired me to get back into some serious trading.

Over the next months I'm probably going to come across like a prick as I'm going to be focusing on turning out the results that I'm intending to have and will be attempting to keep distractions to a minimum.

However once the game is over I will be more accommodating, it's just that I suffer from tunnel vision and totally focus on the job at hand.

Since it is NFP week the game will start on Monday 9th Jan 2012, although I will most likely have a sneaky look tomorrow.

 

[Enivid]

Why 30 pips per day? What max % of your balance will you be risking per trade?

 

[1pipatatime]

Why 30 pips per day? What max % of your balance will you be risking per trade?

Hi Enivi its a minimum average of 30 pips per day as this is all I require to reach my target by end of Febuary.

The max % of account that will be traded 50% risking 25% on the trade and as the game progresses that will come down as the stakes get higher.

I know you should only risk 2-3% of your account but I'm not starting with a lot and if I blow it at the start it will only be a max of $100.

Cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Ok finally dragged myself away from commitments and started trading.

Results for tonight

18/01/2012 DXZ4B6AG Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD converted at 0.962 - 1.27784 A$ -1 1.27481 $29.15, 30.3 pips

This was a practice session on a live account just to get use to the new system which seems to be working fine.

The above trade was entered as a scalp but p.a took off so I let the trade go and closed out when tonights target was hit.

What worked was following the rules, doing a couple of paper trades to get my focus on the new system.

What didn't work was that there was multiple entries and I became focused on the one trade.

Also I had let circumstances take me away from trading up until now, need to workout what I was avoiding? Maybe a trust issue with new system?

I now have a free schedule for the rest of the game and looking forward for tomorrows session

30.3 pips for the first night is good for a 19 minute trade.

All in all a positive start but room for improvement.

Cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Hi Everyone,

Results for tonight

20/01/2012 DX5Q2KA3 Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD converted at 0.9629 - 1.29055 A$ -1 1.2895 10.11 10.5
20/01/2012 DX5GP5AY Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD converted at 0.9629 - 1.2905 A$ -1 1.2895 9.63 10.0
20/01/2012 DX5KUHAE Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD converted at 0.9621 - 1.29328 A$ -1 1.2926 6.54 6.8
20/01/2012 DX5LM5AU Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD converted at 0.9628 - 1.29286 A$ -1 1.29236 4.81 5.0
20/01/2012 DX5FKGAT Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD converted at 0.9611 - 1.29381 A$ -1 1.29329 5 5.2

Daily $ Profit $36.09 Daily Pip Total 37.5

Feeling comfortable with the system now, after doing these live trades I paper traded for another decent amount and feel like it is now flowing, no more trust issues so far.
Focus was the difference for tonight as I was focused with intent and stopped doing multiple tasks at the same time, just traded.

Ready for next week and will start compounding from Monday.

Cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Hi forgot to post this yesterday

24/01/2012 MP37HVA3 Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD - 1.30338 $ -1 1.30089 24.9 24.9
24/01/2012 MP2Y4RAK Spot FX (mini) EUR/USD - 1.30222 $ 1 1.30272 5 5

Daily $ Profit $29.90 Daily Pip Total 29.9

Could not get in the right frame of mind to trade tonight, so will look at it again tomorrow.

 

[1pipatatime]

Sorry for not posting the last few day's but I had an awakening and realised that I had made the system too complicted with if's and then and have gone over the system with the kiss method and too my suprise it makes it a lot simpler.

Tested it on paper tonight and got good results and when I put some real money on it, it still worked.

Boy did I go place's with it, even thought about quitting trading after my partner asked if I still liked trading which made me think about what would I do if I didn't trade which scared me and I did come close to quitting.

Ok still got 4 weeks left to get my came happening, just got $7,479.79 in the account, lets see how long it takes to get the house.

New target is 80 pips per day compounding at 40% starting with 1 mini contract over the next 21 trading day's left of this month.

Will be back tomorrow since I got my head screwed back on, it's amazing how your brian goes soft after a longer than normal break from hunting pips.

Cheers

 

[Forturama]

Hi, thank you for your posts.

What about create an live statement on a site such as mt4stats?

Thanks.

 

[1pipatatime]

Hi, thank you for your posts.

What about create an live statement on a site such as mt4stats?

Thanks.

Hi Forturama,

Your welcome,

but I don't know what mt4stats is mate, website?

cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Hi Forturama,

Just googled it, but I don't use metatrader.

I will when finished get the account audited if that helps?

cheers

 

[Enivid]

What trading platform do you use?

 

[1pipatatime]

Hi Enivid,

I have a couple of accounts with IG Markets and a few other accounts but will trade those accounts using IG's charts.

They use ITFinance charts which I can modify to my liking.

cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Well have I learned a bit tonight.

Follow one's trading rules would be a good start lol.

Ended up 21.6 pips up but could have been around 150-200 up for the night.

The area that was not great was the management of the trade, a few trades tonight where I got out before I needed too went 50-70 pips like the one I'm watching as I'm typing here.

Very happy with the new system, just need to learn to trust it and untrain myself from previous systems that I have used.

Did 3 loosing trades tonight which was absolutely biginners mistakes which cost me 30 pips, well at least the rust is coming off the gears and I just need to polish them up a bit.

The other thing that bugged me was the missing of some entries (again trusting the system would help here, talked myself out of them) which would have lifted the total but they are now in the memory bank to look for tomorrow night.

Noticed some area's on the 5min chart that would help with re-entries but just using the 5 min red points would be sufficient for my targets.

Not too up set about missing my targets for tonight as I know I can make it up with a more disciplined approach tomorrow.

Over all I enjoyed trading tonight which has not been there for a while.

Will post again tomorrow night after trading session is over.

Cheers

 

[Enivid]

Heh... I'd wish my bad trading days be comprised of +21.6 pips profit.

 

[1pipatatime]

Heh... I'd wish my bad trading days be comprised of +21.6 pips profit.

Yeah I'm a bit of a perfectionist lol, your probably right.

cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

A big improvement on yesterday from a mental approach.

Felt the feel of it tonight which is good, only made 18.4 pips but cut out the loosing trades.

Still missed a couple of entries tonight but the level of belief and trust in the system has improved to a level that I am confident that I'll reach my goals at the end of the month.

Didn't trade to long tonight as I had a bug and Mr Loo required my attention more than Mr Computer.

Been listening to motivation recordings tonight and it got me thinking about statements like

"You have to ask yourself what are you going to do today, more importantly how you going to do it"

Another one that stuck in my mind was

"When you want to succeed as bad as you want to breathe then you will be successful"
That was from a clip called "Success.....How bad do you want it"

All this got me thinking about what it is that I allow to hold me back from what I know I can do, is it not allowing myself to fail even though I know its a part of the game I'm in.

Anyway trading for me is all about following the trend and milking it for what I require for the session and one only gets the rewards for executing the system as it is designed.

Next week trading is number one even a head of breathing and the results will look after themselves.

cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Hmmmm the last two nights were not good, lost 21 pips Monday and lost 19pips on Tuesday which made me wonder what was going on and I came to the conclusion that I should stop trying to force a new system to work and revert back to the old way I use to trade.

After going back to my old style (which I have no idea why I changed), I made on Demo for tonight 140 pips using limit orders on early trades and later used the black ema as a stoploss which works a treat and let the trades run.

This felt so more natural for me, I don't know what got into me trying the other method except that I felt a lot of pressure to do so to try and speed things up and it has only put me behind the game plan target.

Tomorrow back on the live trading with real money after getting my confidence back.

Over the next few day's looking to put my trading plan on here which may help a few people out hopefully.

Just marked another trade on the charts and its already 20 pips up and still going which is a good read.

Sorry for note posting over the last 2 day's but I went a few places and the last thing I wanted to do was share my thoughts with anyone.

See you after tomorrow night's trading session.

Cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Hi all,

Just to let everyone know a close friend of my partners Mother passed away today and we have gone up there to comfort them and do whatever we can to assist the family.

Will be trading tomorrow and will post results after the session.

In hast to travel to destination 2.5-3 hour drive I left my trading plan at home and if I get the time will rewrite it over the weekend to post on this site but at the latest I'll post it when we get back which will be Monday, Tuesday hopefully.

Cheers

 

[Forturama]

Ok, thank you for your up date.

We are waiting for your new posts.

Thanks.

Hi all,

Just to let everyone know a close friend of my partners Mother passed away today and we have gone up there to comfort them and do whatever we can to assist the family.

Will be trading tomorrow and will post results after the session.

In hast to travel to destination 2.5-3 hour drive I left my trading plan at home and if I get the time will rewrite it over the weekend to post on this site but at the latest I'll post it when we get back which will be Monday, Tuesday hopefully.

Cheers

 

[1pipatatime]

Thanks for your post Forturama

Just to let everyone one know all is fine and I'll be back trading live on this Monday.

Did a prac session tonight and traded smoothly and relaxed, made my quota in about 1.5 hrs.

Will add trading plan before Monday afternoon.

cheers