The Legend of The Gambler - page 18

 

^ Removed pending order. Price is just not really moving fast enough for me. And it is building a base at its current price, so making the move back down that much harder. Outta here.

 

Originally, I was going to use a very aggressive grid strategy that had a high risk of ruin for the Hare Account, but then decided to reduce my aggressiveness in 2009. Hopefully, I get lucky.

Account #1 Summary:

Deposit/Withdrawal: 20 000.00

Equity: 43 7XX.xx

Account #2 Summary:

Deposit/Withdrawal: Pending

Equity: 0

Tortoise Account Summary:

Deposit/Withdrawal: 5 147.29

Equity: 5 6XX.xx

Hare Account Summary:

Deposit/Withdrawal: 5 000.00

Equity: 5 0XX.xx

 

It may be dumb luck, but my Hare Account is on fire. I'm over +50% on the account for this week. Perhaps it is just favorable market conditions, but it has been kicking butt and taking names...so far 9 winners and 1 loss. Obviously, I don't expect this kind of return because it would be ridiculous to assume this can continue. I'm still amazed at the performance.

I've had high risk, high return scenarios in the past, but it has always come crashing down after the grid gets built too big or too much martingale or some other BS rare event that happens to be the weakness of my strategies.

Let's give it a couple months, and see what kind of return is available long term, hopefully no margin calls. Fingers crossed. So far, so good. Now I'm really excited about next week.

 

Anyways, the weekend is upon us, and I'm going to dedicate this weekend (at least Saturday) to reading and studying a very interesting subject about momentum, confluence, and its derivatives. Most likely, I will not be able to finish everything in one read. Hopefully, I can learn as much as possible, and try to replicate the system in my mind. And let it perculate on Sunday as I'm watching American Football playoffs.

If I am able to understand and apply this new method, and then combine it with my other principles, I may be finally successful in developing a scalper. That has always been my goal, so far it has been elusive. But I'm not going to stop trying...I can feel it...it's close...I'm just missing something to connect the dots.

 

OK, this is the final chart of the previous TP level demonstration.

I've drawn 3 circles on the levels where the short TP were hit, and see how price action reacted to each level. These are not just arbitrary X pips from entry, it is more dynamic and require more observation and experience.

Files:
 

Everyday is a learning opportunity.

And the more I learn, the less I realize I know.

There are thousands of great traders in the history of the markets, and they have written hundreds of books. Most edges are very simple. So they must speak or write in code to mystify their work, basically make it sound more complicated and important.

The trick is not to be a groupie/graduate student. To become successful, you need to quickly extract what is the key ingredient that makes his edge, and filter out all the bullcrap. You need to first identify if the person is even successful, or is he just another marketing guru/demo jockey.

It is very very rare to find a great trader that is willing to discuss his systems with you clearly. There are a few around. And I know at least one, so you have to keep your eyes and mind open. That's when you need to study and gain as much knowledge as possible. These traders are more willing to give away their edge because of their age and that they have made their fortune in the markets already.

 

So far, it has been a terrible start to the week. I already racked up -$1.5K in overall losses, closing in on -$2K.

F$#k. And it is only Monday. I need the markets to start going in my favor soon or the gambler is going to have to hit the bottle of ole' Johnnie (snake oil) again.

/starts praying to the market gods and does a money (peanut butter jelly) dance...

 

Account #2 is being funded, waiting for the check to clear.

Come to think about it, I don't know why I don't use wire transfer. I guess I just don't want to spend any money for the wire transfer when it can be done for free with a check. But it also doesn't make any sense because the time lost and the opportunity cost of having money in the market, and I probably lost more money on slippage than the wire transfer cost. Piker in me, I guess.

Still doing terrible this week. My Hare Account is in major drawdown, and I've basically lost all the gains from last week, and then some. I knew it was going to happen sooner or later. Times like this makes you feel like quit trading.

 

Last week was just terrible. Sigh. My hare account was flying high, and then it hit some unfavorable market condition...sucks. I posted the balance chart of my Hare Account since the start of the month. I wish I could have stopped earlier when I was actually up. Right now, I have shut the Hare Account strategy down, and need to re-evaluate what I'm doing.

Account #1 Summary:

Deposit (Inception April 08): 20 000.00

2008 PnL: +20 3XX.xx

2009 PnL: + 3 6XX.xx

Account #2 Summary:

Deposit/Withdrawal: 10 000.00

2009 PnL: 0

Tortoise Account Summary:

Deposit (Inception December 08): 5 147.29

2008 PnL: + 6XX.xx

2009 PnL: + 4XX.xx

Hare Account Summary:

Deposit (Inception January 09): 5 000.00

2009 PnL: - 1 0XX.xx

 

Kenny,

I applaud your ability to close your account and take a step back to understand your strategy, but out of curiosity have you gone through a detail analysis of the trades during those downslops and account for any unusual activity out of your norm?

This is something I do during terrible parts of my trading- I thought its a good practice as it really does help identify some of the major reasons- although I do not know you trading method personally, if its decently mechanical I would go through each trade one by one and set up a list of environment factors along with trading decisions factors.

Kenny Rogers:
Last week was just terrible. Sigh. My hare account was flying high, and then it hit some unfavorable market condition...sucks. I posted the balance chart of my Hare Account since the start of the month. I wish I could have stopped earlier when I was actually up. Right now, I have shut the Hare Account strategy down, and need to re-evaluate what I'm doing.

Account #1 Summary:

Deposit (Inception April 08): 20 000.00

2008 PnL: +20 3XX.xx

2009 PnL: + 3 6XX.xx

Account #2 Summary:

Deposit/Withdrawal: 10 000.00

2009 PnL: 0

Tortoise Account Summary:

Deposit (Inception December 08): 5 147.29

2008 PnL: + 6XX.xx

2009 PnL: + 4XX.xx

Hare Account Summary:

Deposit (Inception January 09): 5 000.00

2009 PnL: - 1 0XX.xx