June 30, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders (6/30/10)


No trades.

New orders:

Buy YMU10 @9650 with 9638 stop and 9673 take-profit.

Sell YMU10 @9749 with 9761 stop and 9727 take-profit.

Sell YMU10 @9819 with 9831 stop and 9802 take-profit.

[ For some background, check out this foundational post. ]

June 29, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders (6/29/10)


One trade:

Bought YMU10 @10,002, stopped out @9984. P&L: - 18 points.

New orders:

Buy YMU10 @9656 with 9639 stop and 9694 take-profit.

Sell YMU10 @9894 with 9911 stop and 9856 take-profit.

[ For some background, check out this foundational post. ]

June 28, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders (6/28/10)


No trades today.

New orders:

Buy YMU10 @10002 with 9984 stop and 10034 take-profit.

Sell YMU10 @10198 with 10216 stop and 10166 take-profit.

[For some background, check out this "foundational" post.]

Depression Is Just Around The Corner


Paul Krugman's New York Times column makes for compelling reading. According to him, Hooverism and budget-balance orthodoxy rule the day in Europe and the U.S., just when more stimulus and more easy money should, what with record-high unemployment and deflation looming.

One solid reason I have for not quite buying P.K.'s pessimism is that I have a feeling very few early 1930s prominent columnists (except Keynes but he was far less revered then than he would be later on or than Paul Krugman is now for that matter) were calling for less orthodoxy and more stimulus. In those days, the typical newspaper article was more likely saying something along the lines of President Herbert Hoover's infamous "prosperity is just around the corner".

June 27, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders (6/27/10 2:34 pm EDT)


For some background on what this is, check out this "foundational" post.

No trades.

New orders:

Buy YMU10 @10002 with 9984 stop and 10034 take-profit.

Sell YMU10 @10198 with 10211 stop and 10177 take-profit.

June 24, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


One order triggered:

Bought YMU10 @10102, sold @10123. P&L: 21 points.

New orders:

Sell YMU10 @10148 with 10161 stop and 10127 take-profit.

Buy YMU10 @10002 with 9989 stop and 10023 take-profit.

June 23, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


Previous trade triggered:

Sold YMU10 @10298, bought @10277. P&L: 21 points.

New orders:

Sell YMU10 @10298 with 10311 stop and 10277 take-profit.

Buy YMU10 @10102 with 10089 stop and 10123 take-profit.

Latest Trades And Orders


Previous trade triggered:

Bought YMU10 @10306, stopped out @10287. P&L: -19 points.

New order:

Sell YMU10 @10298 with 10311 stop and 10277 take-profit.

June 22, 2010

June 17, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


Canceled previous order.
New order:

Buy YMU10 @10302 limit with 10289 stop and 10323 take-profit.

June 16, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


Last 2 orders not triggered.

New order:

Buy YMU10 @10202 limit with 10189 stop and 10223 take-profit.

For those keeping score, my orders are day orders, which means the previous order to buy YMU10 at 10202 was automatically cancelled at 4:15 pm ET, thus my need to reenter it.

Latest Trades And Orders


Previous order was triggered:

Bought YMU10 @10272, sold @10294. P&L: 22 points.

New orders:

Buy YMU10 @10202 limit with 10189 stop and 10223 take-profit.

Sell YMU10 @10498 limit with 10511 stop and 10477 take-profit.

June 15, 2010

June 14, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


No triggered orders.

New order:

Buy YMU10 @ 10102 limit with 10084 stop and 10123 profit target.

Latest Trades And Orders


New order:

Buy YMU10 @ 10106 limit with 10089 stop and 10144 take-profit.

June 13, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


For the sake of transparency, on Friday I actually entered a first order to buy @ 10011 and when I saw that YMU10 had traded @10012 before the open, missing my order by 1 point, I changed it to 10006. In any case, none of the orders was filled. So no trade.

Obviously, the fact that my orders have either been missed by a wide margin or by a handful of points is a little frustrating. But it's a whole lot less frustrating than actually being filled and losing on the trade, so this trading/blogging experiment lives on.

New order:

Buy YMU10 @ 10052 limit with 10034 stop and 10088 take-profit.

June 10, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


No trades today.

New order:

Buy YMU10 (September contract) @ 10006 with 9984 stop and 10044 take-profit.

Latest Trades And Orders


No trades yesterday. None of the last 2 orders was triggered.

New order:

Buy YMM10 @10002 with 9984 stop and 10044 take-profit.

June 8, 2010

June 7, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


Previous order was triggered:

Bought YMM10 @10002, stopped out at 9989: -13 points.

June 4, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


Previous order was triggered:

Bought YMM10 @10106 Stopped out @10089. P&L: - 17 points.

New Order:

Buy YMM10 @10002 with 9989 stop and 10038 take-profit.

June 3, 2010

Latest Trades And Orders


Previous order wasn't triggered (missed by 3 points).

New Order:

Buy YMM10 @10106 with 10089 stop and 10144 take-profit.

Trading the E-mini Dow Futures: New Direction for the Blog


I've been writing very few posts over the last few months. The reason has been that I've chosen to concentrate more on my trading and less on my writing. I started trading futures almost a year ago. I tried trading the S&P e-mini contract (ES) both in a discretionary and a systematic way without much success (understatement alert!). Having jettisoned both systematic trading and the ES contract, I gave the e-mini Dow contract (YM) a try and I've had some modest success (gross exaggeration) with it. Despite my more than a decade experience trading stocks, I still often feel like a clueless newbie trading futures. It's a totally different game.

The trading style I've grown most comfortable with takes account of the sad but very real fact that my decision making in fast-moving markets (of which the e-mini Dow is undoubtedly one) has been less than sound. It is a subjective, discretionary short-term oriented style and a succinct way to describe it would be as follows:

Combining a study of the daily pivot points, support and resistance levels with an analysis of the Average True Range over the last 5 and 20 days, I try to anticipate the path the e-mini Dow will take during the day and the general levels most likely to see a reversal. I then enter up to three limit orders (it could also - and will often - be 0, if I don't see anything with the right reward to risk equation), each one bracketed by a stop and a take-profit order. I will usually do this shortly after the 9:30 am NYSE open but it could also be at any other time. The orders are day orders, which means they expire at 4:15 pm if they haven't been hit. This style of trading generates more orders than trades so many days will see no trades at all. Obviously this is a work in progress so everything I just described could change.

I will be using this blog to keep a record of my orders, which I will be entering here right after I enter them on my order execution platform (I am currently using Tradestation and Interactive Brokers). I might still write non-trading related posts if and when inspiration hits but I will mainly post the orders, whether they were hit or not and the per contract P&L.

The first order is:

Buy YMM10 @10161 limit with 10144 stop and 10188 take-profit.