My body clock is already twisted upside down but that's because my job which invloves a shift work.
Anyway, sometimes even baby sitting is not helping, like last long GBP/USD trade.
I have note for formal reasons (as this suppose to be my trading journal) another bummer, this time got in on time, normal size but simply didn't work out. I'm desperate for some winner.
I feel this internal desire and itch to jump into the trade, but just looking at the charts now I have no idea where and how. So I'm sitting on my hands now as it looks like the best option for now. At least my account stoped melting down with full loses.

Hello Dear All,

This is working as my trade journal so for formality purposes I have note today's GBP/USD long trade which ended up with a full loss -3% of the account (without getting to the targets).
Well, looking at the market now is one sure things there is no sure thing, price just terribly chops in a wide range without any direction, no wonder there is no follow up of any medium term trend. That's my assessement of the situation.


However looking at the EUR/USD where price also chops for about 24 hrs, the range looks tempting to me

Now price is in the blue box (range). Periods of consolidation are frequently followed by a rapid breakout and big candle. The definite direction is anybodys guess. I will put working orders on the breakout (5 pips) of the box zone.Red dotted lines denote levels of entry and dark dotted lines are respective stop losses.
Of course in case of the false breakout I will have to baby sit the trade not to allow the winner to become a looser


I will be grateful for all your comments and suggestions. I give it ago, as they say no pain no gain. I decide to open positions at 2% risk (as I'm going to move S/L as the trade progresses). See what happens with this, it may not happen (price gets out of the box) until next week, no worries, markets hate standstill for long as they don't earn much then.
Hope all of you Guys are doing fine and well
Keep bagging the pips

Jarek

You are on a testing account, right? This might work sometimes, sometimes not. How many times would it work or wouldn't? Logically there is the risk that a candle opens the trade just to return backwards again. Have you done this before? I would still wait for the signals we learn and practice here and, cancel the order right away when in doubt, if possible. I will wait how you go. I didn't attach the image on the AUD/USD trade I won, also order, but that long trade begun on return upwards after bullish movement.

Hi Papek,
It's not the testing per se. Real but ver small account to test.The money I can afford to lose, so no worries.I want to see and test different strategies. I went through the phase of demoing and I'm ok with life account but very small.When I got the edge of it and become consistently profitable I open bigger account for profit taking. So far I'm not ready yet.
Of course I use Vahid's signals mainly cause they are no doubt very consistent and a high quality.
When I put my own trade ideas I risk much less on them cause I realise the difference between two of them.
Strategy is proper trade management in that case. If the price stops at the very first S/R line and is reversing against you then I book the profit on 50% position and move the stops to the breakeven, then always avoiding a loss althought profits are small. But thenb again if you catch the runner then it is most of the time at least 1:1 RR. Of course it needs a lot of baby sitting but I don't mind that because the more charts you see and analyse the quciker you will learn to do properly and more personal experience you get.
When I do this I'm not fixing targets just observe how is the price action developing at the points of support/resistance levels (horizontal - that is my own approach). I noticed very often this levels oiverlap with Vahid's Bollinger Bands and S/R lines as well.
This is by no means a trade signal journal so therefore I want to make it clear to everybody, these are my trades and that's all. Hope that's clearing some doubts.

I couldn't agree with you more! Just like riding a bicycle or programing, one has to do it to learn or progress to be in it good. I find Vadid's analysis and how he describes things for each trade as excellent eyeopener for me.

Jarek, I am trying to attach picture-s of that trade I mentioned before, but I have save them as active full window chart, not in that 800px image size that is the size limit. I only learned that yesterday. If I cannot find a way, I will ftp them to my w/site space and link to open them in the text in my next post.

Hi Jarek - I see that you show the box on a 4 hour chart so maybe the stop losses are not quite as tight as they look.
How many pips stop loss are they?

I may not be following you correctly but it looks to me with those stops that you would be stopped out within a second or so of entering the trade either on a false breakout or a rapid breakout and a big candle.



I would just like to suggest that you should seriously consider reducing your risk on the more speculative give it a go kind of trades (0,5% - 1%), especially if your stop losses are tight. You may not even have the chance to move your S/L. You cannot take it as a given that your trade will progress in the favoured direction.
This is probably already obvious to you but I just wanted to mention it.

All the best,
aquiagora

I looked at the chart and assumed that the stop for the possible short was just above the high in the box, so about 130 pips and vice-versa.
If they are the other way round as aquiagora says, then they look way too tight to me.
If you want to work with tighter stops and with this type of breakout, may I suggest that you look at trading the overnight breakout on the 15 minute chart? I sometimes trade this way and it can be very good.
In fact I may make a post about it in the strategy forum.

Here is the set up. I set the entry at the long support line level (on a second thought I could have count with a possible shadow under the line which could add a few pixels but, it would be too greedy I reckon ... however it did cross me mind )

*** Vahid, sorry I originally saved these images in MT too big, didn't know I need the 800px max for forum system. But now I know.


Image 1 - start:
http://www.traditionaloven.com/images/aud-usd-breakout-start.gif

(cannot put more than one image link to a post)


Image 2 - trade going on:
http://www.traditionaloven.com/images/aud-usd-breakout-active.gif

Image 3 - end:
http://www.traditionaloven.com/images/aud-usd-breakout-end.gif

Today with EUR-USD we had a good example of a breakout from the overnight range.
The previous candle did actually break the high at its close but only by the tiniest smidgen!



I'm not sure, but it may be better with the H1 timeframe.

Jarek, you should be around 40 pips in profit with the short sell limit if the lines showed stayed the same. Am I right?

That is absolutely right in terms of risk taken in that case I must say.
Giving it a 80% of allowed risk is a strech I know.I usually go with my trades maximum 1% of the total account. I can suspect it was a case of trying to work on week's losses
On the other hand I must say I was practising this boxes on both: historical data and examples as well life on the demo account before I decided to give it a go.Taking both sides of the box with OCO type orders hedges the case .
Of course it may saw me off the box with rapid quick movements but that is I presume always a case. That's why I'm baby sitting this types of trades and if the price action confirmed by my set of indicators is telling me stop or reverse I may cut down losses especially if after intial breakout price reverses with big candle in the oposite direction. Hope you Guys were patient enough to read through all my mumblings and newbie cut.

Have a nice weekend to You ALL and lets hope next week will bring some more bags with pips for all of us
Kind regards
Jarek

Hi Keith



Indeed, the S/L was about 125 pips (that was a number I've used when calculating a total risk and a lot size).
Well, in this case my S/L were pretty wide (so it wasn't a wonder trade working out all losses) But indeed, Keith working on it from a smaller time frame chart would have been a way forward. I not entirely comfortable with 15 mins chart (working now on it) as I find more perplexing and requring sort of "automatic" approach to charts. That is higher skill not probably available to me now.
With the regards to the current setup, I have closed for the weekend but will wait for the price to retrace even more (hopefully) as I find the best reliable scenario for this box breakout is when the price test unsucessfully the bottom of the box in this case. Is the same like Vahid's teaching on the support and resistance trend lines.

Thank you very much for your all comments and suggestions Keit - very informative and I will be exploring this topic.
All the best Keith,

Have a nice weekend, let's chill out a bit from charts and have some fun and time off.
Kind regards
Jarek

Hello papek
Nice sequence,
Went down to the next support trend line and traced the reaction on the shorter time frame to monitor it.
I like it
You should open the journal papek with your ideas to read about and present so we all could read about it.

Thank you very much for lurking, awsome trade with nice pips in the bag
Kind regards
Jarek

I exited for an average 55 pips profit. I have closed all position before the weekend. In the ideal scenario this trade could be a little bit more explored. Let's say the price gets somewhere close to the broken support to test as a resistance. I will try to enter on the shorter time frame and ride it down again, this time hopefuly for longer.Let's hope year end, year end flows (cashing profiits, exiting positions will bring such a massive move in EUR/USD like last year)
ok dream on, that's all right for now, see what happens next week.

Have a nice and relaxing weekend Papek and see you around.
Kind regards
Jarek

I like your blue blue box on the 15 mins chart, another great trade to run indeed Keith.
Looks like there are thousands ways of skinning the cat and these are good news
Hope next week there will be some of this types

Again, have a nice weekend
Kind regards
Jarek

I've been investigating this overnight break-out strategy for some time. It seems to work just as well with the H1 chart. I've been trying to refine it to suit my style and have actually made a profit using it. But not placed many trades with it as yet. I didn't place the trade I posted as an example.
I will be starting a topic about this strategy in the "Trading Systems" section soon and asking for suggestions as to how it can be improved.
I'm happy that you made profit with your trade

Hi Keith,
I keep lurking into your journal as well, as a lot more can be found there
So then in case of the box breakout strategy I will be even more interested to participate.
I will be trying to spot the boxes on 4hrs charts as Vahid suggests is the case of the choppy market. This actually is kept being repeated over and over anywhere you look for news. Maybe will stay till end of the year. Hope not
Happy weekend and happy profitable week to you
Jarek

Hi Jarek,
Yes I start my own too but not just yet, January will be better time. Still not too good at spotting new signals. At the moment I only analyze what others mention but I still get a good kick out of it. That day the AUD/USD pair looked very similar to EUR/USD as described within analysis area and I focused on it.