August 20, 2024 (2 Trades) (+$12.50)
Overall Grade: B
Day Summary: Today was a bit of a choppy day and to be honest I kinda expected that considering we were on an 8 day green streak since the lows of the panic two weeks ago. I came into the session with the idea that we could potentially move long off the open, simply because everyone and their moms is expecting a pullback, and then have a reversal after 10am. Low and behold, that is exactly what we got but unfortunately I didn't trade it well. I saw a couple long entries off the opening drive, but I did not play them because they aren't really a playbooked set up of mine (yet lol). I ended up staying composed and waiting for a set up that I have playbooked but it didn't really fit into my bias for the day so it didn't work out as good as it could have. We'll look at them here in a minute, but overall I am happy with my performance on the day because for the third day in a row, I have followed my plan, only taken trades with a set up, accepted risk and done a decent job of holding my winners!
DAILY - ES
5 MIN - ES
TRADES
Trade 1 - Long 2 Contracts @ 21 EMA Trap & Key Levels Support (PM High + Target Line)
Grade: B-
- entry on this trade was good, buying at support
- held the trade both times that I was in the green - good
- planned stop was a break of the big red candle low which I didn't quite follow but I still stopped out pretty quick overall which is good and allowed me to get back into the green on my second trade of the day (I only lost $22.50 on this trade and 2 mins later it could've been $120)
- I do like this 21 EMA Trap play, but considering we are on an 8 day green streak and that we faked a NHOD, this probably wasn't the best time to take this type of trend continuation trade, even though it had been a strong trend up until this point
- This is another example of why a Trap play should work out quickly or it is best to just get out of it for a BE or small loss (I did recognize this during the actual trade and considered getting out at BE both times we failed to break out) - good
- Not a bad trade overall here but I need to be aware of the fact that I am getting long high in the current daily range after such an extended move higher on the DAILY (see above)
FIX: Know where you are in the HTFs
Trade 2 - Short 2 Contracts @ 21 EMA Trap & Key Level/Zone (Target Line/Recent Consolidation Support)
Grade: B
- My intuition told me here that retail traders would be looking to try to long this to get a reversal, especially considering how bullish we've been so I was looking to short
- Waited for a playbooked set up - good (Flip Flopped from Trade 1 - name of this journal entry)
- Decent entry but I was anticipating a LH (1min) about 20 seconds before this candle closed
- This drawdown was a bit tough to hold through not because I was down much but mainly because I was trading from the red, but once I mentally decided to accept the full risk, it because easy to hold
- I did break my planned stop on this trade as origionally it was planned for a new high of the bounce but I did feel like short was the move so I elected to hold a little longer - risky but played out and I was def going to stop if we broke any higher
- pretty good job of holding the full size winner to the target line below but again, trading from the red is tough and I eventually broke and took 1 off (not bad as it was about a 1R)
- Good job holding the last contract to see if we could get a larger move down, even through an uncomfortable green candle, but I did tell myself I would stop the remaining contract at BE if we bounced to that level
- Gave it one more chance to breakdown and decided to cut it because the momentum just wasn't there
- This trade eventually dumped to the LOD which was my optimistic target, but not before a chop zone and another fakeout high so I think I decided to take that winner in a pretty decent spot (remember the best trades will always work quickly with momentum)
FIX: Be careful anticipating candle closes when I'm taking entries, especially risk ones because that is trading what I want to happen and not what has actually happened
Emotions: I did a good job controlling myself and, for the 3rd day in a row, followed all my rules (waiting for a setup, accepting risk, holding for bigger winners when in the green on a trade instead of just immediately taking it off). I need to stay disciplined and keep this up because it feels now that I am trading more systematically than ever before, instead of just fully relying on my intuition.