February 18, 2026 (+$41.25) | Second Time's the Charm

February 18, 2026 (2 Trades) (+$41.25)

Overall Grade: B+

Day Summary: After having trending up all of yesterday and mostly overnight, I came into the day with a long bias. The only thing was that we had been downtrending since 5am, so I knew that if I wanted to trade long, I needed to allow the market to show me that it wanted to move up. I was able to catch a good, but sketchy Wedge Fakeout long on the funded account after an inital drop from open, but I didn't trade the live a little later. My first attempt on at the long was a 21 EMA Trap set up, but I did consider it subpar based on how price was moving into that level. Thankfully, because I was scaled down, I was able to cut my loss even earlier than I was supposed to and give myself a chance at a second trade. Being in the right mindset to take another trade, helped me recognize what was happening and take a beautiful second trade. Although it wasn't a playbook set up, price action, momentum and the DOM helped confirm to me that we were about to push long, so I grabbed a pullback based on price action and held the winner to my preset TP. Great job bouncing back from a loss on Trade 1, and that was all due to mindset.

DAILY - ES

5 MIN - ES

TRADES

Trade 1 - Long 1 MES @ 21 EMA Trap + Right Idea, Wrong Timing + Subpar Setup

Grade: B-

1. playbook set up - yes
2. trading in direction of price action - yes, but not directly before entry which made this a subpar setup
3. slight FOMO entry
4. quickly realized I felt uncomfortable in this position and moved my stop to the low of my entry candle which was smart
5. being scaled down and taking a quicker than normal stop allowed me to stay in a good mindset for a second trade

Trade 2 - Long 1 MES @ Price Action + HTF Bias + DOM + Held Winner

Grade: A

1. after seeing short bait and the way momentum came in, plus with my HTF long bias, I wanted to grab the first pullback on this move
2. I missed the initial pullback to the 21 EMA because it just happened so fast
3. Seeing larger orders above on the DOM, I grabbed the next decent pulback - scary entry but quickly say it getting bought back up and felt very comfortable in this trade after that
4. no technical playbook set up which is not ideal
5. trading with strong PA/momentum - good
6. held all the way to preset TP (30min equilibrium - also London highs) , even through a target line which was a great hold, especially with the momentum
7. sold right before the bigger extension move which I did feel was coming but I held to my planned target which is most important