My paper trading results were a mixed bag today. I started thinking about a way to filter/sort my screens and let things go the last half of the day, so I decided not to post the trades. I am not one to be all that bashful with respect to my bad decisions (learning experiences), but it is difficult for me to take paper trading seriously - though I see the value. Paper trading finds me entering and exiting a little too eagerly, without good market support. Every trade goes the right direction at first, but without the market support it stalls. I think good market support makes it easier to be late on entry and exit; good for my wannabe trading skills.
The more I engage in this style of trading, the more I enjoy it. When everything just feels right about a trade, I feel like I know exactly what the trade is doing, not what it is going to do, but what it is doing, in the moment. Today it happened with OCN on the 11:15 bar. I didn't hesitate to switch accounts and enter a real position with the IRA account. Exited perfectly just after open on the 11:30. Only a $0.17 move, but those are the times I need to wait for.
As far as logistics, I have way too many instruments to keep up with. I filtered the screener for stocks less than $75/share so they are more in line with what I can trade on the 'income' account. This still left me with a lot of choices, so today I worked on a current and prior bar height to overall change in price ratio. I am not sure if I will sort the screener results by this column or just watch it in conjunction with new highs/lows. Just something to give me a heads up. Me and my indicators.
Tomorrow I will close the door to my office and give the practice trades my full attention.
Oh yeah - the jury duty call was canceled yesterday, so that is why I was able to trade Monday.
One thing I thought about some more with respect to yesterday's trading decisions and right or wrong: to say that a decision to enter a trade is right or wrong implies that there is a right and wrong decision to be made in the now, that is, when I made the decision. What kind of criteria can I use to judge the decision? Only the future. Only after the next 1 second to rest of the day plays out and the dust settles. How can a decision in the now be judged when the determining factors do not even exist? It can't.
That is one of the big distinctions between this type of trading and my previous approach - I thought there was a right decision to make in the moment, and when it was wrong, I would go back to the indicators, or try to come up with a new one, applying them to charts and combing the data trying to find just the perfect combination of what was to come. Silly me, huh?
Well - I sure don't mind pretending like I have all of this figured out. Which I don't... at all.... But the moments that I experience this sense of zoned in confidence in what the markets are doing, are proof enough that it works(even if they don't happen as often as I would like). It just feels right.
I seem to refer to FNG's blog a lot, but yesterday's post was just great.
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