Results of Tuesday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buying 4307.50 picked the bottom of the session and ran for 8.25 points at the close. Holding into the Globex session saw a 29-point run, still open. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4288.75 stop 4285.25. Short 4367.50 stop 4371.75.

The World Index: (+100/-100) jumps from -57 to +29 with most major world markets mildly Bullish on low volatility. 

Catalysts: Durable Goods @ 8:30. Crude Oil Inventories @ 10:30. Government shutdown drama. 

Quick Tip: Swing This Way

Most swing traders use technical indicators and chart patterns to enter and exit their trades. 

Here’s an interesting twist: Starting with high quality high yield (dividend) stocks, use the yield to time entries and exits. Buy when the yield is high (price has dropped) and sell when the yield falls...

Results of Monday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buying 4339.25 delivered 39.25 points to end the session at the suggested short level of 4378.50. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4307.50 stop 4303.25. Short 4378.50 stop 4383.25.

The World Index: (+100/-100) drops from -36 to -57 with all major world markets Bearish.  

Catalysts: Home Price Index @ 9:00. New Home Sales, Richmond MFG Index, and Consumer Confidence @ 10:00. Government shutdown news.  

Quick Tip: End of Session Exit

If you bought yesterday’s suggestion (see chart) and let it ride to the close you would be very pleased. Watching the open trade all day would have been difficult. There were many dips and just about any trailing stop would have limited your potential. 

There is one great trader I know of who uses the End of Session for many...

Results of Friday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Neither level triggered. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4339.25 stop 4334.00. Short 4378.50 stop 4383.25

The World Index: (+100/-100) dumps from +21 to -36 with most major world markets Bearish.  

Catalysts: Nothing on the economic calendar. Trouble intensifies for Chinese Real Estate stocks. 

Quick Tip: Waiting 

I grew up in Michigan. A local saying about the weather was “Wait a day, it’ll change.” Now I live in Florida where during the rainy season you can drop your waiting time to an hour!

Markets are very similar. They trend up or down and then move sideways. Back and forth. Patience pays off and impulsivity gets hammered. 

This cyclicality applies to your strategy performance too. You’ll have winning streaks, flat periods, and losing streaks....

Results of Thursday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buying 4396.50 bounced 11.25 points favorable.

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4339.25 stop 4334.00. Short 4498.00 stop 4502.25.

The World Index: (+100/-100) jumps from -79 to +21 in a world of mixed sentiment. 

Catalysts: PMI Flash MFG/Services @ 9:45. Treasuries yield kisses 16-year high.

Quick Tip: Optimizing Stops

Limiting losses is critical for success in trading. Stop Loss orders are one important part of your risk management plan.

Where you place your Stop Loss will define your position size. The first step in optimizing your stop is to vary it with market volatility. That will obviously vary your position size. 

The second step is to log the MAE (Maximum Adverse Excursion) for every trade setup, whether you took the trade or not. MAE is simply how far against your...

Results of Wednesday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: No turning points suggested on FOMC day. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4396.50 stop 4390.75. Short 4498.00 stop 4502.25

The World Index: (+100/-100) plummets from +7 to -79 with all major world markets very bearish on increasing volatility. 

Catalysts: Jobless Claims & Philly Fed MFG Index @ 8:30. Existing Home Sales @ 10:00. Interest rates will remain high, Xi shakes up his team with no explanation, UAW strike continues. 

Quick Tip: Improving Your Plan

Your trade plan probably started out simple. You had rules for entry, exit, risk, position size, candidate selection, and some filters for changing market conditions. The historical performance was positive. Great start. 

Once you started live trading you likely encountered trade setups that didn’t make sense at the time....

Results of Tuesday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buying 4467.00 stopped out by a few ticks before running for 29.75 points. Re-frame your thinking: the level worked, the noise in the market at the time required a bit more risk. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

No trades on FOMC day. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) eases from +14 to +7 with Asia Bearish and the west Bullish. 

Catalysts: Crude Oil Inventories @ 10:30. FOMC announcement @ 14:00 and press conference @ 14:30. 

Quick Tip: Trading Econ

Economic news, FOMC announcements and press conferences in particular, usually create excess volatility in the stock indexes. These extreme moves can be a blessing or a curse. 

Assuming you’re tracking catalysts in your trade documentation process, finding potential edge is easy. 

Looking at the FOMC-day...

Results of Friday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buying 4539.50 stopped out. The breakout short ran for 37 points to the session close. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4467.00 stop 4463.00. Short 4543.75 stop 4548.25.

The World Index: (+100/-100) dumps from +50 to -14 in a world of mixed sentiment.  

Catalysts: Nothing on the economic calendar. Waiting on FOMC. 

Quick Tip: Confronting Reality

How is your trading going? That’s a question you should be asking yourself on a regular basis. Think hard, be critical, answer honestly. And don’t worry about talking to yourself, we all learned that’s OK during Covid lockdown. :-)

What you’ll find when you question your results critically are some trailheads for improvement. It might be as subtle as the quality of your record keeping or the consistency of your...

Results of Thursday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Shorting 4543.75 stopped out instantly, buying the breakout was the right idea, but spiky price action stopped out the trade.

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4539.50 stop 4535.00. Short 4598.50 stop 4604.25.

The World Index: (+100/-100) inches up from +43 to +50 in a Bullish world on rising volatility. 

Catalysts: Empire State MFG Index & Import/Export Prices @ 8:30. Industrial Production @ 9:15. UofM Consumer Sentiment @ 10:00. UAW strikes. 

Quick Tip: The Redline

It’s not common to get very fast and big moves in your direction. It sure feels good when you do though. And that’s the rub. 

The adrenaline of the win, the ego of being right, and the vision of another wide range candle in your direction all instill greed. You simply don’t want the feeling to end!

...

Results of Wednesday’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Neither level triggered.

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points (consider wider stops and less size in fast moving markets): 

Buy 4499.00 stop 4495.50. Short 4543.75 stop 4548.25 (and if failed, buy the breakout at 4547.00 stop 4543.00). 

The World Index: (+100/-100) reverses from -43 to +43 in a return to Bullish sentiment.   

Catalysts: PPI, Retail Sales and Jobless Claims @ 8:30. Tech should get a boost from the chip maker ARM’s IPO. 

Quick Tip: Night Moves 

If you’re working days and wish you could day trade here’s some great news. 

The result of a significant study on market returns done by Haghani, Ragulin & Dewey called “Night Moves: Is the Overnight Drift the Grandmother of All Market Anomalies” will solve your dilemma.  

In a nutshell, nearly all the return earned in the S&P over...