Yesterday’s results: Neither trade idea triggered. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5569.75 stop 5564.00. Short 5688.25 stop 5693.50.

The World Index: (+100/-100) drops from +57 to +21 with most major world markets mildly Bullish on declining volatility. 

Catalysts: Import Prices@ 8:30. UofM Consumer Sentiment @ 10:00. 

Quick Tip: More Price Levels

This blog suggests two good setups every day. One long, one short. They are not the only setups that are presented from the volume-at-price analysis. 

Every trading day offers a different “map” of volume levels. They only work for so long, then they’re taken off the chart. That happens when the level is stopped out. 

Hint: Save the levels that didn’t trigger a trade or stop out. They’re good until they’re violated. 

In Wednesday’s blog post the suggested short was 5581.25. New levels were offered on...

Friday’s results: Buying 5461.50 only bounced for 6.50 points. Shorting 5521.00 stopped out for a full loss. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5382.75 stop 5379.25. Short 5581.25 stop 5584.75.

The World Index: (+100/-100) jumps from -43 -7 with Asia Bearish and the Western world Bullish. 

Catalysts: Nothing obvious. 

Quick Tip: Tick Trick

A popular indicator for day trading stocks and index futures is the NYSE Tick. It’s a sentiment indicator that measures the number of stocks moving up versus down. For example, with about 2300 stocks on the NYSE if 1500 made an uptick on the last trade and 800 made a downtick the tick index would be +700 (1500 – 800). 

You can use it as supporting evidence to take long/short positions and as confluence for trend. Readings above zero support buys and readings below zero support sells. Keep in mind that it’s only effective for very short periods of...

Yesterday’s results: Buying 5469.75 filled in the Globex session catching the low of the session and ran for 14.00 points still open and running. 

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5461.50 stop 5458.00. Short 5521.00 stop 5525.75. No trades suggested around the Non-Farm Payrolls release. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) drops from -7 to -43 with most major world markets back to Bearish. 

Catalysts: Non-Farm Payrolls/Unemployment Rate/Average Earnings @ 8:30. Fed’s Williams @ 8:45 and Waller @ 11:00. 

Quick Tip: Night Moves

One of the nice features of trading the volume levels from this newsletter is the set/forget entry available on the reversals. 

Yesterday’s buy at 5469.75 didn’t fill until 3:20 AM ET. You were likely sleeping. Placing the order beforehand brought you a welcome “Good Morning!”

You had a choice of stops: leave the initial stop level and potentially give up...

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Buy 5616.25 stop 5611.75. Short 5688.25 stop 5693.50. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) plummets from +64 to -21 with most major world markets mildly Bearish. 

Catalysts: S&P MFG PMI Final @ 9:45. ISM MFG PMI & Construction Spending @ 10:00 

Quick Tip: Drawdowns End

Are you plotting your strategy’s equity curve? If not, get started. It’s a modest amount of record keeping, and it will give you confidence and warn you to drawdowns and restarts. 

It’s important that the equity curve represents all trades your strategy teed up, not just the ones you took. Knowing the difference between your results (behavior) and what you should have done is critical to improving your results. 

The primary purpose of the equity curve is to view strategy results for continuing or halting trading. Our Volume Profile strategy went into a drawdown (losing streak) a while back, so it was halted....

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: This strategy remains on hold but is improving during the Globex session, not the day session. 

The World Index: (+100/-100) remains at +7 with sentiment mixed on falling volatility. 

Catalysts: Fed’s Bostic @ 13:35 and Barr @ 14:45. 

Quick Tip: Best Fit

There are virtually countless ways to trade. Different styles, strategies, time horizons, tools to use, etc. 

How do you know which you should trade? 

Most traders go at this decision backwards. They hunt around for a strategy or mentor that has proof the edge is there and they imagine relatively easy success copying it. 

While there is nothing wrong experimenting with different approaches, successful traders find that they do better fitting the strategy to their personality, not trying to change their personality to fit the strategy. 

One obvious example is time horizon. You might find a solid...

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Nothing tradeable today.  

Monday’s results: This strategy is on hold... but is improving and likely out of the drawdown soon.

The World Index: (+100/-100) reverses from +36 to -14 with many major world markets motionless. 

Catalysts: Existing Home Sales & Richmond MFG Index @ 10:00. TSLA & AMZN earnings after the close. 

Quick Tip: Strategy Death

This Volume Profile strategy has been in a drawdown for some time. It’s getting painful to document the setups/results every day, but it must be done. Otherwise, how would we know if the strategy is worth trading again? 

What I’ve noticed in the daily review is that the levels are not the main problem. It appears the entry and exit rules are. Fortunately, we have thousands of trades documented, each with 47 data points, and this offers us a significant research opportunity to solve the problem. Stay...

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Nothing tradeable today.  

Monday’s results: This strategy is on hold... but is improving and likely out of the drawdown soon.

The World Index: (+100/-100) eases from -36 to -14 with sentiment mixed with low volatility. 

Catalysts: Retail Sales & Import/Export Prices @ 8:30. Business Inventories & Housing Market Index @ 10:00. Fed’s Kugler @ 14:45.  

Quick Tip: Volatility Stops

Price is either trending or not, volatile or not. Your results will largely depend on the rules you apply to these four Market States. 

In the chart above I’m trading our intraday trend strategy. It performs best when the market is trending on LOW volatility. 

After the open price chopped up and down in a range that was volatile but not extremely so. Once the signal to enter the trend triggered, you’ll notice the volatility slowed considerably. All the candles...

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Nothing tradeable today.  

Monday’s results: This strategy is on hold... but is improving and likely out of the drawdown soon.

The World Index: (+100/-100) improves from -7 to +21 with Asia Bullish and the west mixed.

Catalysts: Powell’s Text ahead of Testimony @ 8:30. Fed’s Barr @ 9:15, Powell & Yellen @ 10:00, Bowman @ 13:30. 

Quick Tip: Catalysts

Whether you’re a day, swing, or position trader one thing that must happen for your trade to really move is a catalyst. This could be news, earnings, economics, and many other events. 

A strong catalyst helps in several ways. Price moves quicker and usually farther than normal. Volume increases for better liquidity. 

Ideally, you’ll be proactive in finding potential catalysts that have not hit the mainstream yet. On our Swing Trading Stock/Options team, we get an early peak by monitoring...

Today’s Best S&P Futures Turning Points: Nothing tradeable today.  

Tuesday’s results: This strategy is on hold... but is improving and likely out of the drawdown soon.

The World Index: (+100/-100) soars from -14 to +57 with all most major world markets very Bullish on rising volatility. 

Catalysts: ADP NFP Change @ 8:15. Jobless Claims & Trade Balance @ 8:30. Services PMI (Final) @ 9:45. ISM Services PMI @ 10:00. Crude Oil Inventories @ 10:30. FOMC Minutes @ 14:00. Futures market closes @ 1:15 ET for the holiday.

Quick Tip: Trend or Reversal?

You might be thinking that trading trends is safer than picking turning points. Many strategies focus on trading in the direction of a larger time frame trend. This makes sense and it generally works well. 

But it’s not necessarily “safer.”  Your initial priority is making sure your trade plan rule set has “edge,” meaning over time...