Wednesday’s Results: Neither trade suggestion triggered in a relatively narrow-range spiky day.

Quick Tip: Pay Yourself

If you’re like many retail traders you are focused on growing your trading account so you can increase your risk and ultimately your expected reward. Taking a “paycheck” from your trading account seems like taking a step backward.

The trading account is intangible. The figures on the statement don’t mean the same to you as a tangible reward. Psychologically, you NEED to be rewarded for a job well done. Make those wins REAL.

Here’s a simple trick for getting paid, growing your account, and improving your trading skills simultaneously:  

1. Determine your payday (weekly, bi-weekly, monthly).  

2. Log your trading account balance at the start.  

3. On payday calculate your gain/loss in the account.  

4. Pay yourself a pre-determined percentage of the gain. Take nothing...

Tuesday’s Results: The buy @ 3891.50 stopped out instantly.  

Quick Tip: Artful Exit

Entries for directional trades are easy. You expect price to rise or fall and you have supporting evidence where the entry should be. Not a whole lot to think about. 

Exits are another story. While a good entry is important, you make or lose all the money when you exit. If you monitor your open trades you’ll see the open profit or loss moving up and down. Watching money come and go can be an emotional experience, especially for the newer trader. Not good. 

You need rules in your trade plan for exits. But rather than have one static rule set you should have multiple exit strategies to use in different market conditions. Once you enter, the market characteristics may change, and your original exit idea is less effective. 

Here’s one alternative to consider. If you’re trading multiple strategies (tuned to different...

Friday’s Results: The suggested buy @ 3675.50 ran for 36.25 points.

Quick Tip: Visualization

In sports psychology one highly successful technique is positive visualization. In essence, the athlete will vividly imagine and visualize in the mind’s eye the result of what they are about to do.

Golf is an easy example for clarification. Top golfers, coached by sports psychologists are taught an interesting visualization technique. Famous golf coach and psychology professor Dr. Richard Coop instructs this way:

1. Before you take your shot, visualize exactly what it will look like, including minute details like how far it will roll after landing. Jack Nicklaus claimed it changed his game.
2. HOWEVER, if you address the shot with even a hint of a negative attitude (indecision, concern, lack of focus, etc.) step back and reframe your mind until you are visualizing the perfect shot.

How does this apply to trading? While traders are not in control of the physical outcome like athletes,...

Wednesday’s Results: The suggested buy level at 3648.75 stopped out for a 3.50-point loss (per contract).

Quick Tip: Epictetus

Not being knowledgeable in Greek philosophy I had no idea who Epictetus was. But a famous quote of his is applicable to trading so I’m sharing:

“Men are disturbed, not by the things that happen, but by their opinion of the things that happen.”

What’s your opinion about losing?

Losing is a fact of life. Reacting to it with destructive opinions (beliefs) won’t help. Look at each loser carefully. You either followed the rules precisely or you didn’t. Journal all the trades with the reason why you didn’t. Scan this journal in your morning routine now and then to refresh your memory on what not to do.

Today’s Best S&P Turning Points:

Sell 3755.50 stop 3761.25 (in a fast-moving market consider a stop at 3763.75 and size down).

Buy 3675.50 stop 3679.75.  

Trade Fearlessly,

Mike Siewruk

P.S. Did you know...

Wednesday’s Results: Trading was suspended for FOMC volatility.  

Quick Tip: Simple Not Easy

You’ve probably heard the phrase “trading is simple, it’s just not easy.” Indeed, trade plans can be simple to execute but because of our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors we make it hard to follow thus missing the result we want.

Let’s say your “simple” trade rules were based on 1) Determine the big picture trend, 2) Sell rallies in a downtrend on a shorter time interval, 3) Buy dips in an uptrend on a shorter time interval. This is not only simple, but it makes sense. Price moves in waves of impulses and corrections within a trend.

The stock market is in a big picture downtrend. You should have sold yesterday’s rally on the FOMC news. Had you done that you’d be looking at a huge winner as the market is opening down today around 2%! If you didn’t follow your rules, if you didn’t make it “easy,” it was...

Monday’s Results: The buy at 3779.50 stopped out for a 4.25-point loss (per contract).

Quick Tip: Sweet Dreams

The futures market opens at 6:00 PM ET. It’s called the Globex session and it is easier money than the day session. Why? The participants are different. Day session volume brings out all the large lot and algo traders and that creates a noisy effect on price action.

If you’re thinking “I don’t have the time to analyze the market and KNOW where to place those Globex trades” then you’re in luck. We provide our members a complete trading plan for the Globex session every market day around 5:15 PM ET, that’s 45 minutes before the open.

The chart above shows the trade plan levels for last night’s Globex. Five trades, three winners. Decent moves. Join me on Sunday, June 19 @ 5PM ET for my new FREE mini-class “Day Trading for Day Workers.” Click here to register.

Today’s Best S&P Turning Points: 

Sell...

Thursday’s Results: Buying 4416.25 failed the reversal pre-market and failed the breakout during the day session.   

Quick Tip: Night School Rocks!

With distance learning common today night school might be losing popularity.

But NOT in the futures, Forex, and crypto markets. These assets trade all night long. You should be planning trades for what is called the Globex (night) session in the futures market. Set and forget while you sleep.

What is equally important about the Globex session is the clues and edge it can give your Day session trading. You should study the Globex data on assets you trade. Patterns and edge will emerge. It may change from time to time so keep your research updated.

Here’s an example: The S&P futures is modestly active in the Globex. The volume is a small fraction of the day session, but enough to analyze. Measure the range of the session (from 6PM to 9:30AM ET). This is a great way to forecast the range of the day session....

Wednesday’s Results: Shorting 4158 offered 52.75 points before closing the day +43 points. 

Quick Tip: Courage or Confidence?

You’ve probably experienced that trade setup that just didn’t look or feel right. The rules say “Short” but price is skyrocketing. All you can think about is that stop getting filled instantly and you’re underwater again. Sound familiar?

On the chart above, notice the momentum leading into the suggested short level. The parabolic move up came within ONE TICK of filling your short entry.

Taking that short against that momentum felt wrong. But it wasn’t. Hard evidence over thousands of trades showed the probability was in your favor.

Would it take “courage” to enter that trade? Being courageous sounds too risky to me. I get mental images of danger ahead and I’m supposed to plow right through and prevail… without pain?

Then it retraced several points. Relief! That level may work out!

...

Tuesday’s Results: The suggested short stopped out.

Quick Tip: Learn to Reframe

Yesterday’s short trade @ 4133.50 stopped out by one tick! Price then plummeted 25+ points. Instead of a solid payday you paid out. Are you upset? Critical? Sad?

Having a positive attitude about your trading is important. Banish those negative thoughts and blame. Reframe the results of a trade like this one to the positive.

Here’s how: Ask yourself, overall did the short level work out? Did the trade run plenty? Was it a great short entry? Yes, yes, yes.

The fact that you missed the run by a small margin doesn’t negate a well-planned trade. Instead of fostering negative emotions about this result focus on the positive. Learn from the failure. What could you do differently the next time? Widen your stops, reduce size if needed. Or accept “subsequent-touch” entries. In this case it worked well.

That’s how a successful trader turns today’s loser into...

Monday’s Results: Neither suggested level triggered.

Quick Tip: Nifty Evidence

Filtering your trade entries/exits by time-of-day is a great way to optimize your trade selection. The side benefit is that you know when you’ll be trading and when you can focus on other things.

How you look at the data is the key. By imagining different ways to look at “time” you can find uncommon edge.

Here’s a great example: In the histograms above every bar is 30 minutes starting at 8:30 ET and ending at 16:00 ET. The bars represent the average range of that 30-minute time slot in DOLLARS.

Why dollars? Because futures contracts have different “point” values. The ES contract is $50/point. Oil is $1000/point. Gold is $100/point. To compare them you can normalize the ranges to their equivalent dollar values.

By looking at time-of-day this way you can laser-focus your trade entries for each asset to when the most movement is likely to occur. Study those three...