Tuesday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: Neither trade suggestion triggered. 

Quick Tip: FOMC Trading

The most effective habit a trader can develop is detailed review. Journaling, watch recordings, data capture. Do it all every day. Think of yourself as a professional athlete. Your coach would have you watching films of your performance. 

Today is FOMC day. This is an ideal time to look back and review the S&P price action on prior FOMC days. The pattern tends to be range-bound before the announcement and spiky afterward. This should help your trade selection and planning. In fact, if you have solid historical data on your strategy’s performance on FOMC day you might not trade at all. It’s always better to have some probabilities at hand. Keep accurate records whether you took the trades or not. 

The announcement releases at 2PM ET. You might think the highest volatility is within the 30-minute interval...

Monday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: Neither suggested setup triggered. 

Quick Tip: Niche Trading

Dr. Brett Steenbarger, in his book Enhancing Trader Performance (must read), writes about the importance of FIRST finding your niche in trading. 

Too many new traders spend their time and money trying to find a strategy or indicator that makes money. They think that’s all there is to trading successfully. 

The more basic and important aspect is style. What style of trading resonates with you. There are so many different markets, timeframes, and styles to trade. If you could experiment with several different “niches” you’d be way better off than simply trading just like the guy in the YouTube video. 

For example, our trading room runs 5 different strategies. No one trades them all. And within each I’m sure there are nuances that each trader attaches to their personalized trade plan. There...

Friday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: Neither trade triggered on a relatively narrow, range-bound day. 

Quick Tip: Choices

Market conditions change constantly. This means your strategy will either offer plenty of trade opportunities or very few. Having skill running multiple strategies is the answer to abundance, and that is the foundation of consistency. 

For example, the Volume Profile strategy that is highlighted in this newsletter every day had only 3 setups trigger on Friday, one small winner. And that included the Globex session the night before. A wider range day would have solved that. 

The Volatility Reversal strategy, which prefers range-bound days, offered 7 setups with 5 winners.  

The Trend/Momentum strategy, most active every day, offered 33 setups with 18 winners. 

SPX Credit Spreads had ideal market conditions. 

This is not to say that you would take...

Thursday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: The short breakout below 3925.50 stopped out. 

Quick Tip: Losing streaks… 

It’s Friday and likely this will be a losing week for me… and I’m unconcerned. 

Losing should not affect you financially or psychologically. You’ve determined how much you can lose before you react emotionally, and you’re disciplined to limit your loss to that number on every trade. If not, you’re destined to fail. 

That risk number can change. You can increase it when you’re doing well and decrease it when not. A common formula for that change in risk is the Fixed Percentage rule. Simply this: risk the same percentage of your trading account on each trade, usually no more than 2%. This way you’ll risk more and gain more as the account grows and vice versa. 

But what if you do get anxious or upset in a losing streak?...

Tuesday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: The suggested buy level was cancelled due to the CPI release.

Quick Tip: No Gambling

After trading for 23 years and teaching trading for 14 years you know the top 3 questions you’ll hear when you say you’re a trader: 

Q. Where’s the market going? 

A. I don’t know. 

Q. Any good stock tips? 

A. No. 

Q. Isn’t trading gambling? 

A. No. 

At this point they’re curious and confused. If I don’t know where the market is headed, and I don’t have a good stock tip, and what looks like a crapshoot isn’t, then what is it that a trader does do? 

Traders find opportunities in the market where the probability of success is in their favor. It’s not gambling. It’s more like being the casino, which is a highly profitable business. 

But the main difference between being a trader...

Friday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: The suggested short @ 4133.50 caught the top of the session and ran for 12.50 points to the next volume level (unpublished) which offered 12 points. 

Quick Tip: Real Courage

Hopefully you’re following a rule-based trade plan (if not, get one or stop trading).

If so, you’ve probably experienced that trade setup that just didn’t look or feel right. The rules say, “go short” but price is rising fast. All you can think about is that stop getting filled instantly and you’re underwater again. 

On the chart above, notice the price action just before the level was touched. Just before entry. The steep and fast move up.  And you’re supposed to short at this price?

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...

Friday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: The suggested short @ 4104.50 filled a bit late… like right after the Globex session opened last night, running for 24.25 points. 

Quick Tip: Sweet Dreams 

The futures market opens at 6:00 PM ET. It’s called the Globex session, and it is usually 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, 45 minutes before the open. The day session plan arrives at 8:00 AM ET. Click the link below for details. 

The World Sentiment Index: (+100/-100) inches...

Thursday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: Neither trade triggered.

Quick Tip: No Scarcity

You probably noticed that the Turning Points shared here frequently don’t trigger. Sometimes a few days can go by without a trade. 

You may be thinking, “This is not enough action for me.” 

On the contrary, this strategy provides an abundance of opportunities every day. The chart above shows all the trades that teed up yesterday BEFORE lunch. And this is from only ONE of five strategies. We scan several dozen setups for the best every day. 

Now you may be thinking “That is too much action for me.” 

It’s all about mindset. If you approach abundance with greed and obligation to trade as much as possible you’ll suffer. You’ll over-trade and under-analyze. Your results will be marginal at best. 

If you approach abundance with a selective mindset ...

Wednesday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: Neither trade triggered. 

Quick Tip: Style Matters

I hosted a group coaching session last night on the topic of trading style. This decision is critically important to your success. You must find a style of trading that resonates with your personality. 

Jack Schwager, author of the “Wizards” series of books (interviews with top traders) observed that almost every trader approached the markets differently, yet they all made money.

If there are so many ways to trade profitably why is it so hard to achieve? Jack’s answer was they all found a style that suited them. 

In our trading room we run 5 different strategies that require different skills and time commitments. A new trader joining our team can explore the various styles of trading and select the one or two that “fit” their personality best. 

For example, two strategies require very...

Tuesday’s Best S&P Turning Points Results: The suggested buy level @ 3940.75 stopped out. 

Quick Tip: Risky Business  

There probably isn’t a book, course, or video on trading that doesn’t stress risk management as the key to ultimately succeeding. 

Determine your risk number. Make sure you consider losing streaks and drawdowns. Size your position. Use a stop loss order. Done. 

Not quite. That was simply one part of your “trade risk.” You still need to know if, and when, you’re going to move the stop. How are you capturing the profit that remains “at risk?”

There are many forms of risk in trading that require preset rules in your plan. 

1. Trade Risk: Managing open trades. 

2. Psychological: Managing your emotions. 

3. Market: Preparation for outlier events.

4. Liquidity: Ensuring your chosen asset has enough buyers/sellers. 

5. ...