Donut Shop

[xe2dy]

Words of Wisdom from 'swinger' at TT...

"I am not day trading today (which is why I have time to post). It is OpEx week and they are in the middle of the killing zone centering around 1403 that I mentioned earlier. I feel no particular need to trade in the VST if I don't feel the odds are right and I just don't see an attractive setup today.

As for whipsaws--it happens, and the way I deal with that is to set a maximum daily loss and when I hit it, then I go do something else rather than getting frustrated trying to fight it. If they saw it long enough across a line they can definitely shake me off--but it is usually possible to rejoin the new trend on a pullback (but with higher risk on the stops). The goons never allow a risk-free trade, so you just either have to play the pivot stop game (I don't) or pick a dynamic number to use as an absolute stop/reversal line.

I like to let them stop me in on momentum in the direction of the spike and then immediately set protection and reversal just on the other side of the line. The closer I can enter to my lines, the better for me as it limits the draw downs when I am wrong and let's me ride the wiggle for less money than a wider stop under/over a pivot (which is where almost everyone else is putting their stop and so often becomes a target for the goons).

I am not a 'pivot trader', as is evident by the use of trailing profit stops and trending strategies. Straight pivot traders can get killed on range breakouts (been there and done that, no fun). My thing is to combine trending and ranging strategy--so a little different way of doing things than what you may be supposing. Pivots are always important, of course--but only part of the formula."

http://www.traders-talk.com/mb2/index.php?showtopic=88492&st=10