20210519
Long 5 MNQ 13010.0, 13010.0, 13010.0, 13010.0, 13010.0, -2.75, -2.75, -2.75, -2.75, -2.75,
Long 5 MNQ 12998.75, 12998.75, 12998.75, 12998.75, 12998.75, -2.25, -2.25, -2.25, -2.25, -2.25,
Long 10 MNQ 12984.25, 12984.25, 12984.25, 12984.25, 12984.25, 12986.0, 12986.0, 12986.0, 12986.0, 12986.0, +54.25, +54.25, +54.25, +54.25, +54.25, +20.0, +20.0, +20.0, +20.0, +20.0,
Total MNQ +296.25
Volatility tends to alternate between Frames. If the action is choppy and consolidating for the 1st Frame of the day (until around 11:15am ET), then the volatility is more likely to show up in the 2nd and Last Frames of the day. Just study the charts of yesterday. In fact, the only trade in the MNQ that I was able to profit by yesterday was a volatility breakout that didn't show up until the beginning of the 2nd Frame. And the tremendous volatility of yesterday's last Frame certainly provided a lot of opportunity I was not in front of the screen to take advantage of, as I only trade the 1st Frame of the day now.
Today, it was just the opposite, as least so far as I post this blog. The volatility was so extreme in the early going of the 1st Frame that I was able to practically call it one-and-done, as the initial MNQ buy signal provided such a great launch upward into new highs territory that I was easily able to make a profit goal, albeit after two small stop-outs.
One final word about the underlying skills and discipline to activity of trading as a whole. A plethora of new subscribers have stepped into the fire since the opening of the ValhallaFutures trade room. Many of them have watch our profit / loss postings over the years in this blog, and wondered what the 'secret' was that I was using. They incorrectly assume that it must be something close to the Holy Grail of technical tricks, and that if only they could get their hands on it, they too would be able to turn around their futures trading..
Nothing could be further from the truth. For in order for a trader who is unsatisfied with their results to turn the outcomes around, it is NOT the retooling with new technical tricks that will lead them into it..... Instead, it is the ability and willingness to change themselves that lies in the heart of self improvement.
What I find most traders to be suffering from--and I have coached many hundreds over the years--is the misconception that acquiring a new tool while basically repeating the same behavior will somehow lead them to different results.
I can't tell you how many times I have heard from a new trader "I can't take trades where he takes them"--even though it was partially the technical tools I was using that signaled me to be doing so. In other words, they were unable to change themselves, and like so many unfortunate adults in the related world of personal politics, found the amber trap of their trading 'adolescence' made them too unable to move.
For more on the subject of the need for personal change in order to become a better trader, I refer you to the little book that started a wholesale re-engineering of everything I thought I knew about both the technical and the psychological aspects of trading, True Self, available inexpensively on line.