This is a great market to be trading in. I personally love trading range-bound days, as long as the range is over 15 points. The ATR over the past 10 trading days has been around 27 points! Beautiful. If, as a day trader, you can't extract a few points from a 27-point day, you need to reassess your trading setups because there are plenty of opportunities on the long and short side in this market. On this end, I stayed on the Sim again and managed to eek out a $600 gain with a few trades. I can't emphasize enough the importantance of having a positive risk/reward ratio, with the minimum being 1:2 (risk:reward). I started the day with a gain, but gave it all back over the next 2 trades. But then on the 4th trade, I made 5 points which made up for the prior 2 losses, and then some. When I looked back at my prior 2 losses, I realized both of the setups did not have 1:2 risk/reward potential so I shouldn't have taken those to begin with, but I got caught up in the momentum and put on those losing trades. The important thing is they didn't do much damage since I was using a 7-tick stop-loss.
The TICK continues to be an excellent indicator. With proper money management (1:2 risk/reward), I'm confident you could make money with just a 1 and 3 min ES/TICK chart. Here's a 1-min chart with a short setup that appeared towards the close. We have negative TICK divergence with a double-top on price (excellent, high-probability setup). I entered short at 830.75 on the spinning top candle.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8B4JK7WaX0ay2xrmZIk_sOBXYNUsVVaht4hQ4wXiHz_r4zwnyiKBesO5_MfPBfI5bn4CHM4CpmnO0EXob2_UkrNkvdRn2SryFlQDNgh7uYSxqjVgYHmgjYNoMqaMdWJdDHb0i8uCas1f1/s400/20090213_ES_1min_Tick.jpg)
Gap filled in the morning session (5-min)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhH-rE6HSbCDaSQ1sClA9cYCKeVGbq50DCtq6znvAABB2n99-wY5cICkfnIGpzMZVpWWVK5CMBJrTns_ROOZF3yyyYqgDVqWsL8kO0n2ML_fihgrxApyMtC0FaV9IB3_4x5tOLFtllaYem0/s400/20090213_GapFilled.jpg)
ES/TICK (3-min)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRBm-2uCvxBJzAuNsoirx2fh6GGpaFGtTJj3TcdiXpUZuxqUen3AWEbpGEJ-5jOU83xepIbGBdIYGWngmG0d0vILp2c0KwY7hYweS2Fxf6KssPG52zar3bT4Sr5bd4CVTqA6Os3p9i4oVG/s400/20090213_ES_3min_Tick.jpg)
ES Market Balance (5-min Day Session Only)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwv2JchUiQF1PURyUxeI8I-ncYgFr2HcvCZh-LE3360TZ17yBkCqp9APt-RQqzoDUC1QLQCo-fO4hFuxEul5PiM2FilUDGPfJhmRYsFa2atXgBK9K5oSq-vjLXinT4DbGL5ba1crG_Ac25/s400/20090213_ES_Balance_DaySession.jpg)
TF Market Balance (5-min Day Session Only)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCDf5APq_I6gf5o1wN2zu1gGwSJN_EhwdJXzj_pxuQjhW1Y9Uec_DVikUfCfQD5vTbaXusz8428H7SriTpj42a3LEdPpJLN4cqfXW5N_pOEvYAU9kI-jSQriwz79oaXUi8IMHnrH6qFXu8/s400/20090213_TF_Balance_DaySession.jpg)
TF/TICK (3-min)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXpnnAKniiO_RXouY62YhKYYH1YCZ1sANTodGWxu-k7L4QyVBP47IIr4Yx0geT0AFmX3DVmDFHh2aYvLtEbfDkgz7AUcvBsIl0aXDHFyQAJ4YRoIuDDMMUuYn5eauHYQxqhG2Ip-gnlAOp/s400/20090213_TF_3min_Tick.jpg)
Your one marked entry looks solid... I say that because I was gonna get short right there as well!
ReplyDeleteThe One Lot LLC takes another step forward!