Trade Plan: Thursday, August 17th, 2023
MNQ: Find what speaks to you
Hi all! Back with another trade plan. Yesterday was a small green day for me in the simulator, as I continue to refine my craft. A few things are going to change around these trade plan posts.
I’m going to trade MNQ going forward. It fits my (sometimes impatient) personality better, giving me feedback on my trades much faster than MES. There are also great folks like Spooz Don and Smashelito who give levels and trade plans for ES, so why not crack my own way with NQ / MNQ?
I’m continually experimenting with my key levels and now feature ‘other levels to watch / note’. These have been collected with the time frame and value levels below, so they are easily viewable all in one spot.
Mentor and Mentorship!
I’ve spoken to a profitable trader yesterday, and he’s helped me redefine my entire thinking around trading - most importantly, that I need to continue extensively experimenting in simulator with various chart times, time frames, and so on. I also have a lot to do on the data side - you must master your market - do you know how many days less / more than 1%, 2%, 3% moves? How this compares with VIX? How realized vol (ATR) compares with VIX? All these things I don’t know concretely yet. I don’t want to say he’s officially my mentor, but he has been extremely helpful and it seems he recognizes I’m determined to learn how to trade properly. I also watched a great video by paxtrader, about how he uses the 30 second opening range breakout, how he manages risks, and his trade sizing strategy, and I think I’m going to give it a shot today:
Wednesday's Session Recap
MNQ opened for the cash session at 15079.75, within the previous day's trading range. Both the OR and IB were trending up, but in C period, . You know what this means. We reverted to the IB low and then some. The FOMC minutes brought further volatility and downside. What looked like a last NLOD and fail in J period was then again revsited in a liquidiation in L and M periods, ultimately ending in a slow grind down to NLODs in both periods. MNQ closed for the cash session at 14939.5.
OR: 15050.75 - 15127.75 (77 points)
IB: 15050.75 - 15144.5 (93.75 points)
TR: 14938.25 - 15144.5 (206.25 points)
Trade Plan
Going into tomorrow’s session, I will observe 14963. This is the center of the lower volume distribution from Wednesday’s session. I would typically take 15020 as the starting point, but we’re almost 100 points below that in the ON. Above 14963 targets first 14985, a small volume island inbetween two LVNs that was a key turning point (wicking point on the 30 min) for all afternoon of Wednesday’s session. Above targets 15000 and acceptance into yesterday’s value area. Above 15000 I will observe 15040, Wednesday’s session halfback.
To the downside, I will observe first 14922, yesterday’s RTH LOD. Below that targets 14888, the current ON low. Below that, the last bastion for buyers to defend is 14853
I know these levels aren’t very wide in terms of points, but for NQ/MNQ I’ve been liking to watch how the session develops and go from there, finding how the market itself defines areas of value :)
Key Levels
Pivot: 14963
Upside Levels: 14985, 15000, 15040
Downside Levels: 14922, 14888, 14853
Notes: Jobless claims and manufacturing index at 08:30 EST.
Other Levels to Watch / Note from Wednesday’s Session
PHOD 15259.25
PLOD 15076
Prev Open 15079.75
Prev Close 14939.5
PVAH 15113
PVAL 15000
PVPOC 15020
PTPOC 15020
Timeframe Overview
Monthly OTF down; ends 15551
Weekly OTF down; ends 15441.75
Daily OTF down; ends 15166
Value Overview
Monthly Value (VPOC): 15415
Weekly Value (VPOC): 15111
Daily Value (VPOC): 15020
Trade Review
-$774 in the simulator. What happened? Sequence of events like this:
Hit that 30 second opening range breakout perfectly!
Accidentally added to position, throwing off entire confluence, closed trade for meager profit (this was anyway wrong, as I wasn’t even to 30 points!)
Starting fighting the trend the whole way down
Finally sucummed, flipped short (correctly) but still got stopped out.
I was raging, so I took a break, reconvened, and made some decent trades after the IB was formed, but still heavily negative
Check out how garbage my tilt looks (trades in yellow):
Wow! A $300 trade! Doesn’t matter if you got cut up and chopped the whole rest of the day.
You know what this means! More punishment. Tomorrow, I will take 2 trades: a 30 second OR breakout trade, and an IB / NLOD / NHOD trade. I’ve updated my OCO setup to be 3:1 now, as I couldn’t get a single 5:1 or even 4:1 trade to work, even including the ‘good ones’ later on in the day.
Also, in terms of managing the trade, I need to do the following:
as soon as the trade is on, monitor if it immediately goes in your favor
once auto breakeven is hit, take it easy, monitor for continuation in your favor
don’t panic; there’s always another trade
Here’s to tomorrow. 🍻
Cheers and as always, good luck out there!
-Chris
A reminder that I am still ultimately a beginner to intraday trading and trading futures. This is not an alert service and none of this is financial advice.