Bernie's S&P E-Mini Futures Trading Journal

Boring overnight activity, not much action at the European open. I mentioned that I had been looking at the Trading Day of the Month concept for Bonds. The analysis looks pretty good with a very positive track record so far this year, see chart below. So, I have decided to add Bonds to my Simulation trading to check it out in more detail. This is the 30 year Treasury Bond. Simulation Trading Bonds Bought 1 contract of 30 yr Bonds this morning @ 154.50. Target is first profitable open after  holding for one day. First profit exit day is June 2nd. Stop is 152.875. Real Money Trading S&P 500 e-Mini There was a rally off overnight support at about 6:00 am that was trade-able. I was out for a walks so missed it. Now looking for how this will set up for the open. Rallied continued into the historic high where it found resistance and pulled back. All signals pointed to a sell coming into the open. Took 2 short @ 2415.00. Target...

The Holiday is over, let's get back to the real world. The market re-opened at 17:00 as usual yesterday afternoon and started to decline. Almost hit the target I had on the Sim trade held from Friday, then rallied. Is now looking like it is setting up for a short signal off the rally. Real Money Trading Last week I said I need to learn to transition from the Simulation into the Real World. So, this week I am going to make the Pre-Market trades in the Real Money Account. 2:00 - The 2,000 tick gave us a sell signal declining off the rally into a lower short term low. Took 1 short @2411.00. Target @ 2410.00. Target hit, we are flat with $45. profit. The 2,000 tick rallied and made a slightly lower short term high, could be seen as a second test or the resistance level, then declined into a sell signal. However, the sequence has the appearance of going sideways and consolidating so I will not take this short trade. This trade took a while but did turn out to be profitable...

Memorial Day Holiday Today is a holiday in a number of countries including Canada, USA & Britain. CME market hours for the e-Mini is restricted and I expect there will be low volume and either no activity like on Friday or erratic volatility which is dangerous and difficult to trade. Simulation Trading We are still managing the open trade from Friday and will continue with that position based on the market activities. So far, 04:00, the volume is very low and volatility is almost non-existent. 7:30, not much has changed, low volume and a tight range. Working on putting together a tracking sheet on the Larry Williams Trading Days of The Month  (TDOM) concept for Bonds. As expected the market barely moved on the open and did very little throughout the day closing early at 12:00 noon Chicago time. The day was not a total waste. I put together the Bonds TDOM tracking sheet and brought it up to date for 2017. It looks very promising based on past performance. We wil...

Overall a pretty good week. We tried something a little different with the Holiday Trade and that worked out fine, despite a little mistake. Friday was essentially untradeable for most of the day. We still averaged about $750 per day on the Sim and just about $150 a day on the Real Money Account. The Open Trades did not follow through as effectively as some other weeks, but we managed to recover without any damage. The task for next week is to transition some of the Sim trades into the Real account. A good starting place may be the Pre-Market trades. These have been pretty reliable, the market does not normally run in the pre-market and things move a bit slower. I will start taking these trades with 1 contract to hone my entry and exit skills. Real Account Summary Real Account Equity Chart Sim Account Weekly Summary Sim Account Equity Chart

Update on Memorial Day Trade The rule for this trade was to enter on the open 2 trading days before the holiday. The holiday is on Monday making Thursday the entry day. Entry day was yesterday, the market opened at 2,403.00. Exit on the first profitable open. The market opened today at 2413.00 giving us 10 points on the trade. Pre-Market Simulation Trades Was not focused on the market this morning so missed a couple of good opportunities. 7:23 - 10,000 tick gives us a sell signal. Statistically this trade has a 85% probability of success. Took 2 short @ 2409.75. Target @ 2408.75. Trade did not follow through and the 2,000 tick gave us 2 consecutive buy signals coming off the morning low. Flipped trade. 7:32 - took 5 long @ 2410.75. 2 to cover the shorts and 3 for recovery. Target 2411.75. Target hit, we are flat with $38 profit. Switch to Real Account for Open Trade. All signals coming into the open where for a long trade. Took 2 long @ 2411.75. Tar...

We had a bigger move overnight than all of yesterday pushing through to new historic highs. So, I messed up the Memorial Day Trade. Went back and read through the rules again. Turns out the entry day is 2 days before the holiday, which is today, Thursday, not yesterday, Wednesday. OOPS But, it worked out. I watched the market close and put a sell order in just above the close. Order filled when the market rallied overnight. So, the end result is we made some money, which is a good thing. Down side is we are now not in a position to take the Memorial Day Trade. I will let you know the final results. Pre-Market Simulation Trades The 2,000 tick declined from the overnight high into a previous consolidation level, made a little rally then declined into a sell signal. 2:57 too 2 short @ 2407.75. Target @ 2406.75. Target hit, we are flat with $95 profit. 2,000 tick rallied out of the pullback into 2 consecutive buy signals. 4:20 - Took 2 long @ 2409.00. Target...

Another exciting day in the Financial Markets. Actually not. Turned out to be very boring. Spent most of the day in a very tight trading range with little in the way of trading opportunities. Hence the smaller than normal profits for the day. Pre-market Simulation Trades The pullback in effect at the closed continued into support at the afternoon lows. We then went SWS until the European open at 2:30 when there was a rally into resistance at yesterday's high. Nothing trade-able so far and we are now going SWS just under resistance. 2,000 tick pulled back from resistance, formed a higher short term low then rallied into a buy signal. 7:11 - Took 2 long @ 2398.75. Target @ 2399.75. Switch to Real Money Account for Open Trade We have been consolidating at resistance below yesterdays high for most of the overnight session. Started to break out just before the open. Took 3 long @ 2400.00. Target on 2 is 2401.00. Will hold the other based on a Memorial Day Trade strat...

Swing Trade Strategies Yesterday I mentioned a Swing Trade Strategy that I follow that needs a bit of work to improve it's performance. This strategy is based on the Naked Close concept. First of all what is a Naked Close? There are 2 types of naked closes. For a show of strength the close of this bar is higher than the high of the previous bar. I call this a Naked Close Long signal. For a show of weakness the close of this bar is lower than the low of the previous bar. I call this a Naked Close Short signal. In the chart below, a daily chart of the S&P 500 e-mini, the green dots indicate bars with a Naked Close Long signal and the red dots indicate bars with Naked Close Short signals. You can see that generally the Naked Close proceeds some sort of move in the direction of the signal. My strategy rules are pretty basic. Enter on the open of the next bar after the signal. Exit on the first profitable open or exit on a reversal or exit at a $3,000 Stop for...

Start of another Week. Nothing tragic or weird enough happened over the weekend to have any significant impact and the markets opened more or less where they closed out last week. Swing Trade Strategy Here is another one of the swing trade strategies I am tracking. This one is based on the Naked Close concept that is the core of my day trading methods. I back checked this one to January 2016 until January 2017. From January 2017 forward it is updated daily going forward. It is either hot or cold, so I need to find something that levels it off. Right now it uses a $2,000 stop with no targets. The exit is the first profitable close after the open. And it reverses on an opposing signal Maybe I need to bring in a target? Pre-market Simulation A small rally from the open took us into a buy signal on the 10,000 tick chart @ 1:42. This signal has a statistical probability of 75%. Took 2 long @ 2384.75. Target @ 2385.75. No follow through. Market reversed direct...