Another lesson:
On Friday, 11 May I started trading near NY open. I created a basket of 7-9 trades that quickly went positive. Instead of remembering that it is Friday, and there is little/no news today I was feeling cocky and greedy because my last two weeks have gone well, and a quick +50 pips was too easy/not enough. I saw one trade in my basket that was going backwards, while all the others were performing well, and just ignored it.
It took me a ridiculous ten minutes before I realized that I had Shorted the increasingly negative trade pair instead of going Long! Aughh... I corrected my error, and ate -20 pips.
As I sat there, waiting for more follow-through and for my trade basket to grow to +80, +100, etc pips, imy basket went backwards. I dumped poorly performing trades, as usual, and added new trades to my basket--all the while the no-news Friday NY session was dying, and there was less and less follow through.
Eventually I had dumped most of my basket's trades, and was feeling angry at myself for entering that wrong-direction trade, for not quickly recognizing my Entry error, and for chasing a dying market. Revenge trade-mode, and self-punishment mode kicked-in: I liked the increasing -CHF COT and retail trader extreme +CHF positioning. I opened a 42 LOT trade long USD/CHF, and left it there for the weekend.
Having that trade open all weekend ruined my weekend as expected and made me think, again, about my performance on Friday. By Sunday, at Market open I calmly exited that trade for 1/2 as much profit as had existed on Friday late NY session. Lesson hopefully learned, or at least getting closer to trading more consistently and smartly.
Onwards...
On Friday, 11 May I started trading near NY open. I created a basket of 7-9 trades that quickly went positive. Instead of remembering that it is Friday, and there is little/no news today I was feeling cocky and greedy because my last two weeks have gone well, and a quick +50 pips was too easy/not enough. I saw one trade in my basket that was going backwards, while all the others were performing well, and just ignored it.
It took me a ridiculous ten minutes before I realized that I had Shorted the increasingly negative trade pair instead of going Long! Aughh... I corrected my error, and ate -20 pips.
As I sat there, waiting for more follow-through and for my trade basket to grow to +80, +100, etc pips, imy basket went backwards. I dumped poorly performing trades, as usual, and added new trades to my basket--all the while the no-news Friday NY session was dying, and there was less and less follow through.
Eventually I had dumped most of my basket's trades, and was feeling angry at myself for entering that wrong-direction trade, for not quickly recognizing my Entry error, and for chasing a dying market. Revenge trade-mode, and self-punishment mode kicked-in: I liked the increasing -CHF COT and retail trader extreme +CHF positioning. I opened a 42 LOT trade long USD/CHF, and left it there for the weekend.
Having that trade open all weekend ruined my weekend as expected and made me think, again, about my performance on Friday. By Sunday, at Market open I calmly exited that trade for 1/2 as much profit as had existed on Friday late NY session. Lesson hopefully learned, or at least getting closer to trading more consistently and smartly.
Onwards...
2