Monday 19th April – I’d rather be profitable than right

It’s been a strange few days for me with my routine well and truly broken. Last week was my first losing week in nearly 10 weeks so I shouldn’t be too upset but use it as a chance to take stock and see what I can improve in my business.

The title of this post may seem obvious to some however you’d be surprised at how many people would sooner be right than profitable.  As Ed Seykota states, “Everyone gets what they want from the markets.”  Today is an example of how I called the direction right…but still ended up with a losing day (and the idea for another post).

First up GBPJPY

1.  Overnight we had a gap, a drop and a definite trend down.  Order triggers short and starts to go a few cheeky pips in the black.

2.  Trade promptly reverses and takes me out for -15 points.  It then sets up again and drops strongly….C’est La Vie.  Looking at this chart there where several set-ups to go short on a discretionary basis, I’ll make a note of them in my journal and add them to my sweet set-up slide show.

Ok, next GBPUSD

Pretty much the same as the GBPJPY:

1. Price has gapped, dropped and is trending nicely.  My short order is triggered.

2.  It goes a good 15+points positive before reversing and without any hesitation shoots back upto my stop and takes me out for -15. Ahh well another unsuccessful system trade early on.  No worries, it’s part of the game. But i do spot a discretionary set-up and decided to follow up.

1. This is the original system short now seen on a 5 min chart. Price pints a low test bar – be warned.

2. What a shock price moves up and takes out my stop for a small losing trade.

3. However on the 5 minute chart I now like the look of my pivoting price action of previous resistance.  I prepare to sell at 1.5244, my target is 1.5184 and my stop is at 5274 for a 2:1 trade.

4.  My order triggers and goes…. nowhere.  Just pootles along sideways, goes back against me and then drops nicely.  Price hits my T1 and my stop gets moved to break even

5. Price prints some very nice low test bars against the S2.  That’s a nice indication that the present move down is done.  I’m tempted to just close out and take 30 points but my plan is not to scale out on this trade and just let it run.  Price blows north and I await to see if it’s a retrace or a reverse

6. Price continues north and licks my stop at my entry point of 5244 and I’m taken out for scratch.  Those low test bars were actually a very nice reversal pattern! Later that day price continues in its down trend.

So 3 trades, all shorts, on a day of a strong down trend and I end up with 2 losers and 1 scratch trade for a result of -30 points.   So there you go, even a professional can be on the right side of the trend and still have a losing session. Interesting that I was RIGHT in calling the direction but still un profitable shorting in a downtrend!  Now maybe some of you can  see what I meant in the headline when I said I’d sooner be profitable than right!

I could have just not written up todays trades and spared my embarrasment or protected my ego (there’s another post there as well) but it’s only fair that I put up the losing sessions as well as the winning ones.  What keeps me in the game is that when I have losing days they’re only like today for -30 points and my winning days tend to overwhelm those losing days in terms of return. I know that those trades say nothing about me in terms of my self-worth or ability as a trader or human-being.  “It’s in the game!” cries the voice during the opening credits of EA Sports Video Games. And he’s right, it’s all part of the game.

Trade well