Trading What I see !?

[speedyhamster]

about mindsets

https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/01/2 ... k-mindset/

[jamesg46]

I've not kept up much with this thread, I've seen some beautiful nuggets come along though, my personal favourite "the market literally breathes in and out." I can't quote the other one word for word & I've skimmed back through and can't seem to find it but there are a few.

My point in posting is because I struggle personally with randomness. Most people turn up to the trading world and pick scalping, see that horse markets are popular and begin their journey of developing their new found strategy into gold.

This is where the first layer of the randomness onion is peeled, we start looking for them magical signals at magical times and magical odds... we become convinced that the market has a fixed set of characteristics, that play out time and time again, but the very name of this thread makes me think you know that this isn't true.

Probability & randomness is where its at. The pre off markets have a tonne of different variables that differ from race to race, day to day, week to week & month to month. The horse, jockey, ground, distance, runners, grade, course, flat, jumps and on and on.

Each market has its own characteristics and can probably be traded in multiple ways with multiple strategies, some better than others but its the probability of that strategy working in that market based on the characteristics that you see that counts. Its the reality right infront of your eyes & knowing how to deal with it. Its not the story you heard between your eyes,. Its whats before them that counts.... that quote I think would work well here... generic actions, generic results,.I can't quote it.

Anyway, after my late night ramble and my long story of random markets,.why do I struggle with this if I know that? Its because I can't keep my fingers out of the way. I always want to be acting upon something and its become my biggest downfall.

I havent taken the time to do things methodically and learn one approach for one set of characteristics and build upon that foundation.

I think you may be doing the same, you're over trading and trying to make a glove fit the wrong hand.

I feel mine is almost a learned behaviour now and it'll take a lot to turn myself around, don't quit so early on, make the necessary changes and learn from your mistakes.

Best of luck.

[speedyhamster]

[Rollox]

"pre race markets when flow is so random"
The markets are not random when you enter a trade at the correct time with correct price, just takes time alot of time to study markets.
Not every market will go you're way even with above criteria but that is when controlling you're losses should come into play and very quickly.
If you entered a market and you're trade isn't making money ask yourself a question immediately"why am I hanging about this trade?" Get out imagine it's a burning building.
I'm approx 3yrs in and I can say it's not been easy but you do and will learn perseverance is key.
Hope this aids you@ goat

[goat68]

Thanks for all the ideas chaps
And just to answer Trader Pat's comment about me keeping coming back to this, it's partly because as someone commented a while back, I don't want to be one of those 6 month threads that then disappears.....

[jamesg46]

The front 2 breathing in and out, maybe keep an eye out for it (I don't know if that's what Peter meant by it but this was my take.)

[Kai]

A negative attitude never helps but I fully empathise as I am exactly the same most days after being at this for 2 years.

No doubt it's hard to stay positive when daily P&Ls keep pointing out all the negatives, everyone has a limit and a point of no return too.

I like JollyGreen's older post about that process that yourself and Mr Goat are going through, even though it's probably been posted already, it's still a good reminder there's not much room for negativity, only positivity and sheer persistance.

I can't emphasize enough how much people underestimate trading, thinking that the pre-off markets of today with many experienced traders involved can be beaten in a few months or even a year, only to give up after losing a lot of money.

I'm sure that the profitability threshold has risen over the years as markets have gotten more competitive, people can easily forget how long it took them to learn something, and how much easier was it to get into profit back then as well. There's a bit more concrete info nowadays but that hardly balances things out for the newcomers imho.

[Kai]

Actually, I really don't understand the obsession with the prerace market, it must be a British thing, lul, and most of us foreigners that I talked to feel the same. The only good thing about the market for me is that it's nicely compressed inside a few hours and the markets keep coming one after another in an orderly fashion (when they're not clashing!) so no real need to actively look around for opportunities.

I do get that the Bet Angel Youtube channel is probably the first thing that pops up for the average newcomer and most published content on there is about the prerace market, but still, can't help but feel people are being very stubborn about it.

It's like, every footballer wants to play in the Premier League obviously, but unless you have bags of natural ability then you may need to be patient and may need to make your debut in the Championship or League One first, before trying to push yourself to get to the Premier League level. Maybe even a short loan to the Conference level would be a good career move??

And if English football is not for you, then it's not like Premier League is the only league that pays well, it may be the most competitive and exciting one, but other top leagues do exist as well, y'know In some leagues you don't even need to do much running at all, if you look at Lionel Messi casually strolling about most of the time, but that's someone who knows how to take advantage of good opportunities and boy does he get paid well to do it.

[darchas]

Actually, I really don't understand the obsession with the prerace market, it must be a British thing, lul, and most of us foreigners that I talked to feel the same. The only good thing about the market for me is that it's nicely compressed inside a few hours and the markets keep coming one after another in an orderly fashion (when they're not clashing!) so no real need to actively look around for opportunities.

I do get that the Bet Angel Youtube channel is probably the first thing that pops up for the average newcomer and most published content on there is about the prerace market, but still, can't help but feel people are being very stubborn about it.

It's like, every footballer wants to play in the Premier League obviously, but unless you have bags of natural ability then you may need to be patient and may need to make your debut in the Championship or League One first, before trying to push yourself to get to the Premier League level. Maybe even a short loan to the Conference level would be a good career move??

And if English football is not for you, then it's not like Premier League is the only league that pays well, it may be the most competitive and exciting one, but other top leagues do exist as well, y'know In some leagues you don't even need to do much running at all, if you look at Lionel Messi casually strolling about most of the time, but that's someone who knows how to take advantage of good opportunities and boy does he get paid well to do it.

Great analogy, and I agree. I'm British but also don't get the obsession with pre off horses, especially from new traders with no prior knowledge or particular interest in horses. I've said it before in this thread but I think it's one of the hardest spots on the exchange for a beginner. I think there's a few things maybe at play: 1, the amount of material out there on it, so much money goes through the market it's easy for someone to knock together a YouTube video place a few trades showing some swing trades that look completely easy and logical, gives a false impression and there's plenty of charlatans out there, 2, there's probably a bit of sunk cost in there, if I've already spent a year working day in and day out on the markets, its probably easier to hold on to a breakthrough being round the corner than move on to something else. 3, I think there's a certain cachet around making money on pre off horses, a lot of respected and good traders work here and so naturally new traders look up to that and want to emulate their success.

I'm sure there's other things going on too but in my view the exchange is a massive place and it's good to experiment, probably starting with sports that you have a natural interest in and starting knowledge about, and giving things a go to find your niche.

[Trader Pat]

You also have to be honest with yourself, if you're losing money on the markets you need to be able to explain to yourself why. There's no point blaming the markets if everything you're doing is fundamentally wrong.

If you're entering market after market with no game plan and you're hoping the price goes your way then you're not trading. Every single trade you attempt in the market needs to be justified, otherwise you're gambling.

[goat68]

Actually, I really don't understand the obsession with the prerace market, it must be a British thing, lul, and most of us foreigners that I talked to feel the same. The only good thing about the market for me is that it's nicely compressed inside a few hours and the markets keep coming one after another in an orderly fashion (when they're not clashing!) so no real need to actively look around for opportunities.

I do get that the Bet Angel Youtube channel is probably the first thing that pops up for the average newcomer and most published content on there is about the prerace market, but still, can't help but feel people are being very stubborn about it.

It's like, every footballer wants to play in the Premier League obviously, but unless you have bags of natural ability then you may need to be patient and may need to make your debut in the Championship or League One first, before trying to push yourself to get to the Premier League level. Maybe even a short loan to the Conference level would be a good career move??

And if English football is not for you, then it's not like Premier League is the only league that pays well, it may be the most competitive and exciting one, but other top leagues do exist as well, y'know In some leagues you don't even need to do much running at all, if you look at Lionel Messi casually strolling about most of the time, but that's someone who knows how to take advantage of good opportunities and boy does he get paid well to do it.

So I can't remember which video of the 100s I've watched, nor whether it was one of Peters or CaanB, but there is one description which points out horse racing has a figure of 80% I think for compressed volume, compared to football something like 40%, and I can't quite remember the point but it implied horses had a destinct advantage due to this in terms of trading value... Peter was it one of your videos, I'll have to have a search because it was an interesting point....if only I could remember it!!!!!?

[goat68]

Blimey just traded Rock Sound Chelm 18:15, and it ripped me apart swinging from 2.3 back up to 2.7, as usual I traded out for a loss at 2.6
Should not have attempted that one far too volatile

[goat68]

Blimey it hit 3, good thing I got out... Predicted that one all wrong!

[goat68]

By the way my mental thought on trading it was it was sitting at 2.5 and I reckoned most traders will think this is going to bounce, also the ladder showed backing at 5mins, the typical as soon as the price went out 4 ticks it snapped back down with backers....
But the sentiment changed at 3mins

[goat68]

I think when trading a horse sub 3.0 I need to ignore the .02 and look more at the .1 scale as the price zooms up and down 5 ticks in sub-second bursts...