When to Trail Your Stops?!?#@
August 19th, 2008Q: I still do not understand how you decide to stay in a trade or exit? I bail way too early sometimes only to watch the market (I will not chase trades) go another 10+ points then you guys take profit. I feel “dumbed down” when I capture 10 points and you guys say “that was a nice 25 point run. — Marco/MMTrader74
A: For those of you who remember the old video game QBERT you’ll recognize the frustration marks in the subject line of this blog. We have received a lot of questions from newbies on when to trail and when to bail out of a position in the futures market. Thank Marco, a user in our trading room, for the above e-mail inquiry.
I can tell you how *I* decide to stay in a trade or take a small 10 tick profit on the Dow E-Mini YM.
First, I will look at things such as the type of day we are in. Trending day or oscillation type like Bollinger Band/Keltner Channels being tagged? The strength of Alex’s filters and market internals such as NYSE advance declines. Are they hovering around 0 (indecision) or -2000 (in which case i’d definately trail any short!!) Have the ticks been biased to one side of the + or - scale or have they been choppy. Little things like that will help you see the true breath of the market. Use 2 or 3 or if your a member of the trading room. Go in a trade when the alert is BUZZED and exit when Alex says “I’m flat or I’m all out” Even if you have one contract. You could also just use your auto trail feature in your brokerage program or our Exit Assist program if you have eSignal or Trade Station. Also on days like OEX or FOMC it’s always a good idea to not trail your trades. I won’t trail on these days myself as a lot of games are being played in the market. All these things come with experience and time but we should be able to help you bypass a lot of time by stealing our experience and knowledge :)
VIDEO ON THIS TOPIC: http://www.puretick.com/video/trail
Geoff aka CajunSniper - Co-Admin PureTick.com












They usually provide rock solid excellent support or resistance for high probability trades!



