Keep Objectivity In Your Trading, Here’s How

  • August 25, 2005
  • Chris Curran



color:windowtext”>  The quietness spilled over into the cash open as light
selling filled the opening gaps.  The opening hour range constricted into a
triangle before the futures broke to new session highs, again on light volume. 
The rest of the session turned into a yawn-fest as the bulls and the bears
slugged it out, as indicated by the A/D line.

Friday morning gives us the
Revised Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index at 9:45 ET, however, the main focus,
for lack of anything better, will be on Fed Chair Greenspan donning his cowboy
hat and spurs at the Fed’s annual economic symposium, which starts on Friday in
Jackson Hole.

Which Moves Will Pay Off?

Do you
spend a lot of time and energy trying to figure out
which moves will pay off,
and which moves will not pay off? Do you use a basketball analogy (head fakes)
and an engineering term (noise) to describe moves that don’t work out profitably
according to your analysis and plan? It seems trite to say that the future is
uncertain, and that we cannot know what will happen with certainty, yet this is
the REALITY of trading.

I personally don’t view the market as either true moves or fake moves. I
consider all moves that are of a minimum range to be true and moves that are
less than the minimum range that I’m looking at are pullbacks within the trend.
I don’t believe that the market is ever wrong – it just exists and moves. So by
my definition, there is no such thing as a fake move.

Our job is to be aware of what the market is ACTUALLY doing. To achieve this, we
have to be DETACHED from the market in order to objectively see the reality that
is going on in the market, like an impartial spectator, rather than as a fan who
roots for one side or the other. We can then use our analysis and plan to see if
any of it applies to the current situation. This requires being objective and
true to our plan and not fudging it to make it fit the situation.

 


Daily Pivot Points for 8-26-05

Symbol Pivot       R1 R2 R3 S1 S2 S3
INDU 10448.11 10467.88 10485.13 10504.90 10430.86 10411.09 10393.84
SPX 1211.89 1214.21 1216.05 1218.37 1210.05 1207.73 1205.89
ES U5 1212.33 1216.17 1218.83 1222.67 1209.67 1205.83 1203.17
SP U5 1212.93 1215.47 1217.33 1219.87 1211.07 1208.53 1206.67
YM U5 10455.33 10477.67 10495.33 10517.67 10437.67 10415.33 10397.67
BKX 98.30 98.59 98.82 99.11 98.07 97.78 97.55
SOX 466.80 469.38 471.72 474.30 464.46 461.88 459.54


Weekly Pivot Points for Week of 8-22-05

Symbol Pivot       R1 R2 R3 S1 S2 S3
INDU 10572.56 10641.75 10724.27 10793.46 10490.04 10420.85 10338.33
SPX 1223.96 1231.99 1244.27 1252.30 1211.68 1203.65 1191.37
ES M5 1226.50 1236.25 1248.75 1258.50 1214.00 1204.25 1191.75
SP M5 1226.57 1235.73 1247.67 1256.83 1214.63 1205.47 1193.53
YM M5 10587.33 10668.67 10749.33 10830.67 10506.67 10425.33 10344.67
BKX 99.40 100.25 100.86 101.71 98.79 97.94 97.33
SOX 463.14 468.99 475.71 481.56 456.42 450.57 443.85

Please feel free to email me with any questions
you might have, and have a great trading week!

Chris Curran

chrisc@tradingmarkets.com

Chris Curran started his trading career at the age of 22
with a national brokerage firm. He combines fundamentals and technicals to get
the big picture on the market. Chris has been trading for 15 years, starting
full time in 1997, and has never had a losing year as a full-time trader.