These were the first 2 trades that I made this morning. Both of them followed pretty much the same M.O.

TRIX Divergence (TXD+)
Trendline Break (TL+)
NYSE-TICK hook (TCKH+)

And both of them turned profitable soon after entry. Either I set unreasonable profit targets given the likely whippy nature of today’s trading day or else thease were just as couple of those unavoidable losses.

On the first trade I had my target a couple ticks below the double bottom extension at 793.80. I think maybe 1 contract was traded at the price before it reversed and took out my stop.

So I tried again at 9:44 and almost immediately was up 1 ER2 point. Now here I totally should have exited the trade when the negative TRIX Divergence reared its head instead of waiting for price to 791.70 low. Honestly, I just missed it as I was paying more attention to the 2-minute chart on this trade.

But the key here was that both of these losses were pretty small. So much so that it only took 1 trade to get me out of the hole. Time and time again, my results have shown that if I can just suck up my pride and take these little hits before they get out of hand (EVEN IF I SOMETIMES SHOULDN’T) then I’ll make out ok in the long run as the good trades will eventually come my way.

Since I only made 1 trade today, I thought I’d consolidate tonight’s posts. This was definitely the quickest I have ever hit my Net Daily Goal as I was in and out within a few minutes after the market opened.

This morning we saw a gap down on the Russel 2000 Futures by about 2 ER2 points. At this point I was actually thinking that if the 15 minute bar could close lower then we’d be in for a bearish looking day. But the NYSE-TICK was acting surprisingly resiliant despite an early flurry of selling. Sure it was decreasing, but it was still in positive territory.

Then came a beautiful 55-tick TRIX Divergence (TXD+) almost completely concurrently with a Positive Trendline cross (TL+). Those 2 things combined with the non-negative TICK was enough for me to test the waters so I went long at 789.00.

A few minutes later I closed out the position achieving my N.D.G. at the pre-market price-pivot. Its hard not to feel a little bit guilty after morning’s like this morning, but then I come to my senses because for every day like today I know that there will likely be a long trendless drudgery of a day ahead so I’d better enjoy these gifts when I can.

After this morning’s gap down I was leaning in the direction that price would likely bounce to some degree though I didn’t know how much nor did i feel strongly enough about it to fade the gap w/out some sort of reversal confirmation.

I first went long at A with a stop under the low of the day after the TL+ & 610-tick TXH+. However I became scared when price stalled and moved my stop to under the prior 2-minute bar’s low (an adjustment that is not called for by my trading plan in this circumstance.) Price then reversed and continued to rally for another 2 points. Perhaps a little too conservative on this play.

However, a few minutes later the 55-tick chart sported a beautiful looking double bottom after a 2nd Postive NYSE-TICK hook. I went long on the breakout and targeted the classic double bottom extension calculated by taking the distance between the low of 788.40 and the double bottom high of 789.60 = 1.20 points…and projecting this amount higher at the breakout, giving a price target of 790.80.

I put in a limit sell order a few ticks below that at 790.60 and was soon filled for a quick profit on a nice setup.

I’m not one who puts a whole lot of emphasis on morning gap plays just for the sake of morning gap plays. I’m looking for 3+ Convergence and if I can find that in conjunction with an exhaustion gap then all the better. This morning was just such an occurence.

After being up decisively over the past 2 days, the market was becoming overdue for a 60-minute correction to some degree. That being said, the ER2 was poised for a possible 15-minute negative price divergence (PD-) going into this morning so I was a little bit cautious.

After this morning’s employment numbers, the ER2 ran higher a full 5 points in the pre-market without much of any kind of meaningful pullback in the interim. This is just the kind of extended move after an already extended market that is ripe for a likely morning gap fill.

The first thing I noticed right at the open was the 610-tick chart that was starting to roll over both in price & in momentum (as measured by the TRIX). The next thing I noticed was the Market Delta chart (not shown) which was clearly showing a great many trades taking place at the bid versus the offer, further indicating downward pressure.

Once the low of the 610-tick reversal bar was broken, I didn’t see any support until the 795.50 area shown. So I went short at 797.10 with a limit buy to cover order open at 795.80, 3 ticks above my target. Sometimes here I would put the cover order at 795.60 or even 795.50, but one of my biggest priorities of every day is to make the first trade a winner as I’ve found that doing so really puts me in a better mindset when going forward to hit my net goal for the trading day. So any trades I make before 10:00 I tend to play much more conservatively for this very reason.

Well a few seconds later I was out with a 1.3 point profit and within another 5 minutes I had hit my target for the day. Gotta love days like today when you only have to work less than 10-minutes!