Ever heard of the January Effect? At Day Trade to Win, John Paul describes it as an accurate way to determine if price will be up or down by the end of the year compared to its price at the end of January of the same year. Sounds complicated? Watch the video. If you take a look at January, 2013, you will notice that price closed higher at the end of the month. January was an up month. This will also hold true for the entire year. At the end of December 2013, John Paul claims price will be higher than the closing January 2013 price. Now, there will be pullbacks along the way. When price drops to estimated bottom levels throughout the year, professional traders will buy the market expecting the overall trend to be profitable. This January Effect is known among the professional trading community. In 2012, price followed the January Effect. Although you may find a few years where the January Effect does not hold up, overall you will see a distinct trend – one that hedge funds, high frequency algorithms, and financial institutions will keep in mind. For the average retail trader, you likely won’t be holding positions long enough for the January Effect to matter. At Day Trade to Win, they focus on smaller time frames. The longest they’ll hold a trade for is typically 20 minutes or four bars on a five minute chart. In most cases, the profit target will be hit first, or if the trade goes against you, the prove-it stop. Trading dynamically using price action is important – it’s adaptive.
Going Short on Live E-Mini Trade
John Paul from Day Trade to Win starts this video with a Short Trade using the Atlas Line software. How much profit and stop do you use for each trade? The first trade was good for one point, based on the ATR which was also near a point. The current trade’s profit target is 1.25 points. The stop is around 2.5 points. There are three stop strategies in mind that we went over in the last video. With the ATR hovering above one point, we know the market is worth trading. When you can look at nothing but price and decide to get in and out, you are trading using price action. It’s the most effective and easiest type of trading to learn. Everything you need is provided right in front of you on the chart. There is no guessing – it’s objective. The best time to trade is in the morning starting at 9:30 a.m. US/Eastern until about noon. However, you’ve probably seen many videos with the Atlas Line trading far beyond the open outcry session. Why 9:30 a.m.? When the CME opens, there are millions of orders placed by high frequency trading algorithms, hedge funds, professional and retail traders. In addition, financial news events, press releases and the U.S. daytime infrastructure really comes online during this period. As long as the ATR (with a period of four) remains between two and four points, you can bet the trading conditions are favorable. All you need at this point is an effective day trading strategy. There are many day trading courses at Day Trade to Win that focus on price action.
Overbought vs. Oversold Markets
This example shows how the E-Mini S&P can be a very tricky market. The Atlas Line gives a short order 1461.75. If you followed this short signal by itself, the trade would have not been profitable. There’s a way we filter these trades – we can detect if a market is overbought or oversold. Overbuying or overselling is another way to say a market has exhausted itself going long or going short. We can gauge exhaustion by calculating the difference between the Atlas Line’s entry signal minus the price the Atlas Line is currently plotting at. In most of the Day Trade to Win videos, the Atlas Line is a dashed link of a pink, red or blue color. The plotted begins after 9:30 a.m. usually and provides a measurement to go long or short based on price’s position against the line. If we double the ATR value and determine it is less than the distance between the plotted line and plotted entry signal, we can determine that the market is exhausted and the trade should NOT be taken. Yes, this is a minor consideration one has to perform when using the Atlas Line. It is better to learn to quickly calculate this instead of losing money on a big reversal. You can find more about the Atlas Line trading software at Day Trade to Win.