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March 3th
It’s been a great year for trading!
So far February, last week and this week have being absolutely amazing for both swing traders and intraday traders.

On February 5th we had extreme panic selling with nearly 35 sell orders for every 1 buy order on the NYSE. That extreme panic and dumping of shares was the day we jumped into the market and we nailed the bottom.

As my trading buddy David Banister from ActiveTradingPartners would say “Buy When They Cry!” and that is exactly what subscribers did. Since then our gold, silver and the index funds have been moving up nicely.

I would like to note that there were several more technical reasons why we jumped into the market that day but I won’t get into the nitty-gritty cause this mid-week update would be a trading book…

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Explanation of What happened Last Week & This Week
Ok this may get a little confusing but try to stick with me here…

If you recall last Wednesday’s mid-week report which was called “Gold, Silver & Stock Indices on the Verge of Rolling Over”, I talked about how I was bearish on the overall market. This report has a bunch of detailed charts explaining what was most likely to happen next and some trading.

Well, the market played out just as we had expected. The market dropped 1.35% in over night trading and the following trading session providing intraday traders using ETF’s, Futures or CFD’s a net profit between 1.35% to over 100% return within 17 hours of entering a trade depending on which trading vehicle you used. Check out how this trade was executed by reading my report titled “How To Use Multiple Time Frames For Setups” which I send out the next day. Understanding how to trade using different time frames is a must for all traders and this report shows you how.

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Now here is the part that has thrown a lot of traders off
Just to recap, I posted an extremely bearish report saying the sky is falling on Wednesday. Thursday morning the market moved down as expected, and then late Thursday afternoon I sent out a trade alerts to buy a bunch of precious metal and stock etfs.

I understand why emails flooded my inbox that afternoon…. Everyone wanted to know how I can say the market is falling then turn around and buy the very next day.

It’s actually a really simple answer. “I don’t fall in love with my positions” and “I re-evaluate the market after each new candlestick on the chart”.

Trading is not an easy task, that we all know. The market tests and bends my brain to the limit on a regular basis and if one cannot control their emotions and stick with a set of trading rules, then you will eventually lose all your money.

I have placed thousands of trades in my lifetime and pulling the trigger to get in and out of a position does not phase me anymore. But the problem is most people don’t want to exit a losing trade because then they are proven wrong and most people hate being wrong. If that’s what you are feeling, then you need fix it or get out of trading.

My general rule is “when in doubt, get out”. I would rather watch a trade move without me knowing I had it right, than be stuck in a losing trade, saying to myself, “Why the hell did I get into this trade?”

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Re-Evaluating the Market or Your Investment
After each new candle is formed on a chart it is crucial to re-evaluate the charts. In other words if your main focus is to trade the daily chart then you better re-evaluate the strength of the chart each day and also check the 1 hour intraday chart for possible bullish or bearish patterns.

On the other hand, if you are an intraday trader focusing on trading the 1 hour chart, then you better be evaluating things every hour, and also check the 5 or 10 minute charts for patterns to keep an eye on price and volume action.

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Below are daily charts of some ETF’s I trade showing how we have been trading the market. You can see February 25th the market reversed to the upside and that is when we went long again as prices formed an outside reversal candle and these funds have been moving higher ever since.

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Mid-Week Trading Conclusion:

In short, it’s been a great start to the year with the market performing within its regular trading patterns between fear and greed.

I believe 2010 is going to be very tough for individuals who do not fully understand the market and how to manage risk. I figure the market is about to top in the next week or so then start to head lower. 2010 will most likely trade in a large sideways range for 8-10 months and maybe even longer. Being able to spot market reversals and trade them actively is were the money is this year. No grand slams, just a bunch of single base hits.

I would like to see the market rally and makes new highs but I am ready for what ever the market dishes out in the coming months.

I hope this report helped you to understand that trading is an active sport and being able to change directions one day to another is just part of the game.


If you are interested in my Trading Alert Service for ETFs check out TheGoldAndOilGuy
at www.TheTechnicalTraders.com

On another note, if you would like to trade all the setups I do in real-time I will be launching a service where I provide all my personal trades and analysis for your to follow along in real-time. Members will receive all my intraday and swing trade alerts for indexes and commodities Futures allowing you to trade which ever vehicle you want whether it’s an ETF, Leveraged ETF, Futures Contract or CFD. This way your timing is accurate and you can trade which ever investment you are comfortable trading with.

There will be a 24/7 chatroom allowing us to trade around the clock when setups arise. Also, members can swap ideas, ask me questions, make new trading buddies etc… There is even a squawk box feature! I can talk live with audio to everyone in the chatroom to the site can hear me for important news or trades alerts.

All trade alerts are instantly posted in the members area, chat-room and sent via email making it one of the most powerful trading services I have seen available online.

If you are interested please fill out the form to be notified for this service which will start the last week of March or the first week of April. It will have limited availability to keep it personal:

Chris Vermeulen

A couple months ago I started providing more of my intraday charts in hopes to educate traders on current market conditions so they feel like they are “in the zone” for trading. It’s crucial to understand the intraday moves and volume levels if you want to be consistently profitable trader. It doesn’t matter whether you are day trading or swing trading, you must be following daily and intraday charts.

I have been getting a few subscribers asking me: “Why I jump around from time frame to time frame so much?”

It’s a great question as some days I’m using the 60 minute charts, another day the 2 hour chart, and another the daily chart etc… well I hope to answer this question within this education report.

Get My Free Trading Charts

Trading Time Frames & Their Characteristics

Length of Trades – The longer the time frame you are trading the longer the trade will last on average. For example, if you are swing trading using the daily chart most trades will last 2-20 days, but if you are trading the 60 minute chart, then a trade may only last a few hours. Knowing this allows you to be more or less active depending on the market conditions or the amount of time you are available to trade.

Risk Levels/Draw Downs – The longer the time frame the more potential risk/draw down you will have. For example, when trading the daily chart you may set your protective stop below the previous days low. Depending on the investment, that could be $1-$50 per share or contract. Now compare this to someone trading the 5 minute intraday chart playing volume breakouts to generate quick gains. This person’s risk/draw down may only be 5-50 cents per share or contract.

This is the main reason why short term intraday traders play with larger amounts of money. Simply because their risk is so much lower, they can put more on the line for quick profits. On the flip side, swing traders should be trading much smaller positions to compensate for the increased risk.

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Individual Personalities

Every trader sees the market in a completely different way because each of our brains process chart patterns and time frames differently. This is exactly what creates the market, everyone buy and selling at different times creating liquidity and the random chart movements.

The hardest part about trading in my opinion is figuring out what type of trading personality you have? It took me a few years to actually figure this out, but now I know exactly what type of trading strategies I’m good at and which time frames I prefer trading.

Myself, I like swing trading because it does not require a lot of time to follow the market, and trades last several days and sometimes weeks. But I also like to take advantage of the market when volatility rises and the market becomes choppy because this is when intraday trading becomes most profitable, in my opinion.

Personally I do not want to trade every day because it’s a ton of work and stressful. Rather, I prefer to sit back and cherry pick, only taking positions when I see a perfect setup. This way my win/loss ratio is very high, and I do not need to worry about finding trades every day or week.

Quick Note: When I am trading the intraday charts my focus is to find setups on the 60 minute, 2 hour, 4 hour an 8 hour charts. The reason behind this is that these longer intraday time frames provide very accurate trades and each trade lasts a few hours and sometimes a few days. Trading shorter time frames like the 5 minute chart is torture because you end up trading all day every day and to be honest that’s a lot of work and not fun at all.

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So here are some charts showing you how different time frames show you different patterns, insight and setups:

SP500 Mini Futures contract – Daily Chart
Looking at the past 7-8 days we don’t really see anything exciting to trade as far as chart patterns go. So we sit and wait for something to unfold in a few days if we are lucky.

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SP500 Mini Futures – 2 Hour Intraday Trading Chart
What do you see? WOW a big fat head and shoulders pattern which indicates we should see lower prices.

Traders should have been looking to go short when the price was trading at this resistance level and the 5 minute chart confirmed resistance with the long upper candle wicks (reversal candles) shown in the charts below.

Important Note: When entering this trade, we did not know for sure it was going to be a head & shoulders pattern, but there was a high probability of it happening because of the previous couple day’s price action.

Notice how the left shoulder rallied up and got slammed by sellers, then the next rally (the head) also got slammed by sellers. This price action is bearish as institutions, hedge funds etc… dump positions once they have attained their profit goals for certain investments.

The next rally (right shoulder) drifted up slowly to test the previous resistance level. But look at how the price moved higher…. It drifted higher, which is bearish.

So, if buyers were still in control then we would have seen the price shoot straight back to resistance on big volume then form a mini bull flag (drift sideways) as it digests the resistance level before moving higher. It’s this price action here that was screaming at me to go short.

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SP500 Mini – 60 Minute Intraday Trading Chart
The 60 minute chart helps me to clearly measure how much potential there is for this trade. If you understand technical analysis you will know how to calculate a measured move. It’s simple really.

Take the previous move and add it to the where you think the price is headed. I’ve shown it in the chart below.

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Trading Time Frames Conclusion:
Well there you have it. I hope this report answers some basic trading questions.

If you would like to learn and trade at the same time I will be launching a service where I provide all my personal trades and analysis for your to follow along in real-time. Members will receive all my intraday and swing trade alerts for indexes and commodities Futures allowing you to trade which ever vehicle you want whether it’s an ETF, Leveraged ETF, Futures Contract or CFD. This way your timing is accurate and you can trade which ever investment you are comfortable trading with.

There will be a 24/7 chat-room allowing us to trade around the clock when setups arise. Also, members can swap ideas, ask me questions, make new trading buddies etc… There is even a squawk box feature! When I talk everyone logged into the site can hear me for important news or trades alerts.

All trade alerts are instantly posted in the members area, chat-room and sent via email making it one of the most powerful trading services I have seen available online.

If you are interested please fill out the form to be notified for this service. It will have limited availability:

Get Notified Of Launch

Chris Vermeulen
http://www.TheTechnicalTraders.com/

Disclaimer: I currently do not have a position in the ES futures contract.