I made a home-made bar replay for MT4 as an alternative to the tradingview bar replay. You can change timeframes and use objects easily. It just uses vertical lines to block the future candles. Then it adjusts the vertical lines when you change zoom or time frames to keep the "future" bars hidden.
I am not a professional coder so this is not as robust as something like Soft4fx or Forex Tester. But for me it gets the job done and is very convenient. Maybe you will find some benefit from it.
​
Here are the steps to use it:
1) copy the text from the code block
2) go to MT4 terminal and open Meta Editor (click icon or press F4)
3) go to File -> New -> Expert Advisor
4) put in a title and click Next, Next, Finish
5) Delete all text from new file and paste in text from code block
6) go back to MT4
7) Bring up Navigator (Ctrl+N if it's not already up)
8) go to expert advisors section and find what you titled it
9) open up a chart of the symbol you want to test
10) add the EA to this chart
11) specify colors and start time in inputs then press OK
12) use "S" key on your keyboard to advance 1 bar of current time frame
13) use tool bar buttons to change zoom and time frames, do objects, etc.
14) don't turn on auto scroll. if you do by accident, press "S" to return to simulation time.
15) click "buy" and "sell" buttons (white text, top center) to generate entry, TP and SL lines to track your trade
16) to cancel or close a trade, press "close order" then click the white entry line
17) drag and drop TP/SL lines to modify RR
18) click "End" to delete all objects and remove simulation from chart
19) to change simulation time, click "End", then add the simulator EA to your chart with a new start time
20) When you click "End", your own objects will be deleted too, so make sure you are done with them
21) keep track of your own trade results manually
22) use Tools-> History center to download new data if you need it. the simulator won't work on time frames if you don't have historical data going back that far, but it will work on time frames that you have the data for. If you have data but its not appearing, you might also need to increase max bars in chart in Tools->Options->Charts.
23) don't look at status bar if you are moused over hidden candles, or to avoid this you can hide the status bar.
​
​
Here is the code block.

//+------------------------------------------------------------------+ //| Bar Replay V2.mq4 | //| Copyright 2020, MetaQuotes Software Corp. | //| https://www.mql5.com | //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ #property copyright "Copyright 2020, MetaQuotes Software Corp." #property link "https://www.mql5.com" #property version "1.00" #property strict #define VK_A 0x41 #define VK_S 0x53 #define VK_X 0x58 #define VK_Z 0x5A #define VK_V 0x56 #define VK_C 0x43 #define VK_W 0x57 #define VK_E 0x45 double balance; string balance_as_string; int filehandle; int trade_ticket = 1; string objectname; string entry_line_name; string tp_line_name; string sl_line_name; string one_R_line_name; double distance; double entry_price; double tp_price; double sl_price; double one_R; double TP_distance; double gain_in_R; string direction; bool balance_file_exist; double new_balance; double sl_distance; string trade_number; double risk; double reward; string RR_string; int is_tp_or_sl_line=0; int click_to_cancel=0; input color foreground_color = clrWhite; input color background_color = clrBlack; input color bear_candle_color = clrRed; input color bull_candle_color = clrSpringGreen; input color current_price_line_color = clrGray; input string start_time = "2020.10.27 12:00"; input int vertical_margin = 100; //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ //| Expert initialization function | //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ int OnInit() { Comment(""); ChartNavigate(0,CHART_BEGIN,0); BlankChart(); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_SHIFT,true); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_FOREGROUND,false); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_AUTOSCROLL,false); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_SCALEFIX,false); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_SHOW_OBJECT_DESCR,true); if (ObjectFind(0,"First OnInit")<0){ CreateStorageHLine("First OnInit",1);} if (ObjectFind(0,"Simulation Time")<0){ CreateTestVLine("Simulation Time",StringToTime(start_time));} string vlinename; for (int i=0; i<=1000000; i++){ vlinename="VLine"+IntegerToString(i); ObjectDelete(vlinename); } HideBars(SimulationBarTime(),0); //HideBar(SimulationBarTime()); UnBlankChart(); LabelCreate("New Buy Button","Buy",0,38,foreground_color); LabelCreate("New Sell Button","Sell",0,41,foreground_color); LabelCreate("Cancel Order","Close Order",0,44,foreground_color); LabelCreate("Risk To Reward","RR",0,52,foreground_color); LabelCreate("End","End",0,35,foreground_color); ObjectMove(0,"First OnInit",0,0,0); //--- create timer EventSetTimer(60); return(INIT_SUCCEEDED); } //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ //| Expert deinitialization function | //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ void OnDeinit(const int reason) { //--- destroy timer EventKillTimer(); } //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ //| Expert tick function | //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ void OnTick() { //--- } //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ //| ChartEvent function | //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ void OnChartEvent(const int id, const long &lparam, const double &dparam, const string &sparam) { if (id==CHARTEVENT_CHART_CHANGE){ int chartscale = ChartGetInteger(0,CHART_SCALE,0); int lastchartscale = ObjectGetDouble(0,"Last Chart Scale",OBJPROP_PRICE,0); if (chartscale!=lastchartscale){ int chartscale = ChartGetInteger(0,CHART_SCALE,0); ObjectMove(0,"Last Chart Scale",0,0,chartscale); OnInit(); }} if (id==CHARTEVENT_KEYDOWN){ if (lparam==VK_S){ IncreaseSimulationTime(); UnHideBar(SimulationPosition()); NavigateToSimulationPosition(); CreateHLine(0,"Current Price",Close[SimulationPosition()+1],current_price_line_color,1,0,true,false,false,"price"); SetChartMinMax(); }} if(id==CHARTEVENT_OBJECT_CLICK) { if(sparam=="New Sell Button") { distance = iATR(_Symbol,_Period,20,SimulationPosition()+1)/2; objectname = "Trade # "+IntegerToString(trade_ticket); CreateHLine(0,objectname,Close[SimulationPosition()+1],foreground_color,2,5,false,true,true,"Sell"); objectname = "TP for Trade # "+IntegerToString(trade_ticket); CreateHLine(0,objectname,Close[SimulationPosition()+1]-distance*2,clrAqua,2,5,false,true,true,"TP"); objectname = "SL for Trade # "+IntegerToString(trade_ticket); CreateHLine(0,objectname,Close[SimulationPosition()+1]+distance,clrRed,2,5,false,true,true,"SL"); trade_ticket+=1; } } if(id==CHARTEVENT_OBJECT_CLICK) { if(sparam=="New Buy Button") { distance = iATR(_Symbol,_Period,20,SimulationPosition()+1)/2; objectname = "Trade # "+IntegerToString(trade_ticket); CreateHLine(0,objectname,Close[SimulationPosition()+1],foreground_color,2,5,false,true,true,"Buy"); objectname = "TP for Trade # "+IntegerToString(trade_ticket); CreateHLine(0,objectname,Close[SimulationPosition()+1]+distance*2,clrAqua,2,5,false,true,true,"TP"); objectname = "SL for Trade # "+IntegerToString(trade_ticket); CreateHLine(0,objectname,Close[SimulationPosition()+1]-distance,clrRed,2,5,false,true,true,"SL"); trade_ticket+=1; } } if(id==CHARTEVENT_OBJECT_DRAG) { if(StringFind(sparam,"TP",0)==0) { is_tp_or_sl_line=1; } if(StringFind(sparam,"SL",0)==0) { is_tp_or_sl_line=1; } Comment(is_tp_or_sl_line); if(is_tp_or_sl_line==1) { trade_number = StringSubstr(sparam,7,9); entry_line_name = trade_number; tp_line_name = "TP for "+entry_line_name; sl_line_name = "SL for "+entry_line_name; entry_price = ObjectGetDouble(0,entry_line_name,OBJPROP_PRICE,0); tp_price = ObjectGetDouble(0,tp_line_name,OBJPROP_PRICE,0); sl_price = ObjectGetDouble(0,sl_line_name,OBJPROP_PRICE,0); sl_distance = MathAbs(entry_price-sl_price); TP_distance = MathAbs(entry_price-tp_price); reward = TP_distance/sl_distance; RR_string = "RR = 1 : "+DoubleToString(reward,2); ObjectSetString(0,"Risk To Reward",OBJPROP_TEXT,RR_string); is_tp_or_sl_line=0; } } if(id==CHARTEVENT_OBJECT_CLICK) { if(sparam=="Cancel Order") { click_to_cancel=1; Comment("please click the entry line of the order you wish to cancel."); } } if(id==CHARTEVENT_OBJECT_CLICK) { if(sparam!="Cancel Order") { if(click_to_cancel==1) { if(ObjectGetInteger(0,sparam,OBJPROP_TYPE,0)==OBJ_HLINE) { entry_line_name = sparam; tp_line_name = "TP for "+sparam; sl_line_name = "SL for "+sparam; ObjectDelete(0,entry_line_name); ObjectDelete(0,tp_line_name); ObjectDelete(0,sl_line_name); click_to_cancel=0; ObjectSetString(0,"Risk To Reward",OBJPROP_TEXT,"RR"); } } } } if (id==CHARTEVENT_OBJECT_CLICK){ if (sparam=="End"){ ObjectsDeleteAll(0,-1,-1); ExpertRemove(); }} } //+------------------------------------------------------------------+ void CreateStorageHLine(string name, double value){ ObjectDelete(name); ObjectCreate(0,name,OBJ_HLINE,0,0,value); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_SELECTED,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_SELECTABLE,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_COLOR,clrNONE); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_BACK,true); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_ZORDER,0); } void CreateTestHLine(string name, double value){ ObjectDelete(name); ObjectCreate(0,name,OBJ_HLINE,0,0,value); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_SELECTED,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_SELECTABLE,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_COLOR,clrWhite); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_BACK,true); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_ZORDER,0); } bool IsFirstOnInit(){ bool bbb=false; if (ObjectGetDouble(0,"First OnInit",OBJPROP_PRICE,0)==1){return true;} return bbb; } void CreateTestVLine(string name, datetime timevalue){ ObjectDelete(name); ObjectCreate(0,name,OBJ_VLINE,0,timevalue,0); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_SELECTED,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_SELECTABLE,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_COLOR,clrNONE); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_BACK,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,name,OBJPROP_ZORDER,3); } datetime SimulationTime(){ return ObjectGetInteger(0,"Simulation Time",OBJPROP_TIME,0); } int SimulationPosition(){ return iBarShift(_Symbol,_Period,SimulationTime(),false); } datetime SimulationBarTime(){ return Time[SimulationPosition()]; } void IncreaseSimulationTime(){ ObjectMove(0,"Simulation Time",0,Time[SimulationPosition()-1],0); } void NavigateToSimulationPosition(){ ChartNavigate(0,CHART_END,-1*SimulationPosition()+15); } void NotifyNotEnoughHistoricalData(){ BlankChart(); Comment("Sorry, but there is not enough historical data to load this time frame."+"\n"+ "Please load more historical data or use a higher time frame. Thank you :)");} void UnHideBar(int barindex){ ObjectDelete(0,"VLine"+IntegerToString(barindex+1)); } void BlankChart(){ ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_FOREGROUND,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CANDLE_BEAR,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CANDLE_BULL,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CHART_DOWN,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CHART_UP,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CHART_LINE,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_GRID,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_ASK,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_BID,clrNONE);} void UnBlankChart(){ ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_FOREGROUND,foreground_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CANDLE_BEAR,bear_candle_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CANDLE_BULL,bull_candle_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_BACKGROUND,background_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CHART_DOWN,foreground_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CHART_UP,foreground_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_CHART_LINE,foreground_color); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_GRID,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_ASK,clrNONE); ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_COLOR_BID,clrNONE);} void HideBars(datetime starttime, int shift){ int startbarindex = iBarShift(_Symbol,_Period,starttime,false); ChartNavigate(0,CHART_BEGIN,0); if (Time[WindowFirstVisibleBar()]>SimulationTime()){NotifyNotEnoughHistoricalData();} if (Time[WindowFirstVisibleBar()]=0; i--){ vlinename="VLine"+IntegerToString(i); ObjectCreate(0,vlinename,OBJ_VLINE,0,Time[i],0); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_COLOR,background_color); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_BACK,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_WIDTH,vlinewidth); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_ZORDER,10); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_FILL,true); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_STYLE,STYLE_SOLID); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_SELECTED,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,vlinename,OBJPROP_SELECTABLE,false); } NavigateToSimulationPosition(); SetChartMinMax();} }//end of HideBars function void SetChartMinMax(){ int firstbar = WindowFirstVisibleBar(); int lastbar = SimulationPosition(); int lastbarwhenscrolled = WindowFirstVisibleBar()-WindowBarsPerChart(); if (lastbarwhenscrolled>lastbar){lastbar=lastbarwhenscrolled;} double highest = High[iHighest(_Symbol,_Period,MODE_HIGH,firstbar-lastbar,lastbar)]; double lowest = Low[iLowest(_Symbol,_Period,MODE_LOW,firstbar-lastbar,lastbar)]; ChartSetInteger(0,CHART_SCALEFIX,true); ChartSetDouble(0,CHART_FIXED_MAX,highest+vertical_margin*_Point); ChartSetDouble(0,CHART_FIXED_MIN,lowest-vertical_margin*_Point); } void LabelCreate(string labelname, string labeltext, int row, int column, color labelcolor){ int ylocation = row*18; int xlocation = column*10; ObjectCreate(0,labelname,OBJ_LABEL,0,0,0); ObjectSetString(0,labelname,OBJPROP_TEXT,labeltext); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_COLOR,labelcolor); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_FONTSIZE,10); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_ZORDER,10); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_BACK,false); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_CORNER,CORNER_LEFT_UPPER); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_ANCHOR,ANCHOR_LEFT_UPPER); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_XDISTANCE,xlocation); ObjectSetInteger(0,labelname,OBJPROP_YDISTANCE,ylocation);} double GetHLinePrice(string name){ return ObjectGetDouble(0,name,OBJPROP_PRICE,0); } void CreateHLine(int chartid, string objectnamey, double objectprice, color linecolor, int width, int zorder, bool back, bool selected, bool selectable, string descriptionn) { ObjectDelete(chartid,objectnamey); ObjectCreate(chartid,objectnamey,OBJ_HLINE,0,0,objectprice); ObjectSetString(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_TEXT,objectprice); ObjectSetInteger(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_COLOR,linecolor); ObjectSetInteger(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_WIDTH,width); ObjectSetInteger(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_ZORDER,zorder); ObjectSetInteger(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_BACK,back); ObjectSetInteger(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_SELECTED,selected); ObjectSetInteger(chartid,objectnamey,OBJPROP_SELECTABLE,selectable); ObjectSetString(0,objectnamey,OBJPROP_TEXT,descriptionn); } //end of code 

Its a bit lengthy and I tried to condense it as much as I can. So take everything at a high level as each subject is has a lot more depth but fundamentally if you distill it down its just taking simple things and applying your experience using them to add nuance and better deploy them.
There are exceptions to everything that you will learn with experience or have already learned. If you know something extra or something to add to it to implement it better or more accurately. Then great! However, my intention of this post is just a high level overview. Trading can be far too nuanced to go into in this post and would take forever to type up every exception (not to mention the traders individual personality). If you take the general information as a starting point, hopefully you will learn the edge cases long the way and learn how to use the more effectively if you end up using them. I apologize in advice for any errors or typos.
Introduction After reflecting on my fun (cough) trading journey that was more akin to rolling around on broken glass and wondering if brown glass will help me predict market direction better than green glass. Buying a $100 indicator at 2 am when I was acting a fool, looking at it and going at and going "This is a piece of lagging crap, I miss out on a large part of the fundamental move and never using it for even one trade". All while struggling with massive over trading and bad habits because I would get bored watching a single well placed trade on fold for the day. Also, I wanted to get rich quick.
On top all of that I had a terminal Stage 4 case of FOMO on every time the price would move up and then down then back up. Just think about all those extra pips I could have trading both directions as it moves across the chart! I can just sell right when it goes down, then buy right before it goes up again. Its so easy right? Well, turns out it was not as easy as I thought and I lost a fair chunk of change and hit my head against the wall a lot until it clicked. Which is how I came up with a mixed bag of things that I now call "Trade the Trade" which helped support how I wanted to trade so I can still trade intra day price action like a rabid money without throwing away all my bananas.
Why Make This Post? - Core Topic of Discussion I wish to share a concept I came up with that helped me become a reliable trader. Support the weakness of how I like to trade. Also, explaining what I do helps reinforce my understanding of the information I share as I have to put words to it and not just use internalized processes. I came up with a method that helped me get my head straight when trading intra day.
I call it "Trade the Trade" as I am making mini trades inside of a trade setup I make from analysis on a higher timeframe that would take multiple days to unfold or longer. I will share information, principles, techniques I used and learned from others I talked to on the internet (mixed bag of folks from armatures to professionals, and random internet people) that helped me form a trading style that worked for me. Even people who are not good at trading can say something that might make it click in your head so I would absorbed all the information I could get.I will share the details of how I approach the methodology and the tools in my trading belt that I picked up by filtering through many tools, indicators strategies and witchcraft. Hopefully you read something that ends up helping you be a better trader. I learned a lot from people who make community posts so I wanted to give back now that I got my ducks in a row.
General Trading Advice If your struggling finding your own trading style, fixing weakness's in it, getting started, being reliably profitable or have no framework to build yourself higher with, hopefully you can use the below advice to help provide some direction or clarity to moving forward to be a better trader.

1. KEEP IT SIMPLE. Do not throw a million things on your chart from the get go or over analyzing what the market is doing while trying to learn the basics. Tons of stuff on your chart can actually slow your learning by distracting your focus on all your bells and whistles and not the price action.
2. PRICE ACTION. Learn how to read price action. Not just the common formations, but larger groups of bars that form the market structure. Those formations carry more weight the higher the time frame they form on. If struggle to understand what is going on or what your looking at, move to a higher time frame.
3. INDICATORS. If you do use them you should try to understand how every indicator you use calculates its values. Many indicators are lagging indicators, understanding how it calculates the values can help you learn how to identify the market structure before the indicator would trigger a signal . This will help you understand why the signal is a lagged signal. If you understand that you can easily learn to look at the price action right before the signal and learn to watch for that price action on top of it almost trigging a signal so you can get in at a better position and assume less downside risk. I recommend using no more than 1-2 indicators for simplicity, but your free to use as many as you think you think you need or works for your strategy/trading style.
4. PSYCOLOGY. First, FOMO is real, don't feed the beast. When you trade you should always have an entry and exit. If you miss your entry do not chase it, wait for a new entry. At its core trading is gambling and your looking for an edge against the house (the other market participants). With that in mind, treat as such. Do not risk more than you can afford to lose. If you are afraid to lose it will negatively effect your trade decisions. Finally, be honest with your self and bad trading happens. No one is going to play trade cop and keep you in line, that's your job.
5. TRADE DECISION MARKING: Before you enter any trade you should have an entry and exit area. As you learn price action you will get better entries and better exits. Use a larger zone and stop loss at the start while learning. Then you can tighten it up as you gain experience. If you do not have a area you wish to exit, or you are entering because "the markets looking like its gonna go up". Do not enter the trade. Have a reason for everything you do, if you cannot logically explain why then you probably should not be doing it.
6. ROBOTS/ALGOS: Loved by some, hated by many who lost it all to one, and surrounded by scams on the internet. If you make your own, find a legit one that works and paid for it or lost it all on a crappy one, more power to ya. I do not use robots because I do not like having a robot in control of my money. There is too many edge cases for me to be ok with it.However, the best piece of advice about algos was that the guy had a algo/robot for each market condition (trending/ranging) and would make personalized versions of each for currency pairs as each one has its own personality and can make the same type of movement along side another currency pair but the price action can look way different or the move can be lagged or leading. So whenever he does his own analysis and he sees a trend, he turns the trend trading robot on. If the trend stops, and it starts to range he turns the range trading robot on. He uses robots to trade the market types that he is bad at trading. For example, I suck at trend trading because I just suck at sitting on my hands and letting my trade do its thing.

Trade the Trade - The Methodology

Base Principles These are the base principles I use behind "Trade the Trade". Its called that because you are technically trading inside your larger high time frame trade as it hopefully goes as you have analyzed with the trade setup. It allows you to scratch that intraday trading itch, while not being blind to the bigger market at play. It can help make sense of why the price respects, rejects or flat out ignores support/resistance/pivots.

1. Trade Setup: Find a trade setup using high level time frames (daily, 4hr, or 1hr time frames). The trade setup will be used as a base for starting to figure out a bias for the markets direction for that day.
2. Indicator Data: Check any indicators you use (I use Stochastic RSI and Relative Vigor Index) for any useful information on higher timeframes.
3. Support Resistance: See if any support/resistance/pivot points are in currently being tested/resisted by the price. Also check for any that are within reach so they might become in play through out the day throughout the day (which can influence your bias at least until the price reaches it if it was already moving that direction from previous days/weeks price action).
4. Currency Strength/Weakness: I use the TradeVision currency strength/weakness dashboard to see if the strength/weakness supports the narrative of my trade and as an early indicator when to keep a closer eye for signs of the price reversing.Without the tool, the same concept can be someone accomplished with fundamentals and checking for higher level trends and checking cross currency pairs for trends as well to indicate strength/weakness, ranging (and where it is in that range) or try to get some general bias from a higher level chart that may help you out. However, it wont help you intra day unless your monitoring the currency's index or a bunch of charts related to the currency.
5. Watch For Trading Opportunities: Personally I make a mental short list and alerts on TradingView of currency pairs that are close to key levels and so I get a notification if it reaches there so I can check it out. I am not against trading both directions, I just try to trade my bias before the market tries to commit to a direction. Then if I get out of that trade I will scalp against the trend of the day and hold trades longer that are with it.Then when you see a opportunity assume the directional bias you made up earlier (unless the market solidly confirms with price action the direction while waiting for an entry) by trying to look for additional confirmation via indicators, price action on support/resistances etc on the low level time frame or higher level ones like hourly/4hr as the day goes on when the price reaches key areas or makes new market structures to get a good spot to enter a trade in the direction of your bias.Then enter your trade and use the market structures to determine how much of a stop you need. Once your in the trade just monitor it and watch the price action/indicators/tools you use to see if its at risk of going against you. If you really believe the market wont reach your TP and looks like its going to turn against you, then close the trade. Don't just hold on to it for principle and let it draw down on principle or the hope it does not hit your stop loss.
6. Trade Duration Hold your trades as long or little as you want that fits your personality and trading style/trade analysis. Personally I do not hold trades past the end of the day (I do in some cases when a strong trend folds) and I do not hold trades over the weekends. My TP targets are always places I think it can reach within the day. Typically I try to be flat before I sleep and trade intra day price movements only. Just depends on the higher level outlook, I have to get in at really good prices for me to want to hold a trade and it has to be going strong. Then I will set a slightly aggressive stop on it before I leave. I do know several people that swing trade and hold trades for a long period of time. That is just not a trading style that works for me.

Enhance Your Success Rate Below is information I picked up over the years that helped me enhance my success rate with not only guessing intra day market bias (even if it has not broken into the trend for the day yet (aka pre London open when the end of Asia likes to act funny sometimes), but also with trading price action intra day.
People always say "When you enter a trade have an entry and exits. I am of the belief that most people do not have problem with the entry, its the exit. They either hold too long, or don't hold long enough. With the below tools, drawings, or instruments, hopefully you can increase your individual probability of a successful trade.
**P.S.*\* Your mileage will vary depending on your ability to correctly draw, implement and interpret the below items. They take time and practice to implement with a high degree of proficiency. If you have any questions about how to do that with anything listed, comment below and I will reply as I can. I don't want to answer the same question a million times in a pm.
Tools and Methods Used This is just a high level overview of what I use. Each one of the actions I could go way more in-depth on but I would be here for a week typing something up of I did that. So take the information as a base level understanding of how I use the method or tool. There is always nuance and edge cases that you learn from experience.

• Fundamentals
  • I keep a general high level Macro outlook for currencies. I dont get too deep into Fundamentals and just keep an eye out for news. If I am already in a trade I will hold it if its far enough away from my entry. However, I wont enter right before/during news as it can invalidate your setup.
• Price Action
  • I started with the basics of learning the standard price action formations/patterns and candles. You can find tons of free info on that online, google is your friend. Then I stared at charts and said "why did the price do that or do this etc" then after a while I started to understand what's happening without having to think about it and I can see the market structure without having to look as closely as I did in the past.
  • After many many hours of staring at 5 min charts for 15 hours a day 5 days a week I learned how to look at 5 min charts and be like "Oh that's a hammer on the 15 min etc. If you keep track of time you can do the same for hourly candles as well and you will start to see market structure naturally. However I typically trade in a two chart panel window so I have a 15 min and 5 min chart up when trading intra day so I dont have to think too hard about it.
• Support/Resistance Lines
  • Draw support resistance lines on Daily/4hr timeframes. I prefer to use body of the candle instead of the wick for support/resistance.
  • You can find support/resistance liquidity levels through out the day as well and trade those if the price retraces back through levels its already been through that same day.
  • It would be a bit length to explain exactly the best place to draw them. If your unsure there is plenty of free resources on the internet. Just try to use your head and look for price levels where the price was "Supported" or it "Resisted" that price level then slap a line on it. Draw as few or as many lines as you feel helps you and your style. I tend to lean on the side of fewer. I typically do about 6 lines main support/resistances (3 of each).
• Fibonacci Extensions
  • Draw two Fibonacci Extensions. One on the daily timeframe, and then one on the 4hr time frame. Then you can trade the Fibonacci levels and use them for TP targets or entry zones if price action respects the level. Also you can use it along with support/resistance and pivots if they happen to line up or are very close.
  • I cannot really figure out how to put it into words how to draw a Fib if you dont know how. I will have to make a picture to demonstrate it. If your interested post below and I will draw one up and post a link. Probably the easiest way to understand. Just keep in mind the Fib you draw on the 4hr time frame will be inside the daily timeframe one.
• Currency Strength/Weakness
  • The TradeVision2020 dashboard that I use just helps me keep a tab on the current market post plus any swing strength/momentum a currency might have on higher time frames. Helps me look for shifts in the market or confirmation that the bias it already has in momentum is continuing. I have found that often currencies when they get really/weak or strong might continue for several days or even longer like a full week or more. We recently had what felt like 1 week or so of flat out Yen weakness which was making some things wonky. All it does is allow me to look at the dashboard instead of a million other charts.
• Indicators
  • I use two that work well for my intra day style. The Stochastic RSI is just like a RSI but its faster. The second is the Relative Vigor Index which I use to detect swings in momentum and divergences in bullish/bearish momentum. I have used many others in the past, but as I have grown and got better as a trader I have found making my analysis simpler has improved my trading.I dont like the whole idea of have 43 different indicators on 32 different time frames light up a dashboard to be green for me to enter a trade. With how I do it now, I have a clear understanding of what I expect to happen and why. That way when it does happen I understand the move and dont get freaked out if the market moves funny after I am in the trade.

Conclusion
I use the above tools/indicators/resources/philosophy's to trade intra day price action that sometimes ends up as noise in the grand scheme of the markets movement.use that method until the price action for the day proves the bias assumption wrong. Also you can couple that with things like Stoch RSI + Relative Vigor Index to find divergences which can increase the probability of your targeted guesses.
​
Trade Example from Yesterday This is an example of a trade I took today and why I took it. I used the following core areas to make my trade decision.

• Fundamental Bias: I already had a bullish fundamental outlook on EUUSD with expecting the markets to price in future similes due a higher an higher chance of Biden winning on paper as the election closed in and a "Blue wave" coming which would lead to a weaker dollar. Also, the Euro Zone is getting hammered with COVID pretty hard plus Brexit drama so I had a strong Euro bias.NOTE: As frame of reference, all the other pairs I trade I traded as if they were ranging and trade a range. Markets are messed up right now.
• Currency Strength/Weakness: I use a tool that gives me a currency strength/weakness dashboard called TradeVision2020. Helps me track individual currency strength/weakness intra day. Took me about a month to get used to it, but helps me keep track of intra day strength/weakness that can add a bias to trade direction as the day unfolds. Like "Will this run have a 2nd or 3rd push higher" or "I should look to TP at the first sign of weakness in the push" type bias data. You still got to use your brain and figure out the best decision. It wont make choices for you, its only a guide.NOTE: I am not trying to adverse the tool (if providing the code is against sub rules let me know), its just a tool I use every day that helps me with directional bias calls. I am sharing the coupon code that was given to me when I found out about the tool in the TradingView forex chatroom and the guy gave me the code to use when I signed up. I dont want someone to read the name and want to try it out then overpay for no reason. The coupon will give you 40% off. Coupon Code: 3F7A0T5T
• Higher Timeframe Analysis: Detected some early signs of Bearish Divergence on the 1hr chart using a on a higher time frame using a Stochastic RSI. Then I saw more confirmation on 5 min charts using Relative Vigor Index to help time my entry mid session.
• Pivot Points: I treat pivot points like support/resistance and trade them as such using price action to give me some idea how its being treated by the market. Pretty straight forward.

It may seem like a lot of stuff to process on the fly while trying to figure out live price action but, for the fundamental bias for a pair should already baked in your mindset for any currency pair you trade. For the currency strength/weakness I stare at the dashboard 12-15 hours a day so I am always trying to keep a pulse on what's going or shifts so that's not really a factor when I want to enter as I would not look to enter if I felt the market was shifting against me. Then the higher timeframe analysis had already happened when I woke up, so it was a game of "Stare at the 5 min chart until the price does something interesting"
Trade Example: Today , I went long EUUSD long bias when I first looked at the chart after waking up around 9-10pm Eastern. Fortunately, the first large drop had already happened so I had a easy baseline price movement to work with. I then used tool for currency strength/weakness monitoring, Pivot Points, and bearish divergence detected using Stochastic RSI and Relative Vigor Index.
I first noticed Bearish Divergence on the 1hr time frame using the Stochastic RSI and got confirmation intra day on the 5 min time frame with the Relative Vigor Index. I ended up buying the second mini dip around midnight Eastern because it was already dancing along the pivot point that the price had been dancing along since the big drop below the pivot point and dipped below it and then shortly closed back above it. I put a stop loss below the first large dip. With a TP goal of the middle point pivot line
Then I waited for confirmation or invalidation of my trade. I ended up getting confirmation with Bearish Divergence from the second large dip so I tightened up my stop to below that smaller drip and waited for the London open. Not only was it not a lower low, I could see the divergence with the Relative Vigor Index.
It then ran into London and kept going with tons of momentum. Blew past my TP target so I let it run to see where the momentum stopped. Ended up TP'ing at the Pivot Point support/resistance above the middle pivot line.
Random Note: The Asian session has its own unique price action characteristics that happen regularly enough that you can easily trade them when they happen with high degrees of success. It takes time to learn them all and confidently trade them as its happening. If you trade Asia you should learn to recognize them as they can fake you out if you do not understand what's going on.
​
TL;DR At the end of the day there is no magic solution that just works. You have to find out what works for you and then what people say works for them. Test it out and see if it works for you or if you can adapt it to work for you. If it does not work or your just not interested then ignore it.
At the end of the day, you have to use your brain to make correct trading decisions. Blindly following indicators may work sometimes in certain market conditions, but trading with information you don't understand can burn you just as easily as help you. Its like playing with fire. So, get out there and grind it out. It will either click or it wont. Not everyone has the mindset or is capable of changing to be a successful trader. Trading is gambling, you do all this work to get a edge on the house. Trading without the edge or an edge you understand how to use will only leave your broker happy in the end.

Hi there guys,
Welcome back to my weekly rants. Decided to add some info that should be pretty useful to your daily trading, thanks to the comments of u/Neokill1 and u/indridcold91.
If you have not read the rest of the series, I recommend you take your time and read those before continuing with this piece (check my user activity and scroll down...)
This rant is based on this little comment I posted on the last post:
Price moves because of the imbalance between buying and selling. This happens all the time. Price move where liquidity is, and that seeking of liquidity makes the price to go up and down.
Why price extends on a particular direction? Because longer term players decide it.
So the idea behind what I'm writing about is to follow that longer-term trend, taking advantage of a counter-trend wave that is looking for intra-day liquidity. If I'm bullish on the week, I want to pair my buying with intra-day selling. Because I expect longer-term traders to push price by buying massively. And instead of riding a big wave, I want to ride that push and get out before it retraces.
And also answers to this: why for example would it make sense to draw support/resistance lines on a EUUSD chart? Why would anyone "support" the price of a spread? What are you predicting to happen by drawing those lines, that someone will exchange their currency there simply because it's the same price they exchanged it for in the past and that number is special to them?
A good question that deserves an answer
That question is a pretty good one, and one any trader worth of that name should ask himself why. Why price reacts the way it does? Why price behaves in predetermined ways? Why if I draw a line or area on specific candle places, I expect the price to react?
And the answer is simple and at the same time kinda complicated and fascinating. Why price rallies and rallies andd rallies and then suddenly it stops at a point ,and reverses? . The answer is , because there are sellers at that point. There is liquidity there. There is people at that point that decided it was worth to sell enough to reverse that rally.
All the market does is to put together buyers and sellers. If you want to buy something at some price, someone must agree with you. If no ones agrees, then you will have to offer more. When buyers and sellers agree on similar terms, price is stable. Buying and selling happens on a tight range, because both consider that particular price range worth.
But then, perhaps, someone wants to buy big. And there are not enough sellers. This big boy will dry the available liquidity , and it is hungry for more. So price will move from a balanced state to an imbalanced state. This imbalance in volume between buyers and sellers will cause the price to move up, taking all available liquidity till the monster is satiated. Then the exhaustion of bids, or buying, will cause the price to reverse to a point where buying interest is back.
The same applies for selling activity. The main take away you should get from this is simply that the market keeps moving from balance to imbalance to balance to imbalance all the time. And the points where the big bois deploy this activity of buying , of selling, of protecting levels, of slowly entering the markets, are mostly predetermined. Surprised? Most of the institutional activity happens at : 00 ,20, 50 and 80 levels.
So why drawing a line makes sense? It makes sense because when price stalls at some point, is because sellers or buyers stepped in and stopped the movement. Its a level where something interesting is happening.
It's a level where liquidity was present, and the question is, what is going to happen the next time price touches the area? Is someone stepping in to buy or sell at this point? Or perharps the first touch dried the liquidity, and there is nothing preventing price from going up again??
Lets see a real example of a trade I took today on GBPUSD, where I analyze step by step the balance and imbalance of the market liquidity in real time at those levels. The only way to see this is usingfutures. Because forex is a decentralized market and blah blah blah, and futures are centralized so you can see the volume, the limit orders through the DOM and blah blah blah....
So first things first, read well this articule : https://optimusfutures.com/tradeblog/archives/order-flow-trading
Understand well what is said there. Take it easy. Take your time. And then come back to me.
If you have followed my work, you know how I like to ride the market. I want a retracement on the most liquid moment in the market - the NY-London Overlap, and I need a daily BIAS on the pair.
For today, I'm bullish on the GBPUSD.
So lets check the pics.
https://imgur.com/a/kgev9lT
The areas you see marked on the 30 min charts are based on the price relationships that happened last Friday. As you can see, those areas are always in a place where price stalled, retraced, pushed through,came back to the area and reacted in some way. Are those black magic? Why price reacts so smoothly today on them? Ah you Criptochihuahua, this is 20/20 insight, you are lying....
Those points are marked before today's open, simply because of the price relationship I described earlier. And if you remember the earlier rant, price stalls in there because sellers or buyers were present.
So I would expect that the levels are still interesting, and we should be watching carefully how price reacts in real time.
Now, today I got at 1.2680 and got out at 1.2725. Let's check the 2nd pic, keep following the narrative with your own charts.
What you are seeing is the first touch at the big figure with the total volume chart, and the bid/ask order flow chart. You can see how the price is pulled toward that level through the exhaustion of offers being filled. You can see how exactly they are depleted at 15:51. Why? Because at the next min, you can see how there are no offers being filled, compared to the bids.
Remember, when offers are getting filled , price pulls up. When the bids are predominantly being filled, price is pulled down.
And also take a look on the volume. This is key. If an imbalance is to happen, is because there should be a huge difference between bids and asks. Good volume on such a level, good sign. Price hugging the level without good volume, the level will most likely be broken.
Look at the next pic. See the price behavior in combination with the volume? Price is hugging the level on low volume. Great signal. That means the level is not that greatly defended, at this point.
What are we looking for? We are looking for the bids to be exhausted at our next level with a good volume reaction. Watch what happens.
Next pic is our retracement , and we are watching carefully. And look at that beauty. Do you see the volume? Do you see the bids exhaustion? Do you see how the market orders are getting absorbed by the limit orders at that point? Someone does not want the price to go down. Price jumps as a result. It does not huge the level. Do you see? I'm all in, I want to take part of this trade.
But wait, there is more.... look at the next pic, because you yet have another opportunity to get into this train.... at 17:23.. Even a bigger reaction, while on the other side.... we got more hugging...
No more pics for today. You see what happens next. The level gets broken and price rallies to take the previous day high. Trade was a success.
So I hope this added some value, and explained why drawing lines is useful, and how levels are indeed defended.
P.S - I lied: Extra Pic, you got a VWAP chart with Standard Deviations. You can see how the pullback nicely fits in our long framework as well and adds confluence to the trade. Research about this :)

Let me just sum some stuff up for you newbies out there. Ive been trading for years, last couple of years more seriously and i turned my strategies into algorithms and i am currently up to 18 algorithms thats trading for me 24/7. Ive learned alot, listened to hundreds of podcasts and read tons of books + research papers and heres some tips and tricks for any newbie out there.
​

1. Strategy - How to... When people say "you need a trading strategy!!" Its because trading is very hard and emotional. You need to stick to your rules at all times. Dont panic and move your stop loss or target unless your rules tell you to. Now how do you make these rules? Well this is the part that takes alot of time. If your rules are very simple (for example: "Buy if Last candles low was the lowest low of the past 10 candles." Lets make this a rule. You can backtest it manually by looking at a chart and going back in time and check every candle. or you can code it using super simple software like prorealtime, MT4 ++ Alot of software is basicly "click and drag" and press a button and it gives you backtest from 10-20-30 years ago in 5 seconds. This is the absolute easiest way to backtest rules and systems. If your trading "pure price action" with your drawn lines and shit, the only way to truly backtest that kind of trading is going in a random forex pair to a random point in time, could be 1 year ago, 1 month ago, 5 years ago.. and then you just trade! Move chart 1 candle at a time, draw your lines and do some "actual trading" and look at your results after moving forward in the chart. If you do not test your strategy your just going in blind, which could be disaster.. Maybe someone told u "this is the correct way to trade" or "this strategy is 90% sure to win every trade!!!" If you think you can do trading without a strategy, then your most likely going to look back at an empty account and wonder why you moved that stop loss or why you didnt take profit etc.. and then your gonna give up. People on youtube, forums, interwebz are not going to give you/sell you a working strategy thats gonna make you rich. If they had a working strategy, they would not give it away/sell it to you.
2. Money management - How to.... Gonna keep this one short. Risk a small % of your capital on each trade. Dont risk 10%, dont risk 20%. You are going to see loosing trades, your probably gonna see 5-10 loss in a row!! If your trading a 1000$ account and your risking 100$ on each trade (10%) and you loose 5 in a row, your down -50% and probably you cant even trade cus of margin req. Game over.. Now how does one get super rich, super fast, from risking 1-3% of your account on each trade?? Well heres the shocking message: YOU CANT GET RICH FAST FROM TRADING UNLESS YOUR WILLING TO GO ALL IN! You can of course go all in on each trade and if you get em all right, you might get 1000%, then you go all in 1 more time and loose it all... The whole point of trading is NOT going bust. Not loosing everything, cus if you loose it all its game over and no more trading for you.
3. Find your own trading style.... Everyone is different. You can have an average holding period of 1 month or you could be looking at a 1 min chart and average holding time = 10 minutes. For some, less volatility helps them sleep at night. For others, more volatility gives them a rush and some people crave this. There is no "correct" timeframes, or holding periods, or how much to profit or how much to loose. We are all individuals with different taste in risk. Some dont like risk, others wanna go all in to get rich over night. The smart approach is somewhere in the middle. If you dont risk anything, your not gonna get anything. If you risk everything, your most likely going to loose everything. When people are talking about trading style, this is kinda what that means.
4. There are mainly 2 ways to trade: Divergence and Convergence. Or in other words: Mean reversion or trend following. Lets talk about them both: Trend following is trying to find a trend and stay with the trend until its over. Mean reversion is the belief that price is too far away from the average XX of price, and sooner or later, price will have to return to its average/mean (hence the name: MEAN reversion). Trend following systems usually see a lower winrate (30-40% winrate with no money management is not uncommon to see when backtesting trend following systems.. You can add good money management to get the winrate % higher. Why is the % winrate so low? Well a market, whatever that market is, tend to get real choppy and nasty right after a huge trend. So your gonna see alot of choppy fake signals that might kill 5-6 trades in a row, until the next huge trend starts which is going to cover all the losses from the small losses before the trend took off. Then you gotta hold that trade until trade is done. How do you define "when trend starts and stops"? Well thats back to point 1, find a strategy. Try defining rules for an entry and exit and see how it goes when you backtest it. For mean reversion the win % is usually high, like 70-90% winrate, but the average winning trade is alot smaller than the average loosing trade. this happens because you are basicly trying to catch a falling knife, or catch a booming rocket. Usually when trading mean reversion, waiting for price to actually reverse can very often leave you with being "too late", so you kinda have to find "the bottom" or "the top" before it actually has bottomed/ topped out and reversed. How can you do this you ask? Well your never going to hit every top or every bottom, but you can find ways to find "the bottom-ish" or "the top-ish", thens ell as soon as price reverts back to the mean. Sometimes your gonna wish you held on to the trade for longer, but again, back to point 1: Backtest your rules and figure that shit out.

​
Read these 4 points and try to follow them and you are at least 4 steps closer to being a profitable trader. Some might disagree with me on some points but i think for the majority, people are going to agree that these 4 points are pretty much universal. Most traders have done or are doing these things every day, in every trade.
Here is some GREAT material to read: Kevin Davey has won trading championship multiple times and he has written multiple great books, from beginner to advanced level. Recommend these books 100%, for example: Building winning algorithmic trading systems" will give you alot to work with when it comes to all 4 of the above points. Market wizards, Reminiscences of a stock operator are 2 books that are a great read but wont give you much "trading knowledge" that you can directly use for your trading. Books on "The turtles" are great reading. Then you have podcasts and youtube. I would stay away from youtube as much as possible when it comes to "Heres how to use the rsi!!!" or "this strategy will make you rich!!". Most youtube videoes are made by people who wanna sell you a course or a book. Most of this is just pure bullshit. Youtube can very harmfull and i would honestly advice about going there for "strategy adivce" and such. Podcasts tho are amazing, i highly recommend: Better systems trader, Chat with traders, Top traders unplugged, We study billionairs, to name a few :)
Also, on a less funny note.. Please realize that you are, and i am, real fucking stupid and lazy compared to the actual pro's out there. This is why you should not go "all in" on some blind stupid strategy youve heard about. This is why this is indeed VERY FUCKING HARD and most, if not everyone has busted an account or two before realizing just this. Your dumb.. your not going to be super rich within 1 year.. You can not start with 500$ account and make millions! (some might have been able to do this, but know that for every winner, theres 999 loosers behind him that failed... Might work fine first 5 trades, then 1 fuckup tho and ur gone..
And lastly: Try using a backtesting software. Its often FREE!!! (on a demo account) and often so simple a baby could use it. If your trading lines and such there exists web broweser "games" and softwares that lets you go "1 and 1 candle ahead" in random forex pairs and that lets you trade as if its "real" as it goes.
A big backtesting trap however is backtesting "losely" by just drawing lines and looking at chart going "oh i would have taken this trade FOR SURE!! I would have made so much money!!" however this is not actually backtesting, its cherry picking and its biased beyond the grave, and its going to hurt you. Try going 1 candle at a time doing "real and live" trades and see how it goes.
​
Bonus point!!
many people misunderstands what indicators like the RSI is telling you. Indeed something is "overbought" or "oversold" but only compared to the last average of xx amounts of bars/candles.
It doesn't tell you that RIGHT NOW is a great time to sell or buy. It only tells you that the math formula that is RSI, gives you a number between 1-100, and when its above 70 its telling you that momentum is up compared to the last average 14 candles. This is not a complete buy/sell signal. Its more like a filter if anything. This is true for MOST indicators. They INDICATE stuff. Dont use them as pure buy/sell signals.. At least backtest that shit first! Your probably gonna be shocked at the shitty results if you "buy wehn rsi is undeer 30 and sell when RSI is above 70".
​
Editedit: Huge post already, why not copy paste my comment with an example showing the difference in trend following vs mean reversion:
The thing about trend following is that we never know when a trade starts and when it ends. So what often happens is that you have to buy every breakout going up, but not every breakout is a new trend. Lets do an example. Check out the photo i included here: https://imageshost.eu/image/image.RcC
​
THE PHOTO IS JUST AN EXAMPLE THAT SHOWS WHY A TYPICAL TREND FOLLOWING STRATEGY HAVE A "LOW" WINRATE.
THE PHOTO IS NOT SHOWING AN EXAMPLE OF MY STRATEGIES OR TRADING.
​

1. We identify the big orange trend up.
2. We see the big break down (marked with the vertical red line) this is telling us we are not going higher just yet. Our upwards trend is broken. However we might continue going up in a new trend, but when will that trend come?
3. We can draw the blue trend very earyly using highs and lows, lines up and down. Then we begin to look for breakouts of the upper blue line. So every time price breaks upper blue line we have to buy (cus how else are we going to "catch the next trend going up?)

As you can see we get 5 false breakouts before the real breakout happens!
Now if you could tell fake breakouts from real breakouts, your gonna be rich hehe. For everyone else: Take every signal you can get, put a "tight" stop loss so in case its a fake signal you only loose a little bit. Then when breakout happens as you can clearly see in chart, your going to make back all the small losses.
So in this example we fail 5 times, but get 1 HUGE new trend going further up. This 1 huge trade, unless we fuck it up and take profits too early or shit like that, is going to win back all those small losses + more.
This is why trend following has a low winrate. You get 5 small loss and 1 big win.
​
Now lets flip this! Imagine if your trading Mean reversion on all the same red arrows! So every time price hits the blue line, we go short back to the bottom (or middle) again! You would have won 5 trades with small profits, but on that last one you would get stopped out so hard. Meaning 5 small wins, 1 big loss (as some have pointed out in comments, if you where trading mean reverting you would wanna buy the lows as well as short the tops - photo was suppose to show why trend following strategies have a lower % winrate.)
​
Final edit: sorry this looks like a wall of text on ur phones.

1. Fees affecting my decisions
If my target is 1.5%/1% P/L. Should I keep my position in most cases untill one or the other happens? I had many opportunities to sell on 0.3-0.5% profit but I'm trading crypto and maker fees would put me on breakeven slight loss or profit that doesn't really justify the risk taken or even if I want to take what i'm given I still wait for the confirmation candle and by the time it closes my profit potential is gone. Feels like i'm missing out on many opportunities to make a number of small trades while waiting for larger increase. So I keep the position and couple times already that resulted in stop loss. That I know I could avoid
I also wonder are fees just as brutal on forex market? On kraken maker pays 0.016% + 0.002% for margin call. I don't trade with much, only $600 i don't expect to make money, best I hope for is to break even but those crypto trading fees really make it confusing to see If I'm making any progress at all
2. Review of my trades
I'm completely new to this my plan is to document my trades and ask people what i could do better.
overall look at a chart: https://i.imgur.com/bOe0tzZ.png
closer look: https://i.imgur.com/MCjLLy7.png

1. With my first trade (very left of the chart) I went against the trend which at the time seemed like a good idea. But I was trying to predict breakup based on macd and a gut feeling telling me that ETH is oversold. So in the end I decided to sell as soon as price allowed me to cover the fees. Unfortunely breakup eventually did happen. I'm not sure what my risk there was honestly. On average I'm guessing it was a correct idea to sell rather than hope especially when chart keeps on going down with no sign of stopping
   
2. Next trade is a short. This time I decided to draw trend lines based on 3 min chart. (Did I draw trend lines correctly?) Again this might have been a bad idea but it at the time i felt like galaxy brain move. I saw resistance later I honestly wanted to sell at that time. I would make like 0.40% but I had fees on my mind and decided to wait. This time stop loss at 1% was triggered. :(
   
3. https://i.imgur.com/kmNWSlP.png With that trade I admit I was a little bit tiled I knew i could avoid my previous loss. I drew new upper trend line based on 15 min chart (again, did I draw it correctly?) and decided to short again. One youtuber I watch says that every reaction is an overeaction so my guess was that it's unlikely for price to hit new high. At the moment of writng this this position is at +0.53% P/L. I feel like I should keep this position I plan to sell it once price is near bottom line. Because I've read that once chart breaks through the resistance line, that line is most likely to become a new support
   

Hi, so I am writing this not to tell you a magic strategy or specific way to win in the market, but I do want to state making money on forex doesn't come down to just simply a few indicators and resistance...
​
I Started trading in the US Stock market for about 4-5 Months and I lost around 1500 dollars trading which was what I was willing to lose financially. I then took a break for about a week, but my slight addiction and determination brought me back to the market, but I knew the US Stock market wasn't for me so I switched to Forex.
My journey in Forex went a lot better than before and I ended up making around 600 dollars within my first few weeks, but I was then met with the few mistakes of not looking at larger time frames for patterns and also refusing to take a loss which took about 1000 dollars away from me once again.
At this point and time, I was frustrated and was on the edge of giving up so I took a week-long break once again. I then started trading with 300 dollars so I didn't lose too much money but I could also make trading worthwhile if I did win. Once again I lost 100 dollars.
Around this point, I began to develop some skills of patience and I made around 75 dollars which was great when compared to my account size and position sizes. I was finally consistent for more than 2 weeks, and I thought I was ready to start making some real money. I went ahead and deposited 4000 dollars and started trading larger position sizes.
I immediately lost 1200 dollars within a week with two bad trades that I let run way too long.
​
This is when everything changed...
​
I began to notice something unusually similar in Forex, it moves in a specific direction and almost always begins to form some kind of pattern. Short term patterns on a 30 min chart are based and leading up to the 4 hour and daily chart patterns. Despite having a bull flag on the 30-minute time frame, the 4-hour chart was showing a bear flag formation.
My point being is depending on your style, I would highly recommend trading based on the higher time frames, It makes it a lot easier to find your perfect exact entry points. You can even day trade the patterns leading up to the bigger move if you want to catch some smaller profits throughout the day which is what I do before the big move.
I know this is long, but here is what I learned ... The charts never lie, and every move happens for a reason. Trust the trend and patterns and use technical analysis and also the news to determine if the market will continue a move or if the move will go in the opposite direction of a breakout.
Use indicators to prove that you're on the right side of the market & Please be Patient!! If you are right on the movement of the stock, It will move to your exact entry point, If it doesn't then you know you are wrong and you need to re-analyze the charts. Don't let your emotions get the best of you!
If you get an entry point and it moves against you showing it is not following your pattern, then get out and take the loss because you were wrong. Don't be afraid to take a loss it will help you make more money in the long run.
​
Anyways this is my story. I am happy to say I have made my 4000 dollar account back to where I started... 4000$. Which were 1200 dollars in 2 weeks. Have I made more money yet, no I haven't, but I have full faith in myself now and I am for sure positive I will be making the money I have been working my ass off for 8 months.
A few other tips:
1.) Don't focus on the money, focus on the exit point.
2.) Play it safe by putting your fill price at a guaranteed price level.
3.) USE CHANNELS!! I can not repeat how using channels is so useful. It enables you to find entry and exit points.
4.) Begin to understand price action and candle patterns to confirm your trade or tell you something is going wrong.
5.) Keep practicing, and know you are going to fail when starting out.
6.) Size your positions accordingly, maybe use larger sizes on the big move, but use smaller sizes on the moves leading up to it.
7.) Keep practicing!!
​
I would also like to note, I don't care if you believe me or not, but I know what I am doing is working and if you want to use anything I have learned to benefit you please do, if not fine with me.
​
Keep Trading!

Hi all. Being new on Reddit I see beginning traders asking many questions that I did before I began trading, as I'm sure we all asked. I just wanted to share my technical setups and would love others to share as well. As any full time trader could tell you, if you don't have set rules to trade by, and emotionally trade you will lose. What I'm going to share doesn't account for sticking to my personal rules of trading, and this is something you can only learn with practice. It goes without saying, but never just jump right into any strategy without practicing first. Most trading softwares should have a live realtime practice version.
Onto the technicals:
I only trade using BollingerBands, SMA (Simple Moving Average) and Pivot Points. I'm using TDAmeritrade Think or Swim, but any trading software will have these technicals. You can also use these settings for short term day trading (I like 5 and 10 min time frames) daily, weekly, monthly trading, etc. Without outlining my settings in text I have uploaded all images of my settings for BollingerBands, Pivots, and SMA to an imgur album here [http://imgur.com/a/0bRJh]. I've also added images of this strategy working on different time frames, with stocks, futures, and forex because we all trade different items. Even 2 from today trading Platinum and Silver...Silver was good today!!
The Strategy I Use:
1st - Only buy when price action is above the pivot point (midline/pink line) on the charts I've uploaded, for those that don't know what pivot points are. Conversely, only sell when price action is below the pivot point.
2nd - Buy when price action is above the pivot, the SMA crosses above the BollingerBand midline, and price closes above the midline as well.
3rd - Sell when price action is below the pivot, the SMA crosses below the BollingerBand midline, and price closes below the midline as well.
When to cover or sell for profit?
You want to let your runners run and dump the losers asap, but how? When day trading I personally use the pivot points as target price goals. If I buy just over the pivot point, I'll let price run to R1 (first red line) or try to let it, then watch price action. If price moves and closes above R1, I may hold until R2 and so on. I also watch price as it pertains to the BollingerBands, if price breaks outside the BollingerBand I'll watch closely and may sell depending on the next candle. This is where your personal rules come in. If you get hung up by how much money you NEED to make it could be bad. Be more concerned with watching price action, candles, etc. You'll never hit the total price move.
It goes without saying, but when you are shorting just do the opposite of the above.
Also, people like even numbers, maybe even machines do. If a stock is at $24.35 and moving up, human psychology may tend to let this run up to $25. Not a given, just something to think about.
My longer term daily, weekly, monthly, snapshot images of stocks, futures, forex doesn't show the pivots, but you can just change the pivot point "day setting" to weekly, etc to see them.
Lastly, get out of the trade on the buy side when the SMA and price closes below the BB midline, and on the short side when the SMA and price closes above the BB midline. Don't be eager to just jump right into the next trade. Stick to your own rules and be patient for the right setups. I hope this has helped any new trader save time and narrow your focus. Good luck and I look forward to everyone's feedback and personal technical strategies.

A recent comment by lazycroco captured well the spirit of something that I have been exploring of late. For those who missed the comment, it was in relation to a question about trading the M1/M5 timescale.

The only thing working in this timeframe is explicit trading: knowing the market inside out, knowing the relevant levels, seeing when price wins levels, when it fails levels etc. That however is the Königsdisziplin of trading and takes lot of effort to master. Plus I doubt anybody would teach it.

from here.
("Königsdisziplin" as best as I can tell translates to "supreme discipline", please correct me if I'm wrong)
Whilst many traders are superficially happy to abandon the idea that there is any "holy grail" of trading that "solves" the market, I feel like many advanced beginner and intermediate price action oriented traders replace the search for the holy grail with something similar to the search for lazycroco's Königsdisziplin concept.
Additionally, you'll see experienced long term traders hint at these ideas, whether explicitly, or indirectly by talking about the necessity of mammoth amounts of chart time to develop the 'feel' for the market.
In either case, there is a marked lack of detail when it comes to trying to tease out what does (or might go into) the process of developing, refining and then consistently implementing these abilities.
What are your thoughts?