I attempted a long on Oil 15min which I got stopped on within about 10 minutes. I only risked half the usual amount on this with the previous loss in mind.  Which is just as well really.

I thought the test was testing the high of the highest volume zone today. I entered on the high and my stop was just below the low of the test bar. Technically speaking I shouldn't have been stopped out, but I got caught out on the stupid spreads. Which can be a bit large with a spread betting company. Didn't think to allow for that. 

Oil 15min

From +3.4% for the week to -1.15% for the week in the space of a day. Not happy with today and i'm not taking it too well either.

A great week turns into an entirely average week. And a great month turns into an ok month on the last trading day.

Tried a buy on EUR/USD today and got stopped out pretty swiftly. All info annotated on the chart. It was mentioned to me by a friend that the spike in volume during the Asian session is controlling things at the moment. I was aware of this spike but thought that the volume I marked later in the day had taken over this area, obviously not! 

EUR/USD 15min

Updates have been a little slow this week, apologies! I was working job no.2 yesterday morning so I didn't get much chart time in, let alone any trades. 

Just a quick update to highlight a zone i'm keeping an eye on for today. It has been important since the push through supply on Monday. I was looking for a short this morning based on the volume from 8:45 - 9:00 but unfortunately didn't get an entry and just now we pushed through again, but from above this time. This is also on huge volume so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out for the rest of the day. Whether the market is shaking out the weak holders or absorbing for more downside.

EUR/USD 15min

Nothing to report from yesterday, a lot of movement for a Monday, more announcements than usual probably contributed to this, either way, no trade!

Closed an EU sell not long ago for a nice profit, 3.48% added to my account.

Entry was based on the 15min chart this time around. We had a bounce from yesterday's highest volume hourly bar (upper green line) this morning and this resulted in a widespread bar with a volume increase. Considering the volume to the left of the chart this wasn't a massive increase in volume, but enough to bring in some selling with the following 4 bars printing down. We had a small retrace on No Demand / No Buying Pressure and this hit the 50% to the pip. I shorted the low of this bar with a tight stop above the high for a change. Entry @ 1.3354, stop @ 1.3368.

1:1 target (1.3340) was hit on the first half with the wide-ish spread through the low of the fib zone. I moved the second half of the trade to BE+1 (1.3353) once this happened. Bar B made me do two things, this hit 1.3326 so I moved my stop down (1.3340) again, locking in 1:1 on the second half. But it also closed on the high forming a pin type bar. As we had a lot of potential strength in this area with three fib zones converging I decided to close. Regretted it a bit when the next bar pushed down, but this didn't hit the next target and pushed up and would've hit my stop at 3340. So I actually gained a bit more by closing after the pin instead of letting the market take me out as I was supposed to according to my plan. 

EUR/USD 15min 

If it had kept going down i'd be a tad annoyed with myself for not following my plan to the letter. But by not following the exit rules, I actually made more money. The entry and managing during was perfect, but the exit wasn't. In this instance It was a good thing. 

I'm confused! Should I be happy or does this indicate a flaw in the logic of my strategy?

I have a line in my strategy; "only close out if a really obvious countermanding signal shows on the charts" I guess I considered bar B to be countermanding so this warranted a close. Perhaps I should further define "really obvious" as this is a bit of a loose term.

Anywho, happy with the result and gains on my account. On to the next one!

Finished the week on a high note with a short on EU. Hit 1:1 on the first half of the trade with the second half getting stopped at BE+1.

As usual I took my high volume zone from the 15min chart. This corresponds with a high volume spike on the 5min chart, marked at A. We had a small push out of this zone but this was also on high volume with no follow through to the upside so I took this as weakness as well. We pushed down back into the 15min zone and printed a nice narrow spread No Demand bar with the volume the lowest in over two hours. Set my order just below the low and I was taken in on the following bar. I had my stop just above the high of the zone. 27pips away in total. 

EUR/USD 5min

Once again i'm happy with this trade as I didn't let my emotions get the better of me, even with a bounce from the low of the zone and a revisit to the 50% area, i didn't panic and go to close the trade, I stuck with my original analysis and reached 1:1 just as it pushed down to the green fib (high of Thursday's 1hr zone).

I'm still toying with the idea of taking 1:1 on the first half and letting the second half trail. It has it's pros and cons. A couple of times this year I've had it hit 1:1, gain 1.5% and then the second half retraces and stops at BE+1, leaving that other 1.5% on the table. Then on the other hand it has worked great to trail my stop and get some bigger wins.

Anyway, I made 1.67% on this trade as my broker was kind enough to allow 2 pips slippage in my favour when it the 1:1 mark! Made 1.75% total this week including the small gain on Thursday. 3 profitable weeks in a row, quite happy with how it's going. Next week is the last week of working different hours at job no.2 so I'll be back to normal trading hours for the first week of April, which i'm looking forward to!

That's it for now,

Have a good weekend everyone!