Feb 28 daily chart

First off let me say that the media is full of BS when it comes to what really happens in the stock market. CNBC is doing it again today (I listen to CNBC in the background). What do I mean? Bob pisani, saying that Bernanke moved the market up this morning. Bernanke didn't move anything, it was weak short covering both in equities and bonds that occured before bernanke even sat down. Now we have Bill Griffeth saying that yesterdays 500+pt drop on the dow was due to a computer glitch. PLEASE get the facts straight! YM had no discrepancies in price. When YM was down 400+ pts, DJI was only down 280pts according to CNBC. What really happened was that retail traders were getting burnt to smetherings from forced margin calls yesterday, which added to the fire, and resulted in the huge drop. I remember watching CNBC's fast money this last weekend were the head retail trader said to sell radioshack before earnings, nice call,,not.(RSH was up 18% after earnings).

I traded on the simulator today because I'm working on my trade execution, although I wish I was trading with my real account, I need the practice. There will always be another day to trade, but right now I need to hone my execution skills. I've had to switch back to trading off of the ER2 chart because my IWM tick chart looks scattered.
Today we had several AMEX tick reversals, first a -100 amex tick reversal and then a 100 and 200 tick reversal all at the key reversal points of the morning. I'm seeing a new trading pattern, which is if we get program trading at 9:45am est, and then we later reverse above/below that level within the next 30min, then look to go with the reversal. I need to get rid of some of my charts on my monitors to speed up the CPU's processing or get a better computer because my computer is not running efficiently enough for the volatility that the markets are showing right now.

Here's the morning chart with my drawn in trendlines and red block trade signals. I've refined my NYSE TICK chart with a new filter for volatility spike reversals using bollinger bands and starc bands overlayed.



I traded my regular size and did good on the simulator today, about 2-3 losing trades that were cut at 0.7pt losses, and some good winners with size. I missed the short covering rally to 798 because I left the room, but I got some good action and I'm pleased with my trades for the day. I need more work on incorporating the TICK volatility signals with block trade signals.

P/L on simulator=$~1300

HOLY CRAP Feb 27 daily chart

Well, I traded today, terribly to say the least, but still positive. I kept my composure and ended with the same profit as yesterday, kinda weird. I wasn't use to the volatility and found myself adding to losers, good thing I was right about holding on to some of my trades. I really need to work on just exiting a trade if it doesn't go my way within a few seconds after I enter. Maybe I should make as many trades a day as I can to get more experience like Dr. Steenbarger talks about in his book to advance my skill level, of course I would be doing this on the simulator until I get better. I really want to trade tommorow from the increase in volatility, but I realize at this point that I'm missing something to my trading that makes me the mediocre trader that I am. I'm missing the big picture and the skill to cut losers in seconds after entering them if need be. I should never be in a position that is more than 1.4pts against me when trading ER2, not even 0.7pts. The hardest thing for a trader is having a profit for the day and then going negative. You will fight back as best you can, but sometimes you just aren't on your game and you can self destruct if you don't set yourself with a risk limit for the day.

I have a feeling to go long, call me crazy, after the dow drops 500pts intraday, who would want to go long? I'm looking at crude oil, and its at where it opened for the day after spiking up 2 dollars intraday. If your good at trading then these times are golden. Why am I thinking to go long? Well, tell me why oil is not up and why gold sold off today? Bonds sold off all day today and the VIX looks like a ramp that evil kenivel would ride his motorcycle off of to the moon! I've been watching the relationship between oil, gold, bonds, and certain etfs, and I'm begining to think that there may be better strategy for me to trade than trading index futures. Right now, the problem is time, and getting experience to test my ideas. I need to write out a goal for what I want and I need to accomplish one goal at a time and move on to the next. I need an organized setup to my research and I need real time experience in order execution for scalping profits.

World market plunge

CNBC video of the markets dive.

Market Profile Research

I need to do research on the probability of ER2 trading into its previous days POC, and also look closer at scenarios of when we have gaps to see if there is a higher probability of trading into the previous days POC when there are opening gaps.
Here is an interesting idea to trading the market open using market profile.

Volume Profile works, but my computer doesn't

If your read my post on saturday, you knew what I was planning for today to have happen. I initially saw the volume gap between 824-819 on Feb 20th as noted in my jorunal, and I've been keeping a close eye on it. ER2 hit 819.1 around 1pm EST. Although I predicted what the market was going to do today I was timid to short the VAH on ER2 this morning. I have to admit, it was the ideal setup for the professional traders to inflate the market this morning with a gap up, putting YM right at the 38% fib level for my planned short. The initial 30min of trading I normally avoid because I'm normally still trying to figure out the markets direction. Today I lacked confidence in my execution of trades although I kept to my trading plan of shorting the market down to 819 and remained postive. I had computer hardware problems this morning, having my IWM tick chart stop working(which is the main chart I trade off of) and my internet connection went out 4 times this morning. For some reason my computer is running super slow right now and it is popping up with the message that my virtual memory is too low. My charts kept freezing today, so I'm stopping trading and taking the profit I got until I can figure out how to make my computer work right. I'm pretty sure it's from running too many charts at once(I have about 25 charts up, I'm thinking about getting rid of A/D and Volume market internal charts to free some space, as I rarely use them) I saw that 828 was a good short, however I was timid. The first trade of the day is always hardest for me because it could be a good trade, but I will often put a stop that is too close or once I get a small profit I trail the price too close, only to be stopped out and watch the price continue my direction. Today I bought the LOD again for the 3rd day in a row(it was the LOD when I stopped trading, also I just noticed it was an AMEX -100 tick reversal setup!), I took the trade this time on YM because I wanted to take less risk; however, I did it again. Once I had a profit of 1 tick, I trailed the stop and got hit, only to see 3 minutes later 10pts in my direction(If the trade was on ER2 it would have worked better, I'm begining to think I should stop trading YM altogether). So, my plan is to keep the initial stop and give the trade 6-8 minutes to move, or use my own discretion and exit if I feel the NSYE TICK doesn't favor my position. This weekend I was thinking about trading all day and what I was going to do. Today I made 1 bad trade by shorting ER2 when the NYSE TICK was in the low range and I didn't exit the trade soon enough, instead of -0.2pts, I let the trade run -0.8pts, this is all because I got greedy and tried chasing the trade instead of waiting for shorting on a pullback. This past week I've been getting better at exiting my losers by using NYSE TICK. Also, what has been helpful for me in determining market reversals is by watching VOLUME in USO, SMH, XLB, and most importantly this past week XLF.



Here's the daily chart:

What do OIL, GOLD, and TECHNOLOGY STOCK's have in common?

Teacher: Attention class!!
Pull up a USO and GLD chart and put on your pointer-tracking device students.
Can anyone tell me who leads between the pair?


Student-USO?
Teacher-Yes Billie, you are correct for this particular day, however this is not always the case. For the purpose of this exercise I want you all to recognize the positive correlation between these two commodities.

Teacher: Now class, pull up SMH and tell me what you see between USO and SMH?


Student: Is SMH,,,,like,,the opposite of USO or something??
Teacher: Well Suzie, you have a very kean observation, although USO is an oil ETF and SMH is a semiconductor ETF, they behave with a very noticable negative correlation during certain times of the day; moreover, correlations between pairs and anit-pairs is seen best when volatility and volume are high, particulary in the first 2 hours of trading.

Teacher: Class, we will pick up on this subject next week with a further indepth look at these pairs and how to spot signs of reversals using volume analysis. Also, we may look at how USO and SMH's anti-correlation can be an indicator for reversal signs when trading NQ.

Feb 26 week outlook.

Well one of my fib setups is buying a 38% retrace and that is exactly the level that ER2 has been holding this last week, however there is something interesting happening in YM. YM has retraced down to its 61.8% fib level, which is in my opinion bearish if YM cannout bounce through 38% retrace level. ER2 and NQ have been laggers to the downside this past week with YM and ES leading, so I will keep a close eye on weakness in these 2 indices as well as SMH and XLF as a bearish indication for ER2 to take out its volume gap and to hit 819 and possibly its VPOC at 816 made on February 20th. I will be looking for the possible setups to present themselves in the charts as described:




Checkout the Volume profile chart from chart-ex.com. There is clearly a volume gap on ER2 and NQ to the downside.

Feb 23 daily chart

I'm done early today, leaving a little frustrated but with a positive P/L and a positve P/L for the week. I bought ER2 3 ticks away from the low as noted in my trade execution report, however, I trailed the trade with a stop that was too close, which is something I need to work on. I should have instead used a 0.7pt stop with a profit target placed at the POC or VWAP. Instead of taking only a few trades, I scalped many trades today using the NYSE TICK extremes as guidance while also making sure professional traders were making trades during the same time at these tick extremes. Although I bought the LOD, most of my money made was by scalping during the mid-day by buying tick lows and fading tick highs. You will notice I lost money on YM while making 3x as much in profit on ER2. This is because I normally trade YM when I have less confidence in the trade setup, but I still want to take the trade, so I enter the trade with less risk by trading YM.



Most of my trades today were made around the #'s noted on the chart. During the day I mainly watch ER2 and IWM on a 2 tick chart with block trades noted by red and green blocks while also closely following NYSE TICK. I also watch the key sectors moving the market,(today it was XLF, SMH and XLE). I also watch NQ, YM, ES, NYA index, the 5 year note, and the market internals like VIX and A/D issues and up/down volume for the 3 exhanges. I don't watch the TRIN because I have never seen any edge in using it based on my style of trading.



This weekend I plan on analyzing my charts for patterns in the LOD and HOD with respect to block trades, NYSE TICK, and volume based market profile.

Planing the trade and what to look for on your chart

Large block trades noticed on IWM (50,000s block trades are red. 500,000s block trades are green).



I plan on studying this pattern in trading and combining this information with Volume profile analysis to find the best value in price.
What we are looking at is value defined by the largest traders. You will notice they only enter trades at tick extremes near the HOD, mid point, and LOD(alternatively the LVA, POC, & UVA). Are the professional traders buying the LVA, selling the UVA, or buying/selling around the midpoint. Also, where are the large trades being taken in relation to the 3-5 day volume profile.
Here is a great article by Dr. Steenbarger on tracking large traders.

What are the key questions we should be able to answer before entering a trade that will make the trade have a high probability of working?

1.What time is the trade being executed?
This question is important because you will need to base your stop and profit target for the trade according to the volatility. Volatility is also directionally proportional to volume; moreover, volume is highest during the first hour and a half of trading. Also, the initial balance (first hour of trading) normally covers 90% of the days trading range.

2.How are the major indices trading relative to each other?
If all the indices looked to be in tandem and trending one direction then this would be a strong indication to go with the trend and not fade the market. However, if ES is making a new high on light volume while ER2 is 2pts below its high while also on an uptick and we are 2 hours into the trading day, then this might be a setup to fade ER2.

3.Where are the volume gaps?
Volume gaps are important areas you need to be aware before the trading day because once the price trades into a volume gap the volatility can increase significantly from lack of established support or resistance.

4.What market sectors are trading up or down?
If all the sectors were trading down, then this would be a no brainer that we have a selloff taking place. The more sectors you have trading your direction, the better it is that the trend will continue. (I track some of the major sectors by following XLF, XLE, SMH)

5.What is the NYSE TICK value before you enter a trade?
Buying at 1000+ TICK readings may be dangerous because this value normally represents a climax in buying and is sometimes used as a value that traders watch to fade the market. By making sure you enter long trades when the TICK has pulled back you will be in a much better position of not buying the top. The same goes for when entering short trades as well; moreover, you want to short when the NYSE TICK is in a high range relative to the day, and only when the trend of the market is down.

Feb 22nd daily learning

Today I noticed a re-occuring pattern.
1.Program trades at the morning open 15min pt.(10:45am est)



2.Intraday choppy action with reversals at tick extremes and with noticable block trades at reversal points.



3.12pm (3pm est) reversal trade.(A/D issues reversed and went up 3pm EST)



4. A VIX reversal setup



When was the last time we had a large selloff day on a day where we had an Oil inventory #? (we only get the oil # on Wednesday, or Thursdays if there was a holiday recently.) It seems the selloffs are seen on Monday's, Fridays, and sometimes on FOMC days. I don't recall a large selloff day on the same day as an oil# day unless it was also an FOMC day.

Feb 22nd daily chart

Well I made back all my money from yesterday plus some by holding onto a short position and covering at the LOD.(I actually covered at 824 which was 4 ticks from the LOD, not to bad, however I didn't reverse my position and make more money by going long. If I cover my position because I sense a reversal, why not go long for the bounce as well?, this is something I need to work on)

Today was my best P/L YTD, however, my P/L for the week is not the best I've had because I had a large loss from yesterday.

Feb 21 daily chart

Well today was a bad day for me. I had a stop sell order that got hit 3 ticks away from the LOD and then watched the price reverse quickly and never return again. Hopefully I do better tommorow. I have a new rule now which is to never enter trades on stop orders, only use stops for exiting trades.

Feb 21 premarket- looks bearish

We are trading in the volume gap zone on ER2 premarket this morning, with all future indices looking fairly bearish this morning. ER2 at previous days UVA at 824, and ES is at its previous days POC at 1457.

Feb 20 daily chart

Volume gap between 824-819 on ER2.

Chat rooms & NYSE TICK

I plan on in the future testing out trading chat rooms to learn from other traders such as: Linda Raschke, and the institute of auction market theory.

Here's a good post on how to trade with NYSE TICK from Dr. Steenbarger- Trading With the NYSE TICK

Drilling for trading perfection

Dr. Steenbarger is right about how elite performers are elite because of how they practice. I haven't drilled on an elite level, so why should I trade with real money against professionals. I've been trading futures for over a year, but my drilling to become better at trading has gone no-where since I started trading. Sure I study charts, look at all the indicators the world has to offer, make new rules, read up on other trading techniques, participate in trading rooms, but I have still not trained on an elite level.

So how will I train to become an elite trader?
1.I'm going to pick 1 time frame and 1 chart setup to trade off of so that I become accustomed to how it looks.
2.I'm going to save this daily chart and post it on my blog as a reference.
3.I'm going to record the time period that I trade each day using Camtasia recorder.
4.I'm going to review my recordings to look for patterns that will help me understand how to trade breakouts and when the best time to enter a trade is.
5.I'm going to view how other professional traders trade and try to learn from them by tracking there trades in chat rooms.
6.I'm going to network with other traders and share ideas and hopefully learn something.
7.I'm going to make this a routine at a set time everyday, and I'm going to look for ways to challenge myself to make the trading practice harder so that I become better.

I just spent the last 7 hours working on my indicators and what I'm looking for on my charts. This is a never-ending process. Idea's currently: ADX, price high/low, price channel, volume, parabolic SAR trend. Notice reversals occur when ADX is flat. Still, all the indicators tell you the same thing, I'm just trying to make things visually easiest for myself when I want a signal confirmation for a trade.





The main focus of these charts is to look at ADX when it is near its low levels (red dot paintbar signal), then look at volume, then look at the price channel, and then look at what happens with price after the signal is given. Also look at the high points of the ADX in the chart and the corresponding volume seen near these high levels.

Things to do:
Look at NYSE TICK values and corresponding volume seen with different ADX values.
Brainstorm Market profile strategies in conjuction with my own technical analysis strategies.

Strategy design

First off, what happens when you see block trades in ER2 with no corresponding block trades in IWM? And what happens when you get block trades in both at the same time?
Also what happens when you see large volume when NYSE TICK is at the top of its daily range?


Chart interpertation: First notice we are trading in the middle of the day(time is pacific on the chart). We see large volume traded when NYSE TICK hits the top of its range, next the NYSE TICK pulls backs and we see selling(longs taking profits), next the tick bounces and there is no volume (no buyers), next we continue to selloff after the tick bounce but the volume starts to dry up and the negative TICK attempts provides no new sellers. The trend then continues up.

IWM in my opinion was forced higher friday to close above $81. My theory is that options sellers pushed it higher in order for them to make more money by having the options they sold expire worthless. Does that mean that I should be looking at the options market for signals too? More information never hurts.

Ok, I'm doing my strategy design tonight, adding some rules and indicators and refining my chart setups. Almost all my indicators tell me the same thing no matter if its a moving average, MACD, CCI, or fisher transform. The only difference you see is when you change the time frame for the indicator. The one indicator that is different from the rest is VOLUME.

I'm trying to come up with some good ideas for my strategy, so here is what I was thinking:
What do I want?
I want no more than 5 signals for the day, preferably 3 signals all day, because most days only give 1-3 reversals.
What time frame would I be trading on then if I'm looking for 1-3 signals per day?
Even though I may be only looking for 1-3 signals, the pobability is that these trades will still be kept short, probably no longer than 15min unless there is a breakout trend.I want the chart to tell me what the long term trend is and to give me signals only in its direction.
I want the chart to tell me where volume resistance and support is and where the value are is.
I want to know what the volume is and I want to know when large traders are entering by filtering for block trades.
I want to monitor short term market sentiment by following NYSE TICK.

That is about it, and with all of that said, you can see that I only want to trade with the trend and look for large traders. Does my system really need a ton of indicators? Sure doesn't sound like it does it.

Strategy design rules:
Are there certain NYSE TICK values that I should never enter a trade on when going long or short?
The smartest way to trade is to trade with the trend and enter by taking pullbacks, so this strategy does not chase moves by buying when the NYSE TICK is at the top of its daily range or by entering shorts when NYSE TICK is near the low of its daily range. To make sure we enter the trades based on this rule I have setup a moving average for the NYSE TICK so that long trades can only be placed below the MA and for short trades to be placed above the MA. Also, I've setup a bollinger band indicator on NYSE TICK to identify potential reversal points. The bollinger band indicator on NYSE TICK seems to be an ideal fit because of the way NYSE TICK ossilates, contracts, and expands.

More strategy design rules to come......

Software

I've looked at almost every available trading software I could find, and if I had to switch I would go with either tradestation, neoticker, or top gun software. For now though, I'm going to stay with quotetracker and keep a detailed journal of how my current system would work by saving pictures of each days trading signals and then refine my strategy as time goes on. The strategy focuses on ER2 while in conjuction with NYSE TICK. I've been trading some of my signals from my strategy the last 2 weeks and it has been working, although there is need for improvement both on the signals and on my own trade execution.

Each software provider mentioned above gives limited amount of backfill history to test strategies based on a tick by tick basis. The software providers do give a lot of backfill history on 1 min charts, but I would like a tick by tick backtest which includes volume and a backfill that shows volume profile as well. Tradestation doesn't have range bars which I use for my current strategy and market profile costs extra because its an add on, however tradestation's easy language is the easiest to use to test strategies. Neoticker has a lot of the things I need that Tradestation doesn't have. I think I will go to the neoticker forum to ask questions to see if it can do some of the things that I want it to do.

Things to do:
Add ADX study to chart and test strategy.
What software can you have a strategy designed for when both ER2 and NYSE TICK give a signal at the same time?
Which software can give volume profile strategy backtesting?
Compare volume between IWM and ER2. Which gives a better signal when using volume as a secondary indicator?
Can my current strategy be switched to 1-3min bars, volume bars, tick bars, or will range bars only work?
Do I need to buy a book on strategy development or will internet resources give enough free information to learn from?
How is volume distributed when we come near the LVA, POC, and UVA, both on an intraday time frame and a multi-day time frame?

Feb option expiration and Volume Profile strategy

We had a Vigrin POC put in on feb 9th's sell off and that provided as a target for this weeks trading as the bulls still showed support on monday. The VP chart below is detailed with reasons for entries and exits.



Here is an option strategy I was looking at. Selling OTM calls & puts the last week of option expiry to benefit from increasing theta-time decay(look for high vega options). Sell 1 call and 1 put on Monday or Tuesday and close the positions out Thursday unless they are going to expire worthless.
Here's an article on Theta- Time Decay
Here's a good article on Capturing Profits with Position-Delta Neutral Trading.

Volume Gaps

I've posted before about high probability trades occuring when there are volume gaps. On Feb 13th we filled a volume gap that was put it on Feb 9th. Here's the Volume profile for Feb 9-12th. Notice the "volume gap" between 811.8-814.1. It didn't take much effort for ER2 to gap up and run to 814 the morning of Feb 13th.

Tradestation, Neoticker, or Top Gun software

I want to backtest some strategies but I'm not sure who to go with. I'm trying neoticker right now but it looks like it's going to take some time to figure things out. I like quotetrackers charts and how easy it is to change indicators, the only thing I'm missing is the ability to backtest strategies.

Also I want to be able to make my own index based on a basket of stocks that I choose, and also a modified NYSE TICK index similar to neotickers TICK16.

The system:
I would like to setup a system that enters based on how ER2 and NYSE TICK(or my new TICK index) are trading relative to each other.

The system will only enter long when it recieves a long signal on the ER2 chart and when NYSE TICK is below a certain value.(vice versa for a short trade)
The system will exit the long trade when NYSE TICK is above a certain level or if it gets stopped out based on a fixed number of ticks. This is a vague description of the system, but its the key points.

Another strategy focuses on volume profiles compared over the last few days.

Top gun software looks really cool, however, I'm not sure about its ability to backtest. Tradestation seems like it will backtest my strategies, but I don't think it can make indices based on stocks you choose like neoticker.

Feb 13 to do list

Check out chart setups on traderslab, checkout craigs chart at dcharts, look for correlation and signals between IWM, TICK, SPY, XLF, rus 1500, es cash, prem, volume on etfs, nya and other large composites.

compare tick & vol charts between IWM, ER2, SPY, ES, XLF, BAC, JPM, C, and GS.
Look for TICK divergence indicator with correlation to volume and value area.

Looking for good trading software

Idea's: Neoticker, Tradestation, & Top Gun software.

I'm trying the free trial of NeoTicker right now. The charts take a long time to load. My primary goal of using NT would be able to make my own index based on a basket of stocks and to be able to backtest strategies. I dont like all the windows that pop up after I close a window asking if I want to save. Visually the charts aren't nice as looking as what I'm use to seeing with quotetracker. I like the backtesting feature, but things look hard to be able to backtest my own strategy and make my own index. Maybe I can't get some help on these 2 things to make me be a possible buyer of this expensive product.

3pm reversals

The last 3 days in a row there have been good 3pm EST reversals on ES and the other indices. This trade works good on YM. Look for indications in the tick and volume around 2:54-3:07pm EST.
Here is a chart of NYSE TICK and ER2 of FEB 9th.

Left too soon

I traded the first hour and a half during the chop and then what do you know happens in the afternoon on a friday...The market breaks out of its range and trends all day to the downside. There were G7 meetings that started friday which may have caused the breakout. It actually looked like a gap trade because the NYA index had a gap that needed to be filled, while the other indices had a small gap with an opening range that was choppy. I ended the week positive. I had to trade larger size and scale into some trades because of the tight choppy trading that I traded on wed & thur, and I left early friday. I will try posting charts and setups later and do some analysis of the ticks and volume based market profile. I made a bad trade on YM on thursday, I should have used the 8pt stop, instead I got a 20pt stop and doubled my loss by adding to the position, however I made up for the ym loss and made a gain overall with an ER2 hedge in the opposite direction.

Stock Market is slowing down too much

I was out of town again Monday and Tuesday, and it looks like I didn't miss anything. I probably would have churned myself to death, just kidding. I'm behind on my analysis, I'm going to look at tick highs/lows during the first hour and the corresponding volume seen in the indices during these times. Also, I need to keep track of when the tick stays above/below a certain level after the first hour of trading, which may be an indication of a trend or range day. I'm about 1/4 the way through Dr. B's new book on "enhancing trader performance" and I can say that it is more interesting to read then "trading in the zone". I was thinking that I should write a book on the best trading blogs and websites and compile all the good information these websites provide to give traders a large resource of information and different trading ideas that they can explore. What is the defining point you make when entering trades? What is your thought process before entering a trade, and how is this thought process affected by the visual and auditory information you are recieving while trading? If you trade with candlestick charts does the color of the candle matter to you if you are watching the chart in real time? Do the sounds you here from your speakers of screaming S&P pit traders affect your decisions when trading? How is you environment affecting your trading? How do your goals you set affect your trading?(more stress/pressure or no effect?)

Trading ideas

I haven't done much this week. Took a couple trades and made a little but no real improvement on anything this week. I failed to take an 8pt stop on YM and failed to see that it was a bad trade because ER2 was showing bearish divergence.I knew it was a bad trade after 3min, but I failed to exit or take the stop. My signal said short when I was long. Fortunately I took the next signal on ER2 at the LVA and made back my money and some extra when ER2 returned to the VA. I need to do more tick,time,mp, and volume analysis. I'm too tired and not sure when I will. I just spent the last few hours looking at stock charts looking for patterns. I still like my trading idea of watching highly correlated oil stocks for scalping opportunities. Here's another Trade ideas scan
I need to start evaluating my losing trades intraday before re-entering a position, I believe this will save me money and prevent big draw down days.

Things to do

I read Dr. Steenbargers blog everyday, and his interpertation of the markets in realtime is much better than mine I would say. Dr. B knows what the normal volume is for the periods of the day and is good at measuring the tick to be able to distinguish what type of market action is occuring. This has made me want to focus more time on studying the tick and volume. If you look at the tick intraday, you can see that there are support and resistance zones just like a stock would have because the tick is nothing more than a measure of a whole bunch of stocks being measured at the same time.