Presented By:

Trading a Single Strategy John Hiltz

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 Bottom Line Up front
● I only traded my High-of-Day Break strategy for all of July

● I was consistently profitable throughout the month

● Positive Aspects: ● Negative Aspects:

○ Increased patience ○ Potentially reduced profitability
○ Reduced trading ○ Not getting better at other strategies
○ Edge refinement ○ Maybe overly exposed to market
○ More structure to my trading day changes
○ Better use of trading platform ○ Overconfidence
○ Easier journaling
○ Increased confidence

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 My Trading Journey
● 2014 - 2017: Consumed lots of day trading education
● 2017: Swing trader
● 2018-2019: Occasional and unsuccessful part-time day trader
● July 2019: Retired from US Army and joined BBT as a full-time day
trader
○ July - September: SIM trading
○ October: Went “on-tilt” big time on a $SNAP trade and lost 7% of account
○ November: Concerted effort to control risk with small money trades
○ January: Decided to focus on HOD break and LOD break trades
○ January - June:
■ Realized the HOD break was my best strategy
■ By April the vast majority of my trades became HOD breaks

http://tiny.cc/John_BBT

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 What Am I Trying to Achieve in Trading?
● I have a pension from the US Army (and health insurance)

● My wife works

● I would be very happy to average $300/day through trading

● I want this to be fun and as stress free as possible

● I want to be a consistent trader

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 HOD Break Trade Overview
● $FB HOD break trade, HOD = $211.88
● PM High = $211.94
● RVOL ~320%
● Entry at $211.99 as $212 ASK wall was
breaking down
● But...ASK wall did not break
immediately. NERVOUS!!!
● But...price held strong near $212 and it
PUNCH!!! broke within a minute
● Really wanted first partial near $213,
but got worried at $212.50-ish price
pause
● Others partials: $213.26 (pause after
Increasing Volume strong $-Level break), $214.01
($-Level), $214.48 (½ $-Level), $214.96
($-Level), $215.46 (Yesterday Low)

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 July Market Performance
● The S&P 500 gained 5.44% (170.83 points)
● 14 green days, 8 red days
● Best day was 1.59% (49.71 points), Worst day was -1.23% (-40.36 points)

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 My Performance
● +32.7R over the month
● Traded all 22 days (19 green, 2 red, 1 breakeven)
● 112 trades (averaged 5.1 per day)
● Best day was 2.8R, worst day was -1.4R

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 My Performance
● +32.7R over the month
● Traded all 22 days (19 green, 2 red, 1 breakeven)
● 112 trades (averaged 5.1 per day)
● Best day was 2.8R, worst day was -1.4R

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 My Performance
● +32.7R over the month
● Traded 21/22 days (18 green, 2 red, 1 breakeven)
● 112 trades
● Best day was 2.8R, worst day was -1.4R
Red Days

Best Day

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 HOD Break Trade Stats
● Average R per trade = 0.29R

● % of Trades greater or equal to zero R = 82%

● % of trades greater than or equal to 0.1R = 69%, 0.6R average

● % of trades less than or equal to -0.1R = 15%. -0.76R average

● % of trades > -0.1R and < 0.1R = 16% (breakeven)

● Average trades per day = 5.1

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 Positive Aspects: Patience
● One of the hardest aspects of trading to master

● Strictly obeying a single strategy approach will force patience

● I don’t trade in the first 10 minutes (was 15 previously)

○ Function of the strategy
○ Pattern has to form
○ Average time for first trade of the day is 9:44
○ Average time for last trade of the day is 12:39

● Recognizing patience in yourself will improve your confidence/psychology

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 Positive Aspects: Reduced Trading
● Obviously this goes hand-in-hand with patience

● Averaged 5.1 trades per day in July

○ Fewest was 1 trade on July 21st (1.5R on vacation)
○ Most was 11 trades on July 29th (-0.9R)

● Reduces stress, improves confidence/psychology

● Reduces commissions

● Makes journaling easier

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 Positive Aspects: Edge Refinement (1/3)
● You will evolve and improve as a trader over the course of years
requiring hundreds (thousands?) of hours of screen time

● It will take hundreds (thousands?) of observations to truly identify the

subtle nuances of your strategy

● This happens faster when you are singularly focused on one strategy
for a period of time

● I have traded the HOD Break strategy 318 times in the past 3 months

● I estimate I got ~130 hours of screen time for this strategy in July

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 Positive Aspects: Edge Refinement (2/3)
● New ways to see the same trade (waited for BID to break when I started)

HOD = $371.94 HOD = $128.77

Level = $372.00 Level = $129.00
Entry = $371.95 Entry = $128.98

● Classic near dollar level ● HOD within ~25 cents of dollar level
● 9:45 EDT, early enough to enter between ● Wait for the dollar level
HOD and dollar level without waiting for ● Now 11:25 EDT so wait for prints, ASK
$372.00 prints on time and sales being bought up
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 Positive Aspects: Edge Refinement (3/3)
● New ways to see the same trade

HOD = $379.28
Level = $379.00
Entry = $379.05

● HOD just above dollar level

● Play on dollar level, consider partial at HOD
● Late day here and HOD above dollar level, so
wait for the break
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 Positive Aspects: Daily Process Refinement
● With a single strategy you can shape the day around that type of trade

● You can develop a system of procedures and a daily timeline

9:30-9:40 No trading

9:40 Look for trades, start setting DAS alerts for potential HOD break stocks, $1 move on 1st partials

10:05 Change all charts to 5 minutes, continue to set alerts

10:30 $0.50 move on 1st partials, stocks must show prints on dollar level breaks

12:00 Most alerts for day set by now, have lunch, listen for DAS “beep-boop-beep”

13:00 Switch to 15 minute charts, now looking for the very best trades (catalyst, exact dollar level, “ideal” HODs)

15:30 Stop trading unless stock makes a crazy move (e.e. $AAPL late day on 31-JUl-20, $5 in last 30 minutes)

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 Positive Aspects: Better Use of Platform
● With a single strategy you will start to wonder how each function of
your platform can add to your edge

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 Positive Aspects: Easy Journaling
● It becomes very easy to journal with a single strategy

● Also easier and to compare trade-to-trade and day-to-day

performance, more meaningful

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 Positive Aspects: Easy Journaling
● It becomes very easy to journal with a single strategy

● Also easier and to compare day-to-day performance, more meaningful

● Your screenshots will start to tell most of the story

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Positive Aspects: Increased Confidence!!!
Patience

Easier
Reduced
Journal
Trading

Confidence

Better
Refine
Platform
Edge
Use
Refine
Process

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 Negative Aspects
● Potentially reduced profitability

● Not getting better at anything

else if only trading one strategy

● Market conditions could change

and make strategy weaker

● For me: These stocks are getting

expensive!!!

● Overconfidence

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 My Plan Going Forward
● “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”...

● ...but would like to start trying lower priced stocks...

● ...and will start working on a second strategy in SIM

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 What About You?
● Are you new to trading?

● Are you struggling with trading?

● Are you generally profitable, but would like better consistency?

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 A Note From Aiman
“I think no matter what the strategy is, it’s good to trade only
one strategy. Maximum two, but I’d still go for one. When one is
trading only one setup they know what exactly they're looking
for. No FOMO for missed trades. No FOMO because someone
else made their goal. You know they made their goal trading
their momentum or 1 minute ORBs. You’ll make your day as well,
but you’ll make it when your turn comes. And if it doesn’t come,
or if it comes and then fails there will be no regret. You will be
happy you were patient waiting for your setup and just lost on an
A+ setup rather than chasing a hunch.”

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 Questions/Comments
[email protected]

@JohnH_BBT

http://tiny.cc/John_BBT

Forums > Day Trading > Day Trading Examples and Review > John's High-of-Day Break Trades

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