We all know that "let your profits run" is one the first, most basic rules that new traders learn. It's a simple and true rule but it does not tell the whole story: to get out of a profiting trade too soon (which is very common among new traders) is just as bad as waiting too long and get out when trade has moved back against you.
The question here is that, in retrospective, for any given trade there was ALWAYS an optimum point where you should have exited. Failure to do so means less profit, whether if you didn't let your profits run by leaving too early or if you waited too long and then you lost some of the profit when the price moved back.
All this rather obvious talk for what? I just want to know how people here usually judge when to exit a trade. What kind of tools do you most rely on to confirm that there is a possible change in trend and therefore time to go?
And also, as a curiosity, how do you usually qualify if a trade have been a success? for example, if I go long on a trade and price moves 100 pips in my direction in a certain period of time, I am usually aiming at obtaining at least 70 of those pips. Everything above 70% I consider a great trade, while less than that I feel that I didn't use my stops in an optimal way, whether by making them too tight for fear of a reversal or by waiting too long to exit the trade. This 70% is obviously an arbitrary number, but I have settled on it after hundreds of trades. Also note that I am referring to mostly intraday trading of only a few hours.
The question here is that, in retrospective, for any given trade there was ALWAYS an optimum point where you should have exited. Failure to do so means less profit, whether if you didn't let your profits run by leaving too early or if you waited too long and then you lost some of the profit when the price moved back.
All this rather obvious talk for what? I just want to know how people here usually judge when to exit a trade. What kind of tools do you most rely on to confirm that there is a possible change in trend and therefore time to go?
And also, as a curiosity, how do you usually qualify if a trade have been a success? for example, if I go long on a trade and price moves 100 pips in my direction in a certain period of time, I am usually aiming at obtaining at least 70 of those pips. Everything above 70% I consider a great trade, while less than that I feel that I didn't use my stops in an optimal way, whether by making them too tight for fear of a reversal or by waiting too long to exit the trade. This 70% is obviously an arbitrary number, but I have settled on it after hundreds of trades. Also note that I am referring to mostly intraday trading of only a few hours.