1. Beginning to Trade the S&P 500 E-Mini TOS Symbol /ES Steve Fought
File – Beginning Emini B

2. DISCLAIMER
The following is not an investment or trading recommendation.
The losses in investing and trading can be very real, and depending on your investment vehicle, can exceed your initial investment.
I am not a licensed trading or investment adviser, or financial planner.
You should make your own trading and investment decisions based off your own research, and tolerance for risk.
What follows are just some helpful tips which I have found in my countless hours of researching the subject

3. What is the S&P 500 E-Mini?
Commonly called just the “E-mini” - ticker symbol /ES on the TOS platform,
E-mini is a stock market index futures contract traded on the CME (Chicago Mercantile Exchange) Globex ELECTRONIC trading platform.
The CME created the emini in Sept 1997 because the value of the existing (big) S&P contract cost was over $500,000 at the time which (of course) is just too large for many small traders.
The E-Mini quickly became the most popular equity index futures contract in the world.
Hedge funds like trading the E-Mini over the big S&P because the big S&P still uses the open outcry pit trading method, which has inherent delays, versus the all-electronic Globex system.
The average daily implied dollar volume for the E-mini can run over $140 billion, far exceeding the combined traded dollar volume of the underlying 500 stocks.
Following the success of this product, the exchange introduced other E-minis like the NASDAQ-100 geared primarily towards small speculators, as opposed to large hedgers.
The E-Mini contract trades hours a day, five days a week, on the March quarterly expiration cycle

4. What are the S&P 500 Emini Futures ? Why trade the Emini Futures ?
The below video and text article seem to be pretty good summaries to answer the above questions.
Just go to - Emini Watch. Com (Barry Taylor’s web site)
Inside the web site, just click the EMINI TRADING tab and then click on the 2 articles below:
1.Why trade the Emini Futures ?
This is a video
Here is the link
2. What are Emini Futures ?
This is a text article

5. Directions for the TOS Paperwork
The info below is required by TOS if you want to trade futures from an IRA account
TOS says you have to have a min of $25,000 in your IRA to trade
They also say you need 3 years experience trading derivatives but I think that is up to broker discretion
Below are the details to sign up with TOS to trade from IRA account
Go the TOS website,
log in to your account
Click the MY ACCOUNT tab
Click the ACCOUNT SERVICES CENTER selection
Your basic IRA account info should populate the screen
Scroll down and until you see the link Click Here to Request Futures Trading on Eligible Accounts
Fill on the online forms.
Then print out the PDF format signature card and customer agreement for the Futures account
Scan the signed doc and to
or by fax the doc to
My registration only took about 48 hours to get approved

6. Developing an EDGE Trading Plans for S&P 500 – E-minis
Your edge is your trading plan which gives you a higher probability of making money.
I have spent the last few months researching and testing different strategies to gain an edge trading the ES
From my personal research, it seems like there are literally hundreds of web sites which can help you develop an edge.
The cost for these educational subscriptions, newsletters, and/or coaching can cost from $150 to $7000 +
Right now, I am researching to see if I can gather enough information and education on my own to successfully trade this underlying

7. You might want to check out the Don Miller Blog for some general E-MINI trading Info

8. My Edge (still in development as of 7-31-10)
My current strategy is just working what I call the “STRETCH”
This is a relatively simple strategy (which makes it easier to stick to the plan)
It is a form of “reversion to mean” or some might call it a “rubber band” theory
We all know one thing for sure:
We know the market is not going to keep going in one direction forever
What we don’t know is:
When it will turn
How much will it turn
The STRETCH concept
The more a market STRETCHES in one direction, the Higher the probability the market will turn … except for outliers like the flash crash May 2010
Never trade in No Man’s Land – This is the area between the daily high and low
Never trade before the market has established a high and low for the day
Drop in trades when the market turns from the daily high or low. Wait until you get the 2nd candle in the opposite direction which is a tell of conviction

9. EDGE DESCRIPTION IN A VIDEO
Below is a video which I found pretty much summarizes a lot of my current trading ideas
Just search in GOOGLE for
“Building Your E-mini Futures Trading Strategy”
A CME / Dan Gramza site will pop up
Here is the link
Here is another link if above does not work
This appears to be some CME Education – not sure that connection
They will ask for your name and address in order for you to get this 35 minute video

10. Price and Volume Idea The STRETCH idea uses price as the key indicator
I also watch the common TA (Technical Analysis) indicators (RSI WILDER, MACD, and Stochastics)
But right now to me , it seems like most TA are just lagging indicators
So I just watch Price closely relative to the first high and low established for the day
And also watch price relative to SMA (Simple Moving Averages)
My main chart is an Intra day, 10 day, 1 minute candle chart
I have 3 simple moving average – 9 period (minutes) , 50 period, 200 period
I also have volume on the chart
I also watch on another chart with TICK, DVOL-UVOL, ADVN-DECN – But again, these seem to be lagging indicators and I am just watching for correlation now and not using these particular charts for entry and exit decisions.
Here are some web sites with videos exploring the idea of just watching price and volume to make entry and exit decisions
Day Trade to Win .com – John Paul
Triple Trading profits . com – Stuart McPhee

11. Here is a book I read recently
Trading in the Zone:
Mark Douglas
Recommended by a number of emini traders
This book does not give any specific trading strategy edge.
This book is mainly about the psychology of trading
Particularly day trading

12. My personal take away ideas
Trading in the Zone:
Mark Douglas
My personal take away ideas
Trade a system - Remove the emotion – Stick with the system
Trade one underlying
Develop a feel for how your underlying moves
Get a feel for the market rhythm i.e get into the “Zone” when trading

13. Getting a feel for the market
See Don Miller Education .com
Blog entry
Beyond the Technicals Video
Discusses how TA pales in comparison for a market feel that comes from hundreds of hours of just following and trading a single underlying day in and day out

14. The Future
Will continue to rack up the hours to get a feel for this trading and report back at a future meeting
Running pretty close on the trail stops right now % to 0.10% max
Update report in a month or three