jjs:
Sorry to hear that you had hit a wall. I hope that it is not too painful for you, and you can learn something out from it.
Recently I was met with another bad trade cycle too - encounter a max open drawdown of some 20+% of my account; though 1 weeks+ later I close all at +1% profit, I actually doing all kind of flipping/rescue etc during this period and did not take full advantage of the huge fall of the EU during this period.
In case you are interested: I actually hedge my positions overnight when I have to sleep and be away from the battle station for a long period of time if necessary. When back to battle station, I have the following options depending on price action and chart terrain:
1. take the loss - close all the hedged positions
2. take profit from the profitable hedged positions (all or partial) if I think I can re-hedge it at a better price
3. take loss from losing positions (partial) first and close a corresponding size from the hedge leg later, if I think the I can close the later at a better price.
I also start another short skirmish (a new cycle of new scout) to bite off something from the current move as previously stuck positions does not allow new rescue to be deployed (because of the lot size and risk, too close the the previous rescue), this time round have to be extremely careful, most of them are just scalping and cut if I must. Use whatever profit to off set positions underwater, thus reducing the stuck size and risk, free up margin so that I can continue to fight.
When reflecting on this, I notice a few things:
1. Be cool, don't rush the rescue until you are quite sure.
2. Recuse is a damage control procedure, if all position cannot get to break even and above, and loss is acceptable, close all and re-access is better.
3. Cutting at 3 time average daily profit is worth serious consideration. Even if rescue can be done, the time/effort spend and the opportunity lost may not worth the effort.
4. Flipping is hard to master, at least to me. My trading records shows that my trading result is no good whenever I flipped.
Still learning.
