What if you could only make one trade a day?

How would you trade if you were only allowed, by your trading plan, to make just one trade a day?


I had this thought today as I have relatives from Ireland staying with us for the next month or so. My wife and I get a couple of days in London to see the Horse jumping in the Olympics in the middle of their stay. The dog doesn't need a long car trip and neither do we.


So I'm in a sort of holiday mode. I have to work and earn. I have my longer term option positions that don't need much time and I turn Flo on every day, but I'm a local at heart and have to keep that discretionary trading going.


So what if I only did one trade a day with size, and then stopped, win or lose?


At first it might seem not such a good idea because instead of having the opportunity to make a red day green, I'd end up red.


But looking at the maths, it isn't so bad. Firstly, I'd need to work out the maths of that particular trading plan. Well I did.


I have a particularly nice high win rate picture I like to trade. It "works" on just about any market at over 80%. It sets up at least once a day or more but sometimes it's early in the day and other times it's later. So if I start my day at 7am in Europe and watch a number of markets and take the one that sets up first.


I have to position size each market so my dollar risk per trade is the same over the whole portfolio. that way, it doesn't matter which one I trade on any particular day. My profit target would depend on context and I'd work the exits as usual, scaling out.


Here is an example of this trading plan from this morning, London time. The ES was sold and covered at my FavFib. Profit per contract of 4 points or $200. Multiply this by the number of contracts you need to trade to make your daily nut and then go to the beach.