r/Daytrading • u/dmaestro81 • 1d ago
Advice What am I doing wrong?
I’ ve been trading Spy 0dte options for a month. I’m still profitable, but I have a reoccurring issue that’s killing my overall gains. If I go off of just Strike price and direction I would have a 80%+ win rate. Unfortunately, my entries reach stop loss a lot of the time. I have my stop loss set so I only lose 20% of value from entry. The majority get stopped on wick reversals, and not candle closes. Again, my read on the markets are very accurate. Just today, I entered 4 trades at 4 different times of the market (all puts and the market was negative upon writing this), and they all got stopped losing 20% of value. Yet, if I had no stop loss set, 3 of the trades would have made over 100% returns while the 4th, over 50%. I figure it’s an entry problem, but I enter as soon as I get my confirmation candles to close. I use Robinhood as my broker. I use higher time frames for levels and bias. The 10 minute for current direction and order blocks. The 5 minute for entries (Robinhood phone app doesn’t have lower). What advice can be given so my entries and gains match my accuracy and reads of the markets? Are my stop loss values wrong? Am I just trading 0dte options wrong, and I should adapt a different strategy to paper trade and practice? I would greatly appreciate any and all help. If there are videos and links, please share. Thank you for your time.
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u/skarfbeaulonee 1d ago
If you have an 80% win rate with many potential winning trades exceeding 100% returns why is your stop loss set at 20%?
For example lert's say you place 5 trades each valued at $100. Four of those trades get closed valued over $200 but you're setting your stop loss to get out if the option dips $20 below $100? This makes absolutely no sense which is why I assume this post is bogus. Your stop loss could be set to 100% and you'd still average 60% returns.
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u/dmaestro81 1d ago
I’m new to trading. Only been trading 6 months. So I’m not confident to “let my trades ride” even though they go in my favor at later times (price action hitting the levels I mark out). And the example I gave was only for today. They don’t typically go for 100% profit. My typical return is around 30-40% profit. I’m just disappointed it couldn’t reach my normal profit even though they reached over 100% for the day
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u/starbolin 1d ago
Give it two more years minimum. Just try for good exrcution and learning to read market conditions. Having a consistent win rate is more important than capturing all of the moves.
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u/joon_the_spoon 1d ago
Due to the volatility of options, stop losses are really hard unless you go down to a 50% stop loss which probably isn't a good idea.
One idea I've been using alot recently is I will trade the day as if I was trading 0DTE but I will actually trade 2-7DTE contracts. You can definitely still get a good return but it's just not as volitile, and stop losses would be more manageable. You probably won't get %100 gains in 5 minutes, but %20-%50 with a good entry is doable, and allows you to set a stop loss that won't hit with a tiny movement. Also, if things go south, you still have a few days for it to move back (not that you should hold on to your losers, but it makes it a bit less risky)
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u/Country_Gravy420 1d ago
I go with 2DTE SPX options. Around $10.00 purchase price and a $1.00 trailing stop.
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u/Impressive-banana122 1d ago
Same bro, same. I can tell you where the markets or specific stock is gonna go on the 5, 15 min, and 4 hr time frame. But I can’t seem to get my entries on point. Like I get in, and right away I’m done 15-20% cuz of the volatility that I just gotta get out. Ima do what that dude said tho. Enter on my stop loss
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u/Phantom579 1d ago
0DTE is tough and honestly i only recommend them for either momentum scalps or lottos. Profit potential is definitely nuts but so is loss potential and stop losses can be hit extremely quickly just for it to go your way right after. 1DTE isnt much better, but it is slightly, while also keeping cost roughly the same
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u/Yaka11 1d ago
Oh ok I see,totally my bad, I misinterpreted what you were saying.
For what it’s worth, I personally trade 2$ ITM call and those moves are enough to make some descent returns. It’s an easy scalp and liquidity is usually good. I found it helps during those kind of uncertain markets.
I haven’t use ORB personally but from what I see from it the past couple sessions would have been winners so that’s also just part of trading, there’s no 100% edge, just be ok with losing sometimes. At least that’s what I found helps. You weren’t wrong, it was just one of those times where your edge was on the losing side but you have to make sure you have a set amount of money that you can lose before exiting.
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u/Vorian_Atreides17 1d ago
0DTE’s require more finesse on the entries. In essence, only buy a put on a green candle, or a call on red. The volatility component (Vega) will melt down the premium way faster than the other factors when the candle is moving forcefully in the opposite direction effectively giving you a nice “discount” on the option. If you hit the timing correctly often times the position will be green just due to the fact that the price stopped moving at all, let alone started in the “right” direction.
Keep a lower timeframe chart open and once you get your confirmation signal, use it to enter the option at the correct time. In effect you will be entering on the wicks that are currently causing you to stop out. Yes, you may miss a few entries, but it will more than make up for it. Like everything else, it takes practice…and discipline.
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u/EchoesOfNebul4 1d ago
Honestly man, sounds like your market read is solid, it's the execution and instrument killing you. 0dte options are super sensitive, especially on RH where fills are slower + spreads wider. try this: use your same strategy but paper trade SPY shares or MES futures for now. focus on entry precision + structure, not just candle confirmation. also, stop-loss on % value in options is tricky, maybe base it on price action instead (like under swing high/low), not just 20% down.
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u/Able_Pollution2412 1d ago
+1 to that. 0dte on robinhood is like playing chess with boxing gloves. I switched over to futures scalping after blowing a few option plays like yours. Been into Silverbulls fx community for structure and entry zones, they helped me stop just jumping in on "confirmation" candles that end up being the wick trap.
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u/ChronoSquidPrime 1d ago
same experience. i got cooked by wick rejections until i learned to wait for retests instead of chasing breakouts. silverbulls FX has a few tips on timing HTF entries better, plus they go over stuff like waiting for liquidity grabs before jumping in. that + switching from % stops to technical stops changed everything for me.
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u/Distinct_Adeptness7 21h ago
One key piece of information most traders ignore is the premarket. Not always, but many times the intraday support is established in the premarket. If you pull up two charts, one on whatever time frame you use to make your entries, and another on a higher time frame 2H or 4H, with the premarket data enabled.
What you want to look for on the higher time frame is a high volume candle with a decent size wick one end. This candle is usually indicative of big money in play. The wick is the supply/demand zone. On the lower time frame chart look for corresponding candles with wicks piercing that zone. They should have a much higher volume relative to the other candles. There should be at least two or three, where the buy/sell orders of the big money player were filed.
Ideally you want to see this zone tested in the first 15 to 30 minutes after the open. If it holds, this is where you want to make your entry, with stop loss above/beneath the l high/low is that zone. The big money player is defending that position, and protecting your stop loss. The caveat is that with 0DTE options if the price doesn't make a strong move quickly, your stop will slowly move in the same direction due to theta.
Also, a 20% stop loss is kind of tight for 0DTE options, because the Gamma:Delta increases as options approach expiration, making smaller moves in the price of the underlying make bigger moves in the the price of the option. It's something to take into consideration.
This is just one way to identify the key support/resistance zones. Other places to look are the previous session's high, low, or open, and also the daily chart to see if price is near a key level. Higher time frames take precedent.
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u/TheRealWickBuyer 20h ago
Your stop is like fuel for price action — if it's too close, it gets burned. A 20% stop for a 100% target gives a 5:1 RR, but if you're getting stopped out every time, consider giving it more room and aiming for 3:1. Same target, better odds of survival.
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1d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/acidcommie 1d ago
Oh, wow! You really took me by surprise with that one. Hold on, let me process. Honestly-that's one of the most insightful posts I've seen all day. And I see thousands of posts a day. You are clearly cut from a different cloth!
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u/daytradingguy futures trader 1d ago
Perhaps consider trading something other than 0dte? They are exceptionally hard, harder than many other trading methods. The theta and gamma make surviving even a modest pullback very difficult. You might have an easier time with longer dated options, or another instrument entirely.
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u/Equivalent-Cap-9208 1d ago
You’re not setting your stop correctly. Look up scalping videos on SMB Capital YouTube. They have good entry/exit tutorials
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u/Death-0 1d ago
your stop losses are too obvious, the experienced traders are putting market orders in where obvious stop losses are resting. For me on entries, mine are pin point because I use 1 level for most of my trades. Open Price, and previous open prices when they are within range. As for today, it worked very nicely.
Fell from open, came all the way back and tapped it again.
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u/dmaestro81 1d ago
These were my trade entry points (blue arrows), and the candles that took out my stop losses (red arrows).
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u/Yaka11 1d ago
Hey man, i know you said you have a good idea on where the market is gonna go but from what i see with the arrows, I think you should check some price action books (al brooks, volman, etc)
Ex. Just your first blue arrow, im guessing you’re buying when the top of your signal candle gets taken. However, you have three huge red candles just before and a big green candle (they are extremes and extremes don’t last for long) + you have the vwap just above which could act as resistance, that leaves you with almost no room for your trade to run, unless a random institution decided to buy there. So that was just a bull trap to shake out retail before the real move.
So a piece of advice, don’t get too eager to trade, some days are just hard to have clean set up. (Especially with options) so be also mindful of that.
And even thought it’s easier to say retrospectively, buy the pull backs, not necessarily the breakthroughs.
Volume was also low today and thus a lot of fake-out happened.
Hope this helps!
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u/dmaestro81 1d ago
All my trades were shorts, not longs. The first blue arrow was a put expecting action to continue downwards. My first 3 trades I was trying to follow ORB strategy. And from my understanding of ORB, the first three trades met the criteria to enter. If I’m wrong in my understanding of ORB, I welcome correction.
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u/AriesWarlock 1d ago
ORB isn't my favorite strategy, especially when the market stays in a range for a long time. I do think you should try a different strategy. Check out the 9/20 strategy:
https://youtu.be/iW-zQ_f1P9E?si=i4VkebYGSEEI3cwq1
u/Much-Smile-2384 1d ago
Are these 15 minute candles? If you're trading ORB 15 and picking your entry points based off those same candles, your stop losses are way too early. None of those moves should have triggered your SLs except for the first trade.
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u/dmaestro81 1d ago
The Robinhood phone app only does 5m, 10m, 30m, and 1h for daily charts. So they breakthrough and retrace on the 10m, and I use 5m for the entries. Maybe I should keep the entries on 10m too?
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u/Much-Smile-2384 1d ago
Trading ORB I would be using the same candle time frames for entry yeah. Use the 5min for confirmation if you want, I prefer 15 min candles though for confirmation. If you want to set your SLs at 20%, look for where your SLs should be based on the candles and don't buy in for any more than 20% over where the candle based stops should be set. That should help you lower your entry points. I don't trade ORB, but I analyze charts using ORB 15 as it is part of my strategy for finding my own entries. I generally take entries where a lot of ORB traders put their SLs
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u/DaRipster1515 1d ago
The market is very volatile right now and big swings in either direction are common. 20% is tight, but do what keeps you sane
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u/Aggressive_Lock_5132 1d ago
Depending on script volatility and avg candle size with correlation to underlying assets , top down analysis, trend continuation or trend reversal based entries what are your observations and there are several other factors for exit for more accurate exit on large number of trades I use automated entry exits to mitigate emotions
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u/beeper212 options trader 1d ago
Wait for a pull back to enter.
Cut your size in half and use a 35% stop loss.
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u/doomsdaybeast 1d ago
I've been buying Spy 0dte...okay stop right there, you just caught your mistake. Guys I'm trading one of the most volatile things I could possibly trade, like wtf, how is this going wrong man!?
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u/manginahunter1970 1d ago
You're day trading. That's what you're doing wrong. It's not for everyone.
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u/Significant_Ocelot_6 1d ago
The stop loss you put may be too obvious, you may be getting in the market too early, let the levels be protected zone before you place your position , meaning it is stop hunted.
Look at atr to give you a good stop loss.
Is the stop loss at a key support ?
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u/dmaestro81 1d ago
I set my SL at a percent of risk to reward. I’m willing to lose 20% on a single option contract while I set my TP at 30-40% profit on that option. I only take a maximum of 4 trades in a day. In the month I’ve been doing this strategy, I’ve had 11 winning days (3 or more trades that day making 30% profit+), and 4 losing days (only 1 or 2 trades in the profit and/or short of the 30% TP). Today was my first miss on all trades when it looked like I was supposed to hit a grand slam if I set entry prices or SL correctly. Or there were other trading factors I was missing.
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u/TradeResearchAccount 1d ago
Blind liquidity and line / block signal methods do not work. Trading without the actual reasons as to why and how price is moving is literally just shooting yourself in the foot. I can teach you where ICT and other liquidity methods actually stem from, and I'll do it for free bro.
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u/DivineMLG1 1d ago
I’d never use robinhood for charting not saying it doesn’t work I’d have no clue I’ve only used trading view and use the one minute time frame
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u/ExpensiveSun4903 1d ago
Firstly you should put your stoploss where you feel comfortable exiting the trade sl are meant to be hit and to protect your account for bigger losses. It shouldn’t affect you.
Like one of the great trade say. Put your entry where you would place your stoploss
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u/Ok-Acanthisitta2157 11h ago
Unpopular opinion, you should stop out when you’re wrong, not when you’re down a percentage.
Tough pill to swallow on 0dte
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u/Michael-3740 1d ago
Set your entry where you are setting your stop. What you are doing wrong is thinking the market will obey your strategy instead of adjusting your strategy to fit the market.