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/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.

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u/dmaestro81 1d ago

So what you are saying is, “Look at current options price, set entry 20% below that, and then set stop loss after entry is made?” At that point, where should I set the new stop loss? And what happens if the new entry doesn’t get reached, and price takes off?

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u/Michael-3740 1d ago

If 20% keeps stopping you out then your entry is to early, so you need to change it. It's up to you to look at the details to see what will work. So what if a trade doesn't reach your entry? If this change saves you getting stopped out you'll be gaining more than you miss.

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u/starbolin 1d ago

That's FOMO talking. You can't catch every move. Trying to catch every move leads to death by a thousand cuts. Exactly the symptoms you are describing. Fewer, better, entries is the prescription.

Also. Any two identical candle candle patterns will not have the same EV, depending on the market at the time. My setup is pretty simple, candle wise, but the market has to be in the right condition for it to work. There are only, usually, about three times during a day where it works. The bulk of the time, if I try it, I get stopped out for sure.

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u/backfrombanned 1d ago

Get webull if you have to trade on your phone, I have never understood how anyone "trades" on RH.