Expectations are everything. Trading is so difficult because there is so much opportunity. But if you expect to take advantage of it all the time, that could be setting yourself up for a fall. In this week's Tip of the Week, TopstepTrader's founder Michael Patak talks about managing expectations. 

This is coming from a guy who got started trading as many of us do — thinking he was going to make $1 million+ in year one. That didn't happen, and instead, Michael's trading floundered while he lost $90,000 over three trading accounts. Fortunately, that served as a wake-up call that led him to focus on more realistic expectations. 

Here's Michael's take on managing expectations.

Crude oil is moving to its best levels in months, and an upward trend channel on the chart suggests there’s more room to run.

After falling sharply in the final few months of last year, prices hit a bottom in the Christmas Eve Massacre before a sharp move higher in the first two months of this year. The new mantra as the uptrend takes shape has been “buy the dip” and stands in stark contrast to the bearish sentiment that beset crude oil prices in late 2018.

In this week's Tip of the Week, TopstepTrader's founder Michael Patak points out something that we all must accept: setting a personal loss limit. Whether that's a daily loss limit, weekly loss limit, or overall loss limit, as traders, we don't have unlimited funds and need to realize when things are not going our way. A loss limit is the way to do that.

Instead of viewing a loss limit as something that constrains performance, we have to realize that it actually enables good performance. Losses happen in trading, but you can't let a loss get out of hand and endanger your future in this business. 

Here's Michael's take on why every trader should have a personal loss limit.

Smaller versions of popular stock index futures contracts are on the way. CME Group announced this week that it will list Micro E-mini futures in May. The new products will equal one-tenth of some of the more popular stock index futures contracts today and these new vehicles are intended to make index futures trading more accessible to individual investors.

And before you ask, we know what you're thinking: Will TopstepTrader offer some of these new indexes if and when they become available?

In this week's Tip of the Week, where TopstepTrader's founder and CVO Michael Patak shares one of the most important lessons to any trader. Make. A. Trading. Plan.

Trading plans are critical to any trader's success. They require that you put in thought ahead of actually opening up your trading business (aka live trading). In Michael's first trading plan, he wrote down what products he was trading, his daily loss limit, his target profit and what he was going to do with the money he made. That last point may be unique to Michael, but he believes that you should always connect your work trading to real life. That will stop you from risking too much in any one day or letting profits slip into losses. 

Here's Michael's take on why every trader should have a plan.

This week, we're launching a new video series: Tip of the Week, where TopstepTrader's founder and CVO Michael Patak shares lessons he's learned in more than a decade of trading — and more than 7 years of funding proprietary futures traders. 

 This week, Michael talks about how he found and learned to embrace his trading mantra: Always Trade for Tomorrow. Even though it sounds so simple, it cost Michael $90,000 in blown-up trading accounts to learn this lesson. That's because ego, excitement and passion all cloud a trader's judgment as they are in the midst of a losing battle.

Here's Michael's take on the first Lesson of the Week: Always Trade for Tomorrow.

Twice this week, I’ve been noticeably “scared” to enter a trade.

The first time was Monday, when I noticed an opportunity while watching the Market Forecast with TopstepTrader’s Senior Performance Coach John Hoagland. As he does every day at 8:15 AM CT live on TopstepTrader's Facebook page, John brought up the Crude Oil chart. It showed Crude was selling off hard to $51.26, slightly below a double swing low at $51.33 from January 17 and January 28. It was a clear opportunity.

But I missed it.

As the chart above shows, the price even came back to test that level two hours later. You’d think that this would be a great opportunity, but instead it just confirmed my thoughts that the market was “heavy.” The market looked heavy. It looked like the support was going to give.

It didn’t, and with the benefit of hindsight, we see that prices rallied that day $1.50 and have been rallying ever since. Opportunity missed again.

There were some big moves in equity markets this week. The run higher that started right before the New Year finally hit a snag. And now the chart looks like it might be creating a lower high — at least that's what our Market Analyst Mark Meadows has to say. That's not good for equity bulls. 

But not so fast, says Senior Performance Coach John Hoagland. He thinks that there are some areas of repair lower in the charts, but that the path of least resistance is higher. Here's the debate. 

Are you looking for the best, most concise trading advice that you can find. Then look no further — we have you covered on this Best of Limit Up! episode. Over the year since the Limit Up! podcast launched, Topstep has talked with millionaire (and billionaire) traders and 'Market Wizards,' distilling their experience into actions and routines that you can implement in your trading.

In this episode, Topstep’s Eddie Horn walks listeners through prior conversations with five trading legends — Jack Schwager, Brett Steenbarger, Linda Raschke, Tony Saliba and Larry Benedict. Combined, these guests have taken untold fortunes from futures, options and forex markets. And now they'll share with you those key factors that helped them do it. 

Limit Up! is also available on iTunes, Google Play or Spotify, where you can subscribe to get fresh episodes each week delivered to your inbox. 

The Federal Reserve meeting proved to be the event of the week. By not only reiterating their cautious approach, but also walking back quantitative tightening, the Fed put a bid under markets. Whether this is enough juice to get equity markets moving to new all-time highs is an issue for debate. 

In this week's Weekly Review, Mark takes issue with the idea that the Fed has to support equity markets, while Dan continues to drink the Kool-Aid and call for more accommodation. Check out their reactions to how futures markets moved this week.