Ray - great post!

Ray wrote: Don't look back, never look back. Pick your target and be satisfied when you hit it.

This is great advice. The greatest danger is anchoring to my perceived price, or regret over lost opportunity!

Ray wrote: Probably not Mechanical, of course.

I don't see why not. If your entry and exit method is mechanical, and you follow both in a disciplined and consistent way, it is certainly mechanical by any definition I follow.

Ray wrote: Merrill tossed up a big red popup warning when I entered a buy order, had to click a box "Yes, I know I am an idiot for buying this, but I absolve you from allowing me to cut my own throat."

Love it! This is exactly the sort of message I have to click through with every trade. I take it as a good warning!

Ray wrote: Always big warnings about holding these 3X daily for longer than a day.

I do like to limit to three weeks at most - then just close out the position and wait for the new opportunity.

Ray wrote: But....I did a backtest using historical QQQ daily data, and it shows that in certain conditions that TQQQ is good.

I've tested this myself quite extensively. What I've discovered is that it is best to filter based on certain parameters - e.g., liquidity, consistency, volatility, etc. For quite a while now SOXL always beats out TQQQ by a consistent margin... about 20% higher most of the time.

For the past year these are the trades using this approach. The 3/22 trade is an example where it hit my 21 day threshold and got sold at the open.

Entry Date  Exit Date   Entry Price  Exit Price  % G/L
9/30/2022   10/4/2022   $8.86        $10.19      15.29%
11/2/2022   11/7/2022   $8.21        $9.44       15.71%
1/18/2023   1/23/2023   $12.82       $14.74      15.30%
2/21/2023   3/6/2023    $14.01       $16.11      15.05%
3/9/2023    3/21/2023   $14.89       $17.12      15.01%
3/22/2023   4/12/2023   $16.24       $16.66      2.59%
4/25/2023   5/16/2023   $13.20       $15.18      15.00%
5/16/2023   5/18/2023   $15.02       $17.28      16.04%
8/17/2023   8/24/2023   $19.88       $22.86      15.32%
9/21/2023   10/10/2023  $17.42       $20.03      15.14%
10/20/2023  11/9/2023   $16.61       $19.10      15.46%
12/20/2023  12/26/2023  $28.04       $32.25      15.08%
1/3/2024    1/18/2024   $26.25       $30.19      15.14%
1/31/2024   2/8/2024    $32.10       $36.92      15.01%

You use your method for entry and always enter at exactly the close price on the day of the signal. After the trade is executed you immediately set your Profit Latch. In this case it is 15% from the entry pice. The reason the returns above are above 15% is because interest is added between the exit price and the entry at the next signal.