Trading Knowledge Base

Build a Trading Process

Learn how futures work, set risk before the trade, and test your rules. A good result starts with a process you can review.

423Articles

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Start HereNew to YMI? These guides cover the basics.

Education

What Is Futures Trading? How Contracts, Margin and Tick Values Work

A futures contract turns price moves into dollars through a multiplier, and margin controls exposure far larger than the cash you post. This guide walks through contract math, a worked ES trade, how futures differ from stocks, the tax basics, and common beginner mistakes.

5 min read →

Strategy

How KPL Levels Work in ES and NQ: A Worked Example

KPL levels are fixed reference prices anchored to the regular session opening print. This worked example uses hypothetical numbers to show how to plan a trade at a level, compute breakeven, and test whether the levels mean anything in your own records.

3 min read →

Automated Trading

NinjaTrader 8 Automated Strategies: A Beginner's Guide to Futures Automation

Automation on NinjaTrader 8 removes some emotional errors but adds new ones: bad settings, curve-fit backtests and technology failures. This guide covers how strategies run, how to import and test one, how to judge a pre-built bot, and what can go wrong.

5 min read →

Education

Systematic vs. Discretionary Futures Trading: Which Approach Fits You?

Systematic trading follows written rules for every decision, discretionary trading adds judgment in real time, and most traders land somewhere between. Compare what each approach demands, how each fails, how to test which suits you, and how a fixed level map can combine both.

4 min read →

Prop Firms

Prop Firm Consistency Rules: How to Read the Math Before You Trade

A consistency rule can stop you from passing even after you hit the profit target. This guide shows how the common best-day percentage works, why firm definitions change the answer, how to track it daily and how to check a firm's current rules.

5 min read →

Education

Your First Week of Live Futures Trading: A Day-by-Day Checklist

The first live week tests habits that simulation never touches. This day-by-day checklist covers pre-launch checks, half-size starts, journaling, stop discipline and a structured Friday review, so the week's main output is data about your execution rather than profit.

5 min read →

Choose what you want to work on

You don't need to read the whole archive. Start with a guide that answers the question you have today.

Plan an ES or NQ session

Prepare before the open, learn what the opening price tells you, then review the levels you used.

See the KPL workflow

Set up NinjaTrader and test your rules

Check your workspace and account, run a test, and review the results before enabling a strategy.

Read the bot setup and limits

Track risk and review your trades

Record the same fields on every trade. Use those records to check your risk and losing-streak estimates.

Check your trade and losing-streak numbers

Understand stock and ETF chart signals

Learn the framework, compare trading instruments, and check how a signal behaves in a falling market.

See the TradingView indicator workflow

NewLatest articles from the YMI team

Psychology

How to Handle Losing Weeks and Drawdowns in Futures Trading

A losing week doesn't prove your system is broken, and it doesn't prove it's fine. Here's how to estimate how bad normal streaks get, a four-question diagnosis, and a response plan for each type of drawdown.

4 min read →

Futures Trading

Futures Trading Room 7-Day Trial: What to Check Before You Pay

Most futures trading room pitches are vague about what you actually get. Here is how to test a 7-day trial in a week: what a daily ES/NQ level sheet should show, how to judge the community, what to journal, and when to cancel.

4 min read →

Strategy

Pairs Trading Basics: Hedging One Position Against a Correlated One

Pairs trading means going long one asset and short a related one so market direction matters less and the spread matters more. This guide covers dollar and beta weighting, an ES versus NQ sizing example, calendar spreads, and the risks that remain.

4 min read →

Tech Setup

NinjaTrader ATM Strategies: Setting Up Stops, Targets and Brackets for ES and NQ

Entering a futures trade and forgetting the stop is an expensive mistake. NinjaTrader 8's ATM strategies attach a stop and targets to an entry you place yourself. Here's how to size them in ticks, a scale-out example with real dollar math, and the failure modes.

4 min read →

Education

Using SIM Trading to Test Futures Strategy Changes Before Going Live

Most strategy tweaks get tested the expensive way, with real money and a few bad days. A SIM account is a cheaper place to run the test. Here's a one-variable workflow, the sample-size math, the NinjaTrader 8 setup, and what SIM can't tell you.

4 min read →

Psychology

Fear of Risk: Why Under-Sizing and Endless Prep Keep Futures Traders Stuck

Some futures traders size so small that costs eat the edge, and others stay in simulation indefinitely. Both look like caution and both are avoidance. Here's how to tell risk management from risk avoidance, with a hypothetical cost example and a plan for sizing up.

5 min read →

Technology

Prediction Markets and Futures Trading: What Kalshi Prices Can and Can't Tell You

Event contract prices on platforms like Kalshi give a market-priced probability for things like Fed decisions and data releases. Here is how to read the price, what spreads and fees do to it, and how it can inform exposure around an event.

3 min read →

Tech Setup

Realistic Expectations for Trading Bots: What Automated Futures Strategies Can and Can't Do

A bot that works on paper still has losing trades, losing days and technical failures. Here is the math on streaks, how to separate strategy losses from infrastructure problems, how to size for drawdown, and why prop firm automation rules need checking first.

4 min read →

All articles

5 results for "S&P 500 futures"

FeaturedEducation

2025-10-094 min read

E-mini S&P 500 Futures (ES): A Beginner's Guide

ES is the E-mini S&P 500 futures contract: $50 per index point, $12.50 per tick, with a $5-per-point micro version (MES). This beginner guide covers contract math, trading hours, margin, order risk, Section 1256 tax basics, and a sensible way to move from simulation to live.

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Education

2025-06-105 min read

ES vs NQ Futures: Which Should You Trade as a Day Trader?

ES and NQ differ in point value, notional size, stop distance and what drives them. This guide works through equal-dollar-risk sizing, micro contracts, slippage costs, and a way to test which market suits your plan before you commit money.

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Calculator, notebook and pencil on a work desk

Education

March 21, 20265 min read

ES Futures Day Trading: Contract Math, Sessions, Risk, and Reference Levels

ES is $50 a point and $12.50 a tick, so every decision converts to dollars quickly. This guide covers contract specs, session structure, scheduled-news risk, stop and size math with MES, and how fixed opening-print reference levels differ from order-flow claims.

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Strategy

March 21, 20254 min read

Best Time to Trade ES Futures: Session Hours, Volatility Windows and When to Stay Out

ES trades almost around the clock, but your attention and results do not spread evenly across it. This guide maps the session by time of day, explains what tends to change in each window, and shows how to test which windows work for you.

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Strategy

March 21, 20254 min read

ES Futures Gap Fill Strategy: How to Trade Opening Gaps

A gap fill trade looks easy on a chart and gets expensive in practice. This guide defines the gap, shows the entry and stop math with a worked hypothetical, explains why the reward-to-risk is thinner than most people assume, and how to measure fill rates yourself.

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