rss

3 Characteristics of Great Traders

 Adapt or Die

Market conditions change and technology advances, thus the conditions for trading are always evolving, the rise in mechanical trading is testament to that. The very best traders through a process of education and adaptation are constantly staying ahead of the curve and creating ever new and ingenious methods to profit from the markets evolution.

 Fail to plan, you plan to fail.

The best traders have a well documented plan; they know exactly what they are looking for and follow that plan to the letter. Their preparation for a trade starts long before the market open, it is this meticulous planning and importantly adherence to that plan that helps them avoid the biggest demons for any trader, over trading and revenge trading.

 “Be like Machine”

As human beings emotions pay a key role in our existence, for a trader emotions can be a source of great pain. Trading psychology and the management of your emotions in a trade play a key role in overall success. Fear and greed can cut your winners short and let your losers run. Dealing with emotions follows on from your plan; the more robust your plan the less likely you are to fall into the emotional mine field.

Trading: Doing the Homework

HOMEWORKMany new traders fail in the stock market simply because they rush in without putting in the proper time and discipline in doing their homework. Trading is a professional endeavor much like any other career, you will only get out of it what you put into it. There is no easy money, you will have to earn it by out witting, out playing, and out smarting the majority of other market participants.

You need to learn ten things to be a successful trader:

  1. How to manager your risk per trade.
  2. What systems and methods really make money over the long term.
  3. What system fits your personality and beliefs about the market.
  4. How much heat you can you handle. How big can you trade with out emotions taking over?
  5. You must learn how the market actually works, trends, flows, and functions.
  6. Learn to focus only on what makes money in the market, everything else is noise.
  7. Discover who the greatest traders of all time were and study how they operated.
  8. Find out what the best books on trading are and read them.
  9. Study the charts of the stocks you are trading to understand how it works with trends, support, resistance, and moving averages.
  10. Practice paper trading, simulated accounts, and trading small positions of real money until you have mastered your trading plan. (more…)

What Trading Teaches Us About Life

Trading is a crucible of life: it distills, in a matter of minutes, the basic human challenge: the need to judge, plan, and seek values under conditions of risk and uncertainty. In mastering trading, we necessarily face and master ourselves. Very few arenas of life so immediately reward self-development–and punish its absence.

So many life lessons can be culled from trading and the markets:

1) Have a firm stop-loss point for all activities: jobs, relationships, and personal involvements. Successful people are successful because they cut their losing experiences short and ride winning experiences.

2) Diversification works well in life and markets. Multiple, non-correlated sources of fulfillment make it easier to take risks in any one facet of life.

3) In life as in markets, chance truly favors those who are prepared to benefit. Failing to plan truly is planning to fail.

4) Success in trading and life comes from knowing your edge, pressing it when you have the opportunity, and sitting back when that edge is no longer present.

5) Risks and rewards are always proportional. The latter, in life as in markets, requires prudent management of the former.

6) Happiness is the profit we harvest from life. All life’s activities should be periodically reviewed for their return on investment.

7) Embrace change: With volatility comes opportunity, as well as danger.

8) All trends and cycles come to an end. Who anticipates the future, profits.

9) The worst decisions, in life and markets, come from extremes: overconfidence and a lack of confidence.

10) A formula for success in life and finance: never hold an investment that you would not be willing to purchase afresh today.

Go to top