Archives of “January 11, 2019” day

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Zero is Bottom

  
  Education
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The markets have a clearly defined Zero-value. This has several important implications. First, traders often discount the possibility of something becoming absolutely worthless (i.e. going to zero), so the more the price goes down, the greater the traders’ tendency is to believe that it has a higher probability of going up again; therefore the temptation to catch the bottom and go long becomes compelling (despite its irrationality). Traders must realize that how they are hardwired to think as people is not necessarily the way they should think as a trader. There is a reason why 90% of people who attempt to make a living as a trader end up failing and it is not because of intelligence, information, technology or effort. In a nutshell, I believe failure in trading is because of a lack of self-awareness. The solution is to compartmentalize your thinking. When you are interacting in society or at home, let yourself think like a person; but when you sit down to trade, you need to think objectively by evaluating risk/reward as a trader should.

10 Quotes from: Where Are the Customers’ Yachts?

  
  Education
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where_customers_yachtsMarkets can be very violent on the downside. The old saying —  Markets ride the escalator to the top and the elevator to the bottom — is still quite relevant.

The past week or so has been a rocky one to say the least. This is the time to review the lessons learned from the past. The alternative of listening to hysterical nonsense from forecasters will only lead you to heaps of trouble.

Where the Customers’ Yachts? is a timeless relic which should be read by anyone who professes the slightest interest in finance.  Though written after the infamous 1929 crash, its contents are completely applicable in 2016. In the words of Mike Bloomberg in his review of this classic tale, “The more things change, the more they remain the same. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.”

Here are ten quotes that can serve as a force field to ward of investment charlatans. Ignore these quotes at your own peril:

  • Wall Street Greed – “At the close of the day’s business, they take all the money and throw it up in the air. Everything that sticks to the ceiling belongs to the clients.”  Merrill Lynch Structured Notes, anyone? Yes, the customers got to keep 5%.
  • The Value of Market Predictions – “It seems that the immature mind has a regrettable tendency to believe, as actually true, that which it only hopes to be true.” 90% chance ‘Remain’ wins the referendum… OOPS!
  • Financial Salesman Having an Answer to the Unanswerable – “Now if you do someone the single honor of asking him a difficult question, you may be assured that you will get a detailed answer. Rarely will it be the most difficult of all answers – ‘I Don’t Know.’” Market pundits who were completely wrong on Brexit, telling you what to do now.

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Analysing yourself

  
  Education
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“At the end of each trading day (week) you shouldn’t focus solely on your P/L. Instead, focus on your thought process during the day and how well you executed your plan. If you consistently execute your trades according to plan and still lose money, then you need to reevaluate your approach. While there is definitely a cyclical rhythm to the market, no strategy will always work. You need to constantly  and objectively  review what is working and what is not so you can make necessary adjustments to you plan.”

MindTraps-Great Book

  
  Education
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I read a great book on trading psychology, called MindTraps by Roland Barach. MindTraps focuses on how the average person tends to think, compared to how we need to think to make money over time in the markets.

 Here’s a summary of points that can benefit you as a trader:

  1. 1.Before entering any trade, you should consider the other side of the trade and state the reasons you’d take the other side of the trade.  This helps you objectively enter a trade with a full understanding of the major risks that involved.
  2. Analyze your behavior from the beginning to the end of the trading process (from idea generation to entry and finally to exit) – what are the areas you can improve to help your trading profitability the most?
  3. Keep a trading journal of your thoughts on open positions and new ideas – writing things down helps you objectively look back and see where you went right and wrong.
  4. Fear blinds us to opportunity; greed blinds us to danger – emotions cause “perceptual distortion” where we only see the part of the picture that our beliefs allow us to see.
  5. We are likely to continue doing things for which we are rewarded -this can cause us to get too bullish after the bulk of the uptrend has occurred, or get too bearish near the lows.
  6. Fear of regret slants stock market behavior toward inaction and conventional thinking –  the person who is afraid of losing is usually defeated by the opponent who concentrates on winning (an analogy for sports fans is the Prevent defense in football – playing “not to lose” only prevents you from winning).
  7. Can’t have a personal agenda to prove your self-worth in the markets –  the focus must be on following your plan to maximize the ability to make money.
  8. Don’t get overly attached to any one view on a stock or market – don’t talk to others about open positions; it just makes it that much harder to exit when your plan says it should.
  9. Our predictions are only as good as the information available to us – objectively look at the indicators and data you use, to get the best quality of information and focus available
  10. People prefer for gains to be taken in several pieces to maximize their feeling good about their ability, while they prefer to take all their losses in one big lump to minimize the pain they feel.
  11. People prefer a sure gain compared to a high probability of a bigger gain, so they can say they made a profit; in contrast, people will speculate on a high probability of a bigger loss over a sure smaller loss, because they don’t want to feel like a loser.  In trading, we must flip around the conventional emotions to allow us to let profits run while cutting losses shorter.
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