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6 ways to think about risk

1  Risk is not the same as volatility. Assets can be volatile on the upside as well as the downside. Risk should instead be viewed as the permanent loss of purchasing power.

2 A risk should not be evaluated based its frequency. Some risks only have to happen once to be catastrophic.

3 Sophistication and knowledge are not a form of or substitute for risk management.

4 Although following the crowd may feel comfortable, risks are just as catastrophic whether you suffer with company or suffer alone.

5 Bullish consensus manufacturers the greatest risks because nobody is prepared and everyone runs for the exits at the same time. Strong optimistic consensus provides a sense that nothing can go wrong. This is why the greatest catastrophes seem to come out of the blue.

6 Activity, research and analysis provides a false sense of control over the future. However devastating losses rarely due to a lack of brain power or analytical prowess.

Livermore on speculation

Just remember, without a discipline, a clear strategy and a concise plan, the speculator will fall into all the emotional pitfalls of the market and jump from one stock to another, hold a losing position too long, cut-out of a winner too soon and for no reason other than fear of losing the profit. Greed, fear, impatience, ignorance and hope, will all fight for mental dominance over the speculator. Then after a few failures and catastrophes, the speculator may become demoralized, depressed, despondent, and abondon the market and the chance to make a fortune of what the market has to offer.

Develop your own strategy, discipline and approach to the market. I offer my suggestions as one, who has traveled the road before you. Perhaps I can act as a guide for you and save from falling in some of the pitfalls that befell me. But in the end the decisions must be your own”.

Day Trading – Trade Reluctance

ReluctanceA problem that plagues all traders from time-to-time, trade reluctance, or the inability to pull the trigger has many causes. Recognizing yourself among the following Trade Reluctance Types can go a long way toward eliminating the problem. 

ALARMIST: Characterized by energy being diverted away from placing trades into over-vigilant preparation for low probability catastrophes. Habitual worrying about the worst case scenario. 

ANALYSIS PARALYSIS: Characterized by energy being over-invested in analyzing at the expense of executing trades. Preparation for making trades is out of control. Trader is a walking encyclopedia of technical information with little or no profits to show for it. 

HYPER-PRO: Characterized by energy being lost due to over-investment in the mannerisms and appearances of success. Energy is expended at the expense of goal-supporting behaviors such as analyzing trade performance or analysis for the next trading session, which is viewed as “demeaning” and “unprofessional,” and/or “shouldn’t be necessary.” Often accompanied by over-stylized use of professional jargon, name-dropping, and a reflexive need to appear better informed and more sophisticated than the “average” trader.  (more…)

R.W. Schabacker, the financial editor of Forbes magazine, penned the following advice (warning) in 1934

No trader can ever expect to be correct in every one of his market transactions. No individual, however well he may be grounded, no matter how much experience he has had in practical market operation, can expect to be infallible. There will always be mistakes, some unwise judgments, some erroneous moves, some losses. The extent to which such losses materialize, to which they are allowed to become serious, will almost invariably determine whether the individual is to be successful in his long-range investing activities or whether such accumulated losses are finally to wreck him on the shoals of mental despair and financial tragedy.

THE TRUE TEST

It is easy enough to manage those commitments which progress smoothly and successfully to one’s anticipated goal. The true test of market success comes when the future movement is not in line with anticipated developments, when the trader is just plain wrong in his calculations, and when his investment begins to show a loss instead of a profit. If such situations are not properly handled, if one or two losing positions are allowed to get out of control, then they can wipe out a score of successful profits and leave the individual with a huge loss on balance. It is just as important-nay, even more important-to know when to dessert a bad bargain, take one’s loss and count it a day, as it is to know when to close out a successful transaction which has brought profit.

LIMITS ARE A MUST

The staggering catastrophes which ruin investors, mentally, morally, and financially, are not contingent upon the difference between a 5 percent loss limit and a 20 percent loss limit. They stem from not having established any limit at all on the possible loss. Any experienced market operator can tell you that his greatest losses have been taken by those, probably rare, instances when he substituted stubbornness for loss limitation, when he bought more of a stock which was going down, instead of selling some of it to lighten his risk, when he allowed pride of personal opinion to replace conservative faith in the cold judgment of the market place. (more…)