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Day Trading Mistakes

  
  Education
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There are some major day trading mistakes that just about every new trader will make early on in their career.  The ones who survive are those who can recognize these mistakes and take corrective action.

The first mistake many day traders make is to skip the planning phase of the day or a trade.  Every day you sit down in front of your monitors you should have a general plan for the day.  You should understand the major trends and support/resistance of the major indices, and the stocks you plan on trading.  In addition to that, once you see your stock setting up for a trade you should have a plan that includes an entry, a target and a stop-loss before you even pull the trigger on the trade.

Another mistake that we often see in day trading is the inability to exit on a losing trade.  If you have issues with getting out of the market when your pre-planned loss has been hit on your own, try using stop-loss orders.  Never. Never ever ever move a stop loss order once it’s been placed.  This requires some discipline but it will save you tons of money in the long run.  You should never be hoping that your stock will turn around, and go where you expected.  You should be executing your plan to the letter.

On a similar note, you also never want to move your targets.  If you keep moving your target away from the stock’s current price, you’re never going to take your profits.  A typical day trading exit strategy is to take profits at predetermined levels as you proceed into green territory.  This means that before you’ve entered the trade you’ve chosen two or more targets.  You exit a portion of your trade at each target.  Now, if you think your stock is going to trend for the day, you can plan for that too.  This is called a trade-to-hold.  It doesn’t mean you move your target, but rather you try to stay in the trend by setting a trailing stop.  A trailing stop can either be automatically set at a certain percentage or point value behind the stock price, or you can mechanically keep moving your stop loss up to obvious points of resistance or support behind your trending stock. (more…)

10 Rules If You USE Charts

  
  Education
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Rule 1 – If you cannot see trends and patterns almost instantly when you look at a chart then they are not there. The longer you stare, the more your brain will try to apply order where there is none.
If you have to justify exceptions, stray data points and conflicting evidence then it is safe to say the market is not showing you what you think it is.
Rule 2 – You can torture a chart to say anything you want. Don’t do it.
This is very similar to Rule 2 but it there is an important point to drive home. You can cherry pick indicators to justify whatever biases you bring to the table and that attempts to impose your will on the market. You cannot tell the market what to do – ever.
Rule 3 – Be sure you check out one time frame larger than the one in which you are operating (a weekly chart for a swing trader, a monthly chart for a position trader).
It is very easy to get caught up in your own world and miss the bigger picture getting ready to smack you. It can mean the difference between buying the dip in a rising trend and selling a breakdown in a falling trend.
Rule 4 – Look at both bars (or candles) and close-only line charts to see if they agree. And look at both linear and semi-logarithmic scaled charts when price movements are large.
Short-term traders can ignore the latter since prices are not usually moving 30% in a day. But position traders must compare movements at different price levels.
As for bars and lines, sometimes important highs and lows are set by intraday or intra-week movements. And sometimes intrday or intra-week highs and lows are anomalies that can safely be ignored. Why not look at both?
Rule 5 – Patterns must be in proportion to the trends they are attempting to correct or reverse. I like the trend to be at least three times as long as the pattern. (more…)

Trading as a Business- Dick Diamond :Book Review

  
  Education
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Dick Diamond has been trading fulltime since 1965. By my calculation that’s fifty years, although the subtitle of Trading as a Business(Wiley, 2015) is The Methods and Rules I’ve Used to Beat the Markets for 40 Years. Ah yes, at the beginning of his trading career Diamond didn’t beat the market. In fact, in late 1968, when he had positions in fifteen low-priced, go-go AMEX stocks, he went on a vacation and let the positions ride. Two weeks later he had lost 70% of his trading capital. It was a pivotal moment: either throw in the towel or change course.

Diamond slowly morphed into a short-term technical trader, comfortable with both long and short trades. He incorporated options into his trading arsenal. After the CME introduced E-mini futures in 1997, they became his preferred day-trading vehicle.

In this book Diamond shares the MetaStock templates he uses to make his trades. Traders who don’t have the MetaStock platform can most likely replicate three of his four templates—the moving average template, the moving ribbons template, and the RMO template. But they won’t have access to the Bressert indicator, which is based on cycle analysis and shows trend direction.

Diamond is always on the lookout for the 80/20 trade, the high-probability setup. Throughout the trading day he reads the market with his indicators, asking (1) whether the indicators are flat, trending, or somewhere in between, (2) whether the moving averages are separating or converging, (3) whether any divergences between price and momentum are developing, (4) whether the indicators are confirming each other or are in conflict, and (5) what the next most likely 80/20 trading opportunity is. (p. 118)

Trading as a Business is a thin book, devoted primarily to describing and illustrating the four templates. But it’s a decent starting place for the would-be technical trader.

Trading Wisdom – Jesse Livermore

  
  Education
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“I think it was a long step forward in my trading education when I realized at last that when old Mr. Partridge kept on telling the other customers, “Well, you know this is a bull market!” he really meant to tell them that the big money was not in the individual fluctuations but in the main movements – that is, not in reading the tape but in sizing up the entire market and its trend.”

In all of “Reminiscences” this crucial idea that the Really Big Money is always earned by prudently riding the large trends over time and not in day trading every minute fluctuation is one of the central themes of the book. Livermore hammers this again and again, attacking it from countless angles and spicing up all of his amazing lessons with his own enthralling personal experiences.

This old and successful speculator that Livermore mentions, Mr. Partridge, would always politely tell the younger speculators who asked him trading questions that it was a bull market. The young speculators were always eager to trade, but Partridge was old and battle-scarred enough to know that no mere mortal could even hope to catch every individual fluctuation so the wisest strategy was just to ride the major trends. His simple reply, which would annoy the youngsters since they couldn’t yet perceive the deep wisdom in it, was to subtly advise them to just ride the primary trend and not worry about rapid-fire trading.

If a particular market happens to be in a primary bull trend, then just be long and don’t worry about trying to interpret and trade upon the essentially random day-to-day market noise. If a particular market is in a primary bear trend, then either sit out in cash or stay short and wait for the trend to fully mature and run its course. Don’t try to frantically outguess the primary trend everyday, just accept it and trade with it and you will win in the end.

12 Signs of Stress for Traders

  
  Education
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Markets have been particularly volatile recently, at least for intraday traders and daytrading can create a significant amount of stress. Because our bodies are designed to adapt to stress, we may fail to realize that we are stressed out.
Here’s an inventory of common trader behaviors that may signify excessive stress.
12 Signs of Stress
1. A vivid fantasy of making lots of money today.
2. Feelings of invulnerability.
3. Eating breakfast or lunch at your trading desk.
4. Hyperfocus on price bars as they form.
5. Talking out loud to the market.
6. Bargaining with the market about an open position.
7. Cursing at the market.
8. Expressing irritation at partner, kids, pets, plants, inanimate objects.
9. Sudden urge to increase position size or frequency.
10. Canceling or moving stops for no good reason
11. Adding to a losing position.
12. Trading in your underwear !
TIP: Stress degrades decision-making. If you are stressed out, shift your focus 

10 Trading Books -Every Trader Must Read

  
  Education
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“If there was easy money lying around, no one would be forcing it it into your pockets.” – Jesse Livermore

There is so much garbage out there concerning trading online and the temptation for easy money that many new traders are lured into childish beliefs about getting rich quick, following a guru that can predict the future, or confusing a salesman for a trader. Contrary to popular belief, trading is not about picks, predictions, or personal gurus. Trading is really about entry signals with an edge, following price action, and learning to trade a system that fits who you are as a trader. Real long term profitable trading is about, risk management, robust trading systems, and mental and emotional discipline. I would not trust anyone that did not have those three things at the core of their trading. Here is the right reading path for a new trader to follow to avoid all the hype, foolishness, con-artists, and childishness that arises from ignorance of a solid understanding of the subject of trading in the real world in real time.

Trade Like a Casino: Find Your Edge, Manage Risk, and Win Like the House (Wiley Trading)  “If we are properly managing the risk and adhering to a positive expectancy model, the act of trading a position should be boring.” – Richard Weissman

Trading Without Gambling: Develop a Game Plan for Ultimate Trading Success “If all your decisions were made during nonmarket hours with timing and execution being your main concern during market hours, you will dramatically increase your chances of success.” – Marcel Link

Trend Following (Updated Edition): Learn to Make Millions in Up or Down Markets “Trend followers are the group of technical traders who use reactive technical analysis. Instead of trying to predict a market direction, their strategy is to react to the market’s movements whenever they occur. This enables them to focus on the market’s actual moves and not get emotionally involved with trying to predict direction or duration.” – Michael Covel

Market Wizards, Updated: Interviews With Top Traders “The most important rule of trading is to play great defense, not great offense.” & “Don’t focus on making money; focus on protecting what you have.” – Market Wizards (more…)

Traders Psychological TEST

  
  Education
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Paul Farrell observes that 95% of traders don’t make it. 80% of all day traders lose money. One study found active investors turn over their portfolios excessively (258% annually) but made less than 12% on their money. Passive buy-and-hold investors with only 2% portfolio turnover had significantly better returns.

And, most day traders suffer negative health consequences from their hyper active market moves.

To find out what your trading instincts mean — to grade your own Traders Psychological Profile — answer the following questions Yes or N:

Traders Psychological Profile
Y N You’ve tried more than one new investment strategy this year
Y N Feel you’re buying and selling funds at the wrong time
Y N Rarely open up to anybody for feedback about your losses
Y N Subscribe to two or more newsletters, feel overwhelmed
Y N Can count on one hand all the good laughs this week
Y N Have a lingering resentment about someone or something
Y N You love cable news, but need more time to trade
Y N Rarely break a sweat when exercising the past few weeks
Y N Wonder whether you bet too much on recent investments
Y N Need more than three caffeine and alcohol drinks a day
Y N Feel “something” keeps you from making more money
Y N Frequently don’t trust your instincts or your strategy
Y N You’ve had a major family or personal loss recently
Y N Believe losses are caused by the market manipulators
Y N You’re overweight and snack often on comfort food
Y N Fear your future trades may fail due to a losing streak
Y N Diet and sleep are disturbed by worries about money
Y N Your retirement portfolio’s not growing fast enough
Y N No vacation in a year, and lack an active social life
Y N Nothing (or everything) interferes with making money

 

Add up the number of Yes answers. Farrell notes that if your total number of “yes” answers is six or more, then day trading is too stressful and risky for you.

The alternative to active trading is intelligent asset allocation. At the very least, he advises that you segregate your “untouchable” retirement money . . .

John Murphy’s Ten Laws of Technical Trading

  
  Education
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1. Map the Trends

Study long-term charts. Begin a chart analysis with monthly and weekly charts spanning several years. A larger scale map of the market provides more visibility and a better long-term perspective on a market. Once the long-term has been established, then consult daily and intra-day charts. A short-term market view alone can often be deceptive. Even if you only trade the very short term, you will do better if you’re trading in the same direction as the intermediate and longer term trends.

2. Spot the Trend and Go With It

Determine the trend and follow it. Market trends come in many sizes – long-term, intermediate-term and short-term. First, determine which one you’re going to trade and use the appropriate chart. Make sure you trade in the direction of that trend. Buy dips if the trend is up. Sell rallies if the trend is down. If you’re trading the intermediate trend, use daily and weekly charts. If you’re day trading, use daily and intra-day charts. But in each case, let the longer range chart determine the trend, and then use the shorter term chart for timing.

3. Find the Low and High of It

Find support and resistance levels. The best place to buy a market is near support levels. That support is usually a previous reaction low. The best place to sell a market is near resistance levels. Resistance is usually a previous peak. After a resistance peak has been broken, it will usually provide support on subsequent pullbacks. In other words, the old “high” becomes the new low. In the same way, when a support level has been broken, it will usually produce selling on subsequent rallies – the old “low” can become the new “high.”

4. Know How Far to Backtrack (more…)

The Disciplined Trader: Developing Winning Attitudes by Mark Douglas

  
  Education
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Intro

  • Reaching the level of success they desire as traders will require them to make at least some, if not many, changes in the way they perceive market action.
  • The markets have absolutely no power or control over you, no expectation of your behavior, and no regard for your welfare.
  • There are only a few traders who have come to the realization that they alone are completely responsible for the outcome of their actions.  Even fewer are those who have accept the psychological implications of that realization and know what to do about it.
  • The nature of the markets made it easy no to have to confront anything that otherwise might be perceived as a problem because the next trade always had the possibility of making everything else in one’s life seem irrelevant.
  • I CREATED MY LOSSES INSTEAD OF AVOIDING THEM SIMPLY BECAUSE I WAS TRYING TO AVOID THEM.
  • Unsuccessful Trading Behaviors
    1. Refusing to define a loss.
    2. Not liquidating a losing trade, even after you have acknowledged the trade’s potential is greatly diminished.
    3. Getting locked into a specific opinion or belief about market direction.  I.E. “I’m right, the market is wrong.”
    4. Focusing on price and the money
    5. Revenge-trading to get back at the market from what it took from you.
    6. Not reversing your position even when you clearly sense a change in market direction
    7. Not following the rules of the trading system.
    8. Planning for a move or feeling one building, then not trading it.
    9. Not acting on your instincts or intuition
    10. Establishing a consistent patter of trading success over a period of time, and then giving your winning back to the market in one or two trades.

(more…)

The Only Way to Day Trade

  
  Education
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There are four cardinal principles which should be part of every trading strategy. They are: 1) Trade with the trend, 2) Cut losses short, 3) Let profits run, and 4) Manage risk. You should make sure your strategy includes each of these requirements for success.

Trade with the trend relates to the decision of how to initiate trades. It means you should always trade in the direction of recent price movement.

Mathematical analysis of commodity price data has shown that these price changes are primarily random with a small trend component. This scientific fact is extremely important to those desiring to pursue commodity trading in a rational, scientific manner. It means that any attempt to trade short-term patterns and methods not based on trend are doomed to failure. It also explains why day trading is darned difficult and why almost no day trader is a long-term success.

The shorter the time frame in which you examine price action, the smaller the trend component is. Commodity price action is fractal. That means that as you shorten or lengthen the time frame, price action remains similar in behavior. Thus, five-minute charts have roughly the same appearance as hourly charts, daily charts, weekly charts and monthly charts.

This similarity in chart appearance convinces traders that you can day trade successfully with the same tools you use on longer-term charts. Of course, they try to use much of the arsenal of technical analysis that doesn’t work on long-term charts either. Things like Oscillators, Candlesticks and Fibonacci numbers.

However, even trend-following tools that work in intermediate to long-term time frames won’t work in day trading. This is because the trend component is so very small in short-term data that you must use a highly effective method to overcome the costs of trading.

In longer-term trading, you can let your profits run. You do it by definition or it wouldn’t be long-term trading. In day trading you can only let your profits run to the end of the day. This means your average trade (the average profit of both your winning and losing trades) must necessarily be much smaller than if you could let your profits run for days, weeks or months. However, your costs of trading–slippage, commissions, the bid/asked spread and mistakes–stay roughly the same on a per trade basis. Thus, your day trading system must be much more consistent and robust to stay ahead of the costs of trading than would an intermediate to long-term system. There are few day trading approaches that meet this test.

Since market price action is mostly random, successful trading methods must somehow exploit a non-random feature of market price action. The tendency of most markets to trend is the only possible edge in trading, so a winning approach must harness trend in some way. Tradeable trends do not show up often in the very short term. They certainly are not present every day. That is why the person who tries to day trade at least once every day, and perhaps even more often, is doomed to failure. The more often you day trade, the more likely it is that you will be a long-term loser. (more…)

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