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Core Trading Concepts

If you are serious about your trading there are some concepts you must know in significant details. Those concepts will help you build a strong foundation on which you can build a trading system. There are seven  concepts you should study:
 
  • Momentum : If you understand this you will understand trends and mean reversion. You will understand why and how momentum works in the market. Most indicators are momentum based. Trend following and buying strength also works, so does mean reversion. They are all part of the momentum phenomenon. 
  • Market Breadth: Stock markets are composite markets. The overall move in market is an aggregate of moves of several hundred or several thousand stocks. So the level of participation in a move is important. 
  • Equity Selection: Because the overall market is a composite of many individual moves, it becomes critical to select right kind of stocks from the universe of stocks. Hence equity selection is extremely critical. You should know various ways in which one can select equities.
  • Market Anomalies: Market anomalies are the distortions in the market. If you base your trading on a proven and statistically significant anomaly, you will be profitable. Absent that no amount of indicators will help you. A through understanding of anomalies will give you an edge.
  • Market Microstructure: Market Microstructure is a branch of finance concerned with the details of how exchange occurs in markets.  Understanding this will tell you how the market operates. The concept of market microstructre is very critical if you are trading very small time frames or are a day trader. Because to be successful on those time frame you need to find exploitable anomalies in market microstructure. You need to understand role played by market makers, automated programs, arbitragers, large fund buyers and so on. Their tactics and behaviour creates certain patterns 
  • Growth investing : Growth investors buy stocks of companies growing faster than the average company in the market. 
  • Value investing : Value investors buy stocks of companies which are cheap or out of favor.

Why is self efficacy important

Life does not come with a neatly designed manual.No one gives you a manual on trading when you start. You have to figure out things on your own.
Traders spend so much time moaning about lack of good training resources or programs. Or claiming this does not work, that does not work. Many of these issues are related to self efficacy.
When I did bulk of my work on Market Breadth there was no book on market breadth. I got the same help manual that you get with Telechart when I started using Telechart. In fact when I did bulk of my work on designing my trading methods, Internet was not such a big source of information.Life is much easier now, you can find so much information for fraction of effort and cost. Same thing that I figured out you can also figure out if you spend sufficient time going in to depth and peeling the layers.
That is the story of every successful independent traders. They figured out the market on their own.

This is where self efficacy becomes very critical. If you have strong perceived sense of self efficacy, you would spend your time and energy on finding solutions to your ignorance problems and overcoming inhibitors.
People with strong sense of self efficacy never have inertia problem. They have intrinsic motivation.
 
See my earlier post on “Three most common problem faced by traders”
The three most common problems when it comes to trading profitably are:

  1. Ignorance
  2. Inhibitors
  3. Inertia

Ignorance problems can be solved by acquiring knowledge. These are easiest problems to fix. If I don’t understand something, I need a strategy to overcome my ignorance. It might be reading, attending courses/training program, researching .

For example many users of Telechart do not know how to use many functionality. That is easily fixable problem.Same is true of say IBD methodology. Many people are ignorant of how say EPS or RS rating is calculated. People of ignorant of momentum or risk management or growth investing.

If you overcome your ignorance problem, you might encounter next set of problem.

Inhibitors are things which inhibit us from acting on our knowledge. I know IBD 200 works and how it works and it can be profitable, but I do not have time to input the 200 stocks. Or I know how I can make money trading Double Trouble, but i do not have software to do this for me.

All inhibitors kind of problem require innovation . A little innovation and resourcefulness can solve most inhibitors kind of issues. If A route or scan does not work, you find B route or plan B. When faced with constrains, you have to innovate.

If you are motivated enough trader, you will find solving the ignorance and inhibitors problem is not very difficult. The third set of problem is the most difficult to solve.

Inertia is lack of action on what we know and inability to act on overcoming inhibitors. Inertia makes most people stick to their current orbit of success or performance. You can spend years living suboptimal life and wasting your potential if inertia is your problem.

Inertia problems have one simple solution. A kick in the ass.

 
To overcome all three you need to have higher perceived self efficacy. If you have that then you will find several ways to overcome your ignorance problem. If you have that you will innovate around the inhibitors and if you have that motivation will not be a problem.
The concept of self efficacy is applicable not only to trading but to everything else in your life and career. You will see same thing in organisation, the vast majority is waiting for “the manual”, “the instructions”, “the rules” , “the holy grail” and so on. Few people in any organisation will have the self efficacy to figure out many of the things themselves and they will be the real leaders.
 
The concept of self efficacy is very critical if you have kids and you want them to be successful in life. Much of the school system and learning tools used are not geared to developing self efficacy. Plus parents are so indulgent that they hinder self efficacy development. Kids get rewarded for little efforts.

Seven Concepts

If you are serious about your trading there are some concepts you must know in significant details. Those concepts will help you build a strong foundation on which you can build a trading system. There are seven  concepts you should study:
 

  • Momentum : If you understand this you will understand trends and mean reversion. You will understand why and how momentum works in the market. Most indicators are momentum based. Trend following and buying strength also works, so does mean reversion. They are all part of the momentum phenomenon. 
  • Market Breadth: Stock markets are composite markets. The overall move in market is an aggregate of moves of several hundred or several thousand stocks. So the level of participation in a move is important. 
  • Equity Selection: Because the overall market is a composite of many individual moves, it becomes critical to select right kind of stocks from the universe of stocks. Hence equity selection is extremely critical. You should know various ways in which one can select equities.
  • Market Anomalies: Market anomalies are the distortions in the market. If you base your trading on a proven and statistically significant anomaly, you will be profitable. Absent that no amount of indicators will help you. A through understanding of anomalies will give you an edge.
  • Market Microstructure: Market Microstructure is a branch of finance concerned with the details of how exchange occurs in markets.  Understanding this will tell you how the market operates. The concept of market microstructre is very critical if you are trading very small time frames or are a day trader. Because to be successful on those time frame you need to find exploitable anomalies in market microstructure. You need to understand role played by market makers, automated programs, arbitragers, large fund buyers and so on. Their tactics and behaviour creates certain patterns 
  • Growth investing : Growth investors buy stocks of companies growing faster than the average company in the market. 
  • Value investing : Value investors buy stocks of companies which are cheap or out of favor.

 

7 concepts that can make you a better trader

  • Momentum : If you understand this you will understand trends and mean reversion. You will understand why and how momentum works in the market. Most indicators are momentum based. Trend following and buying strength also works, so does mean reversion. They are all part of the momentum phenomenon. 
  • Market Breadth: Stock markets are composite markets. The overall move in market is an aggregate of moves of several hundred or several thousand stocks. So the level of participation in a move is important. 
  • Equity Selection: Because the overall market is a composite of many individual moves, it becomes critical to select right kind of stocks from the universe of stocks. Hence equity selection is extremely critical. You should know various ways in which one can select equities.
  • Market Anomalies: Market anomalies are the distortions in the market. If you base your trading on a proven and statistically significant anomaly, you will be profitable. Absent that no amount of indicators will help you. A through understanding of anomalies will give you an edge.
  • Market Microstructure: Market Microstructure is a branch of finance concerned with the details of how exchange occurs in markets.  Understanding this will tell you how the market operates. The concept of market microstructre is very critical if you are trading very small time frames or are a day trader. Because to be successful on those time frame you need to find exploitable anomalies in market microstructure. You need to understand role played by market makers, automated programs, arbitragers, large fund buyers and so on. Their tactics and behaviour creates certain patterns 
  • Growth investing : Growth investors buy stocks of companies growing faster than the average company in the market. 
  • Value investing : Value investors buy stocks of companies which are cheap or out of favor.

7 concepts that can make you a better trader

New traders spend lot of time on indicators, scans, or chart pattern. Lot of that effort is wasted. Instead they should focus on core concepts.

 
If you understand core concepts you will find understanding the market and techniques used by traders easier. All the indicators and techniques are based on some underlying core concept. Many times the people who promote some of these indicators do not understand the core concept or purposefully package their indicators as something that is anti thesis of a core concept.
 

If you are serious about your trading there are some concepts you must know in significant details. Those concepts will help you build a strong foundation on which you can build a trading system. There are seven  concepts you should study:
  • Momentum : If you understand this you will understand trends and mean reversion. You will understand why and how momentum works in the market. Most indicators are momentum based. Trend following and buying strength also works, so does mean reversion. They are all part of the momentum phenomenon. 
  • Market Breadth: Stock markets are composite markets. The overall move in market is an aggregate of moves of several hundred or several thousand stocks. So the level of participation in a move is important. 
  • Equity Selection: Because the overall market is a composite of many individual moves, it becomes critical to select right kind of stocks from the universe of stocks. Hence equity selection is extremely critical. You should know various ways in which one can select equities.
  • Market Anomalies: Market anomalies are the distortions in the market. If you base your trading on a proven and statistically significant anomaly, you will be profitable. Absent that no amount of indicators will help you. A through understanding of anomalies will give you an edge.
  • Market Microstructure: Market Microstructure is a branch of finance concerned with the details of how exchange occurs in markets.  Understanding this will tell you how the market operates. The concept of market microstructre is very critical if you are trading very small time frames or are a day trader. Because to be successful on those time frame you need to find exploitable anomalies in market microstructure. You need to understand role played by market makers, automated programs, arbitragers, large fund buyers and so on. Their tactics and behaviour creates certain patterns 
  • Growth investing : Growth investors buy stocks of companies growing faster than the average company in the market. 
  • Value investing : Value investors buy stocks of companies which are cheap or out of favor.
These are the core concepts around which all trading strategies revolve.