Traders often hear about the potential benefits of preparing actionable trade plans prior to the next trading day. The goal of such preparation is to make yourself immune to mental edge breakdown. One of the greatest threats to your mental edge is coming across something that’s unexpected during the trading day. Seeing an unexpected price move (especially one you perceive to be a big move) is likely to stress and panic you and therefore cause your psychology to shift into an emotional, reactive state. An effective way to prevent this is to prepare with possibility mapping.
Possibility mapping is a process which will mentally prepare you to expect the potentially unexpected, and therefore will allow you to numb, in advance, any potential emotional responses. (more…)
Archives of “possibilities” tag
rssProbability game
There is a random distribution between wins and losses for any given set of variables that defines an edge.In other words ,based on the past performance of your edge ,you may know that out of the next 20 trades ,12 will be winners and 8 will will be losers.What you don’t know is the sequence of wins and losses or how much money the market is going to make available on the winning trades.This truth makes trading a probability or numbers game.When you really believe that trading is simply a probability game ,concepts like “right “and “wrong ” or “win ” and “lose ” no longer have the same significance.As a result ,your expectations will be in harmony with the possibilities.
Reacting versus Predicting in Trading
Most of the best traders I have read about and know of personally do not predict what will happen they trade what is happening. New traders always want to predict, they want to argue about their beliefs and why something must happen or will happen. Most rich traders are rich because they are flexible, they have no strong opinions and are just looking at possibilities and ready to take a set up, buy a break out or short a break down. A new trader believes that ‘conviction’ about a trade is important, holding through an adverse move is usually a bad idea, especially if a key level is reached that is showing the trader that they are wrong. A rich trader is waiting for some price level to trigger their entry then another price level to trigger their exit. A new trader is trading off a belief and has no real exit plan most the time because they are sure that they are right.
The money I have pulled out of the market over the past 10 years has come from trading price action not predicting. I have entered at high probability moments on break outs above resistance levels. I have trailed my winning trend trades with a stop and sold when the trend reversed through key short term support. When I was wrong I stopped out for a small loss, when I was right I let the winner run up for a very big win. I am always trend hunting, always taking my high probability trades, always cutting losses short, and when not seeing a great trade doing nothing and waiting.
Mind over the Market Video Interview with Mark Douglas
What is the most important part of your trading? The chart? Managing the risk? Finding the Holy Grail of trading that can’t lose? (I have bad news for you about the Holy Grail).
I am convinced how a trader emotionally reacts to the markets while trading will determine their success more than anything else.
Mark Douglas is a trader and author of Trading in the Zone and The Disciplined Trader two great trading books for traders at all levels that deal primarily with how to develop the correct mindset to be a successful trader.
My favorite Mark Douglas quotes.
Trader Psychology: (more…)
Trading Quote
“There is a random distribution between wins and losses for any given set of variables that defines an edge. In other words, based on the past performance of your edge, you may know that out of the next 20 trades, 12 will be winners and 8 will be losers. What you don’t know is the sequence of wins and losses or how much money the market is going to make available on the winning trades. This truth makes trading a probability or numbers game. When you really believe that trading is simply a probability game, concepts like “right” and “wrong” or “win” and “lose” no longer have the same significance. As a result, your expectations will be in harmony with the possibilities.”
Bernard Baruch:Trading Legend
Baruch was born in 1870 in South Carolina. He was a great student of finance, reading everything he could find about the subject, always trying to learn more. Baruch found out the education process takes time, especially when it comes to trading the stock market.
Early on, Baruch made many of the same mistakes that most traders make. Ultimately, after much dedication to learning proper trading principles, he amassed a huge fortune in the markets. Because of his intellectual reputation, he even held appointive positions in four presidential administrations, and served as an advisor to six different presidents.
In his book titled “My Own Story”, Baruch gives us some rules or guidelines on how to invest or speculate wisely.
1. Don’t speculate unless you can make it a full-time job.
2. Beware of barbers, beauticians, waiters-of anyone-bringing gifts of “inside” information or “tips”.
3. Before you buy a security, find out everything you can about the company, its management and competitors, its earnings and possibilities for growth.
4. Don’t try to buy at the bottom and sell at the top. This can’t be done-except by liars.
5. Learn how to take your losses quickly and cleanly. Don’t expect to be right all the time. If you have made a mistake, cut your losses as quickly as possible.
6. Don’t buy too many different securities. Better to have only a few investments which can be watched.
7. Make a periodic reappraisal of all your investments to see whether changing developments have altered their prospects.
8. Study your tax position to know when you can sell to greatest advantage.
9. Always keep a good part of your capital in a cash reserve. Never invest all your funds.
10. Don’t try to be a jack of all investments. Stick to the field you know best.
Ray Dalio Principles
Afew gems taken from Ray Dalio’s Principles. Here’s the link to the ‘Principles’ Ray Dalio founder of Bridgewater Associates published:
- I remained wary about being overconfident, and I figured out how to effectively deal with my not knowing. I dealt with my not knowing by either continuing to gather information until I reached the point that I could be confident or by eliminating my exposure to the risks of not knowing.
- While most others seem to believe that learning what we are taught is the path to success, I believe that figuring out for yourself what you want and how to get it is a better path.
- How much do you let what you wish to be true stand in the way of seeing what is really true?
- How much do you worry about looking good relative to actually being good?
- The most important qualities for successfully diagnosing problems are logic, the ability to see multiple possibilities, and the willingness to touch people’s nerves to overcome the ego barriers that stand in the way of truth.
- Know what you want and stick to it if you believe it’s right, even if others want to take you in another direction.
- In a nutshell, this is the whole approach that I believe will work best for you—the best summary of what I want the people who are working with me to do in order to accomplish great things. I want you to work for yourself, to come up with independent opinions, to stress-test them, to be wary about being overconfident, and to reflect on the consequences of your decisions and constantly improve.
Conscientiousness and Trading
Self-Efficacy. Self-Efficacy describes confidence in one’s ability to accomplish things. High scorers believe they have the intelligence (common sense), drive, and self-control necessary for achieving success in trading. Low scorers do not feel effective, and may have a sense that they are not in control of their trading. However, consideration needs to be given to motivation for success as complacency with the way things are may be the reason for a low score. - Orderliness. Traders with high scores on orderliness are well-organized and stick to routines and schedules. They tend to make trading plans and use them. Low scorers tend to be disorganized and scattered. Trading plans are viewed as not being important as rules are too confining.
- Dutifulness. This scale reflects the strength of a person’s ability to stick to a trading plan. Those who score high on this scale have a strong sense of moral obligation. Low scorers find trading plans overly confining and thus less likely to follow or even create one. Perhaps trading is seen as more of a “hobby” or just for “fun.”
- Achievement-Striving. Individuals who score high on this scale strive hard to achieve excellence. Their drive to be recognized as successful keeps them on track toward their goals. Low scorers are content to get by with a minimal amount of work, and might be seen by others as lazy.
- Self-Discipline. One of the largest contributors to success as a trader is self-discipline. High scorers are able to strictly adhere to a trading plan and stay on track despite distractions. Low scorers procrastinate, are easily discouraged and show poor follow-through. The lack of self-discipline will make your trading career rather short lived.
- Cautiousness. Cautiousness describes the disposition to think through possibilities before acting. High scorers on the Cautiousness scale take their time when making trading decisions and manage risk well. Low scorers often trade without deliberating alternatives and the probable consequences of those alternatives. Scoring too high on this scale can have its downside as trading opportunities may be missed for the discretionary trader. The more mechanical systems trader will account for this through their strategy.
Self-Efficacy. Self-Efficacy describes confidence in one’s ability to accomplish things. High scorers believe they have the intelligence (common sense), drive, and self-control necessary for achieving success in trading. Low scorers do not feel effective, and may have a sense that they are not in control of their trading. However, consideration needs to be given to motivation for success as complacency with the way things are may be the reason for a low score. Heads or Tails
“There is a random distribution between wins and losses for any given set of variables that defines an edge. In other words, based on the past performance of your edge, you may know that out of the next 20 trades, 12 will be winners and 8 will be losers. What you don’t know is the sequence of wins and losses or how much money the market is going to make available on the winning trades. This truth makes trading a probability or numbers game. When you really believe that trading is simply a probability game, concepts like “right” and “wrong” or “win” and “lose” no longer have the same significance. As a result, your expectations will be in harmony with the possibilities.”
Kiev, Hedge Fund Masters
I took notes on Kiev’s book when I first read it, and I’m going to select four self-therapeutic passages from them for this post. I suspect that most of my notes are quotations, but I don’t think it’s important to check their accuracy, though I will provide page references.
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By establishing a vision, you have promised to achieve something. The promise means you are giving yourself permission to begin to act in the realm of the impossible, to create all kinds of openings. In that one promise, you begin to abandon self-doubt and the need for approval. This way of being in the world lets loose huge reserves of energy and creates enormous possibilities. Yet none of this can happen until you take the first step forward in pursuit of a goal with no guarantee of outcome. (p. 218)
Living in the gap makes you vulnerable. Once you’re out there, on the cutting edge, you’ll suffer breakdowns as well as breakthroughs. Although it will not always be comfortable, living in the gap between where you are and where you want to be will make your days far more interesting and action packed than if you traded with the intention of avoiding pain and discomfort. (p. 229)
It is useful to note when an activity becomes tedious, dull, and routine and leads to withdrawal and avoidance. This is the time to consider whether you are facing obstacles and are retreating behind your survival needs or whether these feelings signify that you have reached your goal and now need to raise the stakes. (p. 236)
The development of mastery is, in a sense, an existential and experiential methodology, directed at what is and what can be. You invent your own future through commitment to a goal, identifying what is necessary to produce specific results, and learning how to handle the unknown. (p. 247)