Readers will have noticed that the posts in this blog to date have been focussed on the trader far more than they have on trading systems. This is for a very good reason which you should all know by now. If not, please read our earlier posts.
This post however is going to introduce some technical analysis and provide some information on identifying 1-2-3 patterns on charts that will help you to trade profitably.
Some time go while learning how to trade profitably myself, I found myself getting frustrated with the amount of jargon and terminology I had to become familiar with.
The terms “option writer” and “option taker” for example didn’t seem to be very descriptive to me, and other terms seemed to be interchangeable, such as Forex and currencies.
Backtesting and paper trading are often talked about that way as well, but regardless of how others choose to use the terms I view them as two separate activities and after reading this post I’m sure you’ll feel the same way.
An effective money management strategy is an essential part of any trading system, and it can make the difference between one that lets you trade profitably, and one which erodes a traders capital until they can no longer trade at all.
In this post, we are going to explain why.
In the previous posts in this series we have focussed on fear, as it is often cited as having the biggest impact on our trading psychology.
I would certainly tend to agree, but it is not the only emotion traders need to master.
In this post I’m going to talk about a couple of sins that traders also need to be aware of if they want to learn how to trade profitably.
So far we’ve concentrated on looking at how fear and greed can affect a traders ability to follow their trading plan, and then we started deconstructing those fears piece by piece.
In this post you’ll find some more strategies for dealing with the fears that may be sabotaging your trading.
In my last post on trading psychology we started looking at some of the indvidual fears that traders can have, and also some of the effects greed can have as well. But if you missed reading it, click Understanding Fear and Greed and read that post first before reading on.
In this post, we’re going to start looking at how you may control fear and greed, so I hope you have your list of fears handy as we might be able to cross some of them off.
In a previous post we talked about lack of a trading plan being one of the reasons traders lose money while trading.
In this post we’re going to talk about one of the other reasons; and that is the inability to trade profitably due to emotions such as fear and greed.
Reading Dean’s last post the other day reminded me of a story I heard some time back that I think is very relevant to the topic of why we trade, and how we choose to trade.
Then not long afterwards I read Sean Rasmussen’s post in the bullhunters blog which reminded me of it yet again, so I’m going to share the story with you now.
In his song “The Gambler”, Kenny Rogers sang; “You’ve got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em, know when to walk away and know when to run. You never count your money, while you’re sitting at the table, there’ll be time enough for counting when the dealings done“.
He could have been singing about trading, because I think those lyrics cover two of the main issues affecting trader’s success. They are… (more…)
Trading and investing can mean different things to different people, so let me share with you the way I define these terms.
I’m sure the dictionary and tax office will have alternative definitions, but to me it’s about the involvement of the trader in actually trading.
Let’s start by looking at decision making.
To me, a trader is someone who… (more…)
