The 20 Trading Lessons from Top Traders I have read a lot of trading books since the time I started trading my own account and the one book that really helps me out and “I wish I’ve read this one first” – is Market Wizards Interview with Top Traders by Jack D. Schwager.
Here’s the list that struck me most that I’d like to share:
“Early trading failure is a sign that you are doing something wrong; it is not necessarily a good predictor of ultimate potential failure or success.” – Michael Marcus
“If you don’t stay with your winners, you are not going to be able to pay for the losers.” – Michael Marcus
“Liquidating positions is the way to achieve mental clarity when one is losing money and confused regarding market decisions.” – Michael Marcus
“Being a successful trader also takes courage: the courage to try, the courage to fail, the courage to succeed, and the courage to keep going when the going keeps tough.” – Michael Marcus
“Place your stops at a point that, if reached, will reasonably indicate that the trade is wrong, not at a point determined primarily by the maximum dollar amount you are willing to lose per contract. If the meaningful stop point implies an uncomfortably large loss per contract, trade a smaller number of contracts.” – Bruce Kovner
“The times when you least want to think about trading – the losing periods – are precisely the times when you need to focus most on trading.” – Richard Dennis
“Everybody gets what they want out of the market.” – Ed Seykota
“It is a happy circumstance that when nature gives us true burning desires, it also gives us the means to satisfy them.” – Ed Seykota
“Frankly, I don’t see markets; I see risks, rewards and money.” – Larry HIte
“ I have two basic rules about winning in trading as well as in life: 1. If you don’t bet, you can’t win. 2. If you lose all your chips, you can’t bet” – Larry Hite
“In my judgment, all traders are seekers of truth.” – Michael Steinhardt
“The more disciplined you can get, the better you are going to do in the market. The more you listen to tips and rumors, the more money you’re likely to lose.” – David Ryan
“When the market gets good news and goes down, it means the market is very weak; when it gets bad news and goes up, it means the market is healthy.” – Marty Schwartz
“Learn to take losses. The most important thing in making money is not letting your losses get out of hand. Also, don’t increase your position size until you have doubled or tripled your capital. Most people make the mistake of increasing their bets as soon as they start making money. That is a quick way to get wiped out.” – Marty Schwartz
“The best traders are the most humble.” – Mark Weinstein
“You have to learn how to lose; it is more important than learning how to win.” – Mark Weinstein
“Most traders who fail have large egos and can’t admit that they are wrong. Even those who are willing to admit that they are wrong early in their career can’t admit it later on. Also, some traders fail because they are too worried about losing.” – Brian Gelber
“You are never really confident in this business, because you can always be wiped out pretty quickly. The way I trade is: Live by the sword, die by the sword. There is always the potential that I could get caught with the big position in a fluke move with the market going the limit against me. On the other hand, there is no doubt in my mind that I could walk into any market in the world and make money.” – Tom Baldwin
“Clear thinking, ability to stay focused, and extreme discipline. Discipline is number one: Take a theory and stick with it. But you have to be open-minded enough to switch tracks if you feel that your theory has been proven wrong. You have to be able to say, my method worked for this type of market, but we are not in that type of market anymore.” – Tony Saliba
“ How do you judge success? I don’t know. All I know is that all the money in the world isn’t the answer.” Tony Saliba
There’s still a lot of golden information that I want to write in here – for ourselves and for everyday reading so as to keep us aligned with our trading goal, but I prefer to encourage you to read the book.
Management
COMPOUND INTEREST: The Secret SauceIn this video I cover the topic of "Compound Interest". I go over the WHAT, WHY, WHO and HOW of it.
The Importance of Compound Interest in Trading
Compound interest is a fundamental concept in the world of finance and trading, offering a powerful mechanism for growing wealth over time. Unlike simple interest, which is calculated only on the principal amount, compound interest is calculated on the principal and also on the accumulated interest of previous periods. This seemingly small difference can significantly impact long-term investment returns.
Amplifying Returns
In trading, compound interest can exponentially increase the growth of your account. When profits from trading are reinvested, they start to generate additional earnings. For example, if a trader earns a 10% return on a $1,000 investment, they would have $1,100 after the first period. In the next period, the 10% return is calculated on the new total of $1,100, resulting in $1,210, and so on. Over multiple periods, this effect leads to exponential growth, far outstripping the returns from simple interest.
Long-Term Benefits
The magic of compound interest becomes particularly evident over longer time horizons. The longer an investment is allowed to compound, the greater the potential growth. For traders, this underscores the importance of patience and a long-term perspective. By consistently reinvesting earnings and allowing them to compound, traders can achieve significant wealth accumulation even if individual trade returns are modest.
Mitigating Risk
Compound interest also highlights the importance of managing risks and minimizing losses. In trading, avoiding substantial losses is crucial because significant drawdowns can severely disrupt the compounding process. A trader who loses a large portion of their capital will need significantly higher returns to recover, which can be challenging. Therefore, prudent risk management and maintaining steady, positive returns are key to leveraging the power of compound interest. Psychology plays a role as well as losing large amounts of your account can negatively affect your decision making.
Conclusion
Understanding and leveraging compound interest is essential for traders aiming to maximize their long-term returns. By reinvesting profits and allowing them to compound over time, traders can achieve exponential growth in their investments. Coupled with effective risk management, the power of compound interest can transform modest returns into substantial wealth, making it a cornerstone of successful trading strategies.
Risk Management Guide for Beginner TradersHello traders.
In this video, I delve into the fundamental principles of risk management tailored specifically for beginner traders entering the world of financial markets. I start by emphasizing the importance of understanding risk and its implications on trading outcomes. By setting clear goals and objectives, traders can align their risk management strategies with their investment aspirations.
We explore practical risk management tools such as stop loss orders, which act as a safety net to limit potential losses on trades. Calculating position sizes based on risk tolerance and stop loss levels ensures traders are not overexposed to any single trade. Continuous monitoring and review of trading performance enable adjustments to risk parameters in response to changing market conditions.
I also shared some tools that can be used to help make the process of calculating risk efficient and accurate. By mastering these risk management techniques, beginner traders can safeguard their capital and embark on their trading journey with confidence and resilience.
Simple management is easier on your mindhi, just wanted to share a couple of thought on management, mainly for new members.
in my eyes, there are two categories of management: simple (fixed RR) and more complex (variations of trailing).
Both have positive and negative sides.
In my eyes, as a very very subjective opinion, simple fixed RR system will be better for most people. Or ok, I'll not speak for most, but for me definitely.
Why so:
incredible simplicity, cause you just need to test to see how much your trades usually run + create b.e. rule, and you're good to go
3-5RR are usually best for fixed RR systems
do not underrestimate the energy that goes into making decisions while managing and waiting, watching for the trade to develop into higher RR's. With fixed you don't have this - you just go b.e. and then you can close the terminal, and go away if needed. However yes, advanced experienced consistent traders would trail almost with no extra emotions, cause it's usually more mechanical. With that said, for many relatevely new traders, trailing could be extra emotional.
with fixed, you'll have less chances to become emotional, because of many reasons, for me personally fixed RR system gives a sense of accomplishment on every trade, while with managing I'm constantly thinking how can I manage longer better etc. So I'm rarely satisfied when I'm getting stopped out on trail, cause I'm still "stopped out", while on fixed I have a sense of good work done. I know it's weird, but it's personal experience
I could continue, but I guess the general guideline is there.
My main message is that TP can be a very simple fixed 3 or 4RR and that would be more than enough and easier for most people's mind
have a good weekend.
Revisiting Automatic Access Management API for VendorsThis video explains how to automate access management for vendors who build and sell invite only scripts based on subscription or one time fee. I have made videos about this earlier as well. But, due to high demand, I have been asked to make this video again.
🎲 Tools Required
Replit - Used for hosting the service that automates access management
Postman - To test the services hosted
🎲 Prerequisites
User should have premium tradingview account and be able to publish invite only scripts by following the house rules.
User should disable 2FA on their account in order to allow programs to login remotely and manage access.
🎲 Steps
All the steps are also mentioned in the githup repository: github.com
🎯 Run the access management service
Fork the replit repository: replit.com
Update Environment Variables tvusername and tvpassword
Run the repl
🎯 Use postman to test the service methods
Detailed explanation of the API calls are present in the github link provided above. The service is capable of doing following things.
Check if the given tradingview username is valid or not
Get the access details of given user to list of scripts identified by pub id.
Delete the access to given user to list of scripts identified by pub id.
Provide/Extend access to given user to list of scripts identified by pub id for specific duration.
🎲 Notes
Please follow house rules while publishing and selling subscriptions to invite only scripts.
Do not commercialize these API calls or do not turn it into product. The mechanism is built on backend calls that are not officially supported by tradingview. While tradingview is tolerant on individual use, any malicious activity may force them to shut this down for everyone.
Risk Management vs. Time ManagementHey! Have you been spending day thinking about mistakes you made and things you didn't do?
Investors are knowingly comparing an exchanges to a casino. A gambler, losing, does not get up from the gambling table in the hope of winning back. He believes that the likelihood of winning increases with every lost bet. This phenomenon, called player mistake, is common among investors.
The pioneers of the theory of behaviour finance Hersh Shifrin and Meyer Statman showed in 1985 that investors intuitively misjudge the likelihood of repeating random results - they hold unprofitable positions too long, hoping for a return in prices, and close profitable positions too quickly, fearing that the movement will end.
The assertion that the market cannot fall for many sessions in a row is untenable. Short-term changes in asset prices are mostly random, notes analyst and author of several books on behaviour finance, James Montier, in his article Global equity strategy, gamblers fallacy. Tails does not become more probable after a series of heads, the coin has no memory - in the same way, the chances of success do not increase after a series of failures.
The major problem in the trading when we trying to recoup from losses. Many people make this mistake over and over again.
The reason of this mistake is the unwillingness to accept and calculate affordable losses and come to terms with the result, the wrong internal setting that you must end every trade and every trading session with a profit. But not every trade will be profitable.
How can I avoid this mistake?
1. After loss trade, tell yourself: "Stop, I won't trade now, I will pause."
2. Analyze the failed trade and write it down. Thus, you will allow yourself to "cool down" and more intelligently approach the situation on the market. There will always be opportunities, don't be afraid to miss out on any movement and profits.
3. Calmly develop a new trading plan based on market changes. If according to the trading plan you need to enter, then enter and earn. Do not rush to enter the market immediately, because it is easy to enter, but it is difficult to exit, since it is no longer possible to change the initial price at which you entered.
4. Make sure you following your risk management and always trade with possibility to lose.
Stay safe and good luck!
3 Types of Stop LossesToday’s topic is going to be on three types of stop losses . This is a very critical topic because stop losses come under the category of risk management.
Risk management is such a pivotal, important and critical topic. Why? Because professional traders and investors, the first thing that they always do and constantly think about before they get into a trade or investment is not how much profit they’re going to make, it’s how much they can afford to lose.
The only control that you have when you enter into a trade and you’re in the trade is the risk factor because most of us will not have the capital power to control that trade. It’s a collective pool of people’s thoughts and a lot of other factors that come in which then determines how the price moves in the market, especially how smart money enters the market actually. So in light of all of that, the real power that you have, the real control that you have is your risk management. How much you can afford to lose. In terms of that, we’re going to be looking at the three types of stop losses and how to stop your loss when the market does something which is not favourable to you and not in line with the direction of the trade that you are taking on.
The first type is what we call the technical stop . This is the one most people will be familiar with. That’s where all your different kinds of stop losses come under: moving averages, channels, trend lines and so forth. All these are summarised under technical stop losses. Even if you use tier based stop losses, they come under technical stop losses.
The second one is called a money stop . A money stop is basically one where you write in your rules, and this is how you execute a trade as well is that you say, for example, you enter a trade and it is going well in profit. You tell yourself to trail your stop loss to break even as soon as the trade is 3% in profit. You don’t care what the moving averages are or where the price pattern is whatsoever, you would just move your stop loss to break even. So that is purely based on money. That is called a money stop because the stop loss is adjusted according to your profits or your losses. Usually it’s to your profits – that’s when you trail and adjust your stop loss.
The final one is the time stop . As you’ve already guessed, the time stop is based on time. Especially for intra-day trading it’s very important because you know certain times of the day volume is really high and other times of the day volume starts to dry up. So especially if you want to capture a certain percentage of move, you want to capture it before a certain time and you usually know that after 5pm or 6pm the volume usually dries up. Price movement is not really that much especially towards 9pm. So you can have a rule saying, for example, at 5pm or 6pm you’ll look at exiting a trade if it’s not reached an objective. If you’re a swing trader you start saying things like you know if it’s consolidating for 10-15 days in a row I will possibly exit out of the trade. So all that is basically based on time.
Let me ask you a question. Out of all the three stops I’ve talked about: technical, money and time, what do you think is the strongest stop of them all? I think, if my guess is right as we have coached thousands of traders, most of them usually tell me it’s either the technical or the money stop. In fact, let me tell you Traders, the weakest one of them all is the money stop because there’s no basis for it. It’s just based on money and just trailing it. The strongest is the time stop because everything is determined on time and you’re time bound in everything that you do. If you look at daily activities: waking up, going to work, having meals, going to bed – your life is time bound.
Here’s the final most critical point. If you actually want to make your risk management really strong, the trick is not to put emphasis on either one of them according to strength, but to make them sync with each other so that they can then adapt to market conditions. It’s basically a confluence of the types of stop losses that can help you to generate the rules which can adapt to market conditions. For example, when you start out if you put in your initial stop loss in a technical place and as time then moves by then you would then get more aggressive with your stop loss and as it’s nearing towards exit, if you’ve reached a certain profit potential as the market price is still hovering around, losing momentum, then you would then start to go into money stop. Money stop is especially useful if you’re in swing trading. For example, when we took the DOW Jones trade and we took that 2,000 point move on a mismatched strategy when it had already done 80% of the move we used a money stop because we don’t want to give back all that profit back to the market. So that’s when we start to us a money stop and a combination of time stop, initially starting with a technical. So that’s how you do it.
Do have a good think about this because this is so critical Traders. If there’s only one thing you have total control of, it’s your stop loss, it’s your risk management. So contemplate this, revisit your strategy rules and see how you can optimise that for maximum performance of your strategy.
I believe that you have really enjoyed this topic and have some amazing value from this. Until the next time, as we always say, stay disciplined, follow your trading plan and keep trading like a master .
What is an "R"? Discover the Most Popular Way to Manage RiskUsing R multiples is one of the most widely used strategies by professional traders for managing risk and tracking results. The R multiple concept is extremely easy to use and implement into your own strategy. With this simple idea, money management will become a breeze! If you have any questions or comments I would love to hear them!
Overtrading VisualizationThis diagram helps visualize the effects of overtrading. Overtrading is placing more trades than should be placed, typically resulting in unnecessary losses. There is a fixed number of trade setups that will occur with any trading system during any time period and ideally each trade setup will be traded to produce maximal profits. In general, trades that are not setups will result in losses.
For simplicity, this diagram assumes the initial trades placed are all trade setups and that all trades placed beyond the # of trade setups are not setups.
In reality, someone could place a number of trades that corresponds to the # of trade setups, but if half their trades were not setups, they will have losses. The resulting diagram may look something like this:
Bottom line: Trade setups only and try and identify as many setups as you can. Identifying 100% of all setups that exist may be a tall order but trading 100% setups is possible with patience and discipline.
Note: This idea was published primarily with day trading in mind, but it applies to any type of trading.
Screenshot of main diagram:
How to use news and data reports to make transactions profitableFrom central bank interest rate resolutions, non-farm payrolls, PMI indexes, inflation rates and other data reports, to geopolitical developments, and even natural disasters, these are major news that foreign exchange investors cannot ignore.Because the trend of the currency is always guided by these major economic events and news developments, it is accompanied by trading opportunities.
Of course, not all news is worth trading, so we must be familiar with how economic events will affect currency market trends.For major transaction news and data reports, we can follow the following three steps:
1. Select news events that will cause price fluctuations
Foreign exchange traders tend to pay attention to certain key economic data that have an impact on interest rate speculation. These economic data include: central bank decisions and speeches, gross domestic product (GDP) data, employment data, inflation rate and trade balance.
2. Choose the right currency pair
Generally speaking, we will choose currency pairs with high liquidity. There are mainly the following 8 pairs: EUR/USD, USD/¥, AUD/USD, GBP/¥, EUR/CHF, and CHF/¥.The sufficient liquidity of currency pairs is conducive to us to use lower transaction costs to win huge profits through greater volatility.
3. Pay attention to the news release time and forecast results
We have to trade based on data expectations, that is, the actual announced results are compared with the predicted values.For example, if the non-farm payrolls report is better than expected, the dollar will generally rise, and EUR/USD may fall.
In addition, before the data is released, we need to check the price movement of the short-term chart (5, 10, 15-minute chart), and use the closing price to decide whether to trade the current data report.After the price trend is confirmed, open a position and set a take profit and stop loss.
In order to facilitate everyone to continue to follow up on my analysis and sharing, you can like and follow me; in addition, I will share the daily real-time strategy in the channel. If you can't follow up in real time, you may make operational errors.You can use the following methods to enter my channel for free to follow the latest news and follow up on market trends in real time.
Two methods to ensure no loss of principal
There are only two ways to avoid losing capital: one is to have a small stop-loss space (reflected in the entry position), and the other is not to bet too much at once. For example, buying one lot with $10,000 can earn $1,000, and buying ten lots with $100,000 can earn $10,000. Although the probability is the same, the more you do, the more you earn, and the less you do, the less you earn. However, controlling losses should be the top priority. As discussed earlier, if you buy too many lots this time and get stopped out, it will result in a big loss, which violates the principle of capital preservation.
Some traders become increasingly greedy after making profits and then add more positions. A typical behavior is adding positions. For example, if you bought 10 lots at first and then made a profit in the expected direction, the trader would blame himself for not buying more at the beginning. Then, he would begin to imagine that the market would continue to move in the expected direction and invest most of his capital in this product, let alone any correct practices such as taking profits in batches.
After you add more positions, it means that the cost has changed. Once the market reverses slightly, you will go from being profitable to losing money. At this point, you panic, lose your ability to think, and greed slowly turns into hope. You hope that this is only temporary, but the losses increase every moment. Perhaps you will have some luck a few times, but it won't be long before there is a risk of a big loss or liquidation.
It is important to understand that becoming rich cannot be achieved by just one market movement, so don't be obsessed with this one time. Greed makes people forget about risk, and don't always imagine that the market will move in the expected direction, ignoring the risk of the opposite trend. This is the key to keeping your capital out of danger.
Follow me, and I will share more interesting ideas that will greatly help your trading.
How to achieve profits by managing emotions?Market fluctuations are often a direct reflection of the emotions of market participants. Managing and controlling emotions is essential for successful trading. If you cannot control your emotions, you will suffer from impulsive emotional behavior and make bad decisions, which will harm your trading performance.
Negative emotions such as fear, hatred, anger, greed, jealousy, pessimism, and despair can lead to negative consequences for traders. Traders who have negative emotions may lack the ability to leave positions, refuse to accept reality, and blame others, resulting in selling positions only after a long period of price declines, missing the best buying points, and selling too early.
Negative traders may also regard failure as a negative, significant, and final result, attributing losses to their own shortcomings or negligence.
Everyone experiences various emotions, but people with high emotional intelligence can better manage their negative emotions and vent them appropriately. Emotional control skills can be developed through practice, but it is important to note that this process is a long-term and systematic one. Traders must be psychologically prepared for this.
Therefore, no matter what happens, you must control your impulsive emotions. Take a deep breath for 10 seconds, then choose the best course of action. This often leads to more rational and correct decisions.
Do not make decisions when impulsive, and do not make promises when excited. By managing your emotions, you gain control over your life.
There are various emotions in life, and you must learn to manage and control them. Do not be a slave to your emotions. Manage your negative emotions and cleverly transfer them . Similarly, controlling emotions in life determines emotional control in trading.
The three stages of emotional failure leading to trading losses are: 1) being careless before unexpected events occur; 2) being panicked after unexpected events occur; 3) being eager to make up losses after suffering losses. The solutions are as follows:
Always respect the market and trade with caution. Approach the market with a trembling, cautious attitude.
Once you suffer losses, do not panic. Stop trading temporarily, find the cause, identify the problems, and improve your system.
Impatience is the biggest reason for traders' losses. Heavy positions are impatience, opening and closing positions without signals is impatience, frequent trading is impatience, adding positions is impatience, which is essentially greed, wanting to make money quickly. Be patient, make calm decisions, and the market will reward you.
MONEY MANAGEMENT: The MOST Important Aspect of TradingIf you are a professional trader or plan to become one, Money Management is your #1 job. You could be the best chart reader or statement analyzer in the world but if you have poor money management you will still fail. In order to succeed you first have to last, and to last in the trading business you must be able to handle risk and manage it accordingly.
How you handle Money Management comes down to a few simple things:
Risk limits
- This consist of knowing your risk per trade, your max drawdown, and buying power limitations.
○ Risk per trade: This is the amount you are willing to lose if the trade goes against you and stops out (remember to always have a stop loss). Many traders refer to this as Risk Units or simply 'R'. This should be a defined amount that does not vary based on emotion. If you do use different risk for different trades you should have that clearly defined in your trading plan otherwise each trade should be the same. Risk per trade should be around 1% for experienced traders and $10 for new traders as they work towards slowly raising risk with consistency.
○ Max drawdown: This is the max amount you are able to lose per timeframe. For example, a day trader may have a max drawdown of 3R per day, 7R per week, and 13R per month. Max drawdown demands that if you lose that amount in that timeframe you are to be done trading until the next one. This helps traders from spiraling out of control and blowing up a trading account.
○ Buying Power Limitations: Knowing how many trades you are able to take at one time will help define your strategy.
Expectations
- This consist of knowing your expectancy and timeline
○ Expectancy: Your trade expectancy is the most important stat in all of trading. It tells you what you expect to make per trade. In order to properly manage risk you have to be sure that the strategy is worth it. The expectancy stat is how you do just that. For more info about expectancy check out my post on it here
○ Timeline: Everything takes time. Trading is no different. Having a realistic expectation about your timeline and how much you are going to make is a critical element in helping traders stay focused on their goals and not fall into a get rich quick scheme. If you expect your trading career will take 3-5 years to become profitable you will manage your money much better than someone who expects full time profits in under 1 year.
Yourself
- This consist of knowing your personality and trading plan
○ Personality: What is your personality like? Are you a jittery person or are you robotic. Knowing this will help build a management that you can trust and are able to follow.
○ Trading Plan: Make sure your trading plan fits your trading style. You have to take many things into consideration here such as time constraints, goals, and personality. It takes time to figure out what works for you.
If you can determine how to handle these three factors then you will be well positioned to not struggle with money management. After you have the fundamentals written in your trading plan all it comes down to is staying disciplined and following the rules set for yourself. Clearly define your limits, have an expectation, know thyself.
Thanks for reading, follow @Jlaing for more educational post about Money Management, Trading Stats, and more. I also stream a stock day trading chat room every morning at 9:15 EST right here on TradingView, come check it out and say what's up.
Trade setups I would take and how to manage riskJust like this. Buy and sell limits above and below structure, as in the most recent highs/lows, with your TP in general being a return to structure. Brutally easy way to scalp and make money.
Few more examples...
This one shows where the stop loss might be. In general, I go with a 2/3 or 3/4 type rule, where I'll have a wide cluster of limits, then a gap, then a hard stop that closes all of them. Just in case. Your order clusters should be wide enough with this strategy that it almost never gets hit. Regular market movement should not be hitting your stop loss. That kind of behavior should generally be reserved for news events that catch you off guard.
Now as far as actual risk goes, this is entirely determined by you and no one else. There's no single correct way to do this. A lot of people are dead set on the idea that you should never risk 10% of your account, but how big is the account? Is it $10,000? Is it $100? If it's $100, why not risk $50+ when the odds of a loss are very low?
On EUR/USD, you might have a hard stop loss of 50 pips with 15 tickets separated by 2 pips each. Each ticket would be 1k (0.01 lots).
If 1 pip on a 1k is $0.10, then a 50 pip stop loss is $5.
Your second ticket is 2 pips away, so that loss would be $4.80. Third $4.60, and so on. It's doable, right?
Maybe the price dips 20 pips into your counter-trend limit cluster, eating 10 limits. Then the price returns to the support or resistance near your starting point, and you decide to close all of your tickets.
The profits from that would be $2.00, then $1.80, then $1.60, and so on. That might not seem like much in comparison to the stop loss, but consider this: your stop loss will have a 0-5% chance of ever getting hit. It's straight profit. And it's constant, and consistent. I cannot stress that enough! You can be doing this all day long.
So, what if you want to follow a trend in this manner? It's the same deal, really... just throw limit orders below (or above) trending wicks. Like this:
It's all just structure. You bet with structure, and you bet against structure. At all times.
You only require a 50% retracement from your starting ticket in order to break even. If you even feel uncomfortable with what's going on in front of you, it doesn't take much for you to get out safely and start over with a new cluster of limits. There is absolutely nothing wrong with closing out safely. You'll be trading so frequently you aren't even a little bit obligated to let things "play out".
Maybe you don't like how quickly the momentum built into your cluster, and it retraces down to the 50% area so you wanna break even, but then you start laying more limits above and below because you believe that momentum is likely to slow down.
I'm gonna tear down a phrase that I'm sick of hearing: the trend is your friend .
The trend could be the worst friend you've ever had. Sometimes he's really cool, and he's the life of the party. But he really likes hanging out with you, especially when nothing is going on. He really likes to wait! He doesn't exactly value your time, and he's perfectly content sitting in a chair next to you watching paint dry. He smacks the remote out of your hand when you try to turn on the TV. This trend guy can be a real jerk sometimes. You also suspect he might be bi-polar, because sometimes when you get excited to do things with him, his mood shifts the moment you open your mouth and suddenly the fun has been sucked out of the room.
That is the trend. On some pairs like USD/JPY, a trend can go on for a very long time, and there's a lot of money to be made. The problem is it is speculative . You don't know where that trend is going to end. Nobody is clairvoyant, and most people will make incorrect guesses. If you simply remove this requirement of speculation, where you have to be "correct" in your guesses in order to make money, you will do better in almost any market.
If your goal in trading is to make consistent money, then the trend is not your friend. He's an acquaintance at best. You have to associate with him in business and that's about it. You spend just as much time associating with the counter-trend, because you should be doing business with both of them constantly.
Now, on the other hand, if your goal is to invest (AKA gambling), that's a separate concept entirely. You're trying to grow a tree from a seed when you invest, and there's nothing wrong with that. But most people cannot live off of it. You can't even order pizza with your investments until they come to fruition.
A trader can make consistent money every single day, without knowing or caring where the market is going or what it's going to do. Price continues trend, price retests, trader makes money. Price reverses, price retests, trader makes money. That's it . No waiting for retarded "key support levels", no waiting for "confirmation", no speculation, no technical analysis. Just raw risk management, getting in and out of the market quickly and constantly.
Now, the one downside to being this kind of trader is you generally can't do this easily with the basic tools provided by your platform, meaning you would need scripts, EAs or whatever in order to quickly deploy limit clusters. The tool I'm working on allows me to drag a horizontal line on the screen, and I have a panel of buttons that do interesting things. I can click "Sell limits" and a whole bunch of sell limit orders appear just above the line. I can move that line again and click "Adjust TP", and the take profits for all of those orders will appear right below the structural retest point I'm targeting. I have buttons to close profits, to close pendings, close all tickets... it's just the bees knees. This is an MT5 EA, which most people won't be using, but I trade on CryptoAltum so that's what I use. I will leave it here for free.
Lastly, have some limit order porn. Every single rectangle is a place where you could've had limits that got filled and made money. On really strong trends, you might notice that the retracement only returns to around the 50% point of your limit cluster, but you'll notice how uncommon that is and how easily you could've gotten out with little to no loss.
A lot of the time, I won't even restrict myself to structure (swing highs and swing lows) even though that's the most reliable way to do it. I'll literally just put limits above and below any wick because I feel like it and I can make a profit in all likelihood.
...Anyway. I hope you enjoyed this write-up. Leave a comment if you did, or have any questions!
Position Size Calculation - Example 11. INPUT
PE = Capital($) = 1000
RP = Risk (%) = 2 %
EP = Entry Price = 1719.78
XP = Exit Price = 1733.75
2. OUTPUT (Goal)
PS = Position Size = ?
LEV = Leverage = ?
IM = Initial Margin = ?
3. CALCULATION
RD = Risk ($) = 1000 * (0.02) = 20
SLD = |EP - XP| = |1719.78 - 1733.75| = 13.97
SLP = Stop Loss (%) = (SLD / EP) = (13.97 / 1719.78) = 0.0081
PS = Position Size ($) = RD / SLP = 20 / 0.0081 = 2469.13
CPV = Current Price Value = EP = 1719.78
QNT = Quantity = PS / CPV = 2469.13 / 1719.78 = Roundup(1.435) = 2
4. Assumption and Final Calculation
LEV = {3, 5, 10, 20}
IM = PS / LEV = 2469.13 / {3, 5, 10, 20} = {823.04, 493.826, 246.913, 123.4565}
Risk Management ‼️‼ Survival rules in trading for newbies, if you respect those rules i can make a bet you wound't lose your account as the majority of traders are.
‼ The key word there is IF YOU RESPECT
✅ 1. Always trade with a stop loss
✅ 2. Have a pre-determined risk on each trade no more then 1%
✅ 3. Don't move your stop loss if the price is not going in your favour
✅ 4. Don't add to losing positions, only viceversa. Add to your winning positions
✅ 5. You have to increase your risk only if you are in profit on your account, decrease your risk when you are losing and increase it when you are winning.
Hope that was usefull for your trading plan.
How to continue in trading during uncertainty timeHello traders:
Recently I received many messages from traders about taking many losses during this uncertain time.
What's going on globally right now may have a different impact on all the different markets.
Many have told me of your frustration, stress, and negative emotion on losing money and continue to feel defeated.
Today I will explain a few things that you can implement into your current trading plan,
approach and perspective during this period of time.
First, you must acknowledge risk management.
Too many traders ignore this key important aspect of trading.
Especially during this time where the market can be volatile and irregular.
It's in your best interest to understand how to manage your risk. You should have a plan that lists out how your approach would be.
For example for my risk management right now:
-1% per trade of account capital.
-No more than 1 trade on the same currency, unless the first trade is secure in profit.
-No more than 2 trades open during a day, max drawdown 2% per day
-10-15 trades per month
-3 trades maximum per week
-Minimum 3:1 RR allow before entry
-Will Take profit on average when in profit 3:1 RR.
Second, learn to control your mindset and emotions.
More often when traders approach me these days, they are telling me they are taking too many trades, chasing profits and revenge trading their losses.
All these arise from the mistakes of FOMO, get rich quick mindset, enter multiple trades.
IF a trader can truly understand the fact that the market will always be there tomorrow, next week, next month..etc, then it's an easier thing to deal with on a psychological level.
You will no longer stress about trying to enter too many trades, worry that the market may not be available tomorrow.
Third, less social media exposure.
In today’s world, unfortunately in trading, most of the things you see on social media are fabricated and fake.
Their sole purpose is to sell you a dream, lifestyle, and easy money concept.
ITs always during this uncertain time, you will see more and more of these “gurus” who will show you how much $ they made during this time.
Now, I am not saying all are fake or scam, I am sure small # of them are doing well.
But, most of the things you will see in your social media feed, are likely to be photoshopped, faked, fabricated to make you believe whatever you are doing is wrong, and you tend to “compare” your result with these people.
This ended up becoming very negative and stressful to continue.
ITs important to understand trading is one of the toughest professions out there.
IT requires so much emotion control, clear mindset, and proper psychology on a regular basis.
If you are struggling, it's usually not to do with your trading strategy, but rather your approach, perspective, and perception.
So, eliminate as many unrealistic things you might see, and focus on yourself and your journey.
Any questions, comments or feedback welcome to let me know.
Thank you
How to Construct Your Trading Plan 2.0 Hi everyone:
Today let's go over a trading plan in more detail. I have made an educational video on this before, and many have asked me to create a more in depth breakdown on this topic.
So let's take a look at what topics to include in a trading plan.
First, what you should understand is there are no set guidelines of what exactly you should include in your trading plan.
Most traders will have different approaches on this topic, and some will have similar ways of constructing it.
What is important is this is something you will look at on a regular basis.
You will add, remove, edit your plan so it is the most up to date with the information you want to include in.
You should NOT however, just copy someone else’s trading plan, since it won't be applicable to you.
Below I have outlined the 6 main topics that I include in my trading plan, and I will go over each topic in more detail on what can be included in.
Personal Goals, Emotion/Mindset, Changes
Trading Checklist
Trading Quotes to reflect on
Trading Past experiences, mistakes, and lesson
Trade Enter Criteria
Trade Management
If you have any questions, feel free to let me know :)
Thank you
What did I learn from 2021 in Trading, & what can I improve on ?Hello traders:
Welcome to 2022 in trading. I am very happy to start off the year with a positive attitude and get ready for the year.
This year will be my 9th year in trading, so certainly a journey thus far.
What I usually will do is to look at trades that I have taken in the whole last year, to find areas to improve.
What can I do better, and what can I change/modify to my trading plan that will help me to become a better, consistent, sustainable trader.
I highly suggest everyone to review their 2021 trading journals, find mistakes that you made, and work on them.
Revisit your trading plan to see what areas can be changed and modified. They can be entry, SL/TP, management and much more.
Below are a few things that I personally find that I can improve more on:
Trade Management:
-Specifically, whether to take profit always at 3:1 RR, or hold onto the trade for longer
-Pros and cons and no right or wrong when it comes to this part.
-Sometimes holding a trade longer term may see price reverse and lose profits
-Sometimes taking profit too early will see trade continue to its desire direction
# of Trades Taken:
-Last year was aiming for about 15 trades per month last year
-The more trades we take, the more potential “Mediocre” trades we enter, those can eat up our good trades’ profit
-Can argue and reduce the # of trades to even less
-Instead of 1-2 same currency pairs allowed, cut down to just 1. Unless I can move it to BE
Understand and Accept the Market can Change/Evolve:
-Market is ever changing and evolving with no pre-determine factors. It can be a variety of factors that is out of our control as a trader
-Key is to always stay in “sync” with the market and its behavior.
-Never “blame” the market if your trading hits a draw down or doesn't “work out” from before.
-Understand as traders we need to adapt to any type of situations to remain consistent and sustainable in the long run
-Find solutions to work around it.
Thank you all
Treat trading like a business or you might not succeed:
When/How to move SL to BE and to profit in a running trade ?Hello everyone:
Today I want to discuss a topic in Risk Management, specifically on when and how to move your STOP LOSS to BREAKEVEN or in PROFIT when you have a running profit trade/position.
In an impulsive phase of the market, we want to make sure to protect our entry as well as secure profits.
In this example of EURUSD, I managed to get 2 entries in, and manage it to my best ability and secure profits
Trade close down for +7.9% profit
Original Trade Forecast and Analysis:
This is a topic that will have various answers across traders, as this is certainly up to each individual trader’s strategy, style, and management approach.
So understand there is no right or wrong, “holy grail” kind of decision.
It's up to you individually as a trader. I will share my management, and why I choose to go with these types of approaches, and you can certainly use them to your advantage to tweak/modify them to fit your strategy.
Few things to keep in minds are:
1. Moving the SL to BE or/and in profit is a way to protect your entry, as well as secure profit.
2. Sometimes moving the SL too early may “choke” the price, and you can get stopped out for BE or small profit. Then watch the price take off in your desired direction, which can create negative emotion.
3. Whereas sometimes if you don't move SL to BE or in profit, you can watch a trade that hits 3:1 RR or more, end up reversing down, passing your entry point and to your actual SL of -1%, which can also create negative emotion.
4. No perfect scenario or management when it comes to the aspect of trading, as every trade is unique, and different outcomes may happen, since the market itself is not perfect, and can do whatever it wants to do.
Now, I will explain my own management when it comes to moving SL to BE or/and in profit.
Certainly this is NOT the only way, nor it will be the best way, but over the years of backtesting & chartwork have given me reassurance on these types of management ways.
I will then show some real live examples on the trades that I closed down, and how I manage them as well.
CADJPY -
Original Trade Forecast and Analysis:
GBPJPY -
Original Trade Forecast and Analysis:
CHFJPY -
Original Trade Forecast and Analysis:
NASDAQ -
AUDNZD -
Original Trade Forecast and Analysis:
First, a general rule of thumb for me. IF the price has hit about 1:1 RR or so, and has broken past the previous recent lows,
I will move my SL to BE. There is no exception in this rule.
Again, I explained earlier that sometimes this will help you to protect your entry when price reverses, and sometimes it will choke the price.
In this case, I would rather take a BE first, and re-look for entry again in the same position, as long as the bias and the price action is still valid on both the higher time frame and lower time frame.
Second, once the entry is in some profit, say 2:1 or higher, I generally will move the SL up to about +0.5% profit or so.
Just want to secure a little profit while not choking the price entirely.
Third, once the entry is in 3:1 profit, then I will move my SL to +1% profit.
This is where I generally will decide whether I should take full profit here, or hold the trade for a mid-long term if the higher time frame has given me the bias.
Fourth, since the trade has already been in 3:1 profit or higher, generally we can expect a continuation correction to form now after the impulse phase.
If it's a smaller correction and price isn't reversing up sharply right away, I will move my SL to about +1.5% profit, set my alert above the continuation correction and observe the development of the correction.
This is generally a point where I can decide to hold the trade longer, or if it reverses up from the continuation correction, then exit the trade for profit.
Fifth, if we start to see a possible reversal development, then I will move down my SL to the recent swing highs/lows,
or just above the reversal correctional structure, and will let the trade tag me out for profit if it reverses.
Any questions, comments or feedback welcome to let me know :)
If you enjoy these contents, and the educational lessons are helpful, please press like, subscribe and follow for more.
Jojo
Creating A Trading Plan and Executing A TradeCreating A Trading Plan and Executing A Trade
As with all great trades, we require a trading plan. This is a perfect example of how to analyse, execute and manage your trade. See linked chart for the initial trade idea.
See below for a step by step guide on how we entered this trade and what we looked for.
Goodluck and trade safe!
Mar 26
Comment: First step: Identification. You have to identify when a trade set up is coming. For this pair, we were waiting for the ascending wedge to break down. From this you can see that we had an impulsve break of the ascending wedge indicating that the trend is about to reverse.
We also marked out an area of interest where price may come back to retest.
Second step: Preparation. We now wait for price to retrace back to the area of interest. We should also attempt to draw a trendline on the smaller timeframe to allow us to monitor the correction and get ready for the next step, execution.
We now wait for the correction to break. Entry is on the break of the correction with stoploss just above the correction. We use the start of the correction as the first TP or a level to put our trade in breakeven. For this set up, the stoploss was only 30pips and first target was 106pips (Risk reward 3:5)
Visualizing Risk ManagementI would like to save people from getting burned so after 3.5 years of being in this space here is my advice:
1. It is easy to fall in love with an investment, especially when you believe it could make you rich.
Have belief, but don't be blinded by it. Consider that you could be wrong, late, or even too early.
2. Price can remain irrational longer than you can stay solvent.
Getting chopped up in the range will dwindle your capital that can be very hard to recover.
3. If everyone knows it, the market will no longer follow that path.
The moment you determine a certainty is the moment you're destined to learn some lesson.
4. Doing nothing is hard.
It feels good to be all-in, but this pushes emotions to the brink for new investors that can't stop looking at the screens.
Trading/investing can be as simple as drawing one horizontal line on a chart.
Price goes above and you're in.
Below and you're out.
Numbers don't lie.
Develop a plan and cut the emotion.
Be like Jake *educational material*
*This is not financial advice, so trade at your own risks*
*My team digs deep and finds stocks that are expected to perform well based off multiple confluences*
*Experienced traders understand the uphill battle in timing the market, so instead my team focuses mainly on risk management*
My team has decided to use a recent failed trade as an example of the importance of stop losses. Here @SimplyShowMeTheMoney you may have noticed that we place stop losses and stop profit losses on the majority of our trades. If we ever post a trade without a stop loss please understand that we're waiting for further information and that we have long-term confidence in the trade and are not worried about the short-term price action in-between.
To demonstrate the importance of stop losses we must first introduce you to a successful retail trader by the name of Jake. Our friend Jake has been trading for the past 5 years. Jakes trading strategy is simple: he finds a company that he likes, and he invests his money into it. Jake hits roughly 6 out of 10 of the trades that he places. Jakes 60 percent winning average may sound 'okay' at first but lets say Jake is consistent about managing his take profits and stop-losses. Jake may be losing 40 percent of his trades, but he is able to mitigate most of the risks due to his insane stop-loss precision.
But if you've been in the market long enough and have ever used stop-losses then you can probably recall a time where your trade broke through your stop-loss and then the worst thing possible happens...it shoots off to the moon without you while you watch in disbelief with your jaw dropped down to the floor.
Jake knows this feeling very well. So to lower this risk, Jake locates key price areas on the chart where the stock may be at its weakest and places his stop losses. Doing this helps prevents scenarios like the one above from occuring.
Jake cares about the roof over his head and keeping food in his belly. He cares about the amount of sleep he gets every night. Jake wants to be able to enjoy quality time with his girlfriend without feeling anxious about a trade that was supposed to buy her a ring, but is now worth as little as a ring-pop. That's why Jake uses stop-losses.
Be like Jake.
If you would like to see more, please please like and follow us @SimplyShowMeTheMoney