Smart Money vs Retail traders (How to Think Like Smart Money)😱 There were a few people there talking about their losses, that they had no idea what to do and I wrote this to them:
It's mostly the fault of mainstream media + youtubers + twitterers etc. It's really easy to communicate the simplest approach that everyone understands and subscribes too. Note that if everyone is on the same side... Usually most people are wrong. They take past events too much at face value. But the market is constantly changing. Its to buy on the upside and not during pullbacks + HODL HODL HODL. With that said they really have no idea where they should get out and get in. That's fine by the way. News can be picked up by any of us from the news portals. They don't inform anyone about the negative side of things. It's a tough place to be and you can't take it half as seriously as it is communicated. Unless you are an investor (REAL) you are looking at the market long term. A multi-year perspective. Of course it doesn't pay off here either. The crypto market is still pretty damn small. No one is too late. Now most of you are losing time, but everyone has to start somewhere. I was in the same situation in 2017. I was drowning. Now I'm still looking at these corrections from + xxxxx% profit. Unfortunately we have to give ourselves time in the market and endure pullbacks of -20-30-40-50-60% to see 3000% profits. Realizing upwards during the upswing is not a bad thing. For me, a huge part of my strategy is to have a lot of money on the sidelines. That's why. Especially on 4H trend changes I sell everything that is not bullish. Then I sell others too if they break the trend and just trade.
💡 We are in the best market in the world, but psychologically the hardest market. If you learn to manage these things and use volatility to your advantage rather than your disadvantage, then it's a game changer.
💡 Institutions (fund managers, pension funds, banks and whales) think in long term horizons and monitor price action based on that (Years, Decades) Small investors, retail traders monitor things in low time frames (Minutes, hours, days). Small investors quickly switch between optimism and pessimism based on current price movements and news in the media. It can be a bull market one day and a bear market for a small investor the next. Institutional investors are not sentimental, they assess the growth rate of the market sector, the total market size available, the adoptation/acceptance, the growth of the network, the analysis of revenues (to predict profitability years and decades in advance). If an institutional investor draws a conclusion, they hold it until the underlying financial situation changes. Small investors usually have limited money to invest, so they often resort to leveraging, which typically results in full liquidation. Leveraged trades have "unlimited" potential losses, and therefore small investors (who do not like to buy spot because it is not "cool") can easily "drop out" of trading because of the "unlimited" losses from leverage. Think about it... as a retailer, you have your precious and hard-earned money on the line. Do you have time to lose what you've worked hard to earn, or even more? Why can't you accept that this is a profession? We study in university for 3-10 years to get an average salary afterwards. But here we are not willing to spend a couple of years without constantly taking time away from yourself with losses? Levrage are not bad. The user is the dangerous one.
😱 There is a reason why 90% of retail traders lose money.
💡Institutionalists brazenly exploit those with few resources and fear. Institutional investors have access to billions of dollars worth of resources and have teams of quantitative/statistical experts who control the automated trading algorithms.
Institutional investors have deep pockets and can influence the general sentiment of the market through the press (news, social media and interviews). Institutional investors influence the news that small investors read. Institutionalists are well known for advertising higher prices to retailers to "buy at the top", This is the FOMO factor (Fear of Missing Out). They are also notorious for creating tremendous market fear (FUD - Fear Uncertainty and Doubt), which encourages retailers to "sell at the bottom".
💡 Institutions are also actively involved in futures, options and derivatives markets. They all actively benefit from short-term price cycles as well as longer-term accumulation strategies. The institutions are sophisticated, financially strong and have expertise. Institutions make money by attracting small investors into the market (via FOMO) and then liquidating their positions (via FUD). In the market, one person's loss is another person's gain.
💡 There is a learning curve that 90% of your people want to skip and get rich overnight. Unfortunately, this is not reality. Knowledge is incredibly important. If you want to be a doctor, or a surgeon, you don't just walk into the operating room and say give me a knife and I'll cut this guy open and operate him without any knowledge. You really have to know what you're doing. If you're an engineer or you want to be an engineer, without training or knowledge, it would be very difficult for you to build a bridge or a skyscraper. You need the knowledge. If you want to be a teacher, but you don't know the subject matter, it would be very difficult to teach students in a meaningful way if you don't even know what you are teaching. So it is essential to acquire knowledge, but that knowledge has to come from the right people. So mentoring is also vital. Everyone must also understand the psychological aspects of investing and trading. Because a lot of people lose money in the financial markets. Not because they are stupid, but because their emotions get the better of them. Focusing on learning is incredibly important, it changes your life. Of course, this doesn't just apply to investing and trading. It applies to everything, which is why the financial markets are so incredible in their ability to create meaning in life, if people are open to it, and if they don't focus too much on money, then money will simply be the result of doing things the right way. Over time, if you do things the right way, you will become rich, you don't have to become a millionaire overnight. If you want to do that, you will probably lose all the money you put into the hands of institutions that want your money, want you to be captivated by a fantasy world.
The reality is that you need the knowledge to fight the big players and win.
💡Self-control is also a must. All wealth will pass without self-control. Self-control makes you keep the money you earn. There are many examples of this among people who have won huge amounts of money without earning it. For example, people who win lottery. These people basically give back all the money they made because they didn't really earn it. A lot of times, the money they didn't earn is put back. When you earn money with self-control, you never have to give it back! It is yours and will continue to grow.
💡 The key is to get off your ass and get moving. Remember these things and you'll be fine.
Trading Psychology
The Lesson From The Biggest Trader I've KnownHello to you TradingView traders,
All the below are based on my preferences, I don't give any financial recommendations and I have nothing to sell you with this article.
I'm sharing content because I see a lot of traders being/becoming broke and I don't want you to be one of them.
I was fortunate enough to work alongside a trader making 7-8 figures a month.
👇 Here is what I learned from him👇
The Pareto law
The Pareto principle or law of the vital few, stating that 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes.
Took me quite some time to truly understand it
Throughout the years, I've had a sneaking suspicion that a small percentage of my trades were responsible for the vast majority of my profits.
Basically, trades I entered early, in the expected direction and held until the next support/resistance zone.
Such trades, where the next S/R confluence zone is "far" tend to give the best results.
Then I started to wonder if I should prioritise only those setups over others because of how lucrative they are.
Why bother taking the "less easy" trades right I asked to a senior trader at the prop?
His answer was enlightening
He said, "because we don't know upfront if those trades will work... we only know they have a better chance of giving bigger rewards.... though it's not a guarantee"
And that's why we have to take the other trades too because "even those ones could bring a lot of gains even though the initial configuration is probabilistically less rewarding"
This piece of wisdom killed me inside because I'm lazy and as everyone, I want to make the big money taking a few trades per day/week only
I felt some pain to learn there is no guaranteed way to know upfront even if a likely high rewarding trade will finance my future fancy lifestyle....
He told me then "If you want to make a soccer player wage, you'll have to take bigger position sizes for those high reward setups"
Sounds obvious right?
When you know your trading system gives 20% of very rewarding trades and 80% of small gainers, it makes sense to increase one position size for the rare high reward trades.
Very quickly, I learned that any other strategy for making money in trading is doomed to failure.
To balance out my losing trades and have a decent profit at the end of each month, I had to bet big on high reward setups.
Might sounds shocking to most of you but even with a low win rate, as long as your winners size and PnL are far higher than all the other trades, you'll be profitable.
This simple change was one of the main things that helped me become a very successful trader.
Success defined as how consistent I am at making the desired monthly/yearly salary and at increasing it every year.
If you struggle making money out of your trading, take some time to reflect and identify which trades setups usually bring you most of the available gains.
Then backtest visually what you would have made if you'd had 2X, 3X, 4X the position size on those trades, keeping all the rest equal.
I'll keep bringing a few articles like this every week because it helps me clarifying my thoughts AND giving back to the community makes me feel good about myself somehow :)
I intend to share all facets of what makes a fantastic profitable trader and how to attain that status.
This is both the most difficult and the most rewarding job.
Thank you for reading
Dave
If You're Thinking About Giving Up On TradingHello to you TradingView traders,
All the below are based on my preferences, I don't give any financial recommendations and I have nothing to sell you with this article.
I'm sharing content because I see a lot of traders being/becoming broke and I don't want you to be one of them.
If you're thinking of giving up on trading read this 👇
A long time before becoming profitable
Trading is one of the most difficult tasks in the world
It sucks you in and takes your money within minutes
But if you're seriously trying to change your life around, here's why you should stick with it:
I've been trading for 10 years now
For the first 2 years I lost money
The first account I funded with $10,000 I lost in 6 days
The trading journey is mentally tough.
Not only did I lose a lot of money, but I lost a lot of confidence
I had devoted 2 years of my life to trading and still could not get consistent profits.
It was mentally draining.
The light at the end of the tunnel
But sticking with it was the best decision I have EVER made
I get to wake up every day now feeling fulfilled.
Feeling like all those years of hard work and sacrifice were worth it
Trading turned me into the person I am today.
Before I had ZERO:
- Confidence
- Sense of accomplishment
- Happiness
And now I have all of those things
AND...
I also learned a lot about myself.
I learned what it takes for me to become disciplined
I learned that in some scenarios I'm not very patient, in others I am
I learned about how I learn and the best way for me to educate myself
Yes the trading journey was financially and mentally tough but it was also fun.
The process was fun.
At the end of the day, that's what makes people happy:
Setting a goal, working towards it, and achieving it
There is no better feeling than that in my opinion
But here's the kicker:
If you don't give up, you can't lose
It's LITERALLY a waiting game
It's impossible to spend 10,000 hours on something and NOT be successful at it
Don't compare your journey to someone else
It took me 3.5 years to become profitable, and one more year to trade full-time
For some, it took 6 months
For others, it took 7 years
But I can say for every successful trader out there that it was totally worth it
So if you're considering giving up, take a step back
Think.
Are you a quitter?
How bad do you want this?
Sleep on it and see what happens tomorrow :)
I'll keep bringing a few articles like this every week because it helps me clarifying my thoughts AND giving back to the community makes me feel good about myself somehow :)
I want to teach you guys every aspects of what makes a great trader and how to get there.
This is the most challenging and the most rewarding job at the same time
Thank you for reading
Dave
THE POWER OF STOP LOSSHello again! Here I prepared for you what I consider the most important tool when it comes to risk management and developing a discipline, which helped me a lot in my trading journey: stop loss!
At first, I have to admit that I found it truly frustrating to see how 2 pips can trigger the stop loss and right after that my position reaches my target, but in time, I realised that in order to stick to my trading strategy and become profitable, I have to also accept the losses, even when I consider them
"unfair". Using the stop loss order not only that it helps cutting the losses, but can also help you lock in the profits. What helped my account the most was, after a while when the price goes in the desired direction, to move the stop loss at the entry point (so whatever happens, there will be no loss), and it honestly eliminates a lot of stress, especially during night.
Hopefully you will find this information as useful as I did, and feel free to ask anything in the comments section!
How to increase your win rate in trading.The first three years of my trading career were a nightmare.
I was all alone, trying to study and apply the course material I bought from a guru who ghosted me a few months later. He didn’t teach me anything besides telling me how to study the course and what my future will look like with trading. I followed his instruction, failed, and told him about the outcome. The response I always got was to study again.
After some time I stopped following his advice. I decided to study what other successful traders were doing. And I found the cause of my problem - not taking responsibility.
At first, I didn’t understand how I’m not taking responsibility. Because I forced myself to study the course and apply everything taught. But as I questioned myself and searched for the answers, I bumped into an AHA moment that was a game changer.
It improved my trading performance.
I unconsciously devoted myself to creating and mastering my 3 edges, which are my:
1. Technical edge.
2. Risk management edge.
3. Psychological edge.
Following the steps we'll discuss below, allowed me to become responsible. And made me realize that taking charge of your trading career early on is important. Because it shortens the journey from being an unsuccessful trader to a successful one.
Not Taking Responsibility For Your Trading Results Prevents You From Succeeding
There are other factors that lead to avoiding being responsible, such as:
1. Focusing on the outcome instead of the journey.
2. Not documenting our performance.
3. Blaming the markets and brokers.
Without realizing that it's holding us back.
Taking responsibility creates integrity. Many people have been taught to believe that accepting responsibility weakens their position or causes them to look bad. But in reality, the inverse is true. By taking responsibility and accepting the consequences, we create safe places of trust and learning. We then stay in a learning loop that makes us better traders.
With that said, let me show you how to stay in the loop and become a full-time successful trader.
Step 1: Create a Trading and Risk Management Plan
Having a plan will get you to cut distractions to keep you focused. But it needs to clearly outline all your strategies, rules, and processes for execution, managing, and reviewing to do that.
It will save you a lot of time and allow you to run your trading business smoothly. Like any other successful business, they have the plan to run successfully.
So, take time to create your own trading and risk management (business) plan. It must include your:
- objectives and executive summary,
- trading system strategies and rules, tools, and checklists,
- risk management strategies,
- as well as processes for planning, executing, managing, and reviewing your trades.
Step 2: Document everything you do in your Trading Journal.
Keeping a trading journal that has your thought processes written in it before, during, and after your trades, will allow you to execute the next step.
Thus having it will keep a record of what led to missing, losing, or winning a trade. You need that data. If you don’t have it, you won’t be in a learning loop, which will result in being stuck in the same place.
So, create a simple journal on Notion or buy one on Amazon. If you decide to create it in Notion, it must include your:
- entry, stop loss and take profit details that have reasons behind the trade,
- emotions before, during, and after the trade,
- before and after chart images.
Now with all the data, it's time for the next step.
Step 3: Review your performance 2-4 times a month.
This is where you become responsible for your trading. This is where you start and stay stuck in a learning loop that insures trading success. This is where you become the top 5% who make it.
What you need to do here is simple. Set a time or day to review your performance using your journal and software that’s like (or is) Myfxbook.
You can do this daily, weekly, or monthly. Not quarterly or yearly. Unless you’re a veteran trader who knows what they’re doing, why they're doing it, and how they should continue doing what they do to stay successful.
That’s the stage you should be aiming at. If you haven’t reached it, review your performance daily, either after your trading session or before sleeping time.
Follow the above steps and start molding yourself into one of the best traders in the world who are rich, famous, and free.
Cognitive Biases in Forex Trading
This article explores the cognitive biases in forex trading. The biases discussed in this article can play a significant role in any form of speculative trading and investing, not just forex trading.
A cognitive bias is a systematic flaw in how we think. Cognitive biases are present in every decision we face.
Anchoring Bias.
People rely too much on reference points from
the past when making a decision for the future -
they are "anchored" to the past.
Loss Aversion.
This is when people go to great lengths to avoid
losses because the pain of loss is twice as
impactful as the pleasure received from a win.
Confirmation Bias.
The confirmation trap is when traders seek
out information that validates their opinions
and ignore any theories that invalidate them.
Superiority Trap.
Many traders in the past have lost large sums
of money simply because they have fallen prey to
the mentality of overconfidence.
Herding.
Many traders in the past have lost large sums
of money simply because they have fallen prey to
the mentality of overconfidence.
Pay close attention to your decision making to spot the fallacies.
What do you want to learn in the next post?
Trading Psychology – FOMO #2JS-Masterclass: FOMO-Trading #2
In the first FOMO tutorial, I have summarized the characteristics of a FOMO trader and explained contributing factors which encourage FOMO-trading.
In this tutorial, I will compare the typical behaviors of FOMO traders versus disciplined traders and give tips to overcome FOMO-trading.
FOMO TRADERS VS DISCIPLINED TRADERS
The process of placing a trade can be very different depending on the situation in hand and the factors that are driving a trader’s decisions. Here is the trading cycle of a FOMO trader vs a disciplined trader – as you will see, there are some fundamental differences that can lead to very different outcomes.
TIPS TO OVERCOME FOMO
Overcoming FOMO begins with greater self-awareness, and understanding the importance of discipline and risk management in trading. While there is no simple solution to preventing emotions from impacting trades and stopping FOMO in its tracks, there are various techniques that can help traders make informed decisions and trade more effectively.
Here are some tips and reminders to help manage the fear factor:
• Be aware that there will always be another trade. Trading opportunities are like buses – another one will always come along. This might not be immediate, but the right opportunities are worth the wait.
• Everyone is in the same position. Recognising this is a breakthrough moment for many traders, making the FOMO less intense. Join a social trading platform or a trading service to get in contact and share experiences with other traders – this can be a useful first step in understanding and improving trading psychology.
• Have a trading plan and stick to that. Every trader should know their strategy, create a trading plan, then ALWAYS stick to it. This is the way to achieve long-term success
• Taking the emotion out of trading is key. Learn to put emotions aside – a trading plan will help with this, improving trading confidence.
• Traders should only ever use capital they can afford to lose. Always define your stop-loss levels before you enter a trade and always stick to that. This helps to minimize losses if the market moves unexpectedly.
• Knowing the markets is essential. Traders should conduct their own analysis and use this to inform trades, taking all information on board to be aware of every possible outcome.
• FOMO isn’t easily forgotten, but it can be controlled. The right strategies and approaches ensure traders can rise above FOMO.
• Keeping a trading journal helps with planning. It’s no coincidence that the most successful traders use a journal, drawing on personal experience to help them plan.
Overcoming FOMO doesn’t happen overnight, it’s an ongoing process. This article has provided a good starting point, highlighting the importance of trading psychology and managing emotions to prevent FOMO from affecting decisions when placing a trade.
What Are The Pros And Cons of Intraday vs Swing TradingHello traders,
There is not such a good or bad timeframe.
Like cooking, everything depends on how you use the ingredients for your meals.
Intraday timeframes
Pros
Earlier entries
Earlier exits => losers are smaller compared to losers with SWING trades
You make your daily goals earlier
With Intraday trading, we're not impacted by contracts expiration, rollover, over-weekend, overnight fees
It's rarely boring (especially with indices trading)
Leverage isn't needed
Perfect for beginners or small capital
Cons
More in/out entries => you have to enter, exit, enter, exit until the real move happen
You have to be more reactive and accurate when taking a position or exiting.
Swing timeframes
Pros
More time to react and prepare
We don't need to be too accurate with our entries and exits
You're less impacted by news/events/rumours/tweets - They have a real visible impact on intraday but generally don't change a thing for the swing trend
Cons
Bigger drawdown by design
Forces to hold trades over multiple days/weeks.
In a range, we pay a lot in funding/rollover fees before the real move happens.
Being double digits percent down because of fees isn't pleasant.
Big capital required to afford to lose a few percentages sometimes with those trading fees
1 click takes 5 seconds.
Then you wait and wait and wait and wait, and then look on Twitter for ideas to invalidate your entries.
When your favorite guru shares a contrary setup, you follow his/her call and wreck yourself.
You really need patience with SWING trades.
If the patience for you is an issue, I'd stick with Intraday.
Have a great day
Dave
10 Important Trading LessonsWhat are most useful trading tips you have heard so far?
Today, I am going to share with you 10 important trading lessons which market taught me after years of experience and I wish these tips to help you in your future trades :
1. We should Only do trading whenever we can obey all the following items or we had better leave trading forever.
2. Never enter into a stressful trade. This means you have to set you stop loss and calculate you target before executing a trade and possible loss should be small enough that you can tolerate.
3. If you feel to need to sit behind your laptop or PC to monitor and check your trade after opening a position, you are entering into a wrong one !. Do not open it.
4. Doing an analysis in relax and comfortable condition is necessary before any trade. Opening a position without " an already done analysis " is a great mistake ! .
5. Running an immediate analysis when market has strong momentum and trading based on that is very risky. Try to avoid such trades.
6. Never fade the gain of a good trade with a loss of a bad one. Good here means trading based on pre-defined strategy and bad means throwing it away .
7. Using leverages can be dangerous as much as it can be fascinating.
8. Only use leverages when all elements of your trading strategy are present.
9. Stick to your Stop loss and Take profit which you set and calculated outside of any market excitation.
10. Being optimistic and over pessimistic is forbidden. Trading is all about being realistic.
please share your own experiences as comments. I am eager to learn from you my friends.
Good luck.
How To Master Your SleepHello traders and investors,
This week, I'll talk about physiology, but I'd like to relate how I went from being an overly worried, under-slept, overfed, under-muscular person to the MAN I am today.
Let's start with how I conquered my sleep to get at least 7 hours of sleep per night, including hours of REM and DEEP sleep.
Trading after a bad night's sleep is extremely difficult, if not dangerous.
Because we can't think clearly when we have brain fog.
And trading necessitates that we be hyperaware.
I've had trouble sleeping virtually my whole life....
Even if I went to bed early, I usually experienced insomnia, woke up at 2/3 a.m., and couldn't fall back asleep.
It made my life unpleasant by causing chronic mental fog and an inability to be motivated.
I'm happy to report that I've mastered my sleep issues and discovered routines and tools to help me stay and fall asleep.
The majority of what follows was taught to me by Andrew Huberman, a well-known physiologist with about 2 million subscribers on YouTube (at the time of writing).
Protocol: Right after waking up
I go to my patio and soak up 10/15 minutes of sunlight.
I'm fortunate to reside in a sunny location.
On cloudy days, you'll have to increase your time outside first thing in the morning to 30 minutes.
This approach is for awaking your circadian cycle and signalling to your body that the day has begun.
It's critical to start as early as possible in the morning.
I conduct a 10 minute HIIT workout on my terrace.
You don't necessary need to do this; going for a walk outside is also a great morning routine.
I've read several times that this early workout is highly useful for letting our brain know that it's time to start waking up the "machine."
Protocol: During the day
- I don't drink coffee after noon.
Some folks do and sleep well.
I'm one of those guys who is hypersensitive to caffeine and can't fall asleep anytime I consume coffee in the afternoon.
- I don't consume junk food nor just eat whole foods.
I eat a well-balanced diet consisting of 60% carbs, 30% protein, and 10% fat because I work out for 1 hour every day.
I also always eat below or at my calories maintenance - studies show metabolism are the healthiest when we don’t overeat - I don’t want no hormones, health issues - I want to live healthy, rich and for a very long time.
This contributes to the development of my body, charisma, testosterone, and courage.
Courage is essential while dealing with difficult circumstances, especially when our trades are underwater.
- I don't consume alcohol or smoke.
I don't feel smoking is harmful to sleep; I simply don't do it for health reasons.
However, alcohol is known to have a bad impact on our brain and sleep.
Protocol: 2 hours before going to bed
I go to bed around 9:30 p.m. every night.
Going to bed at the same time every day trains our brains to allow us to fall asleep around that time.
The caveat is that anytime I go out at night and go to bed beyond that time, I tend to have poorer sleep quality.
- Beginning with the most important: I am closing ALL of my intraday trades
I don't want my intraday trades to turn into swing trades or, worse, long-term investments.
I don't want to wake up stressed every night to check my trades PnL.
I want to go to bed stress-free.
- Blue light glasses
I still work late at night, so I wear blue light-blocking glasses.
Our brain associates blue colors with "hey, it's still day time."
That is why protecting our eyes from bright lights (even those in our homes) is essential for a healthy night's sleep.
Looking at your TV or computer at night without them guarantees that you won't sleep well, that you'll wake up in the middle of the night and won't be able to fall back asleep.
- Self-massages
I use a foam roller to roll my back and neck on, as well as a massage tool.
Eric Berg: shop.drberg.com
I have no affiliation; that product improved my life by allowing me to remove nodes in my back and neck without visiting a chiropractor
- Stretching
Shaolin Monks are famed for being highly flexible; they say flexibility is a sign of an extremely healthy physique, and I couldn't agree more.
Stretching my hamstrings and back on a daily basis greatly fixed my lower back/neck pain.
Protocol: Back/Neck Pain
75% of the persons I spoke with were suffering from back/neck pain.
Some people sleep on their stomach, which is bad for their neck, and they know they should sleep on their side, but they can't fall asleep that way.
Some are extremely stressed and cringe.
Cringing frequently causes neck pain.
I needed a dental tray to prevent my cringing from causing nodes in my neck.
Really a life-saving, or should I say sleep-saving, device.
Protocol: What to Do If You Wake Up in the Middle of the Night
- Self-massage using the foam roller and the Eric Berg’s massage tool.
- Never check your phone or social media
According to Andrew Huberman, checking your phone at night depletes your dopamine for the next 48 hours.
Dopamine is the hormone giving us motivation
How could you manage difficult trades without being motivated?
Well….it’s harder….
Tool
I use an OURA ring to track my REM and DEEP sleep.
It's Bluetooth-enabled and linked to my phone.
Every morning, the OURA app gave me a score; the greater the score, the better my sleep was.
It also distinguishes between REM, DEEP, and STANDARD sleep.
Supplements
Supplements I consider myself to be in a deep level of calm. I follow the dosing guidelines on each product label.
- Magnesium L-Theanone
- Zinc
- Argenin
- Tart Cherry
- I used to take Ashwaganda, but I discovered it reduced my overall happiness/excitement during the day, so I stopped taking it.
How long should you do these protocols before seeing some effects
Talking from experience, it’s a matter of days.
Yeah really, it’s amazing how quick our body and brain adapts to weather great or terrible inputs.
Feeding your body with mostly great inputs leads to a great mind, mood and is the first step at getting shot at being profitable with your trading.
The second step is mastering your anxiety and stress.
Article coming up on that topic on Monday :)
Have a good weekend everyone
Dave
Gambler's Vision VS Pro Trader's Vision 👁
Hey traders,
In this article, we will discuss the perception of trading by individuals.
We will compare the vision of a professional trader and a beginner.
The fact is, that most of the people perceive trading performance incorrectly. There is a common fallacy among them that win rate is the only true indicator of the efficiency of a trading strategy.
Moreover, newbies are searching for a strategy producing close to 100% accuracy.
Such a mindset determines their expectations.
Especially it feels, when I share a wrong forecast in my channel.
It immediately triggers resentment and negative reactions.
Talking to these people personally and asking them about the reasons of their indignation, the common answer is: "If you are a pro, you can not be wrong".
The truth is that the reality is absolutely different. Opening any position or making a forecast, a pro trader always realizes that there is no guarantee that the market will act as predicted. Pro trader admits that he deals with probabilities, and he is ready to take losses. He realizes that he may have negative trading days, even weeks and months, but at the end of the day his overall performance will be positive.
Remember, that your success in trading is determined by your expectations and perception. Admit the reality of trading, set correct goals, and you will take losses more easily.
I wish you luck and courage on a battlefield.
❤️If you have any questions, please, ask me in the comment section.
Please, support my work with like, thank you!❤️
10 Important Tips & Tricks To Improve Trading Skills
In this article, we will discuss ten important tips and tricks that can enable you to improve your trading skills.
A trading plan is a must
Once you have tested the plan developed and it shows good results, that is the time to go full throttle investing in the stock market.
Do not lose confidence
Be a learner
Be a learner and practice trading as a new entrant, even if it has been decades of trading for you. Look at trading as a classroom with much to offer and to be taken one thing at a time.
Don't fall for rumours
Treat it like a Business
It is serious business here and requires precision, patience, commitment, in-depth analysis and cold-blooded research.
A stop-loss is essential
Have technology at your side
Trader must be up-to-date on the happenings in the trading world and use technology to know about stock movements, new products, new trading schemes and pre-empt market movements.
Defend your trading capital
Take risks that you can afford
It enables you to plan well and not overexpose yourself to the risks in share market trading.
Be open to new strategies
Never in trading should there be a time that you follow a trading plan that is outdated or rigid to change.
What do you want to learn in the next post?
How to differentiate a fake-out from an actual break-outHappy Friday, sorcerers. Welcome on another educational post by Investroy!
The trading and investing industry is a difficult one to succeed in as it has various complex details that you need to dig into both from technical and psychological perspectives. Predicting the price movement and understanding the logic behind it may be challenging at first. But as time passes and you gain experience, you understand the science behind price action and make more logical decisions.
Today, we will talk about a rather puzzling issue faced by many beginning and experienced traders: the theme of differentiating fake price movements from real ones. Although, it is not always possible to separate the two to the full extent, it is feasible to build a plan around it and stick to it on a consistent basis.
A fake-out is a failed attempt of the price to break above/below a key zone. Very often, it is associated with liquidity grabs and Stop Loss hunts. To demonstrate, looking at the illustration pictured on the chart, you can see how the price attempts to continue its bullish moves, but fakes out from the sideways-moving range and re-enters the borders of it instead.
On the contrary, a breakout happens when price successfully penetrates a key level and continues its impulsive moves in the same direction
Now, the question is: how to distinguish a real breakout from a fake one?
Firstly, it has to be kept in mind that what goes up, must come down. In trading terms, after an impulsive move, a correctional one should come; after a breakout, a re-test should happen before continuing impulses. In order to identify whether a breakout is a fake or a real one, we should always look for a re-test of the penetrated zone after a break is completed. However, you have to keep in mind that it is not a 100% fact that a re-test will happen every time. Sometimes, breakouts will be so impulsive that price will not retrace back to re-test a penetrated zone.
Nothing is 100% accurate in trading. Not every breakout will lead to a re-test before impulsive continuations. Not every fake breakout will seem like a fake-out at first. However, waiting for a re-test of a broken zone is a good way to evade fake breakouts and capture high risk-to-reward trades and opportunities.
To conclude, if you want to make sure you don’t get faked out and liquidated, always wait for a re-test of a penetrated level before forming biases and executing positions.
What Kind of Person You Need to Become to Be ProfitableHello traders,
All the below are based on my preferences, I don't give any financial recommendations and I have nothing to sell you with this article.
I'm sharing content because I see a lot of traders being/becoming broke and I don't want you to be one of them.
Why have I been sharing so many articles so far?
I’ve shared one educational post a day because being a trader is a job.
And a job is the sum of many skills to acquire.
Each skill taken individually won’t make you a profitable trader.
Talking about me and the guys from my trading community, only all those skills applied altogether give us a shot at making money.
Trading is one of the most challenging and one of the most monetary rewarding activity.
Work on yourself first
Your trading profitability is a direct reflection of who you are as an individual.
It’s just is.
If you’re not profitable, it’s because you made some mistakes.
And if you made them, it’s because you didn’t work enough on yourself yet.
Having great trading signals is indeed an essential tool among the stack of tools to have but… this is not enough.
And I’m saying this as someone selling trading signals (and a trading course).
In a past life, when I worked as a back office Quant, we were strongly encouraged to workout, meditate, eat healthy, sleep 7+ hours, having some social life, etc…
Being a trader is first being a human with great habits leading him/her towards nothing else but excellence.
How can someone expects to perform well at such a tough job while being fat and/or sleeping 4 hours a night and/or not controlling his mind/emotions,…
YOU JUST CAN’T.
Trading is hard enough already and the market knows damn well how to take the hard-earned money from people who didn’t work on themselves enough.
Your skills stack
As an entrepreneur owning online businesses, I had to learn about sales, marketing, negotiation, copywriting, accounting, taxes optimisation, coding, hiring, building a company culture, …
Each skill taken separately isn’t enough to bootstrap a business.
All of them used together gave me a shot at succeeding
The same goes with trading.
The reason any very profitable trader I know became profitable after some serious time is because the stack of skills to acquire is consequential.
And I’m not talking about skills we can learn in a short timeframe.
I had to learn how to: (non-exhaustive list)
- Meditate
- Refrain myself from trading when I’m tired or sick or frustrated
- Put my ego side and time to time get back to trading with smaller position size
- Take my profit for the day and get out of my place and go outside
- Eat/sleep properly
- Relax and breath and do some NSDR (Non-Sleep Deep Rest)
- Working out properly and building muscles -> I’m so sure there is a direct correlation for men between our Testosterone level and the courage to enter and manage difficult trades.
- Not be greedy -> One needs to get slapped hard in the face a few times to understand that
- Never anticipate -> many times I cut a trade before the stop-loss or I entered too early front-running some signal(s) - in retrospect, was really a stupid behaviour
- Psychology and Game Theory
- Code trading scripts and trading bots in multiple programming languages
- Listen to the right mentors aka traders way ahead of me in term of net worth
- …
Those skills used altogether compound and made me a very disciplined person - those are my daily non-negotiable behaviours.
If you’re not profitable yet, it isn’t necessarily because the signals you have are bad.
And to figure out if they’re bad or not, you need some trading experience… which comes from….. taking a huge amount of trades for an extended period of time.
Your lack of profitability, comes for most of you from some work you still need to do.
And by the way, each trade you take works on you.
Your trades work on you more than you work on them.
What I mean by that, the more trades you take, the more skilled you get as you keep learning about yourself.
A virtuous feedback loop.
Many traders who lost everything due to a big mistake knew how to make it all back and beyond because…. they already had the required skills.
Conclusion
A red-pilled trader could decide to put his/her money into a 100% trading bot because… learning all those skills is time-consuming.
My advice to that person is…. “Good luck with your endeavour, you’ll likely wreck yourself”
If you don’t trust me… well… I worked as a back office Quant coding trading bots for about 5 years in NYC.
I tested and built more bots than 99.99% of people.
Retail trading bots sellers are selling a concept, a dream which by definition doesn’t reflect the reality.
Regardless of the strategy, it’s unlikely a 100% automated bot performs well overtime as market conditions keep changing.
We’re now in uncharted territory with a very high inflation rate, extreme tensions between countries, an extreme defiance of people of their governments, the WEF, WHO, … (and how could we not blame them seeing what they did to us those past 2 years)
Anyway, what I’m strongly recommending as someone who built non-retail trading bots for a living: learn to trade manually first and then learn how to pilot a bot.
Quotes of the day
- “Never chase opportunities. Let it come to you by creating value and building rare skillsets.” ― Johannes Larsson
- “The ability to make wise choices is the most valuable skill a person can develop.” ― Abhishek Ratna
“Skills don’t die; only people do.” ― Anas Hamshari
“A good trader converts his skills to cash.” ― Michael Bassey Johnson
I'll keep bringing a few articles like this every week because it helps me clarifying my thoughts AND giving back to the community makes me feel good about myself somehow :)
Thank you for reading
Dave
Trading Psychology – FOMOJS-Masterclass – FOMO (Fear of Missing Out)
Definition
FOMO – Fear of Missing Out - is a relatively recent addition to the English language, but one that is intrinsic to our day-to-day lives. A true phenomenon that affects many traders and can be a major hurdle to become a successful trader.
For instance, the feeling of missing out could lead to the entering of trades without enough thought, or to closing trades at inopportune moments because it’s what others seem to be doing. It can even cause traders to risk too much capital due to a lack of research, or the need to follow the herd. For some, the sense of FOMO created by seeing others succeed is only heightened by fast-paced markets and volatility; it feels like there is a lot to miss out on.
To help traders better understand the concept of FOMO in trading and why it happens, this tutorial will identify potential triggers and how they can affect a day trader’s success
WHAT IS FOMO IN TRADING?
FOMO in trading is the Fear of Missing Out on a big opportunity in the markets and is a common issue many traders will experience during their careers. FOMO can affect everyone, from new traders with retail accounts through to professional and institutional traders.
In the modern age of social media, which gives us unprecedented access to the lives of others, FOMO is a common phenomenon. It stems from the feeling that other traders are more successful, and it can cause overly high expectations, a lack of long-term perspective, overconfidence/too little confidence and an unwillingness to wait.
Emotions are often a key driving force behind FOMO which can lead traders to neglect trading plans and disrespect their trading strategy.
Common emotions in trading that can feed into FOMO include Greed, Fear, Excitement, Jealousy, Impatience and Anxiety
CHARACTERISTICS OF A FOMO TRADER
Traders who act on FOMO will likely share similar traits and be driven by a particular set of assumptions. Below is a list of the top things that guide a FOMO traders’ behavior:
1. Listen too much to the news. ‘They are all doing it so it must be a good idea’.
2. Be too much focused on potential profits versus thinking risk first.
3. Not sure but just let’s give it a go.
4. Getting frustrated in hindsight: ‘OMG, I should have seen this coming’.
5. This will be a great opportunity and if I do too much analysis, I will miss this great opportunity.
What factors contribute to FOMO trading?
FOMO is an internal feeling, but one that can be caused by a range of situations. Some of the external factors that could lead to a trader experiencing FOMO are:
• Volatile markets. FOMO isn’t limited to bullish markets where people want to hop on a trend – it can creep into our psyche when there is market movement in any direction. No trader wants to miss out on a good opportunity
• Big winning streaks. Buoyed up by recent wins, it is easy to spot new opportunities and get caught up in them. And it’s fine, because everyone else is doing it, right? Unfortunately, winning streaks don’t last forever
• Repetitive losses. Traders can end up in a vicious cycle: entering a position, getting scared, closing out, then re-entering another trade as anxiety and disappointment arise about not holding out. This can eventually lead to bigger losses
• News and rumours. Hearing a rumour circulating can heighten the feeling of being left out –traders might feel like they’re out of the loop
• Social media. The mix of social media and trading can be toxic when it looks like everyone is winning trades. It’s important not to take social media content at face value, and to take the time to research influencers and evaluate posts.
Why You Should Meditate - And How To StartHello traders,
All the below are based on my preferences, I don't give any financial recommendations and I have nothing to sell you with this article.
I'm sharing content because I see a lot of traders being/becoming broke and I don't want you to be one of them.
Why to meditate?
It will help you closing these unsolved thoughts that come from living and are based on fear, pain, ...
Eventually, you will have resolved all of these unsolved issues, and you get into a state of bliss and peace = true happiness.
If you can get there, it changes your life.
Protocol to get started
- Timeline: 60 days
- Duration: up to 1 hour a day, start with 5 minutes your first time but the end goal is reaching 1 hour a day.
I started with 5 minutes, then added about 5/10 minutes more every week
- Protocol: First thing to do in the morning - No music, No sound, No apps.
Get super comfy because you don't wanna move for the next hour.
If you really struggle to stay within yourself, you can use an app or any guided meditation content - there are plenty for free on Youtube and Spotify.
Why do I even meditate?
I'm doing it every day as it helps turning off my "monkey mind"
You know that state of mind when we take trades we shouldn't or with a position size we shouldn't :)
Basically, acting like animals living in a pretty blank state...living in the moment.... following their instincts, feelings, wants.
Trading is very often going against what I feel.
Then, meditation helped me kind of suppressing this "FOMO/FEAR/OH CRAP I HAVE TO TAKE THAT TRADE BECAUSE EVERYONE IS IN IT" state of mind
When we let the monkey mind governing us, we may develop a strong self of self/ego.
We then tend to see the world as we want and mold it to our desires and preconceived notions, instead of seeing it as it actually is.
The huge issue with this is it leads us to trade based on on our vision of the World and not based on the charts.
For an investment or a SWING trade, it's always uncomfortable and painful to see it as it is.
How many times was I plain wrong and I held because I wanted to believe it would sort itself out and I'll end up making a profit.
The longer I waited to react and cut my losses, the higher the odds that trade could wreck me
Anyone else got in that situation?
Conclusion
The mind should be a servant and a tool, not a master.
My monkey mind should NOT control and drive me 24/7.
I want to break the habit of uncontrolled thinking, which is very hard.
Quotes of the day
- “Meditation is not about stopping thoughts, but recognising that we are more than our thoughts and our feelings.” — Arianna Huffington
- “Mediation is not spacing out or running away. In fact, it is being totally honest with ourselves” – Kathleen McDonald
- “I meditate so that my mind cannot complicate my life” – Sri Chinmoy
- “Meditation is like a gym in which you develop the powerful mental muscles of calm and insight.”– Ajahn Brahm
- “Meditation is not about feeling a certain way. It's about feeling the way you feel.” — Dan Harris
I'll keep bringing a few articles like this every week because it helps me clarifying my thoughts AND giving back to the community makes me feel good about myself somehow :)
Thank you for reading
Dave
Do not get caught in this trap!Good time of the day, friends! Rushing into trades is definitely among the top #3 common mistakes done by relatively newer market participants who we would call early sellers in this context.
The chart/infographic above is pretty self explanatory, but let’s still cover some aspects of it by considering a following scenario:
Market was moving sideways the whole week, you almost lost hope to finish the month in profits and now you see the up-trending channel with already 2 lower trend-line touches. You instantly get excited and set a long position in the area of a third touch. Well, next thing you know it plummets right past through it. Lesson learned, but what can be done to avoid that?
Well, first of all “look for multiple confluences”. Does the third touch coincide with a potential support zone? If not, that already weakens the point. Was there any signs of bottom forming and reversal? Another strike if not. Did it coincide with any Fibonacci levels, for instance? No? You’re out.
Going over mistakes is easy, as there are always so many things that can go wrong, but what’s an alternative then, you may ask. On the chart above, we also indicated a point where we would consider entering the mentioned trade. Patient execution with a proper Risk-Reward is a way to do it.
Hope this helps, and tune in for more content for us!
Trading-Psychology: Fear & GreedFear & Greed
Trading psychology is different for each trader, and it is influenced by the trader’s emotions and biases. The two main emotions that are likely to impact the success or failure of a trade are greed or fear.
Greed is defined as the excessive desire for profits that could affect the rationality and judgment of a trader. A greed-inspired trade may involve buying stocks of untested companies because they are on the rise or buying shares of a company without understanding the underlying investment.
Greed can also make a trader stay in a position for too long in an attempt to squeeze every event out of the trade. It is common at the end of a bull market when traders attempt to take on risky and speculative positions to profit from the market movements.
On the other hand, fear is the opposite of greed and the reason why people exit a trade prematurely or refrain from taking on risky positions due to concerns of incurring losses. Fear makes investors act irrationally as they rush to exit the trade. It is common during bear markets, and it is characterized by significant selloffs from panic-selling.
Fear and greed play an important role in a trader’s overall strategy and understanding how to control the emotions is essential in becoming a successful trader.
Your Ability To Stick To a Strategy MattersHello traders,
All the below are based on my preferences, I don't give any financial recommendations and I have nothing to sell you with this article.
I'm sharing content because I see a lot of traders being/becoming broke and I don't want you to be one of them.
Your ability to stick to a strategy matters more than the strategy itself
As a systemic trader, I've always said knowing what to do is the easy part.
Applying a proven strategy with unconditional conviction is when it starts getting hard.
Trading against your deep beliefs
You want to believe a narrative
You want to believe it has to go up or down because someone from CNBC/Twitter said something
When any trading strategy then gives a signal in the opposite direction of your beliefs, you're undecided, you can't take the trade.
I've heard those sentences from unexperienced traders
"It has to go down because the FED increased the interest rates so I'm not taking that Long"
"It has to go up because ABC is an inflation hedge and we're only 3X from the previous ATH"
Let me ask you this...
Don't you think most traders are losing money because of their beliefs?
Trading against yourself
There is a signal to exit but you don't want to exit because the last few exits made you exit too early..
There is a signal to enter but you don't want to enter because the last few entries weren't winners...
Then comes an entry that you decided to ignore, the trade worked wonderfully but you ignored it....
Then comes an exit for a trade you're in that you decided to ignore leading to a bigger loss....
See a pattern here?
Following a strategy is hard because it's trading against who we are and what we think.
But, once we learn to ignore as much as possible our "human" side, is when we start making the sweet gains!!!
Quotes of the day
- “Everything must be made as simple as possible. But not simpler.” ― Albert Einstein
- “Any system was a straightjacket if you insisted on adhering to it so totally and humourlessly.” ― Erica Jong, Fear of Flying
I'll keep bringing a few articles like this every week because it helps me clarifying my thoughts AND giving back to the community makes me feel good about myself somehow :)
Thank you for reading
Dave
Trading-Psychology: Fear & GreedFear & Greed
Trading psychology is different for each trader, and it is influenced by the trader’s emotions and biases. The two main emotions that are likely to impact the success or failure of a trade are greed or fear.
Greed is defined as the excessive desire for profits that could affect the rationality and judgment of a trader. A greed-inspired trade may involve buying stocks of untested companies because they are on the rise or buying shares of a company without understanding the underlying investment.
Greed can also make a trader stay in a position for too long in an attempt to squeeze every event out of the trade. It is common at the end of a bull market when traders attempt to take on risky and speculative positions to profit from the market movements.
On the other hand, fear is the opposite of greed and the reason why people exit a trade prematurely or refrain from taking on risky positions due to concerns of incurring losses. Fear makes investors act irrationally as they rush to exit the trade. It is common during bear markets, and it is characterized by significant selloffs from panic-selling.
Fear and greed play an important role in a trader’s overall strategy and understanding how to control the emotions is essential in becoming a successful trader.
Losing is a tough pill to swallow.Losing is a tough pill to swallow. No one wants to admit defeat, but in order to win, you have to learn how to lose first.
It's not easy to do, but understanding and accepting that losses are a part of trading is crucial to your success. If you can't handle losing, then you're never going to be able to win.
In trading, as in life, it is important to know when to admit defeat and move on.
There should be a point at which you are willing to say "I was wrong about this trade" and exit. This requires a certain amount of detachment from your ego and emotions.
Of course, it is not always easy to know when to cut your losses. That is why it is important to have a solid trading plan with clear entry and exit points before you even enter a trade. Once you are in a trade, it is important to stick to your plan and resist the urge to second-guess yourself. If the market moves against you, take a step back and reassess the situation objectively.
How To Improve Decision Making SkillsHello traders,
All the below are based on my preferences, I don't give any financial recommendations and I have nothing to sell you with this article.
I'm sharing content because I see a lot of traders being/becoming broke and I don't want you to be one of them.
Decision & Outcome
As a trader, I often noticed a disconnect between the right decision and the right outcome.
If you read my previous content, I talked about repeating successful trades, finding a trading strategy that works and keep trading it over and over again.
Your decision-making process in the most valuable thing that you have.
It’s what make you decide who you’re going to marry, what business opportunity you’re going to pursue, which mentors you’re going to follow, what assets you’re going to trade etc…
You could take the money away from the most successful traders or entrepreneurs and they’ll make it back again.
Ray Dalio, Elon Musk for example, lost everything and made it all back.
The hardest part about trading (and life in general) is you can make the right decision and have the wrong outcome.
Warren Buffet
Warren Buffet says “I wouldn’t touch Bitcoin” because it’s speculative, has no intrinsic value and would buy it only because someone else will buy it at a higher price.
Plus, a Bitcoin doesn’t produce anything… unlike a stock that produces dividends….unlike some real-estate that produces some rental income…unlike a business spitting out profit.
Those who listened to him chose to not buy Bitcoin years ago.
And until 1 year ago, the amount of money if would have been worth would have been a lot more.
Was the decision wrong? Or was it that the outcome did not match the quality of the decision?
If you’re going to change the way you made decisions because a decision you made in the past ended up bad, you have to apply the same decision making context/framework to everything else.
If I say, I’m now going to be a speculator - someone who buy things in the hope to sell it later for more even though the things themselves don’t have more value.
If I choose to start making this kind of decision, I have to think about all the other investments I would have and lost money on as a result of that decision making framework.
I heard this first from Ray Dalio.
Ray Dalio
He said, the hardest things is passing up on an opportunity and then seeing it do really well.
If I were to use the decision framework that would have made that deal a winner then I’d have to apply that same framework to all the other trades that would have been losers.
And my net net of having that decision making framework would ultimately cause me to lose.
This has been one of the most powerful concept for me as a trader because it allows me to separate the outcome from the quality of the decision.
Most speculators don't make money so that's why even if I feel pain when assets I don't own go up, I comfort myself thinking I made the right decision to choose to only trading cryptocurrencies and not holding any long-term.
And god bless..... I was right based on the events from last week #FTX
Reflecting on my trading
It’s not because I missed some opportunities or failed some trades that my decision-making framework was wrong.
My father and mentor taught me during my first year to only trade based on a convergence of indicators - to never use fundamental analysis nor blockchain analysis for those trading cryptos.
My decision-making process is 100% based on the chart and nothing else.
Whenever I get a bad outcome but traded my system as I should, it’s okay as I know overtime it gives me more winners than losers.
However, if I trade based on something I read on social media then more often than not, I end up losing money.
I've been trading using the same trading system for almost a decade - the convergence of indicators used encapsulates automatically a list of checkpoints verifying if a trade has enough momentum/strength/volume for me to consider whether I should take it or not.
Quotes of the day
- "We all make choices, but in the end, our choices make us." — Ken Levine
- "Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance." — C.S. Lewis
- “It's not about making the right choice. It's about making a choice and making it right.― J.R. Rim,
I'll keep bringing a few articles like this every week because it helps me clarifying my thoughts AND giving back to the community makes me feel good about myself somehow :)
Thank you for reading
Dave
Indecision is the enemy of success.The most successful traders have one thing in common: they know when to pull the trigger. They don’t hesitate. They don’t second-guess themselves. They make a decision and they stick to it.
Indecision is the enemy of success. It’s what causes trading losses. If you can’t make a decision, you’ll never make any money in the markets.
The trick is to not let indecision steal your opportunity. When you see a good trade setup, don’t hesitate. Take action and be confident in your decision. Remember, even if it turns out to be a wrong decision, it’s better than no decision at all.
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