Skip to main content

Hardwork

 “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.”

—Thomas Edison


for One Good Trade, Hard Work assumes a different context from what you might originally assume. It is about the work you must do beforehand.

Watching your trading screens intently and gathering important information is how we define hard work. We must ask the following questions at a rapid fire pace, just as a batter determines the prospects of an incoming 95 mile-per-hour heater.


 Who is buying?

 Who is selling?

 What levels are most important?

 Is this stock stronger or weaker than the market? 

 Is this stock stronger or weaker than its counterparts in its sector? 

 Where is most of the volume being done? 

 How much volume at a price causes the stock to move up or down? 

 What is the spread? 

 How quickly does the stock move when it is ready to find another price? 

 How is the Specialist treating your orders? 

 Are there any big prints? 

 Is the stock trading in a particular pattern?

These are the questions that I answer before trading a stock. This information—yes, all of this information—should be gathered before you make One Good Trade. This is what we mean by hard work.

Most successful trades are easy trades. They result from doing the above, seeing an excellent and simple trading opportunity, and then pouncing. Watch, watch, watch, and BAM! Your edge comes into play, and you make your next trade.

If you are trading a stock, and it is not offering excellent risk/reward opportunities, then move on. Type up some other stocks, and watch them intently. Gather all that information from before. And do not make a trade until you have this information, as a new trader. Never. Do not make trades unless the edge you require is present along with the right type of information.

Woody Allen said: “Ninety percent of life is just showing up.” The same idea applies to trading. Showing up every day matters. Searching for support and resistance levels every day will positively impact your trading. Heading home early because a few moves went against you should be saved for special occasions when you really must clear your head.

To make One Good Trade you must prepare properly, work hard, and have patience.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

CAN A FIRM ALWAYS SPOT THE NEXT GREAT TRADER?

 No. But a prop firm can tell who has a poor chance to become a CPT. To be good at anything will take everything you have. Not having developed the skills to work hard is a turn-off. Trading is a skill learned by doing, not just by reading a lot, theorizing, or the faux art of “paper trading.” THE PROS AND CONS OF RECRUITING EXPERIENCED TRADERS Loyalty is a good thing to a point, but it cannot trump logistics and reality. losing money should really bother you. If I am negative three days in a row, I spend a long evening on my couch with a bottle of red wine and comfort food. As traders, we can all recite the memorable line from Wall Street: “A man looks in the abyss, there is nothing staring back at him. At that moment he discovers his character. That keeps the man out of the abyss.”  Traders don’t talk about how they want to trade, what they want to read about trading, or how they wish they could talk about trading. Traders trade, read about trading, and talk about trading.
Post a Comment
Read more

Reading the Tape

 Dr. Steenbarger, aka the godfather of modern trading psychology, wrote: “My experience is that an understanding of (and ability to read) order flow is one important factor that separates the older, successful generation of day traders from the newbies who only know simple chart patterns and indicator readings.” continue working on the skill of reading the tape and to sell the stock on the offer when the tape showed weakness. “Reading the tape must be learned through personal experience and long observation.” keep in mind that nothing can top experience. Don’t give up. It is not always this easy to Read the Tape. But there are plays where it really is simple. And reading the tape will offer pattern recognition plays that you can exploit. Overcoming a Confirmation Bias We all fight confirmation bias. But it will harm our performance if we do not overcome it. Let the tape talk to you. And use online vehicles like StockTwits and your peers sitting next to you to gain second ...
Post a Comment
Read more
 All great leaders in every walk of life are highly sexed, but they follow the habit of controlling their sex desires, switching them into a driving force behind their occupation. The person who has self discipline understands the emotion of sex, respects it, and learns to control and transmute it into contructive activities. Q: Just what damage is there in over-indulgence of sex? A: The greatest damage is that it depletes the source of man's greatest driving force, and wastes, without adequate compensation, man's creative energy. Controlled sex supplies the magnetic force that attracts people to one another. It is the most important factor of a pleasing personality. It gives quality to the tone of voice and enables one to convey through the voice any feeling desired. It serves, as nothing else can serve, to give motive power to one's desires. It keeps the nervous system changed with the energy needed to carry on the work of maintaining the body. It sharpens the imagination...
Post a Comment
Read more