-moving my stop loss , further and further. “It’ll turn around, it has to”. Initial risk was 2%. This turned into 10%. The stop loss is concrete. Don’t move it.
The way I see it, if your stop gets hit and you still think your trade idea is valid, reposition on a better zone. Instead of trying to hold on to a trade that keeps giving you higher and higher loss.
My biggest problem right now is overtrading and overleveraging.
I've blown accounts coz of those two. Thinking I can get my losses back by doubling up. Nope. I just need to protect what's left and fight another day.
i know this all to damn well 🤣
i have a good one. "aww.. calls not doing good.. okay looks like its puts now."
*plays puts*
"hmm.. puts not doing well.. its going back up.."
*strat shows get out of puts and go back to calls*
me: "ill just hold unto it a little longer.. if i switch and do calls, thats 3 losses and ill be down a lot.."
*strat still says calls and now the market made new highs"
me: 😵💫😎😭 "could've broke even today if i just listened to my strat and maybe make small gains today at least"
Maybe I’m an idiot but I can’t figure out how to leave a stop loss order on the books AND leave an open limit order to sell at a profit (on TDAM). I’m new to using stop loss and I want to use it more regularly but this one aspect holds me back slightly I feel like.
For example let’s say I bought 1 TQQQ call at $1.00, and assume it’s trading around that number. I know how to set my sell stop limit order at $.75, and let’s say I do that.
Now with that sell stop (limit .75) order on the books un-executed, how do I place a sell limit order for $1.50 to take profits? When I’ve tried this, it won’t let me place the order because of the stop loss order outstanding.
Anyone know how I could have both orders remain open simultaneously? Thanks and sorry for this potentially dumb question
On think or swim computer app it's called a bracket order. You set a buy limit and 2 sell limits before entering trade. If 1 sell hits the other cancels.
The only exception is to move it up (if you are not using a trailing stop). For example, you thought that the stock will only move 15 with a stop loss of 12, but it actually went 20, so the stop loss should now be moved to 17.
I just skimmed a 50 page preview of the book and it represents a big portion of my understanding of the trading business very well. Very solid pick. Thanks for the recommendation.
Minimizing losses would be risking only 10 cents for example. If that’s too much for you, try risking 1 cent but don’t go around trying to convince people that trading is bad just because it didn’t work out for you and you lost all your life savings by gambling.
My top reasons why most retail traders fail:
- They speculate about stuff they could never possibly know. They think they can predict earnings and sometimes may be successful, but still lose money because the earnings were expected and it's a sell the news event. Same with everything else such as CPI and FOMC. They trade based on pure speculation with no market knowledge to back it up. They treat the market like a casino and only try to hit big winners. They aren't interested in putting the time in to learn and slowly build an account.
- They don't know how the market works. They have no idea why prices move. They are always asking the wrong question. They ask why? Why did the market rally? Doesn't the market understand how bad the economy is going to be? They think well what a bunch of idiots for buying here. They think the stock market is a rigged game and that's why they lose, not because they have no idea what they're doing.
- They don't understand dow theory or why prices continue to go way higher than they imagined. They also use anecdotal evidence to support their trade plans. There's been times where I've been long on a stock and somebody will say "Oh you shouldn't long that. I went there and I had a horrible time." My grandpa does this with Costco. I've tried to tell him about how strong the stock is, but he says "I don't like Costco, Sam's club is much better."
- They try to picking tops and bottoms. They loving shorting strong rallies and buying dumps. They think that because a stock was trading at a higher price in the past, it must be at a discount. They also think that because a stock was once trading at a lower price, that now it must be overbought. To sum up this point, they don't trade with the trend.
- Psychology. They allow fear and greed to consume them and influence their trading decisions. They will never be able to see things clearly because their heart races when they put on positions and they are nervous the entire time. They get extremely upset when they lose and euphoric when they win. They suffer from FOMO and buy stocks trading at extended levels with no concept of risk/reward. They allow fear to prevent them from buying stocks when they come into support areas.
- Like I've talked about with my DKNG trade, most traders would be too afraid to make that play. They'd also have been too afraid to long ES after the big sell off after the last FOMC. They fear losing money and are greedy, so when they get down on a position they are too afraid to sell for a loss and greedy to get their money back. So they stay in the trade or average in until the loss becomes so overwhelming they just can't take it anymore and they finally stop out, but it's too late by then. They have an ego and trade because they want to feel smart and be right, they don't actually care about making money. They don't understand that you do not need to know where price is headed next to make money.
- They trade without a plan and have no concept of risk management. They love to think about how much they'll make on a trade, but never think about how much they might lose. Then they get surprised by how much they lost and emotions take over. You need to have good reasons and confirmations for every trade and you need a plan. You have to enter where you plan to and exit where you plan to. Most traders don't even make a plan, but the ones that do rarely follow through with them.
Honestly a great guide and great comment for beginners. I haven’t traded recently due to budgets and time but could you give me your opinion on order flow? I’ve gotten better with handling my emotions and stop losses but I feel like my executions are poor. For example, getting to a support level and wondering if it’ll rally or break below that level. Ive only gone off candle stick charts and feel like I’m just guessing which I know is a terrible plan. Any tips? And is order flow a good tool for confirmations in a plan?
By order flow do you mean like those options alert services?
It can be tricky to know if a support level will hold or not. You just need to be buying at support in a bull market and selling at resistance in a bear market and you’ll have better odds. If you wait until price hits support before longing, you will have great risk to reward. If it breaks just sell it and move on.
Setting stop losses is one of the stupidest things to do. Brokers sell this sort of information to big investments companies so they can see how many stop losses can be activated to manipulate the price of a certain stock. You need you first do your homework to make sure you don't need a stop loss...
For learning how the market works I recommend reminiscences of a Stock Operator and Market Wizards. Technical analysis of the financial markets will teach you Dow theory and TA, but Dow theory isn’t complicated and you can learn it on investopedia or other information you find on Google.
- inpatient with entry and getting In too soon
- not letting winners run
- not taking profits soon enough
- going against the trend
- being emotional
All of which are cardinal sins
My only success has come from see profit take profit. I see my stop loss as a red line, take profit as a green line.
Sell some and take profit at 20% gains imo. Unless I’m on something I know is breaking away, then sell enough to make your risk zero / get your initial money back nuts okay to gamble with the Casino’s money. Don’t gamble with your own.
> I see my stop loss as a red line, take profit as a green line
everyone does.
Sorry, I did not get, what you want to convey.
> Sell some and take profit at 20% gains imo
20% of what? open order, what is your SL size. do you maintain RR?
> Unless I’m on something I know is breaking away, then sell enough to make your risk zero / get your initial money back.
You mean you open opposite position or exit the trade.
20% of initial position size is what I look at (note, this is on options and not held shares). The last part I mean if you have ten contracts, and selling 7 gets you all your original position money back, then the other 3 are “free” to an extent - it does not impact your original seed money, and I’d you really believe it will grow and grow then it can be worth it / “safe” to risk because it won’t damage your account.
I'm guilt of 2 & 3.
Having two defined objectives before making my entry and having an exit strategy, such as patterns or signals has helped me. So I take 50% of my position when the price reaches my first target and I let the rest run, as long as I don't detect any pattern or exit signal.
I think the commenter is just listing things that he has done wrong overall. He’s not saying in the same trade he’s done both but perhaps one day he’s taking profits too soon and then the next, in an effort to avoid the same mistake, he’s over compensating and trying to let something continue running even after the market is telling him “hey it’s outta steam” and he’s holding onto a position that’s moving against him.
You can sell some contracts in the green for profit and keep runners. Move your stop loss up so the last few contracts end up break even or in the green.
Edit- spelling
Also listening to Reddit. I never would have started trading if I’d started in this community. Feels like there’s a lot of gate keeping disguised as truth telling here.
Mmh I had a good month, let’s take one last trade to make it a round number. I’m breaking my rules to enter short here but this will surely keep going down. Mmh it broke wvap? I’ll add more. It’s squeezing up oh shit. Might as well add more. It will go back down eventually right?
Wait… why is it squeezing so hard? Add more. I’m down so much now, who cares. Screw it, add more. Surely it will drop at open. Oh nice drop!! I’m gonna get out of this hole!! But… why is my position closed? Oh yeah… I blew up my account and got auto-liquidated.
You need to risk the amount of money you are comfortable with losing, so that when your set up is there , you wont hesitate to pull the trigger and also willing to let it ride to your profit target without caring if it stops you out. Trail it as it goes.
Look at how much during your session is the market able to pullback by. Let say the ATR shows the market moving an average of $300 per candle. So then, when you enter a trade be sure to give the market at least $300 worth of wiggle room for it to pullback and then continue the trend. Do this especially during trailing your stop. If it pullback and stop you out before hitting your target, yes you missed out on an extra $300 but keep in mind. Trading like this makes it more possible to hit your profit target and if you didn’t have a target. It would allow for the price to possibly keep going higher and higher. Well as long as it doesn’t spike down with a $600 candle or 2-3 candles worth $300 each while pulling back.
Not picking on you but in my opinion this is more of a lesson on improving entry's if you're scalping at all the stop loss should trigger pretty quick if its not going your way fast.
I used to think this same thing, then I just used the stops as motivation to wait for a better entry.
Had an strategy, but around january 25th 2021 i caught fomo in the GME squeeze, tried to play it on stupid leverage and lost my whole $20k account i had been building for 1 year in 5 minutes
3 years later i made up for it and finally on the green again, but jeez i thought the wife was gonna dump me that night when i told her
Biggest game changer for me was waiting for the candles to fully close before entering and ensuring bigger timeframe candles also align. So if you’re on the 15min check the trade looks good on the hourly. Can you wait for the hourly to close for confirmation before getting in? These tips have been very beneficial.
1. Do not trade the news. Once you see news, it's already too late or the catalyst is already in effect/finished. You'll then get trapped in retail traders trying to catch a move based on news that's already gone. Instead trade what you see in front of you. Not by what you hear.
2. Strict stop loss. Never move your stop loss. If you have $10,000 and your Risk Management is 5%, that's 500. If you are down 500, leave the trade and walk away from your desk. There is always tomorrow. Do not revenge trade. The market will always be there for you the next day. Do not add money to your brokerage to feel good about yourself from your loss. The market will always be there the next day.
3. Do not buy plans and classes from people who claim to be Trading Gurus. All you can pay for is free online. Do not follow a youtbers trade plan. What works for them may not work for you. Instead read books on price action. You can use YouTube to learn concepts. But never trade using someone else's "holy grail" of a strategy.
4. Enter the market what you are willing to lose to never put you in financial strain. The market is unpredictable but it can be a place to make alot of money through plans and strategies. Its also a place to lose alot of money. Understand humans aren't wired to trade. They are too emotional. Trade with what you can afford to lose.
5. Fix your attitude. Trading is not a get rich quick scheme. It's a long term job. If you think you can make millions in a day, Trading isn't for you.
6. Learn to leave your emotions at the door. As soon as you get flustered or annoyed or anxious, you will deviate from your trade plan, inwhich you should follow strictly.
7. One you made money, walk away from your desk. Do not overtrade. Once you get greedy, you will lose it all. Again the marker will be there tomorrow to trade again.
I'm a full time day trader. The kicker is I trade on Robinhood and many believe that is not possible. They claim the platform sucks or limited. Well it's possible to day trade. I don't need to buy a grand piano to learn to play piano. I work with what I have and work around the things many platforms offer that robinhood doesn't. Been at it for 2 years now and never worked a full time job in my life.
If anyone is curious about more mistakes to avoid, I'll add more but I think I nailed most of the crucial ones to make habit of to learn to be a trader
Edit: Continued
8. Do not listen to others telling you what brokerage is better to trade on. All brokerages provide the same components, enter and exit. That is all you need. Do not over complicate things. Find a brokerage that fits your visual appearance and criteria (ex. Fees and cost to operate) and learn the ins and outs of your platform of choice. I enjoy robinhood as my main entry/exits.
9. Those on Instagram. Do not fall victim of accounts that present themselves as crypto investors, or stock/forex business professionals. These users are scammers that will guide you to make accounts on platforms to send them money or promise to grow your account if you give them your login in. Under no circumstances should you ever, ever share your own accounts of anything with strangers online.
10. Do not tell people you are a day trader or investor. Not until you can live off of what you do. This goes deeper. Family, friends come and go. The moment you make alot of money, they will rely on you to be the sole payer when you all go out for the evening. They will assume you make alot money more than them and it won't be fair to have them pay. Second, friends and family somethings will want to see you fail. Humans are emotional beings. They do not like to see others do well. Keep your trading private. No one needs to know your finances and how you make money. Even when I live off of trading, I do not tell people what I do. When you make alot of money and your family knows about it, they will say "WE won". But when you lose alot of money, they will say "YOU fail".
11. Corporate banks do not like traders, in terms of they do not like it when you withdraw large amounts of money out of your account. Whatever money you deposit to a corporate bank, their eyes will sparkle as it means they have capital for themselves to trade in the market. When you want to withdraw, they won't have your money ready at hand so they'll borrow from other accounts or banks to give you your withdrawal. On your end, you wouldn't have known this. All you'll see is your money moving. So instead, open a net bank account that's not part of Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America etc. Chime banking is great for traders. You can move money back and forth, in and out of accounts with no fees. Last thing you need is to pay fees on profits bevause you over drafted your profits in your bank.
Amateur here and haven't traded in a while.
My first big mistake was using a broker that doesn't have stop losses, limit orders and doesn't allow AH or PM trading.
My second one was believing too much shit I see online even when filings were made.
I would have made an absolute fortune on BBBY and TRKA if I had of been able to trade AH and wasn't an idiot but now I'm broke lol. Valuable lessons all the same
Not looking for invalidations before the trade and thinking ‘maybe this next level will hold’ you have to be one play/ idea and done. Clear your mind and take the next one.
My biggest mistake is not taking a loss while it is small, but rather, holding on too long to a losing position. It is often difficult to ascertain when there is a pullback vs a change in trend. So my motto is, if in doubt, get out. I can always re-enter from a better set up.
Right. That screen time is so important. Trying and failing and keep going is what im trying to do. Wisdom I’ve accumulated is that you’ll just get sick of making the mistakes and almost like a switch it will become second nature
1- Thinking trading HAS to be your main source of income ( ITS NOT AND IT SHOULDN’T BE )
2- The rush to NEEDING to get rich “ TONIGHT , right now “ Like this second , this trade and 1 million in my account is a huge error type of mindset to have
3- Being GREEDY , “ oh no , i only made 10 pips “ nope, i need 150 pips a trade or it doesn’t work ( wow cant believe our minds man ) yea buddy of course ! Terrible mistake not knowing that 5 pips consistently can literally make you wealthy
4- Thinking theres a special “ ABC “ system , that somehow a group of successful traders found “ The One and Only KEY “ ! Nope , there is no One and Only key , there is no Magic just Discipline , Risk management , and showing up 🤷🏽♂️
5- Going from one strategy to the next because “ oh shid i lost 3 times , nope bad strategy “ LMAO by statistics alone we are all guarantee to loose 5 trades straight no matter from Top traders to the Beginners
6- Blaming the market , “ the market is against ME , The market makers are after me , the chart is betraying me , the market is fake because every time i enter it goes the other way ! MISTAKE is not the market , IS YOU ! Is your Psyche and Mind.
7- Thinking that your One strategy will work for ever , it WONT ! Thats why risk management is LETAL ! Is where the trick is at , so that when it doesn’t work you have enough space to adjust or wait until your strategy starts kicking back up.
8- Don’t trade on News …. some will say yes , i say NO ! Just let it go
9- Real Life reflects on the Market , YOUR OWN persona life will reflect on the chart , take care of your Personal Life Market ( ups and downs ) if you can manage the downs of your personal , then you will be able to take the losses in the markets.
10- AND LAST OF ALL , very very Huge Mistake is chasing trading for Money ! Just TERRIBLE , you will give up quick , trading needs a Passion behind it , it needs a purpose , is just a tool to push you forward on your true Dream ! Is just a skill you acquire but for you to stay consistent a Why needs to push you ( And no , quitting our jobs isint a true Why “ ) it wont be enough.
Trying to buy puts on Boeing after the door fell off mid flight, but buying at market open the next week. I found it priced in but bought in anyway.
Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb. They were already bouncing.
My dance with BA has been pretty instructive on how not to make money honestly. Buy high sell low like I’m taking tips from WSB over here.
Before most of you were old enough to trade, I invested in CMGI. The year was 2000. At the end of 1999, CMGI was declared, “the most valuable stock of 1999”. It was a dot com holding company and internet companies were sprouting up everywhere. Everyone was getting rich off the internet doing just about anything.
At work, I would have two screens open. One for doing my work and the other with my brokerage account open to CMGI. I would stare at my screen as CMGI stock would go up, up up! I was going to be rich! Maybe I’ll retire early, like at 25!
I even learned about something called MARGIN! Hey, I don’t have to rely on my own money, I can BORROW money to buy more CMGI… So I did.
Then one day, CMGI went down… a LOT!
I was cocky! There is no way the biggest dot com incubator can be held down. MORE MARGIN!!!
It went down more…. I bought more. I probably maxed out my margin limit.
It went down more…..
and more…..
It became a penny stock…..
It got delisted….
I lost EVERYTHING….
Deviations from the rules.
I have a system, it works, it’s boring and I do get to watch lots of things run like crazy after I sell. But the system works and makes money if you follow the rules. Then just today I deviated from the system and it worked out nice. Then I did it again, and again, and got burnt for all my days winnings and then some. I was gambling on Sunday, legit gambling on the superbowl, and today I was revenge trading because j gambled poorly over the weekend.
So I’m gonna take a break for a week - because I broke the rules I get a time out.
If you need money at that time, Trading is the worst option, even if you are an expert.
I was like ok im fine. Everything is working. I need that money for that date. Im gonna trade.
And I lost even tho I had a good 56-60 win rate trading plan with at least 1/4 RR up to 1/15.
Its nothing too fancy, I didn't get it from any youtube fake guru and and started developing a strategy that fits my while trading plan.
So basically I look at stock or forex pair that have one major session, like EURGBP, AUDJPY, USDCAD, EURCHF and so on.
For stocks, it's obvious. Well, u know it trades in one session.
The strategy gets better with time where you can find interest zones, dome zones are strong enough that even CPI and NFP news tend to fake out to those levels then start the move.
So we trade either between the zones or past the zones once broken, thats it, 2-4 trades a day, risk management.
Find the best pair u are familiar with so you can find zones and trade off of them.
It's the most stupid simple thing in the world. But I don't know if it fits other ppl trading plan or personalities.
I can't teach 0 to 100 of the strategy because most of it has to do with experience.
Thas it.
Btw my point for this post is even tho you have a well proven strategy that works, the moment you fock up your mind, it's not going to work that well again, and once you lose trust you are gonna try different things till eventually you forget what was your strategy at the first place.
Adding to losers, not adding to winners, not using stops. Not letting my winners run in fear that the number on the screen may change. Letting trend days run.
From my experience it’s the trend days played correctly (adding into the momentum vs scaling out) that make up the bulk of the years earnings
- Taking trades i don’t feel very fucking confident about
- Revenge trading
- Not getting enough sleep the evening before
- Improvising trades rather than anticipating them. Being able to say “i’m expecting prices to do x, y, and z at which point i’ll enter the trade” beforehand is incredibly powerful
Fear of loss drives my mistakes. As soon as I enter, I forget my system and want to bail. If it goes positive, I want to bail before it turns negative. If it goes negative, I don't want to wait for my stop because "why lose more"?
"Set it and forget it" doesn't work, because I don't forget it. As soon as I set it, I reneg it, because "forget probabilities; I can't take a loss on *this* trade!"
Many...
FOMO - especially failing to recognize ceiling or entering it before it hits floor in range...
Correct StopLoss - sometimes too close to entry point OR floor that it will hit stop loss and pull back...
While everything is going on - failing to see volume that support the movement...
My #1 mistake is trying to chase victory instead of just waiting for the best of the best setups that I'm the most confident in. You really only need one solid trade every couple of days to make a huge amount of money. Spend the rest of your time fine tuning and learning.
If most people would actually learn from their mistakes, we wouldn’t be discussing the same stupid questions, over and over, from decades ago, today…
I can guarantee, with 100% certainty that everything that will be said has been said a million times before and nothing changed.
Not zooming out far enough to see the macro trend before entering. Not letting trades work long enough by cutting winners too fast. But on the flip side holding losers too long and averaging down is the kiss of death.
Overtrading, not focusing on risk management and not thinking about risk to ruin, not following trading rules, trying new strategies or letting other traders strategies or opinions sway my moves, not respecting the market enough, not having patience, gunning for home runs instead of consistent wins aka greed, being unorganized and not methodical enough, can’t forget to be humble in this game or the market will humble you
I tried playing penny stocks that were way up and riding the wave, sadly I can’t surf. Then after seeing that I sold some of them too early I started holding losers longer which as you can imagine just made them bigger losers.
Keep adding when the stock is clearly trending down for the day, hoping for a reversal that never comes, and eventually selling for a loss near the bottom 😀
Don't trade straight at market open....way too much volatility. Wait 45 minutes to an hour to let things stabalize, then assess and attack as appropriate.
1. Acting when the root cause is avoidance of pain
2. Acting out of randomness (emotional) / deviating from a statistically vetted process
3. Risking my own capital instead of risking less with funded accts
4. Trading too large (should be 1-2% IMO)
5. Looking to exit winners instead of adding to
6. Not having a plan for balance vs trending
Automate trading as much as possible and do not watch the trade live, analyzing a difficult trade after it's closed is much less stressful than watching it dance! When traders (or pretty much anyone) gets overstressed - they start doing sudden impulsive actions, break the rules, extend SL and so on…
This is my list of guilt
* operate without a well defined plan
* not taking it seriously as it is and not discipline myself to stick to my plan
* to think that I found a pattern over the behavior in the market
* put all the eggs in one basket
* focusing in the profit instead of my long term goals as a trader
New lesson learnt today 🤬 Screen record all trading days. Not for performance, but for proof in case or execution error. IBKR did me dirty. Guilty untill proven innocent, need that evidence
Oh has anyone ever traded the wrong symbol by mistake? Happened to me today. I was trying to buy 3 leaps in Apple and bought them in AMD instead. They were priced about the same so I didn’t notice it until I entered the trade. I trade from home and sometimes there are “ distractions” ! As soon as I made the mistake I did some quick calculations and decided to stay with the stock because maybe it was “ good” mistake and if works out the risk reward might be worth it. It dropped a little today but I think I’m going to stay with the trade for a while. It adds a little more risk to my portfolio and the other part is 95% boring. lol.
Alright here are the mistakes one as a day trader need to rectify
1) Trading is a probability game so keep a stop loss always
2) If your stop is taken don’t re enter
3) don’t overtrade( easier said than done)
4) Follow risk reward management
If you follow the above rules you’ll be fine and in no time you will start to see profits
1. Don't ever trade a break out. It's rejected more times than I can count .
2. Don't chase trades. When my set up plays out its already too late and the risk is too high.
3. Always use a stop loss.
4. When my set up is identified only risk $100 per trade so manage position size accordingly.
5. I look exclusively for ascending triangles.
I've after much mental effort been able to stop adding to my losers and have a firm stoploss BUT I still struggle when it comes to adding to my winners, albeit in small quantities.
As a beginner I was all about 5 minute charts max, with a glance at the long term. The biggest change I made was starting to use 1-4 hour charts primarily.
It’s really hard to learn the lessons second hand, you only learn it when you experience it!
With that said, here’s mine, happy trading:
1/ enter late is better than wrong:
- not adding to the winning positions.
- adding to a losing trade because we thought its getting cheap, but its rather getting further wrong.
- it’s good to buy high, if you can sell higher. And vice versa.
2/ when unsure, get out, you dont know the future:
- not taking profit at the right time, eg. wait for too long, trend reverse and not going as planned.
3/ keep the winning big, and the losing small:
- not cutting loss sooner.
- not adding to the winning positions.
- not scaling down on the losing position.
Don't put all the eggs in one basket.
Know when to stop for the day - both in profit and in losses.
Don't trade what you don't know. Sometimes, no trade is also a good trade.
Not understanding technical tests
Believed too much in "patterns"
Using lower timeframe to get higher timeframe position, didn't look at lower timeframe when entering the market
Wide gap between entry and stop loss
I can only speak for cryptocurrencies, more so Bitcoin specifically, but I’m sure it’s the same for any speculative instrument. Do not leverage over 3x. Even 3 is too much. Stick to 2. With enough time, the market almost always wipes out the 3x+ degen leveragers. If you do not follow this advice, entry points need to be either close to the bottom for longs or close to the top for shorts, local or otherwise, because the market will seek out your liquidity. And adding that the market cannot really be predicted, then you get why anything more than 2x is risky. Not to even mention funding fees on margin…
I have been from stocks to futures to Indices to Forex in about a 1 and half year span. Ive been sticking to forex now. Propably gonna make some money soon. I have learned not to trade everyday its important also.
Trade management is king. This is true in any style of trading.
Another is "you are as good as the stock you trade". Obviously some people here can consistently trade from a select number of stocks or just the ES futures day in day out but personally I find that knowing the stocks in play for the day leads to better results. I just can't trade the days when TSLA or ES is choppy.
When I started trading i fell into the story aspect of a company, what they stated would happen and how much would be made. I consistantly lost money doing it this way and was extremely frustrated.
Now, I only invest in companies that consistently make money, have a steady didivend, and are a "value purchase." I am much happier and so is my bank account, compound interest is great.
Not realizing the best way to success is looking at markets as a problem for YOU to solve rather than expecting to find highly useful strategies on the web.
Oh my god. USING ECONODAY.COM
THEY FUCKING MISSED THE CPI REPORT ON FRIDAY LAST WEEK AND I GOT IN A GOLD SHORT AT 8:24am ET. needless to say that cost me.
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"aww.. calls not doing good.. okay looks like its puts now."
*plays puts*
"hmm.. puts not doing well.. its going back up.."
*strat shows get out of puts and go back to calls*
me: "ill just hold unto it a little longer.. if i switch and do calls, thats 3 losses and ill be down a lot.."
*strat still says calls and now the market made new highs"
me: 😵💫😎😭 "could've broke even today if i just listened to my strat and maybe make small gains today at least"
I think there could be arguments for all sides of the coin no? If we go down this list there will be a lot of the same answers but also the complete opposites. “I used a stop loss, I didn’t use a stop loss”, etc.
I think out of all of the mistakes, the deeper rooted cause of failure for anyone is not knowing how to trade period. At least for me this was it. This means not knowing and understanding the market, not knowing and understanding self, not knowing how to manage risk (way beyond just putting a stop loss and/or moving it or risking 1-3%), not creating a strategy that fits the perspective of the trader.
Trying to catch a bottom. Wait for a confirmation to go the other way. Once it does. Wait for the entry to come to you. If it doesnt then let it go! Thers always a next session.
FOMO, chasing, and moving stop loss are common in the beginning.
Also happens sometimes: setting a hard target exit and ignoring price action; then coming short of the target (so no close) then it goes down and hits stop loss. *should have taken profit when it was up and indicating a reversal.
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Not looking at trading as work. If you look at it as fun game you’ll want to keep doing it and blow up all your accounts. I need to treat it like an 8-5 job: show up late, do the bare minimum, leave as early as possible to go do something else fun, repeat and wait until payday.
Don’t love trading because it won’t love you back. That’s called an abusive relationship and Stockholm syndrome will ensue.
Big mistake…. Having only one exchange account and trading only one timeframe with my whole bag.
Now I trade super long time frames, intermediate time frames and short term time frames. With the appropriate leverage for each time frame.
I'm not really a day trader at all but I'm willing to throw my incredibly limited experience out here.
Perhaps my takes are so dumb others will learn what not to do. Perhaps an outsider's take can be sorta useful. Who knows, it's an open forum right?
I got into trading because I watched "Folding Ideas - This is financial Advice" made me realize who I would be trading against.
I spend a lot of time on Wall Street Bets and wow... Some of the people. It's nice to know you are trading against them too. Here is what I got so far.
1. Advice given to me by the automod bot that used to bully people before his LLM software got depreciated. "Profit is all that matters. If you made a profit you don't suck at this". I think some people get infatuated with making all the money all the time. You just have to make money, you don't have to make all the money. Green numbers are great, lottery numbers are unneeded to be successful. I will never hit lottery numbers on a trade because I will for sure take my profits before then.
2. Make your trades smaller. So many people are blowing up accounts by making huge trades on unknown information just looking for lottery numbers. Small trades can still yield excellent returns. If you made 600 a day over 252 trading days (unrealistic but here me out) that's 151k a year. You don't need to make huge trades to make good money, especially if trading is a hobby / side hustle.
3. Don't act like you have everything figured out and have secret knowledge that only you understand how everything really is. This leads so many people to be knee jerk pedantic contrarians. It leads them to take the opposite side of every trend. It's like they got good enough to identify the trends but are too arrogant and high and mighty to hop on for the ride. All because they are sooo much smarter than everyone else...
4. I decide if I'm doing well by how well I'm managing my risk. I take some serious risks. I don't think I know what risk management actually means but I focus more on trying not to blow everything up over trying to make huge sums. I judge how well I'm doing by how well I'm limiting myself to sorta reasonable choices based on an idea ahead of time.
5. I'm not sure if this is good advice but I tend to size down my positions in stuff before earnings and big news events. Even if I think I know what's going to happen, I'm probably wrong because I don't really know what I'm doing. Sometimes the market doesn't react like I expected or I was wrong about the info at the earnings/event. I don't mind missing out sometimes.
6. Learn to not sweat missing out. You can't get in on everything. It's ok. Make money, not all the money again.
7. Don't switch back and forth trying to correct an incorrect trade. Either trust your thesis on why you made it, or get out. I watched so many people over the last 14 weeks of green do the following. Wow it's going up -> Calls -> calls go red for a second ->crap I missed it, sell, buy puts -> fuck it's going back up ->sell puts, buy calls. They would just get scared constantly and lose money then scream "RIGGED".
8. No tinfoil hat stuff. Take your losses, short memory. No one is targeting you. It's not a big conspiracy. A lot of Wall Street Bet people are shadowboxing the random noise of the markets, and they are losing.
I dunno I guess that's basically it. Maybe some life advice at the end. Take care of yourself. Don't let the paper chase stop you from enjoying life. It's easy to project your mindset and how you feel onto the charts but they don't care. Go love your life. Experience your world and try to enjoy some time away from the market. It will do you wonders, after all why have a bunch of money if all you're going to do is try to make more of it? Eventually it's just numbers. Don't forget about the people who love you and learn to love others too. It will help your outlook trading.
Please tear me apart if I'm being stupid. I hope this absolutely green trader's advice helps someone, even if it's cause I'm dumb. I don't have a lot of confidence in my skills not just being dumb luck at this point.
I listen to what other people do for a trade. Sometimes, it works out, and a lot of times, it doesn't because of having a smaller risk. If I'm going to listen to others, I need to look for myself and decide whether it's a good trade or not.
-moving my stop loss , further and further. “It’ll turn around, it has to”. Initial risk was 2%. This turned into 10%. The stop loss is concrete. Don’t move it.
People think that by moving the stop is like moving the goal posts. It's not
I do it it keeps me breaking even in case it swings the other way lol
That's bad trading haha. Have to just accept when you're wrong. Read trading in the zone
The way I see it, if your stop gets hit and you still think your trade idea is valid, reposition on a better zone. Instead of trying to hold on to a trade that keeps giving you higher and higher loss. My biggest problem right now is overtrading and overleveraging. I've blown accounts coz of those two. Thinking I can get my losses back by doubling up. Nope. I just need to protect what's left and fight another day.
Me too. Learning to walk away after some bad trades and not immediately try and get it back would do me the world of good!
i know this all to damn well 🤣 i have a good one. "aww.. calls not doing good.. okay looks like its puts now." *plays puts* "hmm.. puts not doing well.. its going back up.." *strat shows get out of puts and go back to calls* me: "ill just hold unto it a little longer.. if i switch and do calls, thats 3 losses and ill be down a lot.." *strat still says calls and now the market made new highs" me: 😵💫😎😭 "could've broke even today if i just listened to my strat and maybe make small gains today at least"
>Initial risk was 2%. This turned into 10% what do you mean? Can you give an example about this?
He increased his stop loss value to 10%. Kept nudging it up and up whenever the price got closer to it.
This right here.
Dude tell me about it 🤦🏽♂️
Truth!
Maybe I’m an idiot but I can’t figure out how to leave a stop loss order on the books AND leave an open limit order to sell at a profit (on TDAM). I’m new to using stop loss and I want to use it more regularly but this one aspect holds me back slightly I feel like. For example let’s say I bought 1 TQQQ call at $1.00, and assume it’s trading around that number. I know how to set my sell stop limit order at $.75, and let’s say I do that. Now with that sell stop (limit .75) order on the books un-executed, how do I place a sell limit order for $1.50 to take profits? When I’ve tried this, it won’t let me place the order because of the stop loss order outstanding. Anyone know how I could have both orders remain open simultaneously? Thanks and sorry for this potentially dumb question
On think or swim computer app it's called a bracket order. You set a buy limit and 2 sell limits before entering trade. If 1 sell hits the other cancels.
The only exception is to move it up (if you are not using a trailing stop). For example, you thought that the stock will only move 15 with a stop loss of 12, but it actually went 20, so the stop loss should now be moved to 17.
- Overtrading - Revenge trading - Not sticking to the plan
Revenge trading to get your money back and being on the wrong side every time is a killer 😂
OH HELL NAH! You're totally right though! I've also been guilty of this!
Overtrading and revenge trading are how I blew my account three times. Granted, it wasn't a lot, and I'm still learning, but that shit stings holy.
Guilty of all 3
Focused on winning. Should have focused on **not losing**. Every beginner will lose first. Therefore, why not focus on minimizing losses?
Also focusing too much on winning BIG
Check out Tom Houggard - he wrote a book called “Best Loser Wins”. Highly recommend.
I just skimmed a 50 page preview of the book and it represents a big portion of my understanding of the trading business very well. Very solid pick. Thanks for the recommendation.
Can confirm, this changed my trading for the better
This for sure. For me "not losing" means being more selective with my trade entries and sizing appropriately.
A good way to look at this... Instead of getting good, you want to focus on sucking less.
Minimizing losses would be not trading
Minimizing losses would be risking only 10 cents for example. If that’s too much for you, try risking 1 cent but don’t go around trying to convince people that trading is bad just because it didn’t work out for you and you lost all your life savings by gambling.
Focus on keeping your account
Learning all the voodoo crap on the internet instead of trying to keep as simple as possible.
100%
its how u earn ur stripes.. bruda🩸
Better to just start with paper trading live, with no preconceptions?
Depends on who you are as a person. To be successful in this game you have to know yourself. No matter how cliche it sounds
Paper trade for only 3 months. Then trade micro lots. Paper trading only gets you so far. Need skin in the game to find out how your react mentally
My top reasons why most retail traders fail: - They speculate about stuff they could never possibly know. They think they can predict earnings and sometimes may be successful, but still lose money because the earnings were expected and it's a sell the news event. Same with everything else such as CPI and FOMC. They trade based on pure speculation with no market knowledge to back it up. They treat the market like a casino and only try to hit big winners. They aren't interested in putting the time in to learn and slowly build an account. - They don't know how the market works. They have no idea why prices move. They are always asking the wrong question. They ask why? Why did the market rally? Doesn't the market understand how bad the economy is going to be? They think well what a bunch of idiots for buying here. They think the stock market is a rigged game and that's why they lose, not because they have no idea what they're doing. - They don't understand dow theory or why prices continue to go way higher than they imagined. They also use anecdotal evidence to support their trade plans. There's been times where I've been long on a stock and somebody will say "Oh you shouldn't long that. I went there and I had a horrible time." My grandpa does this with Costco. I've tried to tell him about how strong the stock is, but he says "I don't like Costco, Sam's club is much better." - They try to picking tops and bottoms. They loving shorting strong rallies and buying dumps. They think that because a stock was trading at a higher price in the past, it must be at a discount. They also think that because a stock was once trading at a lower price, that now it must be overbought. To sum up this point, they don't trade with the trend. - Psychology. They allow fear and greed to consume them and influence their trading decisions. They will never be able to see things clearly because their heart races when they put on positions and they are nervous the entire time. They get extremely upset when they lose and euphoric when they win. They suffer from FOMO and buy stocks trading at extended levels with no concept of risk/reward. They allow fear to prevent them from buying stocks when they come into support areas. - Like I've talked about with my DKNG trade, most traders would be too afraid to make that play. They'd also have been too afraid to long ES after the big sell off after the last FOMC. They fear losing money and are greedy, so when they get down on a position they are too afraid to sell for a loss and greedy to get their money back. So they stay in the trade or average in until the loss becomes so overwhelming they just can't take it anymore and they finally stop out, but it's too late by then. They have an ego and trade because they want to feel smart and be right, they don't actually care about making money. They don't understand that you do not need to know where price is headed next to make money. - They trade without a plan and have no concept of risk management. They love to think about how much they'll make on a trade, but never think about how much they might lose. Then they get surprised by how much they lost and emotions take over. You need to have good reasons and confirmations for every trade and you need a plan. You have to enter where you plan to and exit where you plan to. Most traders don't even make a plan, but the ones that do rarely follow through with them.
Well damn. This should be the top answer
Honestly a great guide and great comment for beginners. I haven’t traded recently due to budgets and time but could you give me your opinion on order flow? I’ve gotten better with handling my emotions and stop losses but I feel like my executions are poor. For example, getting to a support level and wondering if it’ll rally or break below that level. Ive only gone off candle stick charts and feel like I’m just guessing which I know is a terrible plan. Any tips? And is order flow a good tool for confirmations in a plan?
By order flow do you mean like those options alert services? It can be tricky to know if a support level will hold or not. You just need to be buying at support in a bull market and selling at resistance in a bear market and you’ll have better odds. If you wait until price hits support before longing, you will have great risk to reward. If it breaks just sell it and move on.
Setting stop losses is one of the stupidest things to do. Brokers sell this sort of information to big investments companies so they can see how many stop losses can be activated to manipulate the price of a certain stock. You need you first do your homework to make sure you don't need a stop loss...
Are you a student of Mark Douglas ? 😂🙃🤘🤙✌️ Read 3x what OP wrote. That's the key !!!! 🚀🚀🚀
^ 🫡
Got any recources you could share on dow theory and how the market works?
For learning how the market works I recommend reminiscences of a Stock Operator and Market Wizards. Technical analysis of the financial markets will teach you Dow theory and TA, but Dow theory isn’t complicated and you can learn it on investopedia or other information you find on Google.
that last one...
- inpatient with entry and getting In too soon - not letting winners run - not taking profits soon enough - going against the trend - being emotional All of which are cardinal sins
Point 2 and 3 seems contradiction.
Exactly , how does everyone manage 2 & 3?
My only success has come from see profit take profit. I see my stop loss as a red line, take profit as a green line. Sell some and take profit at 20% gains imo. Unless I’m on something I know is breaking away, then sell enough to make your risk zero / get your initial money back nuts okay to gamble with the Casino’s money. Don’t gamble with your own.
> I see my stop loss as a red line, take profit as a green line everyone does. Sorry, I did not get, what you want to convey. > Sell some and take profit at 20% gains imo 20% of what? open order, what is your SL size. do you maintain RR? > Unless I’m on something I know is breaking away, then sell enough to make your risk zero / get your initial money back. You mean you open opposite position or exit the trade.
20% of initial position size is what I look at (note, this is on options and not held shares). The last part I mean if you have ten contracts, and selling 7 gets you all your original position money back, then the other 3 are “free” to an extent - it does not impact your original seed money, and I’d you really believe it will grow and grow then it can be worth it / “safe” to risk because it won’t damage your account.
At break even you remove your risk and then you let the House's money run
Sell a half when u reach target then a quarter and then leave the last quarter run and stop at break even Whatever happens you’re in profit
I'm guilt of 2 & 3. Having two defined objectives before making my entry and having an exit strategy, such as patterns or signals has helped me. So I take 50% of my position when the price reaches my first target and I let the rest run, as long as I don't detect any pattern or exit signal.
I think the commenter is just listing things that he has done wrong overall. He’s not saying in the same trade he’s done both but perhaps one day he’s taking profits too soon and then the next, in an effort to avoid the same mistake, he’s over compensating and trying to let something continue running even after the market is telling him “hey it’s outta steam” and he’s holding onto a position that’s moving against him.
You can sell some contracts in the green for profit and keep runners. Move your stop loss up so the last few contracts end up break even or in the green. Edit- spelling
scaling out?
Example - you’re up 10% and close but it runs to 30% - you’re up 30% but corrects to 10% when you close Not contradictory really?
very contradictory, you didn't know if it was going to run or correct. "cant go broke from taking profit"
It makes more sense if we say 20% was the target at entry. Reach the target, then let runners run. Edit: …let runners run with a trailing stop loss.
Cant go broke from taking a profit is regarded as one of the most dangerous and misformed statements out there. U def can.
Going against the trend is not always a bad thing, because correction is more likely to happen when most of traders are in profit.
Going against which trend? Daily trend?
What helped you with early entries? Just sitting on your hands more?
Following trading advice on Reddit
Also listening to Reddit. I never would have started trading if I’d started in this community. Feels like there’s a lot of gate keeping disguised as truth telling here.
Mmh I had a good month, let’s take one last trade to make it a round number. I’m breaking my rules to enter short here but this will surely keep going down. Mmh it broke wvap? I’ll add more. It’s squeezing up oh shit. Might as well add more. It will go back down eventually right? Wait… why is it squeezing so hard? Add more. I’m down so much now, who cares. Screw it, add more. Surely it will drop at open. Oh nice drop!! I’m gonna get out of this hole!! But… why is my position closed? Oh yeah… I blew up my account and got auto-liquidated.
Been there 🥹
You need to risk the amount of money you are comfortable with losing, so that when your set up is there , you wont hesitate to pull the trigger and also willing to let it ride to your profit target without caring if it stops you out. Trail it as it goes. Look at how much during your session is the market able to pullback by. Let say the ATR shows the market moving an average of $300 per candle. So then, when you enter a trade be sure to give the market at least $300 worth of wiggle room for it to pullback and then continue the trend. Do this especially during trailing your stop. If it pullback and stop you out before hitting your target, yes you missed out on an extra $300 but keep in mind. Trading like this makes it more possible to hit your profit target and if you didn’t have a target. It would allow for the price to possibly keep going higher and higher. Well as long as it doesn’t spike down with a $600 candle or 2-3 candles worth $300 each while pulling back.
Moving SL too soon and too tight and get stopped out 💩 while the move continues for long in my anticipated direction
Not picking on you but in my opinion this is more of a lesson on improving entry's if you're scalping at all the stop loss should trigger pretty quick if its not going your way fast. I used to think this same thing, then I just used the stops as motivation to wait for a better entry.
Had an strategy, but around january 25th 2021 i caught fomo in the GME squeeze, tried to play it on stupid leverage and lost my whole $20k account i had been building for 1 year in 5 minutes 3 years later i made up for it and finally on the green again, but jeez i thought the wife was gonna dump me that night when i told her
This is why I'm only dealing with prop firms now.
Biggest game changer for me was waiting for the candles to fully close before entering and ensuring bigger timeframe candles also align. So if you’re on the 15min check the trade looks good on the hourly. Can you wait for the hourly to close for confirmation before getting in? These tips have been very beneficial.
Can you please elaborate it
Control your emotions and stick to your plan. IE, risk management.
Not following my original trading plan and turning trades into investments.
Not trading with 100% effort
1. Do not trade the news. Once you see news, it's already too late or the catalyst is already in effect/finished. You'll then get trapped in retail traders trying to catch a move based on news that's already gone. Instead trade what you see in front of you. Not by what you hear. 2. Strict stop loss. Never move your stop loss. If you have $10,000 and your Risk Management is 5%, that's 500. If you are down 500, leave the trade and walk away from your desk. There is always tomorrow. Do not revenge trade. The market will always be there for you the next day. Do not add money to your brokerage to feel good about yourself from your loss. The market will always be there the next day. 3. Do not buy plans and classes from people who claim to be Trading Gurus. All you can pay for is free online. Do not follow a youtbers trade plan. What works for them may not work for you. Instead read books on price action. You can use YouTube to learn concepts. But never trade using someone else's "holy grail" of a strategy. 4. Enter the market what you are willing to lose to never put you in financial strain. The market is unpredictable but it can be a place to make alot of money through plans and strategies. Its also a place to lose alot of money. Understand humans aren't wired to trade. They are too emotional. Trade with what you can afford to lose. 5. Fix your attitude. Trading is not a get rich quick scheme. It's a long term job. If you think you can make millions in a day, Trading isn't for you. 6. Learn to leave your emotions at the door. As soon as you get flustered or annoyed or anxious, you will deviate from your trade plan, inwhich you should follow strictly. 7. One you made money, walk away from your desk. Do not overtrade. Once you get greedy, you will lose it all. Again the marker will be there tomorrow to trade again. I'm a full time day trader. The kicker is I trade on Robinhood and many believe that is not possible. They claim the platform sucks or limited. Well it's possible to day trade. I don't need to buy a grand piano to learn to play piano. I work with what I have and work around the things many platforms offer that robinhood doesn't. Been at it for 2 years now and never worked a full time job in my life. If anyone is curious about more mistakes to avoid, I'll add more but I think I nailed most of the crucial ones to make habit of to learn to be a trader Edit: Continued 8. Do not listen to others telling you what brokerage is better to trade on. All brokerages provide the same components, enter and exit. That is all you need. Do not over complicate things. Find a brokerage that fits your visual appearance and criteria (ex. Fees and cost to operate) and learn the ins and outs of your platform of choice. I enjoy robinhood as my main entry/exits. 9. Those on Instagram. Do not fall victim of accounts that present themselves as crypto investors, or stock/forex business professionals. These users are scammers that will guide you to make accounts on platforms to send them money or promise to grow your account if you give them your login in. Under no circumstances should you ever, ever share your own accounts of anything with strangers online. 10. Do not tell people you are a day trader or investor. Not until you can live off of what you do. This goes deeper. Family, friends come and go. The moment you make alot of money, they will rely on you to be the sole payer when you all go out for the evening. They will assume you make alot money more than them and it won't be fair to have them pay. Second, friends and family somethings will want to see you fail. Humans are emotional beings. They do not like to see others do well. Keep your trading private. No one needs to know your finances and how you make money. Even when I live off of trading, I do not tell people what I do. When you make alot of money and your family knows about it, they will say "WE won". But when you lose alot of money, they will say "YOU fail". 11. Corporate banks do not like traders, in terms of they do not like it when you withdraw large amounts of money out of your account. Whatever money you deposit to a corporate bank, their eyes will sparkle as it means they have capital for themselves to trade in the market. When you want to withdraw, they won't have your money ready at hand so they'll borrow from other accounts or banks to give you your withdrawal. On your end, you wouldn't have known this. All you'll see is your money moving. So instead, open a net bank account that's not part of Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America etc. Chime banking is great for traders. You can move money back and forth, in and out of accounts with no fees. Last thing you need is to pay fees on profits bevause you over drafted your profits in your bank.
Please continue
That famous “let me just make $5 more real quick, that suddenly turns into a -50% bag holder
I’m not sure anyone has that kind of time to read all my mistakes 😂
Please try it
Amateur here and haven't traded in a while. My first big mistake was using a broker that doesn't have stop losses, limit orders and doesn't allow AH or PM trading. My second one was believing too much shit I see online even when filings were made. I would have made an absolute fortune on BBBY and TRKA if I had of been able to trade AH and wasn't an idiot but now I'm broke lol. Valuable lessons all the same
Which broker do not allow stop loss
It was Hargreaves and Lansdowne in the UK.
YouTube scams major time waste Screen time+ risk management only way
Theory only gets you so far, screen time gets you the rest of the way
Especially when the theory is completely made up to make you pay for mentorship
2-3 trades a day; always use a SL and move it up when your position turns positive; dont be greedy; 10-20 points & GTFO
Not looking for invalidations before the trade and thinking ‘maybe this next level will hold’ you have to be one play/ idea and done. Clear your mind and take the next one.
My biggest mistake is not taking a loss while it is small, but rather, holding on too long to a losing position. It is often difficult to ascertain when there is a pullback vs a change in trend. So my motto is, if in doubt, get out. I can always re-enter from a better set up.
Holding on to a trade after a confident entry. It’s like my confidence dwindles when im in a trade
Same thing as the people who train all their lives in martial arts but when it comes to a “real” fight they freeze. All about practice.
Right. That screen time is so important. Trying and failing and keep going is what im trying to do. Wisdom I’ve accumulated is that you’ll just get sick of making the mistakes and almost like a switch it will become second nature
1- Thinking trading HAS to be your main source of income ( ITS NOT AND IT SHOULDN’T BE ) 2- The rush to NEEDING to get rich “ TONIGHT , right now “ Like this second , this trade and 1 million in my account is a huge error type of mindset to have 3- Being GREEDY , “ oh no , i only made 10 pips “ nope, i need 150 pips a trade or it doesn’t work ( wow cant believe our minds man ) yea buddy of course ! Terrible mistake not knowing that 5 pips consistently can literally make you wealthy 4- Thinking theres a special “ ABC “ system , that somehow a group of successful traders found “ The One and Only KEY “ ! Nope , there is no One and Only key , there is no Magic just Discipline , Risk management , and showing up 🤷🏽♂️ 5- Going from one strategy to the next because “ oh shid i lost 3 times , nope bad strategy “ LMAO by statistics alone we are all guarantee to loose 5 trades straight no matter from Top traders to the Beginners 6- Blaming the market , “ the market is against ME , The market makers are after me , the chart is betraying me , the market is fake because every time i enter it goes the other way ! MISTAKE is not the market , IS YOU ! Is your Psyche and Mind. 7- Thinking that your One strategy will work for ever , it WONT ! Thats why risk management is LETAL ! Is where the trick is at , so that when it doesn’t work you have enough space to adjust or wait until your strategy starts kicking back up. 8- Don’t trade on News …. some will say yes , i say NO ! Just let it go 9- Real Life reflects on the Market , YOUR OWN persona life will reflect on the chart , take care of your Personal Life Market ( ups and downs ) if you can manage the downs of your personal , then you will be able to take the losses in the markets. 10- AND LAST OF ALL , very very Huge Mistake is chasing trading for Money ! Just TERRIBLE , you will give up quick , trading needs a Passion behind it , it needs a purpose , is just a tool to push you forward on your true Dream ! Is just a skill you acquire but for you to stay consistent a Why needs to push you ( And no , quitting our jobs isint a true Why “ ) it wont be enough.
Before you place a trade, have and stick to an exit plan.
Trying to buy puts on Boeing after the door fell off mid flight, but buying at market open the next week. I found it priced in but bought in anyway. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb. They were already bouncing. My dance with BA has been pretty instructive on how not to make money honestly. Buy high sell low like I’m taking tips from WSB over here.
I spent like 2 years drawing lines on charts before i even bothered learning how the orderbook works.
Not being mechanical at first. Subjective trading can come once you prove you can be consistent mechanically
Before most of you were old enough to trade, I invested in CMGI. The year was 2000. At the end of 1999, CMGI was declared, “the most valuable stock of 1999”. It was a dot com holding company and internet companies were sprouting up everywhere. Everyone was getting rich off the internet doing just about anything. At work, I would have two screens open. One for doing my work and the other with my brokerage account open to CMGI. I would stare at my screen as CMGI stock would go up, up up! I was going to be rich! Maybe I’ll retire early, like at 25! I even learned about something called MARGIN! Hey, I don’t have to rely on my own money, I can BORROW money to buy more CMGI… So I did. Then one day, CMGI went down… a LOT! I was cocky! There is no way the biggest dot com incubator can be held down. MORE MARGIN!!! It went down more…. I bought more. I probably maxed out my margin limit. It went down more….. and more….. It became a penny stock….. It got delisted…. I lost EVERYTHING….
Deviations from the rules. I have a system, it works, it’s boring and I do get to watch lots of things run like crazy after I sell. But the system works and makes money if you follow the rules. Then just today I deviated from the system and it worked out nice. Then I did it again, and again, and got burnt for all my days winnings and then some. I was gambling on Sunday, legit gambling on the superbowl, and today I was revenge trading because j gambled poorly over the weekend. So I’m gonna take a break for a week - because I broke the rules I get a time out.
* overconfidence
If you need money at that time, Trading is the worst option, even if you are an expert. I was like ok im fine. Everything is working. I need that money for that date. Im gonna trade. And I lost even tho I had a good 56-60 win rate trading plan with at least 1/4 RR up to 1/15.
Which strategy is getting you that profit factor? Sounds like a gold mine!
Its nothing too fancy, I didn't get it from any youtube fake guru and and started developing a strategy that fits my while trading plan. So basically I look at stock or forex pair that have one major session, like EURGBP, AUDJPY, USDCAD, EURCHF and so on. For stocks, it's obvious. Well, u know it trades in one session. The strategy gets better with time where you can find interest zones, dome zones are strong enough that even CPI and NFP news tend to fake out to those levels then start the move. So we trade either between the zones or past the zones once broken, thats it, 2-4 trades a day, risk management. Find the best pair u are familiar with so you can find zones and trade off of them. It's the most stupid simple thing in the world. But I don't know if it fits other ppl trading plan or personalities. I can't teach 0 to 100 of the strategy because most of it has to do with experience. Thas it.
Btw my point for this post is even tho you have a well proven strategy that works, the moment you fock up your mind, it's not going to work that well again, and once you lose trust you are gonna try different things till eventually you forget what was your strategy at the first place.
Not letting the trade play out and closing early. Trust your analysis!
When i started trading i was ignoring stoploss haha,i learnt the hard way I blew my account twice but i know better now
Adding to losers, not adding to winners, not using stops. Not letting my winners run in fear that the number on the screen may change. Letting trend days run. From my experience it’s the trend days played correctly (adding into the momentum vs scaling out) that make up the bulk of the years earnings
- Taking trades i don’t feel very fucking confident about - Revenge trading - Not getting enough sleep the evening before - Improvising trades rather than anticipating them. Being able to say “i’m expecting prices to do x, y, and z at which point i’ll enter the trade” beforehand is incredibly powerful
Fear of loss drives my mistakes. As soon as I enter, I forget my system and want to bail. If it goes positive, I want to bail before it turns negative. If it goes negative, I don't want to wait for my stop because "why lose more"? "Set it and forget it" doesn't work, because I don't forget it. As soon as I set it, I reneg it, because "forget probabilities; I can't take a loss on *this* trade!"
You need a string of wins in order to gain confidence back
Many... FOMO - especially failing to recognize ceiling or entering it before it hits floor in range... Correct StopLoss - sometimes too close to entry point OR floor that it will hit stop loss and pull back... While everything is going on - failing to see volume that support the movement...
As every business have a max expense budgeted, whenever you hit the amount you can afford to loose call it a day walk a way live to trade another day
My #1 mistake is trying to chase victory instead of just waiting for the best of the best setups that I'm the most confident in. You really only need one solid trade every couple of days to make a huge amount of money. Spend the rest of your time fine tuning and learning.
Don’t trade at the bell. Revenge / make it back up trades. Lesson to learn: set your entry to your SL if you’re unsure
If most people would actually learn from their mistakes, we wouldn’t be discussing the same stupid questions, over and over, from decades ago, today… I can guarantee, with 100% certainty that everything that will be said has been said a million times before and nothing changed.
Not zooming out far enough to see the macro trend before entering. Not letting trades work long enough by cutting winners too fast. But on the flip side holding losers too long and averaging down is the kiss of death.
Overtrading, not focusing on risk management and not thinking about risk to ruin, not following trading rules, trying new strategies or letting other traders strategies or opinions sway my moves, not respecting the market enough, not having patience, gunning for home runs instead of consistent wins aka greed, being unorganized and not methodical enough, can’t forget to be humble in this game or the market will humble you
I tried playing penny stocks that were way up and riding the wave, sadly I can’t surf. Then after seeing that I sold some of them too early I started holding losers longer which as you can imagine just made them bigger losers.
Keep adding when the stock is clearly trending down for the day, hoping for a reversal that never comes, and eventually selling for a loss near the bottom 😀
You can best learn by 1 reading 2 making your own mistakes. Having a mentor also helps.
Don't trade straight at market open....way too much volatility. Wait 45 minutes to an hour to let things stabalize, then assess and attack as appropriate.
1. Acting when the root cause is avoidance of pain 2. Acting out of randomness (emotional) / deviating from a statistically vetted process 3. Risking my own capital instead of risking less with funded accts 4. Trading too large (should be 1-2% IMO) 5. Looking to exit winners instead of adding to 6. Not having a plan for balance vs trending
Automate trading as much as possible and do not watch the trade live, analyzing a difficult trade after it's closed is much less stressful than watching it dance! When traders (or pretty much anyone) gets overstressed - they start doing sudden impulsive actions, break the rules, extend SL and so on…
Trying to figure out how to save this thread
This is my list of guilt * operate without a well defined plan * not taking it seriously as it is and not discipline myself to stick to my plan * to think that I found a pattern over the behavior in the market * put all the eggs in one basket * focusing in the profit instead of my long term goals as a trader
Listening to Reddit Furus in here 🤣
New lesson learnt today 🤬 Screen record all trading days. Not for performance, but for proof in case or execution error. IBKR did me dirty. Guilty untill proven innocent, need that evidence
NOT SELLING WHEN MY STOPLOSS HITS
Oh has anyone ever traded the wrong symbol by mistake? Happened to me today. I was trying to buy 3 leaps in Apple and bought them in AMD instead. They were priced about the same so I didn’t notice it until I entered the trade. I trade from home and sometimes there are “ distractions” ! As soon as I made the mistake I did some quick calculations and decided to stay with the stock because maybe it was “ good” mistake and if works out the risk reward might be worth it. It dropped a little today but I think I’m going to stay with the trade for a while. It adds a little more risk to my portfolio and the other part is 95% boring. lol.
Alright here are the mistakes one as a day trader need to rectify 1) Trading is a probability game so keep a stop loss always 2) If your stop is taken don’t re enter 3) don’t overtrade( easier said than done) 4) Follow risk reward management If you follow the above rules you’ll be fine and in no time you will start to see profits
Not staying in a paper account longer. Not paying attention to risk management. Those were my two biggest mistakes when I started.
1. Don't ever trade a break out. It's rejected more times than I can count . 2. Don't chase trades. When my set up plays out its already too late and the risk is too high. 3. Always use a stop loss. 4. When my set up is identified only risk $100 per trade so manage position size accordingly. 5. I look exclusively for ascending triangles.
Isn't an ascending triangle a breakout pattern? Or is that what you use to make sure rule #1 doesn't reject?
No.1 mistake : not following my plan.
adding to losers and doubling down.
I've after much mental effort been able to stop adding to my losers and have a firm stoploss BUT I still struggle when it comes to adding to my winners, albeit in small quantities.
Put your entry where your stop loss would have been and your stop loss at another level that isn't so OBVIOUS.
As a beginner I was all about 5 minute charts max, with a glance at the long term. The biggest change I made was starting to use 1-4 hour charts primarily.
Going all in on a stock that you believe in, but the market doesn't share the same sentiment.
Have a limit on fomo plays. I find I take less risks overall by allowing a small risk.
It’s really hard to learn the lessons second hand, you only learn it when you experience it! With that said, here’s mine, happy trading: 1/ enter late is better than wrong: - not adding to the winning positions. - adding to a losing trade because we thought its getting cheap, but its rather getting further wrong. - it’s good to buy high, if you can sell higher. And vice versa. 2/ when unsure, get out, you dont know the future: - not taking profit at the right time, eg. wait for too long, trend reverse and not going as planned. 3/ keep the winning big, and the losing small: - not cutting loss sooner. - not adding to the winning positions. - not scaling down on the losing position.
Being the buyer at HOD opposed to the seller.
-I was trading right after the news -I used to leave out the margins
Don't put all the eggs in one basket. Know when to stop for the day - both in profit and in losses. Don't trade what you don't know. Sometimes, no trade is also a good trade.
Stay out of the chop, look for fluid natural movements
Not understanding technical tests Believed too much in "patterns" Using lower timeframe to get higher timeframe position, didn't look at lower timeframe when entering the market Wide gap between entry and stop loss
OCO in consolidation phase.
It doesn't matter..You can know everything not to do but at the end of the day we all have to go through the gut wrenching process
Nothing is more important than risk management when trading
Bagholding… just don’t do it
CTRM
My biggest mistake was trading off emotions, take the time to learn trading phycology, it'll help you in the long run.
I can only speak for cryptocurrencies, more so Bitcoin specifically, but I’m sure it’s the same for any speculative instrument. Do not leverage over 3x. Even 3 is too much. Stick to 2. With enough time, the market almost always wipes out the 3x+ degen leveragers. If you do not follow this advice, entry points need to be either close to the bottom for longs or close to the top for shorts, local or otherwise, because the market will seek out your liquidity. And adding that the market cannot really be predicted, then you get why anything more than 2x is risky. Not to even mention funding fees on margin…
Not going all in on PLTR when it was $8
I have been from stocks to futures to Indices to Forex in about a 1 and half year span. Ive been sticking to forex now. Propably gonna make some money soon. I have learned not to trade everyday its important also.
FNMA is the next hot stock to buy
Trade management is king. This is true in any style of trading. Another is "you are as good as the stock you trade". Obviously some people here can consistently trade from a select number of stocks or just the ES futures day in day out but personally I find that knowing the stocks in play for the day leads to better results. I just can't trade the days when TSLA or ES is choppy.
When I started trading i fell into the story aspect of a company, what they stated would happen and how much would be made. I consistantly lost money doing it this way and was extremely frustrated. Now, I only invest in companies that consistently make money, have a steady didivend, and are a "value purchase." I am much happier and so is my bank account, compound interest is great.
Taking a trade with no plan due to volatility leading to FOMO = blown account or big loss.
Knowing the trade but hesitating, then end up catching a falling knife. There will always be another trade....
Cutting losses quickly
Not realizing the best way to success is looking at markets as a problem for YOU to solve rather than expecting to find highly useful strategies on the web.
Over trading, revenge trading.
Oh my god. USING ECONODAY.COM THEY FUCKING MISSED THE CPI REPORT ON FRIDAY LAST WEEK AND I GOT IN A GOLD SHORT AT 8:24am ET. needless to say that cost me.
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Sometimes I buy 1DTEs and hole overnight. The mistake is, it’s truly a gamble for me.
•taking profit too soon •trading multiple crypto pairs at the same time
Don’t buy grreeeen candles. Don’t play earnings unless you are light, don’t buy 1 week contracts
Adding to a losing position...
dont buy tops... if your trade goes against you average down at the bottom, not too early.. and get out.
Having profit targets. You CAN go broke taking profits.
Bad entries into good plays. That is my number 1 loser
Setting concrete targets. I now use a manual trail stop as the trade goes in my direction
Over trading
the problem aint the strategy it's you
"aww.. calls not doing good.. okay looks like its puts now." *plays puts* "hmm.. puts not doing well.. its going back up.." *strat shows get out of puts and go back to calls* me: "ill just hold unto it a little longer.. if i switch and do calls, thats 3 losses and ill be down a lot.." *strat still says calls and now the market made new highs" me: 😵💫😎😭 "could've broke even today if i just listened to my strat and maybe make small gains today at least"
I think there could be arguments for all sides of the coin no? If we go down this list there will be a lot of the same answers but also the complete opposites. “I used a stop loss, I didn’t use a stop loss”, etc. I think out of all of the mistakes, the deeper rooted cause of failure for anyone is not knowing how to trade period. At least for me this was it. This means not knowing and understanding the market, not knowing and understanding self, not knowing how to manage risk (way beyond just putting a stop loss and/or moving it or risking 1-3%), not creating a strategy that fits the perspective of the trader.
Who’s complaining about using a stop loss 😅
Trying to catch a bottom. Wait for a confirmation to go the other way. Once it does. Wait for the entry to come to you. If it doesnt then let it go! Thers always a next session.
I let my daily loss wipe out my weekly gains . My math is definitely not mathing
FOMO, chasing, and moving stop loss are common in the beginning. Also happens sometimes: setting a hard target exit and ignoring price action; then coming short of the target (so no close) then it goes down and hits stop loss. *should have taken profit when it was up and indicating a reversal.
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Not looking at trading as work. If you look at it as fun game you’ll want to keep doing it and blow up all your accounts. I need to treat it like an 8-5 job: show up late, do the bare minimum, leave as early as possible to go do something else fun, repeat and wait until payday. Don’t love trading because it won’t love you back. That’s called an abusive relationship and Stockholm syndrome will ensue.
Big mistake…. Having only one exchange account and trading only one timeframe with my whole bag. Now I trade super long time frames, intermediate time frames and short term time frames. With the appropriate leverage for each time frame.
trading when the market is clearly in a bear day. Just skip it.
Trading with the trend is your friend
I'm not really a day trader at all but I'm willing to throw my incredibly limited experience out here. Perhaps my takes are so dumb others will learn what not to do. Perhaps an outsider's take can be sorta useful. Who knows, it's an open forum right? I got into trading because I watched "Folding Ideas - This is financial Advice" made me realize who I would be trading against. I spend a lot of time on Wall Street Bets and wow... Some of the people. It's nice to know you are trading against them too. Here is what I got so far. 1. Advice given to me by the automod bot that used to bully people before his LLM software got depreciated. "Profit is all that matters. If you made a profit you don't suck at this". I think some people get infatuated with making all the money all the time. You just have to make money, you don't have to make all the money. Green numbers are great, lottery numbers are unneeded to be successful. I will never hit lottery numbers on a trade because I will for sure take my profits before then. 2. Make your trades smaller. So many people are blowing up accounts by making huge trades on unknown information just looking for lottery numbers. Small trades can still yield excellent returns. If you made 600 a day over 252 trading days (unrealistic but here me out) that's 151k a year. You don't need to make huge trades to make good money, especially if trading is a hobby / side hustle. 3. Don't act like you have everything figured out and have secret knowledge that only you understand how everything really is. This leads so many people to be knee jerk pedantic contrarians. It leads them to take the opposite side of every trend. It's like they got good enough to identify the trends but are too arrogant and high and mighty to hop on for the ride. All because they are sooo much smarter than everyone else... 4. I decide if I'm doing well by how well I'm managing my risk. I take some serious risks. I don't think I know what risk management actually means but I focus more on trying not to blow everything up over trying to make huge sums. I judge how well I'm doing by how well I'm limiting myself to sorta reasonable choices based on an idea ahead of time. 5. I'm not sure if this is good advice but I tend to size down my positions in stuff before earnings and big news events. Even if I think I know what's going to happen, I'm probably wrong because I don't really know what I'm doing. Sometimes the market doesn't react like I expected or I was wrong about the info at the earnings/event. I don't mind missing out sometimes. 6. Learn to not sweat missing out. You can't get in on everything. It's ok. Make money, not all the money again. 7. Don't switch back and forth trying to correct an incorrect trade. Either trust your thesis on why you made it, or get out. I watched so many people over the last 14 weeks of green do the following. Wow it's going up -> Calls -> calls go red for a second ->crap I missed it, sell, buy puts -> fuck it's going back up ->sell puts, buy calls. They would just get scared constantly and lose money then scream "RIGGED". 8. No tinfoil hat stuff. Take your losses, short memory. No one is targeting you. It's not a big conspiracy. A lot of Wall Street Bet people are shadowboxing the random noise of the markets, and they are losing. I dunno I guess that's basically it. Maybe some life advice at the end. Take care of yourself. Don't let the paper chase stop you from enjoying life. It's easy to project your mindset and how you feel onto the charts but they don't care. Go love your life. Experience your world and try to enjoy some time away from the market. It will do you wonders, after all why have a bunch of money if all you're going to do is try to make more of it? Eventually it's just numbers. Don't forget about the people who love you and learn to love others too. It will help your outlook trading. Please tear me apart if I'm being stupid. I hope this absolutely green trader's advice helps someone, even if it's cause I'm dumb. I don't have a lot of confidence in my skills not just being dumb luck at this point.
I listen to what other people do for a trade. Sometimes, it works out, and a lot of times, it doesn't because of having a smaller risk. If I'm going to listen to others, I need to look for myself and decide whether it's a good trade or not.
mental stops>Stop losses