Hey traders,
I've had the privilege to have been involved in trading, both retail trading and working within a prop firm for many years. The biggest benefit I get, is to work with so many different traders with so many different strategies, personalities, timeframes, assets, you name it. I've probably worked with a trader that trades it. Now, there's a few things that are extremely common in all traders, regardless of what or how they are trading. It's the same mistakes that keep making traders fail. So today, I'm going to explain what five of these mistakes are and how to avoid them. I will also discuss how to incorporate them to ensure that you don't get hit by the stone wall that many traders do. If you have any extra information to add, please do so in the comments. I look forward to hearing from you all.
TRADING WITHOUT A PLAN
This right here is the biggest one and this is usually for the early beginners or even strategy jumpers. You must have a plan. That is non negotiable if you ever want to see some kind of consistency in training. I can tell you from experience, both personally and with working with traders from firms, that the more in depth that plan is, the better chance of success. The same way you create a business plan before launching a new endeavor. The same way you create a game plan for your team before you go out and verse the opponent. The same way politicians plan out their PR campaigns before running for office. You must have a thorough trading plan.
A plan can consist of a multitude of different things, from understanding what you're willing to lose, understanding overall position size, understanding your trading strategy, minimizing drawdowns, maximizing profits, the assets you are trading, the times you're going to be trading, how much time you actually going to be allocating to trading and setting up goals. A trading plan must be thorough, so you can not only track your progress, but when you start getting unmotivated or confused, you have something to look back on to realign you with where you are and where you want to be.
My final advice with your trading plan is stick to it. You will have bad trading days. You will have bad trading weeks. You will have bad trading months. Stick to your plan.
OVERTRADING
We've all been there. It's the start of a trading session. We've opened two positions. They've both gone on to be fantastic winners. You're unstoppable. Nothing can possibly go wrong from this point. You have mastered the markets. You are the best trader the world has ever seen. So what do you do? You open another seven positions because it's just free money on the table. And what happens? All seven of those positions lose, wiping off your original profit and some. This is so common in beginner traders. It's that aspect of unpredictability that they forget about in the markets.
Trading too much too soon is a serious issue and it needs to be worked on as soon as possible. I understand the excitement of being live in the markets, the excitement of the profits you could earn day today, but the reality of the situation is if your brand new. Trading too much is going to be a serious issue. What sitting back watching and not trading does is not only increases your patience, but also allows you to analyze the markets in a clearer state of mind, making your future decisions a whole level ahead.
Add that into the plan, give yourself a maximum number of positions per day if you are new. Trust me, it's going to help you progress.
FAILING TO CUT LOSSES
I've spoken about this a lot, especially in one of my recent webinars. A lot of traders are taught the whole set an forget method, and I'm not a big fan of it, but in some circumstances I won't lie. Yes, it does work. But a lot of the time, these trade ideas that they're in there actually give massive warning signals prior to hitting the stop loss that they are going to do that. The trader could have cut those losses a lot shorter. Now don't even get me started on traders that don't use a stop loss. What I wanted to do really in this segment is dive into the emotional side of failing to cut a loss.
It's true. I remember experiencing it early on my trading career, that feeling of when a trades going against you, but you did all the analysis, so it shouldn't be going against you. So what do you do? You hold on with hope and temptation that it will turn for the better. The reality of the situation is in very, very rarely does. It's a horrible feeling because some traders are prone to even giving those trades more room, adding to the position, moving there stop loss, removing their stop loss altogether. Everything you shouldn't be doing in the time that your analysis is going against you, most traders lean towards because they done all the research they needed to do and they cannot comprehend bring wrong.
The best way to battle this feeling, if you've ever felt it or still to this day feel that urge, is going back to number one. Trading with a plan. Have a plan. Risk management plans are the greatest things ever. We can plan for the absolute worst so when it does come in and everyone's going manic everywhere, we know exactly what to do, where to be and how to position ourselves. This will help you learn to cut those losses.
NOT UNDERSTANDING LEVERAGE
The world changed times are changing. You can access any type of information or access pretty much any type of market you want at the click of a button by the glorious internet. Same goes with trading is probably how most of you have gotten here, or even just into trading as a whole. The thing is, we reach out to these brokers and we open accounts with small amounts of money and they offer us great deals like 300 hundred or even 500 to 1 leverage.
That means with $1000 account, you can open $500,000 of currency. Now, the reality of the situation is most traders will never use all of that leverage. But as a result is that most trade is also wouldn't have experienced a no money call when opening a position, or perhaps a margin call, or a true understanding of when they put in 0.5 lots of EURUSD, what they are actually doing. Leverage is a great tool. Fantastic tool. When used correctly. Working at the firm, had so many traders reach out. They keep getting an error code. They say, "I can't open this position!? WHY!?!" and it's all because they don't have the margin requirements to actually open that position and it is alarming to see how many traders don't fully understand what leverages and margin is considering they have used it for years.
When you open a position of 0.5 lots on a U.S. dollar currency pair, for example, UUSDJPY. You are opening a position size of $50,000. You have just entered a $50,000 position. That means you are actively managing $50,000 while you are in that position. Let that sink in. Now that's just a position of 0.5 lots. There is traders pit there trading 10-100 lots and it is just baffling to understand the amount of risk there actually taking in accordance to their account size.
Do your research. Understand your position size and when you're doing your trading journal. Instead of doing lot sizes in your trading journal, I recommend you do actual position size, value. That will give you a much better understanding on the risk you undertake when you take positions and also if you can, lower your leverage. You don't need 500:1.
BEING ABLE TO ACCEPT LOSSES
Now this is a fun one and this is what I really wanted to chat about. Being able to accept losses can be one of the most damaging things a beginner trader can ever have, because what happens is they lose the value and respect that the market can take their money. Every market "guru" and every trading course out there tells you to remove emotion from the equation, accept that losses are gonna be a thing, and trade knowing that. Now most people go, "OK, let's do that." and surprisingly, they actually managed to pull it off. Which actually creates a bigger problem. They become reckless. They no longer care if there's a little bit of parameters different from their trading plan. They no longer care if there's key indicators that the trade idea is wrong because, "we're going to have losses. So what? This one might as well be one. If you're not in the market, you're not going to make money." they become reckless.
Do not remove emotion from your trading. Incorporate emotion into your trading and once again this results back to the first tip. Trade. With. A. Plan.
Traders, that is all for me today. These are five things that I've noticed in struggling traders which seemed to be a common recurrence. Thank you for your time. I hope you enjoy the read. As always, have a fantastic trading week.
-Jordon Mellor
I've had the privilege to have been involved in trading, both retail trading and working within a prop firm for many years. The biggest benefit I get, is to work with so many different traders with so many different strategies, personalities, timeframes, assets, you name it. I've probably worked with a trader that trades it. Now, there's a few things that are extremely common in all traders, regardless of what or how they are trading. It's the same mistakes that keep making traders fail. So today, I'm going to explain what five of these mistakes are and how to avoid them. I will also discuss how to incorporate them to ensure that you don't get hit by the stone wall that many traders do. If you have any extra information to add, please do so in the comments. I look forward to hearing from you all.
TRADING WITHOUT A PLAN
This right here is the biggest one and this is usually for the early beginners or even strategy jumpers. You must have a plan. That is non negotiable if you ever want to see some kind of consistency in training. I can tell you from experience, both personally and with working with traders from firms, that the more in depth that plan is, the better chance of success. The same way you create a business plan before launching a new endeavor. The same way you create a game plan for your team before you go out and verse the opponent. The same way politicians plan out their PR campaigns before running for office. You must have a thorough trading plan.
A plan can consist of a multitude of different things, from understanding what you're willing to lose, understanding overall position size, understanding your trading strategy, minimizing drawdowns, maximizing profits, the assets you are trading, the times you're going to be trading, how much time you actually going to be allocating to trading and setting up goals. A trading plan must be thorough, so you can not only track your progress, but when you start getting unmotivated or confused, you have something to look back on to realign you with where you are and where you want to be.
My final advice with your trading plan is stick to it. You will have bad trading days. You will have bad trading weeks. You will have bad trading months. Stick to your plan.
OVERTRADING
We've all been there. It's the start of a trading session. We've opened two positions. They've both gone on to be fantastic winners. You're unstoppable. Nothing can possibly go wrong from this point. You have mastered the markets. You are the best trader the world has ever seen. So what do you do? You open another seven positions because it's just free money on the table. And what happens? All seven of those positions lose, wiping off your original profit and some. This is so common in beginner traders. It's that aspect of unpredictability that they forget about in the markets.
Trading too much too soon is a serious issue and it needs to be worked on as soon as possible. I understand the excitement of being live in the markets, the excitement of the profits you could earn day today, but the reality of the situation is if your brand new. Trading too much is going to be a serious issue. What sitting back watching and not trading does is not only increases your patience, but also allows you to analyze the markets in a clearer state of mind, making your future decisions a whole level ahead.
Add that into the plan, give yourself a maximum number of positions per day if you are new. Trust me, it's going to help you progress.
FAILING TO CUT LOSSES
I've spoken about this a lot, especially in one of my recent webinars. A lot of traders are taught the whole set an forget method, and I'm not a big fan of it, but in some circumstances I won't lie. Yes, it does work. But a lot of the time, these trade ideas that they're in there actually give massive warning signals prior to hitting the stop loss that they are going to do that. The trader could have cut those losses a lot shorter. Now don't even get me started on traders that don't use a stop loss. What I wanted to do really in this segment is dive into the emotional side of failing to cut a loss.
It's true. I remember experiencing it early on my trading career, that feeling of when a trades going against you, but you did all the analysis, so it shouldn't be going against you. So what do you do? You hold on with hope and temptation that it will turn for the better. The reality of the situation is in very, very rarely does. It's a horrible feeling because some traders are prone to even giving those trades more room, adding to the position, moving there stop loss, removing their stop loss altogether. Everything you shouldn't be doing in the time that your analysis is going against you, most traders lean towards because they done all the research they needed to do and they cannot comprehend bring wrong.
The best way to battle this feeling, if you've ever felt it or still to this day feel that urge, is going back to number one. Trading with a plan. Have a plan. Risk management plans are the greatest things ever. We can plan for the absolute worst so when it does come in and everyone's going manic everywhere, we know exactly what to do, where to be and how to position ourselves. This will help you learn to cut those losses.
NOT UNDERSTANDING LEVERAGE
The world changed times are changing. You can access any type of information or access pretty much any type of market you want at the click of a button by the glorious internet. Same goes with trading is probably how most of you have gotten here, or even just into trading as a whole. The thing is, we reach out to these brokers and we open accounts with small amounts of money and they offer us great deals like 300 hundred or even 500 to 1 leverage.
That means with $1000 account, you can open $500,000 of currency. Now, the reality of the situation is most traders will never use all of that leverage. But as a result is that most trade is also wouldn't have experienced a no money call when opening a position, or perhaps a margin call, or a true understanding of when they put in 0.5 lots of EURUSD, what they are actually doing. Leverage is a great tool. Fantastic tool. When used correctly. Working at the firm, had so many traders reach out. They keep getting an error code. They say, "I can't open this position!? WHY!?!" and it's all because they don't have the margin requirements to actually open that position and it is alarming to see how many traders don't fully understand what leverages and margin is considering they have used it for years.
When you open a position of 0.5 lots on a U.S. dollar currency pair, for example, UUSDJPY. You are opening a position size of $50,000. You have just entered a $50,000 position. That means you are actively managing $50,000 while you are in that position. Let that sink in. Now that's just a position of 0.5 lots. There is traders pit there trading 10-100 lots and it is just baffling to understand the amount of risk there actually taking in accordance to their account size.
Do your research. Understand your position size and when you're doing your trading journal. Instead of doing lot sizes in your trading journal, I recommend you do actual position size, value. That will give you a much better understanding on the risk you undertake when you take positions and also if you can, lower your leverage. You don't need 500:1.
BEING ABLE TO ACCEPT LOSSES
Now this is a fun one and this is what I really wanted to chat about. Being able to accept losses can be one of the most damaging things a beginner trader can ever have, because what happens is they lose the value and respect that the market can take their money. Every market "guru" and every trading course out there tells you to remove emotion from the equation, accept that losses are gonna be a thing, and trade knowing that. Now most people go, "OK, let's do that." and surprisingly, they actually managed to pull it off. Which actually creates a bigger problem. They become reckless. They no longer care if there's a little bit of parameters different from their trading plan. They no longer care if there's key indicators that the trade idea is wrong because, "we're going to have losses. So what? This one might as well be one. If you're not in the market, you're not going to make money." they become reckless.
Do not remove emotion from your trading. Incorporate emotion into your trading and once again this results back to the first tip. Trade. With. A. Plan.
Traders, that is all for me today. These are five things that I've noticed in struggling traders which seemed to be a common recurrence. Thank you for your time. I hope you enjoy the read. As always, have a fantastic trading week.
-Jordon Mellor
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