Saturday 14 November 2009

Downs and Ups

I was feeling quite confident after how the last few days went, my state of mind was positive, I was ready to accept losses when they came, and trying to trade without fear. This state of mind was sorely tested when race after race went badly, After the first losing race I thought " Ok, I can accept that, the market was hard for me to read", after the second losing race I was thinking "Wow, Im losing confidence in my reading of the markets", and by just over an hour in to the trading session, I was £4 down, my positive feelings were gone, and I was ready to quit before I really went to pieces and lost more. I couldn't believe how I seemed to get every race wrong, for large losses each time.
Anyway, I kept going, tried to stay positive and believe in my trading ability, and race by race clawed it all back. I got a nice trade in the 15:05, where I caught 2 swings on the 2nd favorite and greened up for nearly £2. In all, I got 8 winning races in a row from being at my lowest point, and ended the day up £1.89

The nature of the markets mean that there will be times where I hit a run of losing trades, even though my entry points may be ok. This is all part of accepting the losses and putting in trades when you see opportunities, even if you have lost the last 5 times. At the moment my edge is fairly small(if it even exists), so these losing runs will have a large impact on my PnL. As my trading improves and I identify better and better entry points, my edge will grow and hopefully lessen the effect

4 comments:

  1. Don't get too hung up on your entry points it's probably a lot more important to get the exit points correct. The markets naturally bounce around so even if the markets goes against you to start you'll find they'll recover on numerous occasions.

    Too many novice traders feel they need to find a swinger despite the fact they won't ride it it out and only ever get on board when swing is about to end due to inexperience or hesitation in placing the bet. Try and tailor your entry points to how many ticks you're looking to take out of the trade. Not too many traders can succesfully swing and tick trade especially early on, eventually you'll spot the signs just by playing so many markets but it'll pay to specialise in one type of trading for now dependant on how risk averse you are.

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  2. Thanks for the comments. I agree that my exit points need work too. At the moment, the markets seem so volatile that I am not able to wait and see if the market comes back. I am also guilty of hesitation when I see a swing start, although I think I have mostly stopped getting on just as the swing is about to end.

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  3. Hello,
    I was wondering if we could exchange links?

    http://sportsdaft.wordpress.com

    thanks

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  4. I have added ur blog to my blog roll

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