trading_time,
Something about my post regarding entries seems to have struck a chord. Let me say this: Swing traders and those who trade longer term are not obsessive about their entries, and rightly so. They build an opinion about where the market's going, and will hold on to that opinion until such a time as price action proves them wrong (I assume -- I know very little about swing trading). A swing/long term trader, I assume, employs far more capital in their trading than I do, and has more modest expectations about what type of return they want on their money. The 'job' of a day trader, as I see it, is to take advantage of the intra-day momentum of the market as it oscillates, or trends, and capture parts of the day's action with relatively high leverage and relatively low risk. That's why day traders are not subject to the same margin requirements as are position traders.
To a day trader, entries are critical.
Something about my post regarding entries seems to have struck a chord. Let me say this: Swing traders and those who trade longer term are not obsessive about their entries, and rightly so. They build an opinion about where the market's going, and will hold on to that opinion until such a time as price action proves them wrong (I assume -- I know very little about swing trading). A swing/long term trader, I assume, employs far more capital in their trading than I do, and has more modest expectations about what type of return they want on their money. The 'job' of a day trader, as I see it, is to take advantage of the intra-day momentum of the market as it oscillates, or trends, and capture parts of the day's action with relatively high leverage and relatively low risk. That's why day traders are not subject to the same margin requirements as are position traders.
To a day trader, entries are critical.