Day vs Position Trading

T

toc

What has been the experience on traders on ET. Have they been more successful in day trading or taking postions and sitting for like few days to few weeks at a time.

Am I right in saying that position trading tends to be less emotional with fewer knee-jerk reactions. Taking the topic a little further, for FOREX what is recommended, given the markets can move very fast suddenly.
 
it seems to me most experienced forex traders trade off longer positions of several days, or 1-2 weeks, so they can take advantage of the trending in forex. just what ive heard...
 
It depends. I sleep better if I am back to cash at the end of the day.

I got killed back in Sept with BIDU I was holding over night at 115 only to wake up and read where Goldman came out with an underperform and the price was 80. It went up to around 91 when I sold and it closed that day back down around 81.

Others have had the reverse gap happen. But I still have not made that money back yet.

Had it not been Fri I might have take a piece of it but backed off.

I'll just have to wait and see Monday whether that was wise or not.

Like I said in the beginning, I sleep better not holding and my profits are smaller daytrading, but they're more consistent

Don
 
Depends: the only things worth daytrading IMO are earnings, so, it's good to be active every three months and employ as main strategy swing trading stocks and options; sometimes I look at futs and commodities but still maintain longer time frames bias and approach.
 
Dont let day trades turn into swing trades. If it dont work now, most likely it aint working overnight or in 2 days.
 
most great traders i've met or read about began with shorter time frames, and moved on into longer holds ie position trading for weeks.

short term moves are much easier to predict, but there is a cap on profitability. that is why traders eventually step up into position trading. position trading obviously becomes riskier, but the reward is higher.

Quote from toc:

What has been the experience on traders on ET. Have they been more successful in day trading or taking postions and sitting for like few days to few weeks at a time.

Am I right in saying that position trading tends to be less emotional with fewer knee-jerk reactions. Taking the topic a little further, for FOREX what is recommended, given the markets can move very fast suddenly.
More...
 
Just like a child learning to run by taking baby steps, so too must be a trader.. progressing from being a scalper to a longer term position trader.. to finally buy and hold.
 
actually, both

ES one trade was sell for the day 2/2. cover on the close.

ES another set was sell 2/2 and hold overnight then cover at the close 2/3

You are just covering part of the position each day until the trade is complete.

Aside from the night zombie's that trade after the close and screw things up for me, it works pretty well.


I am gettting up the nerve to buy and hold the Russell for weeks. Just can't quite get there. I get up in the middle of the night and see what the zombies are doing. Makes for fitfull sleep.
 
Quote from tomcole:

Dont let day trades turn into swing trades. If it dont work now, most likely it aint working overnight or in 2 days.
More...

You don't hold position trades overnight that are against you already. And buy/sell on close is not my cup of tea.
 
patoo
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Quote from tomcole:

Dont let day trades turn into swing trades. If it dont work now, most likely it aint working overnight or in 2 days.
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You don't hold position trades overnight that are against you already. And buy/sell on close is not my cup of tea.
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I agree with both of you. But each person has to deal with what cards you're given. What I mean is one has to know oneself to make any of this work. As you say, "not my cup of tea".

But I disagree about hard and fast rules. flexibility has a part to play in trading. The rule about never doubling down is also a good rule but it has saved my butt several times. Placing automatic stops has cost a lot of people a lot of money. Had I had stop on that trade particular trade I would have lost even more money.
Fri. ERTS is a perfect example. By all rights it should have dropped further Fri as it did Thurs night, but instead it gapped up in the morning and only lost 0.44. for the day. I don't think it would have lost that if it hadn't been such down day on the market as a whole.

"toc" was asking for opinions, that was mine.

The stock I was referring to in "take piece of but backed of was BIDU.
Don
PS. No one needs to tell me how dumb that was, but it was nice to see that the often name calling here at Elite wasn't started.
Good trading to everyone.
 
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