Quote from NY_HOOD:
this is what is making my decision so tough;whether to leave trading or not. i am actually pretty good.i make good calls and feel i have a certain ability to tell where a stock will go.these are usually stocks with news or stocks that are moving/breaking out of consolidationj on volume. now to my problem;its discipline. i never hold overnight but last night i bought CAE on an earnings release. they beat the numbers and i bought after hours at 77.68 when i saw the stock moving and i read the report. everything looked good and it went over 78 but i decided to hold and sell pre-mkt on an upgrade. looking at the chart i figured the 80 level would be a shoe in,ignoring the fact that the most important jobs report was due out this morning. anyway,CAE actually gets downgraded and it opens at 76. i actually sold at 75.40 pre-mkt because the job number scared the heck out of me combined with the down grade. luckily i sold because it went down another 5 points anyway,its always the same problem,i will have a good couple days or even weeks and then bamm! i make a dumb decision and hold overnight. i actually made 900 yeaterday and then gave back 400 so what did i do? i wanted to get back that 400 even though i walked away with 500 by making an after hours trade. i had 800 shares and figured i could sell at 78.50. it only went to 78.10 so i decided to hold over night and sell near 79. well,the rest is history. now that i am down so much at the open,i start to over trade to compensate for the big loss i took before the market ever opened and over trade and take a bunmch of small losses that add up on top of the big one i hit. when you have a day like this it takes all the wind from your sails and drians you completely to the point of exhaustion. i was shaken out of CRM, IDCC,and NYX(short) and a few others. bottom line,i was'nt trading with a clear head. had i not held over night,i would have started the morning off fresh with a clear head and made a good trade. its almost as if i keep asking myself; "how many lessons to i need to learn before i go broke,especially when iys the same lessons".
Theres not many lessons you need to learn anymore other then:
Your trading method (daytrading 1 or 2 stocks randomly) you have, is always 50/50 random.
Any wins you had before, any losses, were all 50/50, thats what made you think you were making progress.
But in reality, it was just random luck some of them went your way.
Stop trading, Look at the P&L
What does the P&L tell you about profitable traders?
150,000 shares traded?
50,000 shares traded?
75,000 shares traded?
Find one who's trading 500 shares of something and holding all day and is still profitable day in and day out.
It is unlikely any of them trade in regard of market direction, Most of them are providing liquidity / market making/ arbing, of some nature. None of this depends on market direction.
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Reality: Market direction is also 50/50 random.
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Realize how you are trading will never be profitable no matter how much effort you put in, It was just 50/50 random.
I don't know why profitable traders don't tell traders whenever they see someone trading this style (95% of all retail traders , trade like this) from the getgo , All of them will lose money sooner or later.