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Extra Effort: The Three Steps to Jump Start the Week

Saturday, 17 September 2011 05:43

The title of this blog says it all when it comes to success as a professional trader. Success (making money) in trading is directly correlated to the amount of work you are willing to put in not just during market hours but I think more importantly after the markets are closed. Weekends are an especially good time for me to put in that extra effort. When the markets are closed I am able to put my whole focus behind the process of analyzing my performance and I can be most objective.

First, I start out by reading through the previous 5 days journals and look for common themes to tell me if I keep making the same mistake over and over or if there is a certain setup that is just killing it everytime I see it. Clarity is King in my world and the more clear I can be about the good and bad from last week the better I will perform next week.

Second, I look at charts in my larger universe and see patterns developing that will start my mind working on a broad thesis for the weeks trading. I am watching to see if stocks are overbought/sold, where is resistance or support, MACD crosses, sectors that look attractive for trading.

The last step is to take an assessment of your "trading streak", for me that is the last 20 trading days. If I am in a good streak and making smart trades and stron P&L, then I want to push myself to bigger size and out of my comfort zone. If those 20 days are not up to my standards, then I want to be more conservative in my planning and focus on simply a solid week.

I will go through this process early Saturday morning and then finish late Sunday night. The purpose of that is to keep my mind on trading seven days a week, I do not want to get sloppy and breaking up this exercise over the two days is the remedy. Try these three steps and you will see improvement in all facets of running your trading business.