Leroy Rushing is an active, professional day trader; trading coach; and author. He is the Founder and CEO of Trading EveryDay, a distinguished provider of educational trading products and services that are available worldwide. Trading EveryDay also has many articles with unique perspectives on day trading.
Professional traders know all about the guts and glory of live trading. Trading discipline is the only difference between unprofitable and profitable traders. Watching a violent swing in the charts that can put a dent in your trading capital can be tough to swallow.
Avoid the Cringe of the News
To preserve your trading capital and avoid a heart attack, it is best to stay away from news related market activity. Even proven strategies are proven to fail when there is a large amount of volatility and gut instinct present in the market. After data releases, such as the Nonfarm payroll or inflation statistics, the markets will go wild with volatility.
Plan to Avoid the News
A trading plan planner should always be kept to outline under what conditions your strategy works best, but also to include times when the strategy is not as profitable. Key news dates should be written down in an easy to see area of your workstation. Markets like to respond to news 15 minutes before the actual news release and continue for hours after the news breaks. Avoiding high volume news times is the best way to preserve your trading capital and keep the cringe-inducing trades to a minimum.
Preservation Equal to Growth
To master day trading is to know when not to take a trade. Preserving your capital is equally as important as growing your portfolio. If the market loses 30% one year and a profitable trader preserves his capital, he’s outpaced the market by 30%. While wealth was not created, he made an effective gain of 30% after comparing to other investors. In a downtrend, trading discipline is critical to keeping your head and your profits.
Monitor the Trends
Cringe-inducing trades are often the product of a sideways trend, rather than a downtrend or uptrend. The uncertainty that comes with a sideways trend makes it that much more difficult to swallow than a well defined uptrend. A sideways trend can snap at any time, sending the price up or down at a violent pace.
Stay True to Your Trading Strategy Plan
The most common mistake made in testy markets is to interfere with your trades. Moving stop losses, taking early profits, or letting a loser run are all dangerous. It is best to let the proven strategies work their magic over the long run than to interfere with the odds on the short run. Creative techniques, such as trading smaller trade sizes or avoiding the trade all together, is the best way to prevent a loss.
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By: Leroy Rushing | 29/09/2008 | InvestingAfter knowing what a piercing candle is, you’ll find that they are very easy to spot on a candlestick chart. A piercing candle usually comes to rest after a downturn that is longer than five periods on the chart. Thus, on a one day candlestick chart, the trend would have to be more than 5 bars and exist at the bottom of a downtrend.
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By: Leroy Rushing | 29/09/2008 | InvestingStock scanning is a vital tool used by professional traders to find symbols that fit their criteria. There are thousands of programs and resources that scan the stock market based upon investor criteria, locating stocks that fit your trading system. Are you seeking stocks with a price between $5 and $50 with a PEG ratio of .4? A stock scanner will search through piles of data and return with hundreds of names that match the criteria. Why do all the initial searching when automated programs c
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By: Leroy Rushing | 29/09/2008 | InvestingTrading gaps is extremely profitable, especially for traders with strategies for gapping up and strategies for gapping down. Some traders only take one side of each gap, but learning to trade the gaps up and down proves to be doubly profitable. It’s hard to trade the gaps intraday, on a short term chart, but can be done. For the swing trader, there is much more money to be made in gaps.
4 Steps Necessary for Trading Preparation
By: Leroy Rushing | 29/09/2008 | InsuranceThere are four very crucial steps for determining a trade and making the right decision. Profitable traders are able to spot opportunity, but not act until it knocks. Waiting for opportunity to knock is the sole difference between the average Joe and professional traders. True insider methods aren’t methods at all – just a strict adherence to the day trading rules.
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