The Exciting Life of a Trader…..

NOT!

The last 2 days have been exceedingly boring (tradingwise) as perhaps the market prepares itself for NFP day today.

So whilst the market does nothing I have watched all 12 episodes of season 4 of Dexter – I love that program and OMG what a shocker at the end. Absolutely fabulous!

It always help to have something else to do whilst waiting for your set up to not appear otherwise you end up doing boredom trades which slowly erode your account. These are the Starbucks coffee kind of trades. It’ll cost you about £2.50 per day for your vente latte but over 12 months thats about £650 per year and with trading we are spending more than £2.50 per day!!

Over the last 2.5 days I have also been looking at my trade journal and realise that I have in fact been placing Starbucks trades. Trades at 20% my normal position size, trades that 8 times out of 10 cost me money. Individually the cost to my account is not that big a deal, accumulatively the skies the limit. It’s the erosion effect of water dripping on stone to my account balance but also the psychological effect that needs to be considered.

Why place the trade in the first place at 1/5th of my normal position size either a) I’m bored or b) The trade doesn’t follow my strategy or c) I’m just ‘giving it a go’

Whatever the answer a, b, or c the trade should not have been placed and this is a habit that must be broken.

If I’m bored – do something else (Like watch Dexter! I’m moving onto Lost next)

If the trade doesn’t follow my plan either don’t place it or if I’m testing out a new system use the nano account

If I’m just ‘giving it a go’ i.e. punting – THEN DON’T!

First step in rectifying a problem is recognizing that there is a problem!!!!!

Trade journals are a wonderful thing – have you looked at yours lately?