Ten Lessons I Have Learned in Working With Traders

When I sat down to write this article, I thought it would be challenging—but useful—to distill over 20 years of trading experience—and 25 years of specializing in brief therapy—into ten lessons that I have learned while working with traders (including myself!). In that time, I’ve written two books on trading and worked with dozens of professional traders at a proprietary trading firm. What has this taught me? Let’s break it down:


1. Trading affects psychology as much as psychology affects trading – This was really the motivating factor behind my writing the new book. Many traders experience stress and frustration because they are trading poorly and lack a true edge in the marketplace. Working on your emotions will be of limited help if you are putting your money at risk and don’t truly have an edge.


2. Emotional disruption is present even among the most successful traders – A trading method that produces 60% winners will experience four consecutive losses 2-3% of the time and as much time in flat performance as in an uptrending P/L curve. Strings of events (including losers) occur more often by chance than traders are prepared for.


3. Winning disrupts the trader’s emotions as much as losing – We are disrupted when we experience events outside our expectation. The method that is 60% accurate will experience four consecutive winners about 13% of the time. Traders are just as susceptible to overconfidence during profitable runs as underconfidence during strings of losers.


4. Size kills – The surest path toward emotional damage is to trade size that is too large for one’s portfolio. We experience P/L in relation to our portfolio value. When we trade too large, we create exaggerated swings of winning and losing, which in turn create exaggerated emotional swings.


5. Training is the path to expertise – Think of every performance field out there—sports, music, chess, acting—and you will find that practice builds skills. Trading, in some ways, is harder than other performance fields because there are no college teams or minor leagues for development. From day one, we’re up against the pros. Without training and practice, we will lack the skills to survive such competition.


6. Successful traders possess rich mental maps - All successful trading boils down to pattern recognition and the development of mental maps that help us translate our perceptions of patterns into concrete trading behaviors. Without such mental maps, traders become lost in complexity.


7. Markets change – Patterns of volatility and trending are always shifting, and they change across multiple time frames. Because of this, no single trading method will be successful across the board for a given market. The successful trader not only masters markets, but masters the changes in those markets.


8. Even the best traders have periods of drawdown – As markets change, the best traders go through a process of relearning. The ones who succeed are the ones who save their money during the good times so that they can financially survive the lean periods.


9. The market you’re in counts as much toward performance as your trading method – Some markets are more volatile and trendy than others; some have more distinct patterns than others. Finding the right fit between trader, trading method, and market is key.


10. Execution and trade management count – A surprising degree of long-term trading success comes from getting good prices on entry and exit. The single best predictor of trading failure is when the average P/L of losing trades exceeds the average P/L of winners.

Well, I’ve already hit ten and I have at least ten more I could jot down. Number 11 would be that successful performance mentors have content expertise in their particular domain. What I mean by that is that teachers of concert musicians themselves have experience as musicians; basketball coaches invariably have played the sport themselves. You learn trading by seeing your mentor trade and by having your mentor observe your trading. The right mentorship goes a long way toward shortening learning curves.

Figure it out: what proportion of baseball players, golfers, actresses, chess players, singers, or bicyclists can make a consistent living from their performance activities? Is trading really so much easier than those activities? The stark reality is that expertise in any performance field is the exception, not the rule, requiring dedicated practice and training. If you are emotionally prepared for the learning curve—and excited by the challenge—you are well ahead of the game. Start with finding the Three M’s: right methods, markets, and mentors. Those are the foundation of success, upon which you build skills and experience. Enjoy the journey!

Bio:

Brett N. Steenbarger, Ph.D. is Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, NY and author of The Psychology of Trading (Wiley, 2003). As Director of Trader Development for Kingstree Trading, LLC in Chicago, he has mentored numerous professional traders and coordinated a training program for traders. An active trader of the stock indexes, Brett utilizes statistically-based pattern recognition for intraday trading. Brett does not offer commercial services to traders, but maintains an archive of articles and a trading blog at www.brettsteenbarger.com and a blog of market analytics at www.traderfeed.blogspot.com. His book, Enhancing Trader Development, is due for publication this fall (Wiley).

90% Modeling Quality EA Tester in MT4

For those of you who want to test Phoenix (or any other EA) this manual shows you how to
get a Modeling Quality of 90%:
Use a separate installation of MT4 for testing
Install MetaTrader in a separate folder. You’re going to use this one for testing only. After the
installation open a demo-account so MT4 can update itself. After the update you click on
Help and About. Now you should see something like this:
After that, delete your account! This is necessary, because when your Terminal is
connected to the broker and you open a chart your History will be overwritten and
that’s not what we want.
Open your Windows Explorer and look for the folder where you have installed your test
version of MT4. Open the folder History and delete everything that ends with *.hst. Now
you’re ready to import the historical data for the pairs that you want to test.
Were to get the historical data
Go to:
http://www.alpari-idc.com/en/dc/databank.php
In this example we need the USDJPY:

Click on the USDJPY symbol and look in the next screen for FORMAT – MT4 and than click
on the M1 data:


Save the zip-file into a separate folder (DownloadSymbols or something like that) and unzip
the file. You now have M1 historical data for the USDJPY for more than 2 years.
How to import historical data in MT4:
Open the test version of MT4. You will get 2 screens about opening an account. You have to
cancel both because we don’t want to use an account for this test-version!
In MT4 click Tools and History Center and look for the USDJPY. Double-click the 1Minute
button. There should be no data in this screen:
Now click the Import-button and go to the folder were you have saved the file
M1_USDJPY.hst. Make sure that you’ve selected the right file-type (MetaQuotes files):


Now click the Import-button and go to the folder were you have saved the file
M1_USDJPY.hst. Make sure that you’ve selected the right file-type (MetaQuotes files):

When the data is imported, close the Import-screen with the OK-button. You have now
imported the data in the History Center. You can close this screen with the Close-button.
Converting the M1-data
Now we are going to convert the M1 data for the other time frames (M15, M30, M60, M240,
M1440 and M10080).
Click on File, Open Offline and look for USDJPY, M1. Select this and click the Open button

You now have an offline chart for the USDJPY M1 on your screen.


One more thing and I’m not sure if it’s still necessary but you have to change the Max bars for
your History and your Charts:
Click Tools, Options, and Charts and change it like this:
Close this screen with the OK-button.
On the left side of your screen you have your Navigator screen. If not you can open this with
CTRL N. Under Scripts you see the script period_converter. Double-click on it:


Close this screen with the OK-button.
On the left side of your screen you have your Navigator screen. If not you can open this with
CTRL N. Under Scripts you see the script period_converter. Double-click on it:


Now we have to convert the M1 data to the other TimeFrames. To start with the conversion
from M1 to M5, change the value of the Variable ExtPeriodMultiplier to 5 and hit the OKbutton.
The screen disappears and the script is busy converting the data:
The script needs some time for the conversion so you have to wait 20 to 30 seconds
before double-clicking it again!!
After the wait-time double-click the script again. You get a warning-screen asking if you
really want to stop the script. Yes we want, so click Yes:


Now you have the start-screen of the script again and you can use the next setting (15). After
that repeat the procedure for the rest of the settings. So we have: 5, 15, 30, 60, 240, 1440
and10080. Don’t forget the wait-time!
After the last one restart MT4, go to you Strategy Tester and you have a Modeling Quality of
90% for the USDJPY!!

Forex Tips: How to Place Stop Loss

Using Stop Loss in anytime we enter the market is one way to manage our risk in trading. While some other traders might consider it as the sissy way, I don’t….. I like to trade using Stop Loss. And it brings me to good results in the end of the day. Keeps me stick with well-controlled trading system.

When we decide to use stop loss, then we must be discipline in implementing it. If market price is heading so close to our stop loss, then we must not do anything. Do not ever try to replace your stop loss at further level from your open position level.

Replace your stop loss only for one reason:
For Trailing Stop Strategy (although I hardly ever use trailing stop strategy).

Now the problem is… where should we put our stop loss in each trading? Here are some tips I could give you:

1. Measure the gap between your stop loss and your open position level.
Usually I use these rules:
Eur/Usd: gap between stop loss and open position = 35 pips
Gbp/Usd: gap between stop loss and open position = 50 pips

These are representing maximum losses that you could handle in each trade.
Keep that always in mind. We’re not gonna enter the market without this gap rule.

2. Entry strategy
Then you could predict your best entry level using your trading system. And when you decide to enter the market at certain level (using your trading strategy), do not forget to pay attention to your stop loss. Where will your stop loss be placed using the gap rule on tips #1.

Try to put your stop loss below Support Level (for Long position) or above Resistance Level (for short position).

For example:
We had Eur/Usd support and resistance levels are at:
R3 1.3052
R2 1.2962
R1 1.2906
Pivot 1.2816
S1 1.2760
S2 1.2670
S3 1.2614

Then after measuring the trend, you noticed that 1.2870 is the best place to short on eur/usd. That means, by using 35 gap rule (see point#1), your Stop Loss would be at 1.2905.

Unfortunately, 1.2905 level is not a good level to place your Stop Loss. Why? It is not protected by resistance level. When market moves upward, your Stop Loss is not well protected by its technical factor. So it would be quite easy for the market to hit your Stop Loss. Nearest resistance is 1.2906, above 1.2905. So what do we do here is to move our Stop Loss a little above 1.2905. Let’s say we move it to 1.2910. Now technically, you have a well protected stop loss.

When you move your Stop Loss do not forget about the gap rule (as said in point#1). So we have to move also our open position plan.

And now, your plan becomes Short at 1.2875 (5 pips above 1.2870) and Stop Loss at 1.2910 (5 pips above 1.2905).

3. Keep calm when market heading so close to your stop loss.
Anything could happen in Forex in very short time. No one can control people madness when they enter the market. But the most important thing in dealing with this mad world is ‘risk management’. Successful traders realize that sometimes they had to deal with fail trades.

So if your stop loss is hit, let it go. That’s just the way it is.

You can find this article in www.briansignal.blogspot.com
Written by richie
YM ID: richie_news@yahoo.com

Psychology of Trading

by Jason Alan Jankovsky
As we have discussed before, this discussion forum is to explore the psychology behind the success or failure to trade successfully. As most traders with any experience know, the ability to “call “ the market is relatively easy in comparison to getting properly positioned within the market, and taking the most amount of money from your observation; that is where the real work of lasting trading success really lies. All of us have found the actual bottom or top of a significant move but failed to capitalize on that opportunity for one reason or another.

This month, I would like to address one of the more common trading errors. Everyone has made the error of overtrading at some point and many continue to make this error despite knowing they have this problem. Just knowing you have a propensity for a trading problem is half the battle but more importantly, you need skills and tools to correct your trading error. One of the more critical skills to develop in my view is to stop and confront the problem of overtrading.

Overtrading is a symptom of a deeper psychological problem which I like to call attachment to results. All traders have a certain degree of results they are pursuing in the markets; that is not the problem. The markets exist to exploit inequalities (real or imagined) in the supply and demand of something or financial instruments. It is a good thing to see an opportunity and assume the risk for the potential that is there. Once that action has been taken the only question is whether or not that inequality you perceived is an actual event that is unfolding over time. Between the time you execute for an entry and the time you liquidate for an exit; the markets will be moving. That movement is where the issue of attachment to results translates into your personal results.

Attachment to results can actually be expressed two ways depending on your personal psychology and trade method. The first way is holding losers and the other way is overtrading. We will discuss the issue of holding losses at a later time but the net effect on your equity is the same whether your problem is holding losses too long or you overtrade. Attachment to you results is the bedrock problem behind either overtrading or holding losses. In the case of overtrading, it represents the psychological need for immediate results (or positive results) without the corresponding willingness to allow time to pass. I think it is safe to say that a certain amount of time is required for any trading style to generate a gain and the unwillingness to let the required amount of time to pass comes out in the markets as constant execution over some timeframe.

If you use an hourly timeframe to pick your points of entry it is safe to assume that more than one hour must pass in order to determine if your executed trade has potential as you see it. Should the market move against your position that is to be expected, it is unreasonable to assume you will “buy the low” or “sell the high” every time you trade. As the market moves, if you are attached to your results, that movement means something to you. It is personally helping or hurting your equity. As your account balance changes from open trade equity, your focus narrows down to how this is affecting you personally. Most traders with this problem now seem to forget the high degree of study, preparation and thought they invested into picking that spot to execute. For some reason, the long-term fundamentals are forgotten, the technical studies are re-evaluated in real time, the protective stop order might be moved and the limit order to take the gain is moved closer to the market. Or any number of things. Then this trader executes to exit the market. Prices remain near their entry or advance. Attachment to results now says “You are missing it! You were right!” and this trader now executes again for an entry. As prices return to the first entry price, this trader again has a small open-trade loss; again the trader’s attachment says the trade is not going to work. This process may repeat itself several times over a short period of time, especially if the market is advancing in the intended direction. The problem is not the market price action; the problem is the attachment to results imposed by the trader creating an urge to action that is not consistent with normal ebb and flow of most market action. The trader has failed to allow time to pass and let the market do what it is going to do. During a major price advance or decline that was properly observed, this trader has small gains or even net losses when his just sitting tight for a period of time would have resulted in a nice gain.

Solving this problem is a factor of learning patience as well as adapting your thinking to better fit with the market you trade. I have observed from working with many developing traders that if they have the problem of overtrading, the simplest solution is to impose a new set of rules on their execution that allows time to pass. I have a very common sense based method that I would encourage you to try for yourself. Simply turn your screen off; the assumption here is that the market will do what it will do whether you watch it or not. The problem is not the market price action, the problem is attaching meaning to that action and executing. If you can’t see the price action, you can’t execute. So the first thing we do is impose the rule: After you execute you have to turn the screen off for at least one bar of your time frame as a minimum.

In most cases, several bars are needed to either confirm or deny a trade potential is developing so often the trader must sit in front of a dark screen for several hours. The market is still moving, but in this case, the stop is also still where it was originally placed, the limit is still where it was placed and the trader cannot reevaluate the trade nor do anything except wait. During this time I also require the trader to write out in as much detail as possible exactly his hypothesis for the trade. This keeps the trader focused on the critical thought required to do the trade as opposed to how the tic-by-tic price action is affecting his equity. After enough time, this self-imposed isolation develops into patience to let the trade work. At some point, the trader will no longer need to be “in the dark” and he has the skill to simply sit still and let the trade work.