When a novice trader first enters the marketplace, s/he is bombarded with decisions regarding where to begin and what approach to take when it comes to trading and/or investing. There are as many styles of successful trading as there are traders, and which direction a trader takes is a very personal decision. There are four major factors one must consider in making this decision:

Which type of market analysis will I employ?
Which markets should I focus on?
Which strategies should I use for trading?
Which time frame should be my primary focus?

How a …

The market is an ever-changing entity, each day presenting us with different and unique scenarios with no two days every the same. Nevertheless, the market is more or less a reflection of people’s ideas and attitudes and while it is also true that no two people are alike, each and every one of us has something in common with someone else, whether it’s the way we get out of bed in the morning or the foods we prefer to eat. Additionally, we tend to repeat actions, such as preferring to …

I am going to share with you a simple discipline that can really help your trading. This simple little act is often ignored by new traders and overlooked by experienced traders.
Here’s what brought me this subject. Whilst discussing the markets with one of my students he was trying to justify a position in the market he had. This particular trader was an intraday trader who normally trades off a 1 minute and 5 minute chart. His typical style of trading was to try and …

Support and Resistance 2 – Swing Highs and Lows
In the last article I stated that support and resistance (for me) is based on previous swing highs and lows, areas of congestion, round numbers and gaps. We’ll now review these types of support and resistance, discussing how to identify them, and how they formed. In this article we’ll start with my favorite support and resistance – swing highs and lows. Why are they my favorite – in my opinion they can form some of the strongest signals.
A swing high is simply …

Support and Resistance – The Greatest Trading Tool
Despite all the hype from the internet marketers who try to sell you the latest trading ‘secrets’, the fact is there are NO secrets.
* Identify setups which provide the potential for lower risk and/or higher probability trades.
* Enter and manage those trades in a consistent and disciplined manner.
* Minimize risk.
* Manage your money.
* Manage your emotions.
* Journal your results, and review them to identify what’s working and what’s not working.
* Keep doing what is working, and
* Improve what is not working.
If you’re not trading …

In this article the author outlines five simple tips to pick stocks for day trading.
Just having all the important qualities required to succeed as a day trader won’t help; proper selection of stocks for day trading is equally important. Generally day traders fail because they don’t select a proper stock for day trading.
Certain rules that can help you in selection of stock for day trading are discussed here. These rules can be digested quickly to help you avoid the biggest pitfalls in trading. These rules include:

Trade liquid stocks
Avoid unpredictable (chaotic) stocks
Trade …

The nature of the markets is uncertainty. Human beings do not like uncertainty. In fact we fear it at the very depths of our soul. Much of our society has evolved in an effort to reduce the uncertainty we face in day to day life, through controlling the environment, and implementing a structure of laws, rules and regulations. This has been largely successful. Although uncertainty in life cannot be totally removed, we have managed to create a structure in which people can live with relative safety and generally a higher …

I’m of the belief that the single biggest barrier to success for most traders, is themselves. Psychology is one of the aspects of this job that is discussed the least, and yet when you ask most professional traders, they will agree it is the most important to understand. Master yourself and the rest is easy.
As traders, we know that we must run our winning trades, and cut our losing ones. This is of course, more easily said than done. How many times have you …

In this last article of the series, I’m going to look at what is perhaps the biggest mistake of all, and yet should be the easiest to overcome.
Mistake Number Seven – Not Taking Action
For every trader who opens a brokerage account and starts placing trades, there must be a hundred more who had every intention of doing so, but for one reason or another, never actually took that step.
It’s a blindingly obvious statement to make I know, but you cannot make a profit from the markets if you don’t actually …

If you’ve been following these lessons through so far, you might by now be wondering if this trading thing is really worth it. What with all the planning, testing, and continued effort, it perhaps seems much more complicated than you first thought.
Mistake Number Six – Over-complicating It
It’s easy to get caught up in the details, but if we take a step back for a moment, trading really need not be complicated at all. Finding a strategy to work with can take as long or short a time as you like …