This is the time of year, everyone reflects on careers and life with questions about habits and how to improve.
Here are my top 3 habits to replace in 2024 as it relates to trading:
Listening to Opinions as if They Are Facts
Just the other day, I was listening to a well-known market expert. He was giving commentary on how he believes 2024 will play out.
As I listened, I realized he was just giving his opinions. He provided no data or history to back up any type of thesis. Later, when I reviewed some of his comments from 2023, I found those to also be opinions that never came to fruition.
Traders will be better off in 2024 if they quickly distinguish between opinions and facts.
Second Guessing Trading Tactics
When a trade goes against us, it’s easy to want to ditch proven trading tactics. This is especially true if we hear of another trader taking a position in the opposite direction on the same ticker.
This type of second guessing generally leads to more failure. While tactics can always be improved, the best use of time is to instead apply proven exit strategies.
Often when we practice this, we find losses are minimized or that our trade actually works out positively the way we planned. We would have been better off not paying attention to others and not second guessing ourselves.
Making trading Decisions Based on Emotions
This often occurs during times of great fear or extreme greed.
For example, when certain types of banks began failing in early 2023, fear was high and traders bailed.
If traders had based their decisions on historical data, a different outcome might have been realized.
For example, Charles Schwab Corp. (NYSE: SCHW) fell heavily along with all other banks on March 13. What has SCHW not done all year long? It has not made a lower low off that news.
There were multiple trading opportunities available in SCHW, especially when noting that insiders were buying it hand and fist after the fall. But trading SCHW was not for the faint of heart…
Replace Bad Habits With This Visual
To help me regain sanity at any point in time, I often refer back to this picture from Fidelity. It depicts the movement of markets throughout time as defined by three basic cycles: Secular, Business, and Tactical.
Is there anything chaotic about this chart? In my opinion, no. It is very smooth and rather predictable.
Markets move in cycles and patterns. Regardless of the juiciest current event that makes us feel like the end of life as we know it is near, opportunity is available within multiple time frames.
Stop trading with your ears in 2024. Trade what you see instead.
Think and win!
Celeste Lindman
Celeste Lindman Trading
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*This is for informational and educational purposes only. There is an inherent risk in trading, so trade at your own risk.
P.S. The 2024 Gold Supercycle Has Begun!
By now, most traders already know this year could spark an epic supercycle in gold.
So the No. 1 question begging for an answer is:
How can you best prepare yourself for this anticipated surge in the price of gold?
The way I see it, you can do one of two things…
You could trade gold the “old fashioned” way, meaning you would pay around $2,000 an ounce right now.
Or you could take advantage of this simple way to trade gold — without buying the precious metal itself…
A way that currently has a win rate near 80%!
If you choose the second option, I can show you how best to use this simple gold trading method in your brokerage for FREE.
The profits and performance shown are not typical, we make no future earnings claims, and you may lose money. The trades expressed are from historical data in order to demonstrate the potential of the system