Trader Mindset

Some options trades require you to complete the structure in two steps.

Whereas you don't want to "leg" into intra-commodity spreads, you might consider that a strategy for your butterfly or condor trades.

Instead of putting on a long butterfly all at once, many traders we've worked with are buying call spreads, for example, and then after the market moves selling the call spread above it to complete the butterfly.

This doesn't work 100% of the time, and sometimes you just offset the vertical spread. However, sometimes is does work and you can take advantage of the flexible nature of options to carve out your Reward to risk profiles.

Michael Martin discusses how it's appropriate for some traders to focus on one market or sector for professional purposes.

Both winning and losing streaks are "user-defined" so make sure you understand what your trading results are telling you.

Here's one way to know.

You are powerless over the markets, regardless if you have 30 years of experience or only 30 days.

Focus on your process, because you can't control the outcome.

I believe you need to have positive intention about your trading as "intentions equal results."

Your intention is closely related to your attitude and your attitude affects your judgment, judgment affects your behavior, and behavior predicts where you end up in life.

You can't work backwards from losing money in one month and determine that you are not a good trader. You may have had bad luck or the markets might not be amenable to your trading rules.

You may come to understand that your process needs tweaking to better suit the markets or your emotional makeup. That's what backtesting is for.

If your results from trading in one month are "in model" then all you can do is study the variance between what orders your system generated and what orders you entered.

The same can be said about winning months and good trading.

In this episode, Michael Martin has a frank discussion about what you need and what you don't need at the beginning of your career.

In one sense, your job is to survive. That means going slowly and playing superior defense.

Many traders keep a full-time job to make sure they can pay their bills before going solo.

Michael Martin discusses the "triumvirate" that every trader needs to succeed long-term trading the markets.

In this episode, a reader asks Michael Martin about some of the markets he's trading.

Most allocators know that you are powerless over the markets. But if you tell them the markets you trade, they'll have a good idea of where your performance should come from.

Be mindful of all your trading activity and non-activity. Growing too slowly can be problematic, but so can growing too quickly.

You don't have to double your position to have added to a winning trade.

Try adding 20% to see how it feels.

For best results, you'll have to backtest in a simulator to determine the best location and position size for adding to your winners.

If you believe, like I do, that most markets don't trend and that trends persist, this might be a good tactic for you to look at.