Dealing with technical difficulties in our devices can be frustrating, especially when it affects our work productivity. That was the case with my Samsung laptop. Despite the depot's attempts to repair it, it failed upon receipt, and I had to send it back. As a result, I had to resort to using my backup laptop, which wasn't ideal but did the job.
My blog posts have became inconsistent as most of my trades were scalps during Holiday conditions. For those unfamiliar with the term, scalping is a trading strategy where a trader enters and exits positions quickly, often within seconds or minutes, aiming for small gains. This style of trading requires intense focus, discipline, and a clear strategy. This style of trading is not ideal for charts on blog posts but I hope to find some opportunities to share this week.
On Friday, I got trapped into NAS100 and US30 trades, which I was forced to carry over the weekend. It was a costly mistake since the market closed at 905 am, and the trades remained open until Sunday, resulting in significant swap costs. This experience taught me to always pay attention to holiday hours, especially when trading in international markets.
Another mistake I made was not accounting for the spread during the thin liquidity when trading USD/CAD and AUD/USD. A spread is the difference between the buy and sell price of a currency pair, and it represents the cost of trading. During volatile and/or sleepy market conditions, spreads can widen significantly, which can result in unexpected losses. The potential swings that I had anticipated were destroyed when spreads increased, resulting in significant losses.
One habit that I'm working on getting back into is securing partials. When entering a trade, I'm starting to take partial profits at predetermined levels again. This way, I can lock in profits and minimize my losses. It's a simple yet effective technique that can help manage risk and improve overall trading performance.
Finally, as a trader, it's essential to stop worrying about how much could have been taken. In hindsight, it's easy to see missed opportunities and potential profits. Dwelling too much on these missed opportunities leads to my biggest trading mistakes, especially holding on to too much of the next position, for too long. It's important to focus on the present moment and make the best decisions with the available information.
Holding too long or cutting your winners short in trading can be something else. In my experience, there were trades that i take full profit at my first profit target, only to come check the chart at days end and realize that the trade would have hit my full tp if i had help on.
The next day i would see another opportunity and this time decide to hold through till tp only for price to come take me out after being in good profit for a while.