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Close to ninety percent of all traders lose money. The remaining ten percent somehow manage to either break even or even turn a profit — and more importantly, do it consistently. How do they do that? The goal here is to make you the 10% that makes money consistently. There will be bumps along the road and it truly is a marathon and not a sprint. There is no Holy Grail of trading. You can succeed, and you can outperform the averages as long as you keep focused.
We will spend a lot of time on this topic this year. There will periods when it is easy and periods that you will want to quit or bang your head against the wall. I am also in the process of creating a longer term swing list. Don’t panic, it wont be a buy and hold situation. We don’t do that here. Some may be dividend payers and some may be ideas where I am looking for multiples on the trade. The key is to perform over time and not worry so much about about last week or last month. Try and look at it on an annual basis, at least that’s what I do. Of course there will be very short term trades.
I also encourage you to “get on the chat room” if you can. There is much knowledge disseminated there. Charts, set ups etc…
The last couple of months of 2011 were challenging to say the least, but at the end of the day it was a good year.
I will try and keep the P&L list a little more manageable this year with less names so you will be better able to diversify among all the names on the list. I will list bonus ideas that may not be on the P&L, so you will have more of a selection for those of you that want more selection.
I cant stress enough for 2012. If you are following my P&l to the letter, you will do well (barring any unforeseen disaster), if you trade your own ideas and mix in some of mine that’s fine, but I can only be accountable for my ideas.
Diversification is key, so try and keep some powder dry for the next idea that may be right around the corner and NEVER go all in on one idea. You know the drill and you may pick the one that fails miserably.
As you know, I try my best to be available to all of you. I am pretty much open 24/7 and those of you that have been with me for a while know that I’m not a world traveler, meaning I’m always in the trenches with you guys. So if you have questions, please email me, I do my best to respond in a timely fashion. Is it sometimes exhausting? Yes. Would I want to be doing anything else? No.
I hope you all have a great 2012 and many of you have become an extended family to me. Acquaintances are just friends you have not yet made and I look forward to getting to know all of you better. The bottom line though is the dollar sign when it comes to trading, and I am working hard to make this a good year for all of you.
Europe continues to be the five hundred pound gorilla, and here in the States we have a Presidential election around the corner. Will the euro get crushed and will the eurozone dismantle? When their recession deepens how will it effect the U.S. markets? What will happen to gold and the dollar? What happens with the Mideast and how will crude be effected? So many questions. It wont be easy.
I find it hysterical that the S&P closed flat for the year, when I felt like I was in a dryer’s spin cycle almost ever day in 2011.
Tune in to tomorrow night’s blog as I will point out some of the biggest mistakes that traders make.
I will have our video out within a few hours and I will email that to you as soon as it is finished.
Now let’s go take some names.