From The Economist, a piece studying judicial rulings: Decision making is mentally taxing and that, if forced to keep deciding things, people get tired and start looking for easy answers. As active intraday traders do we hit a point where we want easy trades? Do we stop thinking as thoroughly as we should after a series of trades on the Open? … Read More
05/08/11 Market and Swing Setups
@AdamG_SMB covers setups in $ES_F $SPY $SI_F $SLV $AMZN $MCP $AAPL $PAY $VMW $BIDU $BTU $HUM $COF $SGI $BJRI
Katz’s Corner: Are There Trading Hot streaks?
Do we have hot streaks as a trader? There is some research here from the must read @jonahlehrer that suggests that the belief there are shooting streaks in basketball is not supported by the data. I asked Dr. Jonathan F. Katz of High Performance Associates and who works with traders for his thoughts (see below): Ah, the age old question, perception … Read More
Dimes for Dollars
The second reason many traders fail to “stay with the move” is the fear of giving some profits back. The overriding emotion of having to get every penny in every trade causes them to get jumpy as soon as the stock does a stutter step. That’s fine if you are willing to get right back in if the trend resumes, … Read More
Forex trade of the week
A key point in the EUR/CHF trade was when the price fractured the areas of support, which are identified by the Fibonacci retracement at level .618 % at an approximate price of 1.2800. Once those areas have been breached, we expect the trend to be lower than the previous minimums, but in turn, the price increases producing up trends. This … Read More
Confirmation bias and the trading this week in SLV
From Ian Leslie in his blog why is reasoning really all about winning: It’s been shown again and again in studies that we have a very strong ‘confirmation bias’; once we have an idea about the world we like (Obama is un-American, my girlfriend is cheating on me, the world is or isn’t getting warmer) we pick up on evidence … Read More
SMB Visits Indiana University
Mike Bellafiore recently visited Indiana University to speak with college students interested in trading.
Sittin’ on the front porch sippin’ iced tea
It’s funny how non-directional options trading differs from many other kinds of trading. For example, most forms of trading require price change to be taken advantage of by the trader. Day traders salivate when they look at charts that are vertical, in either direction. Directional options traders are the same way. But, non-directional options traders normally do best when … Read More