There’s lots of research out there about business failure and for the most part, the same could be said for trading. Here’s a list of the 10 most frequented catalysts for business failure: 1. 78% lack a rigorously-developed business plan keyed to the realities of their market, including sufficient research on the business before launching [...]

There is no feeling quite like that of success in trading. To take the time to perform analysis on a name, establish a trading plan and then profit from your hard work is an awesome feeling. Putting a string of winning trades together like that is priceless. However, the chance of overconfidence or believing that [...]

I’m presenting a psychology of trading webinar for free with the good folks at TradeKing. The webinar will be Tuesday, August 24th at 5pm ET If you’re interested, click the logo below to be taken to the page to register. I hope you’ll find the time to attend.

It seems so easy to focus on the things we do wrong. I can name hundreds of mistakes I’ve made in my life. I choose not to focus on what went wrong, but rather on how I can improve my standing and learn from my mistakes. I found one of the most frustrating aspects of [...]

One of the five factors the Market Awareness Profile (MAP) measures is conscientiousness– the way in which we control, regulate, and direct our impulses. Impulses are not inherently bad; occasionally time constraints require a snap decision, and acting on an initial impulse can be an effective response. Nonetheless, acting on impulse can lead to trouble in [...]

The old saying “the trend is your friend” is easily one of the most widely used and accepted aphorisms of the markets. Looking back at what the market has done since March of 2009 it is easy to see why the trend is indeed your friend. It’s also easy to see why so many market [...]

Stock market bubbles exist when stocks are overvalued but can be difficult to truly measure as” value” is a subjective metric. Bubbles are easily seen in hindsight as the warning signs that may have suggested the bubble tend to glare; this is known as hindsight bias. However, the issue I have with hindsight bias is [...]

Personality can be defined as a dynamic and organized set of characteristics possessed by a person that uniquely influences his or her cognitions, motivations, and behaviors in various situations. One such situation is trading and the basis for the personality assessment that I created called the MAP (Market Awareness Profile). The Big Five factors of [...]