I've been trading for a living - supporting a family of five; for several years now... and I can't remember the last time I came in at the open and said, "well, the market's going up, so I'm going to get long right now" - and just started buying and was correct (or vice-versa).
Of course they do unless they trade purely mechanical systems, but if you trade in a discretionary way you do predict. Say, you see a bullish stochastics divergence in a 2 min chart. What do you do? You go long because you anticipate the market to rise. You may of course argue that you reacted, but you reacted because you anticipated something, so your reaction followed your anticipation.
Well, I'm not saying that I would trade my predictions, buy my inkling inside for a day like today would be that it is a pretty big pop up for just one report. This is strictly just a casual observation and not something I'd go in tomorrow and start shorting everything. I am just hypnotized by the up and down oscillations of the market lately.
Equal on bull/bear and 2 to 1 favoring another year of congestion as of 1/3. Would love to hear from more of you. Thanks.
Think about the difference between an assumption and a prediction. The story of "The Phantom of the Pits" clarifies this.
He writes some really good things. When I read his stuff, I realized just how much my natural reaction is to do the opposite. He's buying more when its going up and I'm selling off -- or, he's selling more as it goes down and I'm covering. Or, I'm scaling in to the point of averaging up/down -- when he says to do the opposite. From a few months of trading and watching the market daily, I am convinced that trading is 99% money management. I'm not so convinced that any particular entry is better than the next, but if you're on a sinking ship in trading, sometimes the natural reaction is to make the hole even bigger. The hardest thing that I have learned is to accept that trading is not ego-driven and if I trade to be right, I'll lose money very quickly. I can't go into any trade and say, "I need to be right on this one." If I don't keep focused, I'll fall into that trap over and over again. The market is so close to random that a trader cannot afford to piss around in bad trades.
You and others are correct; for daytrading it does not matter as long as the market MOVES. But, I prefer to think of our mission as one of an "indian scout", find the trail and follow it!! Or as an interperter, as the thethaurus provides as a synonym fo "interperter": "forward planner". My interest in the poll was not reallt related to my trading only to evaluate a theory I have and will post when there are enough respondents to make a valid "sample". Unfortunately, I need about 500 and at this rate will never see that number.
prediction vs. reaction vs. opinion ..... sounds all like semantics to me? I thin time horizon makes a difference too in some of the interpretations.
I vote [ No Clue ] However, I did tell a couple of friends last week that when NQ got to the 980 area that I suspected that a 100 pt Nas 100 squeeze would be likely to occur. (90 so far) On the same token, I could have just as easily been wrong. Just so happens that this time I wasn't.
We react... Why? First, opinion... it's a reaction to what we see... We see a chart or hear a news. Then we interpret it. Then we create an opinion. So in another words, we reacted to the chart or news to create an opinion. Second, prediction. Same thing. We get a set of criterias. We take those criterias based on what the market "did". We can't predict without information. OK, let's say we create an opinion or a prediction out of no where. Like: Hogs are going up today.(I don't trade or follow Hog) That's not both but a guess. Understand? Do you guys really trade??? C'mon it's trading psychology 101.