Can knowing too much about finance hurt your trading?

those "piss poor' phd types are making a hell of a lot more than most here... and more importantly, their earnings stream is more valuable because it is more certain and steady, ie their p/e ratio as an individual would be much higher.

 

i remember the first time i started trading. i thought that since i have a degree in international finance, i'll be a millionaire in a few months (literally).

to my disappointment, i have to realize that trading(not sure about investing), has very little to do with finance.

whether u trade stocks, toys, books, kittens, etc. it all has to do with basic supply and demand. PRICE and VOLUME. it also has alot to do with your attitude/personality (Read psychology) in order to determine the trading time frame that suits you best.

in other words, a knowledge of finance is going to cost you a lot of money in realized losses when it comes to trading.

i had to unlearn and "dumb down" myself. finally, i had to destroy my ego like they nuked japan.

that was just to learn how to stop loosing money. making money is another topic altogether.

 

I found PhD's and MBA's make the worst traders. Economists come in second worst.

The absolute best traders are Engineers, especially E.E.'s , then CS majors.

 

I'm not talking about their "fixed income" paychecks but how they handle trading decisions.

 

It depends. Some engineers are stubborn perfectionists and can't handle losing trades or mistakes. They would rather be right than to make money.

 

This is true, but financial statement analysis will only help a long term investor. In the meantime you could have dead money for years.
Also, because of the games companies play, financial statement analysis can often be borderline useless for investing.

 

The best traders are like thos antisocial autistic savant/genius types who are far from perfectionist, wear the same ripped jeans and don't comb their hair. Like this guy at an office who never spoke to anyone, but munched on assorted chocolate bars all day with his feet tucked up in his chair. His eyes never left the screen, I don't even think he went to the bathroom. When things went his way, he would just start to cluck like a chicken.

"Bawwwwrkk Bawwwwwrkkk Bawwwwrrkk!!"

 

Engineers/Comp Sci generally have the advantage here.

 

I'm going to go way out on the limb here and take a wild assed guess that your not a millionarie trader.