Interesting thread, and got me thinking...... For me the biggest mistake was letting my curiosity lead me to the various books, gurus, blogs and backtests to satisfy my lust for knowledge. And I spent over ten years learning all the ways to lose! There has been one way to take money out of the market since the very beginning that I discovered my first month, but refused to keep using because it wasn't the money I was after (not all of us want to be rich, buddy). And I'm having to force myself to use it now, because I hate it and there is no sport in it whatsoever. Who was that one guy who made the famous quote: "everybody gets what they want out of the stock market"?
My biggest mistake was watching financial TV news...reading mainstream financial news....and then BELIEVEING THEM. I never made any money until I firstly turn off financial TV and canceled my financial News. And then, i did even better learning contrarian thinking, fading the financial news. It was also similar when believing the Fed knew what they were doing and trading accordingly. Once I realized the Fed was clueless, I began to take advantage of their blunders and bubbles.
The dumbest thing I've done is not withdrawing my profits. I've had multiple 6 fig runs, but instead of taking out half or something, I thought I could let it run more. And time and time again, I lost most of it Always withdraw your profits consistently.
"""Dumbest thing you ever did in trading""" To begin trading with the INSANE assumption that my many past successes at extremely difficult activities that i was involved in (sports, IT Training, coding, etc.) would allow me to easily master trading. Not... Even... Close...
It was 30yr T-bonds, had three lot AND I was on vacation. Lol, so many reasons...it was so funny after years' time. Had cat back then, he would play with my mouse after I took a break, I'd come back to the screen to hear "order filled", both times had made a small profit. Stay in game long enough, everyone makes a mistake. Lol, what happens when your internet/electric/broker goes out and you are scalping ES, you learn to have backup internet, generator and brokers.
Good Morning ironchef, YES, The $1million profit club. I am trying. I am trying my friend. I will join soon.