Was up $300 this week and just busted my $1000 account today and feel god awful. I won a $1000 gift card in a stock contest out of 500 players and just received it today but that in no way eases my pain. Is there any way I can take that loss and use it to my advantage instead? I am just really fed up of feeling miserable everytime I bust my account. It's like my whole life depends on the success of daytrading.
With your account go away the illusions. That’s why it’s so difficult. 1st. A thousand bucks is toy money. 2nd. You need a minimum to trade correctly. 3rd. You can’t trade properly asking too much. 4th. It takes time and it’s hard 5th. Especially illusions. 6th. You may not be ready yet. It’s a big hit to see your dreams go away in one trade. Because you didn’t want to take that loss. That grew out of hands. You ain’t too big to fail. You’re too little to win xD (Just want to sound stupid). Think survival. You can’t cheat the market ad infinity. Stay in the game. Don’t try to fool the market. Keep realistic. Don’t run away from hardship. Cut loss short. Losing 1K is a gentle lesson. You had to lose it anyway. What have you learnt ?
Trading is a game of probability. Loss is unavoidable and a good loss is better than a bad one. What is a good loss? A small loss.
It always bothered me if I lost money in a trade. It is unnatural if it doesn't. A couple of suggestions: 1. Trade smaller sizes. If $1,000 bothers you, trade $10, $100. 2. You win some and you lose some it is all part of the game, just like playing sports. Used to bother me a lot, with practice I am now ALMOST (not quite) numbed to losses and wins.
Everyone has losses. Anyway, considering taxes, taking a loss can be a definite plus when paying them. Just keep in mind the wash sale rule ... after taking the loss, don't buy substantially similar stock w/in 30 days.
Only if you do a proper analysis. First you have to figure out if the trades you took made sense. Some would say if the trades you took were part of your trading plan that showed you had a statistical edge, but just asking if they made sense is the watered down version. Then you have to figure out if the trade was managed properly. Did you exit at the place you intended to, and is this stop also a stop that you researched as making sense? Some use a fixed stop, which is fine, others use a stop based on price going somewhere that shows the reason for the trade is no longer valid. Or maybe the stop can be based on giving the trade enough time to either work out or not. If the trade made sense, and you managed it properly, but it still turned out a loser, then nothing you can do about that. But more than likely, once you analyze each trade, it will dawn on you that you're doing shit you never intended to do and that emotions going in the way. So once you figure out what went wrong, then you can move forward with figuring out how to fix it. I could say post some of the trades here for us to view, but this might be troublesome since everyone has a different way of trading. But at least if you post some trades and a productive discuss ensues, you might begin to figure out where you went wrong.