Time is precious. Wasted time can never be recovered, while wasted effort drains energy and commitment. All my trades are off the D1 chart and entries are order-driven only. I don't need to watch the markets waiting for an opportunity to enter - no trades are opened live, SL's and TP's are already set. The chart situation can only change after the close of each new day's session. There is generally nothing for me to see if I open the chart intra-day. Added to this, I use just a few reliable set-ups for trading. I take the features that confirm these for the markets I track and log them on a spreadsheet after each session. I spend more time looking at the spreadsheet to direct me to the best charts than I do looking at the charts themselves.
how much time/day do you spent on research, charts & TA? is the time spent on these things that valuable that it provides you with a higher [success] win rate/profit rate ove someone such as myself that spends little if any time on charts & TA? how many trades on average/day do you do over the course of an average month?
I might spend half an hour a day on TA Monday-Friday, probably an hour at the weekend. I log the TA features that are characteristic of the set-up onto the spreadsheet, then look at the positive charts in more detail for a potential entry point. This is a top-down approach that definitely keeps me out of low probability trades. Thing is that spending longer looking at weaker charts (with respect to my preferred set-up) is unproductive. Number of trades per month is a lumpy figure, depending on how "trending" the forex markets are but maybe 20-30. In any case, this figure isn't crucial - maybe I could take a much smaller number of much larger positions.
I trade hard all day long which is why I assume its called day trading. I gave up a $300K per year job to do this so I am going all in with my time. I don't take a walk around the block during the day, I don't wash clothes and I don't do errands out and about. I love the first 15 minutes of every trading day and it totally gets me stoked for the day. My heart beats big when I place my first $1M trade. For example, I was up $1000 this morning but got hit hard by the down turn and was down $7000 quickly. But I clawed and scratched my way back with little $500 - $800 wins throughout the day to get to a $352 profit for the day. But I worked at it all day without taking a break. Also, on the occasional time when the market is kicking butt I would never leave my trading desk when the fish are biting -- I'm all in all day long.
Competently and correctly distributing your trading time is very important, your success and emotional state depend on it.