I would think that a sociopath would have a hard time trading. It is not true that they have no emotion - they have no empathy. They feel things acutely for themselves though and have a really hard time being honest with themselves. I would think that might make becoming a successful trader a lot more difficult than it already is.
You don't have to be a sociopath to follow some trading rules. Personally, if I could generate a set of rules that made me money I'd program it into an algo and let the computer do the work.
Yes, antisocial personality disorder is mostly connected with neglect of common social rules, habits as well as ethical/moral practices considered normal in a given society. Can such a disorder help one become a better trader? Doubt it. A better criminal? Absolutely. So what we have is probability that criminal or borderline criminal part of financial (or any other) industry is full of sociopaths. At the same time it's possible that on the retail level people who are misanthropes (not necessarily sociopaths) choose trading as their career because there is no need to interact with as many people as it usually happens in many other professions.
For those of us who watch CNBC's American Greed, in the relatively few cases where some ponzi scheme scammer actually tried to trade on their own, they all failed miserably at it. Nuff said.
They'd rather thrive in a setting where they have easy human targets to profit from. In the world of computerized trading we are all relatively equal and our losses are our own - we can't really talk ourselves out of it as psychopaths/sociopaths would like do. As already mentioned, the sociopaths on American Greed rarely do any real trading and if they do, they tend to lose a lot amazingly fast. There's an interesting documentary about psychopathy titled "Psychopath Night" on your favorite Swedish sailboat website.
Exact psychiatric definitions and populirazations aside, a properly altered psychological make up, that denies emotional response seems to me to be most certainly beneficial in trading. Half the equation in trading is being unaffected by monetary considerations and by irrelevant information so as to be able to see and, without any resistance, act upon relevant signals disregarding all that one thought before and the immediate consequences. That of course assuming that one's methodology is profitable in the first place. That's the second half of what it takes to trade successfully. Discretionary traders and mechanics face the issue differently; with a different âtempoâ. I'd bet emotionally compromised persons are represented above average among successful traders. I wish I were a psychopath. ras72
Control over negative emotions is not related to psychopathy. More so, self-control is one of key components of people with high EQ. As for positive emotions (of moderate, "average" strength, not speaking of euphoria here of course), they help everywhere, including trading. No single reason to be envious of psychopaths.
Yeah... I'm a layman. You are the psychologist. Speaking of which, I believe I am not the only one who would appreciate any practical tip you could share that could help with emotional control. I posted yesterday or the day before in another thread some of the stuff I do. I wonder if you could help me take my mind messing to a whole new level. Thank you. LOL ras72