Your most valuable lesson

That is very good advise if you add "If it goes down get rid of it"

 

Stick not to plans, but to your rules.

Do not expect market will make you money, only you will make (or lose) your money. Which means be active , aggressive, and vigilant in constant assessment of the situation. Keep your eyes open - situation is fluid , trends got accelerated, exhausted and reversed, the new supports and resistances develop constantly. You have to notice the changes and react accordingly. Do not pray, do not wish, do not hope - act, motherfucker !

Never concentrate too long on one time period even if you have just opened position in it - you will miss something important on shorter or longer ones.

 

Not even close and not what I said.

 

true it is not you exact words but it is a corollary to it.
r.morses said

• Only allocate funds toward strategies that make money and avoid those that do not.

will rogers said '"Don’t gamble"; take all your savings and buy some good stock, and hold it till it goes up, then sell it. If it don’t go up, don’t buy it."
on a third reading it still remains close enough to be an offshoot.

 

don't trade at all unless you can backtest your strategy 10-20 years with triple slippage, with stock and similar stocks and ETFs showing a positive expectancy.

 

The most valuable lesson being, if you do not have skills to code, you will forever be on the back foot.
Buy trading software which allows you to code your own algos.
The process alone of running your own algos will teach you how the market operates.

I can immediately visualise many ET'ers scratching their heads over that statement.

When you code algos, you will learn what works and what won't work.
It will keep your brain active.
You will learn that there are certain trading rules which work consistently.
Your success rate will improve, only limited by what you put in is what you get out.

I've been coding for many many years (not every day, week) and still discovering new stuff.
Just finishing off what I've called my 'Supalgo' and intend to run a journal on it.

 

Oh I gotcha... Five Stars. It took me a minute. Yes, its the best advice one could give someone starting out.

 

Well then I guess you have to ignore Warren Buffett and most of the "gurus".

 

This. Risk management (I use % loss stops, but I like my initial position to have some elbow room so I size down and pyramid up later when the edge increases). I don't sit there frozen and dumbfounded when the market moves against me anymore. It's really changed the game for me.

 

Most valuable lesson: Do NOT believe your losses can reverse even if it has turned around 9 out of 10 times before.