Monday, March 28, 2011

Dealing with Floating Profit

How to deal with floating profit / loss?

We always being told not to sit on a losing position, also not to sit on our hand watching our winning position turn sour.

There are so many theories, philosophies, rules out there regarding this topic, but just recently heard from Jason, "trading is not about how much you earn, but is about how much you don't lose".

When a trade goes in my favour, SL has been moved to breakeven, price is approaching my initial target, should I:
1. wait till it hit the profit target and call it a day, or
2. take away the TP and set reasonable trailing stop to let the profit run?

Usual thoughts will be in the direction of "how can I maximise my gain?", and therefore we will try to find ways and rules and truths on how to "leave the least on the table". We want to earn more. However, if we think in the direction of "it's about how much I don't lose", then we will be happy to take away the initially planned profit. After all, that's our PLAN. We should not regret for following our plan (provided we planned it properly). We should only regret if we do not follow our plan (even though the outcome might be a desirable one for now).

Protect ourselves, before thinking to take something out of the market.

不入虎穴焉得虎子,但上得山多终遇虎。。。所以上山前先铺好退路,穿上铁布衫软胄甲,到时就算遇了上山大王,也得保个全身而退。

Thanks to Trading Buddy for the reminder.

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4 comments:

  1. Good piece of food for thought. Good job, buddy. You should share more about your trading philosophy in this blog, so that read like me will be benefited. Thanks. :D

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  2. you tell me more things, then I got more things to write...haha

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  3. hi Ayumi :) yea, haven't been posting on the blog for a very long time.

    thanks for dropping by...haha

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