Anybody who wants to learn day trading needs to follow certain principles. I won’t say rules because a lot of folk do not like the word, but beliefs. Some of them are quite well known and some of them are less so, but they are all urgent to the successful trader. I call them the 4 major guidelines of day trading.
1. The Buck Stops With You
Whether you are looking about for a day trading system or developing your own, remember that whatever you do is your responsibility. Ask for advice and help by all means, but don’t believe everything you hear. Everyone is different and their trading styles can change exceedingly, so never follow recommendation blindly.
Equally, you can purchase in a system but do not neglect to test it. Even if the guy who designed it is saying that it’ll double up your cash in two months for certain sure, you must test, because there are three possible issues with that. One, he might be lying. Two, maybe it used to work well but it does not work any more. Three, maybe it works for him except for some peculiar reason to do with your spread or whatever, it does not work for you. Your cash is your responsibility and yours alone, so put the system to work on a demo account till you are sure.
2. Stay Calm
The biggest enemy of any trader is their own feelings and this is especially true for the individual that wants to learn day trading. If you are the kind of person who makes bad choices under stress, you may want to think again about choosing day trading as your method. This is a fast moving world where seconds can count in thousands of greenbacks, so you must keep a very cool head.
Now just about everyone likes to think they seem to be a calm kind of person who would react well under pressure, so even if you’re convinced you’re going to be the world’s number one ice cold trader, test yourself as well as your system in that demo account. If you veer off the system even once or start altering your position size, closing out early, waiting too long etc in demo mode, sorry but you aren’t ready for real life trading when things will be much more hairy. Work on it.