Category Archives: Market-Forces

Market Ability

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Hammers…

…hammer.

That’s their job.

They do a good job, at hammering.

At times, the market behaves like a hammer.

Market players learn from hammerings.

Question is, can market players learn without being hammered?

I don’t think so.

One can psych oneself into believing otherwise, I’ll give you that.

And, for a while, things will look like all’s good.

Point is, one isn’t looking for the hammer, …

… the reason for which being, that one has never experienced one.

That’s when the hammer falls, when and where one is least expecting it.

It is better to undergo a hammer event in the early days of one’s market career, and while one’s young.

Young – because – a). one plays small when one’s young, mostly by default, owing to there not being ample access to fund supply. Also, b). in the early days of one’s market exposure, the bulk of one’s mistakes and miscomprehensions emerge. The combination of these two facts a). and b). leads to losses that are bearable (youth has backups, like parents). In our youth, we tend more to brush it off and move ahead, full of energy. Yeah, youth has the energy, and time (upcoming multiple market-cycles), to not only emerge from a hammer, but to go on to prosper from the now ingrained learning.

Issue starts when our corpus is big and we still don’t know what a hammer is.

Issue compounds when we then confuse our ability to implement money into markets, in an effort to make it work, with actual market ability.

What is market ability?

It all starts with risk profile.

Some people die without having recognized their risk profile

Then, after having recognized one’s risk profile upon encountering some hammers and seeing our bodies and minds react to these, we move on to systems.

From development to fine-tuning to implementation of a system, we keep chipping and chiselling away at our strategy. We emerge with one that has an edge. We continuously work to keep our edge profitable.

Simultaneously, we throw in risk management. Development of an emergency fund is part of this.

Discipline.

Regimen.

Rules.

Let’s throw in some unpredictability, on purpose.

After putting one system on semi-auto, we work on another, and so on and so forth. We use our profits to diversify and make ourselves more secure, ideally anti-fragile.

Market ability is a successfully implemented combo of all these factors and perhaps more.

It includes being a good human being at home too. There’s no question of letting out the effects of a bad market day on one’s family members. We’re stopping all market action before anything like this develops. Harmony paves the way for another serene market day…

…about to dawn.

Thaw?

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What does this even mean, …

… in today’s financial context?

Great, there’s some kind of a thaw on the horizon.

It’s only happening because one leader refused to be bullied.

Now, others are at least voicing themselves.

Had no one stood up, bully would have continued to arm-twist the world.

Is this a healthy situation?

Specificallly, in the context of one new tantrum almost everyday, there seems to be something big brewing.

Markets, in their efforts to behave ‘efficiently’, factored in a possible ‘thaw’, and one is barely getting entries now, for lack of margin of safety.

Fine.

No action is also considered action. No action is supreme.

Since one can feel it in one’s bones that something big is brewing, …

… will choose to save entry capital for the times to come.

Whatever’s brewing, should it come to pass, …

… will create the conditions for more entries, …

… will create margin of safety.

Proppers

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Come a crash, …

… we will let it…

…rip.

Toolkit is in place.

Having said that, the thing about crashes is, that when everyone expects them, …

… they don’t come.

If it were that easy, markets wouldn’t be markets.

That’s exactly what they are doing currently, being what they are, markets.

Some are being propped, and other markets are showing resilience, taking any kind of news in stride, and still advancing.

How long can something be propped?

Not forever.

However, longer than most players can stay liquid, that’s how long.

That’s an old market adage.

Eventually, proppers get tired, of printing, circulation, falsification or whatever gimmick they are employing. Mistakes at this level are deadly.

When a propped main market pops, initially it does take down most other markets, but resilient ones recover fast. Propped ones, after the pop, remain down, meaning that they encounter a delayed recovery.

A big pop only means entry opportunities in our resilient market of choice.

There’s no question of fear. This is what we wait for. Margin of Safety. Value. Opportunity.

Entry.

Winnings

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Not all…

…winnings…

…are tangible.

Intangible winnings…

…can be far greater…

…in stature.

One can carry these with…

…anywhere.

Don’t need to know more.

They’ve won their case already.

Let’s break this down, using a concrete example.

Let’s take this blog.

First, the losses.

Subscribers?

Hardly.

Financial loss?

A few pennies a day, equalling domain charges plus plus divided by 365.

Effort loss?

Yes, a lot of effort goes in. However, it is rewarded heavily, though indirectly. Since there are no more losses, let’s talk about winnings.

Sharpening of skill – maximum.

As words flow, ideas are elucidated, take greater shape, and are cemented into a system.

I’ve often spoken about the fact that this blog can also be seen as fundamental / critical / what have you research towards developing a 360 degree unified market field approach. I think I’m there.

Let’s look at the system that has evolved over the last fourteen years – specifically, let’s look at modules incorporated.

Small Entry Quantum.

Non-Linear Position-Sizing.

Cost-Free-Ness.

Long-Term-Hold.

Positional-Hold (culminating in trade booked with cost-free-ness generated).

2 Demat Approach.

GTT incorporation.

Buy Low.

Sell High.

Entry.

Sitting.

Letting Profits Run.

Exit.

Averaging Down.

(Stop-)Loss attenuated by Cost-Free-Ness’s capability to rise by…

…’Banking on Infinity’…

…in a Non-Linear Long-Term Growth-Market.

The Zone.

The Line.

Fitting.

Market Forces.

Market Presence.

List goes on.

Bottom line is that what has emerged is a decent-size double-digit list of modules incorporated into one clear-cut, multi-level and dynamic wealth-creating strategy…

…with results that make ‘losses’ due to lack of subscribers statistically too small to even mention.

I write to create a magnificent system, and to keep fine-tuning it.

My system creates wealth for my family.

I donate a small part of our wealth to charity.

Hence my writing facilitates pro-bono work.

Some of the few readers of this blog might one day choose to implement a few modules, or perhaps the whole approach. I’m happy for them. God bless them. Magic Bull is completely free, and is part of my give-back to society.

I create good causes with my writing.

While writing, I feel buoyant, sharp, and fulfilled, carrying this combination of feelings into the day, spilling them over into other good causes created over the whole day.

Am thankful for this avenue, since it gives my creativity an outlet.

🙂

Throw-Offs

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Hey.

Stumbled upon a concept.

Calling it the throw-off, and…

…sharing it with you.

How many times have you booked too early?

Booked late?

Gotten in early?

Late?

Not risen to required action?

Made a bad decision?

Lost faith in the market?

In yourself?

These are results of throw-offs.

Something has thrown you off your game.

This something is the ongoing market action at the time.

Action has been such, that it has thrown one off one’s track.

It’s not your fault. Action is such.

Price hits a stop, for eg. You take the stop. Price resumes in same direction.

Price hits a target. You get out. Price resumes.

Price falls just short of the stop, resuming. You double down. Price then breaches stop and a down-trend starts.

Price shoots past target, not giving you time to act. You then define a new target. Price nose-dives beneath old target, just as fast, eating up a good portion of your original profits.

Examples can be many. Common factor is market action throwing you off your profits, or throwing you out in loss.

Where do we stand?

Is this cause for alarm?

Is there something we can do about it?

First up, market action is a sum resultant of all market behaviour put together, and is perhaps impossible to defy. Our pockets are not deep enough by miles.

We don’t fight market action.

We use it.

Yes, since we can’t defy it as such, we make it work for us. Also, if market action alarms you, do something else which doesn’t. That’s where we stand.

It’s ok to be thrown off while following one’s trading plan.

It’s not ok to be thrown off, having been psyched into altering one’s trading plan mid-trade.

Meaning that it’s not ok to book below target owing to adverse market action above one’s stop.

Also, when a trade is going against us, again, it’s not ok to exit owing to adverse market action above one’s defined stop.

One exits at stops, not above. Sticking to this one rule will nullify throw-offs above stops. Defining is easy. Doing is difficult. Over time, with practice, we define and do. Period.

Now we tackle targets.

How do we knock-out throw-offs here?

Another day, another defining rule… 🙂 … .

Don’t exit at targets.

If you don’t exit at targets, no one can throw you off before a target.

Ok, so what’s the exit strategy whilst in profit?

Have a target.

When it comes, it triggers your stop into existence, which you have defined x% below this target.

So, we now stop using the word target. We use ‘trigger’ instead.

In other words, your stop gets activated, or triggered into existence, once a certain profit-threshold is crossed.

This stop, which has just come alive, is dynamic in nature, towards the profit-side only.

It moves in the same direction as the price, in a proportion defined by you.

As price keeps moving, your stops keeps locking in more and more profit.

You’ve knocked out the throw-off, since your exit is completely rule based, and no one else knows the parameters (numbers) you are feeding in for exit.

Eventually, price action makes you exit rule-based, when price reverses above the ‘trigger’ and hits your dynamic stop. Market action hasn’t succeeded in throwing you off your game.

Notice one thing?

You’ve been in control of your trade all along.

Your head is sane, your emotions are stable. You have set yourself up to take some very profitable decisions.

Wishing for you lots of profits…

… 🙂

.

Beta

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We’re not afraid…

…of beta.

In fact, we want beta to be there.

And, we want it to be big.

Beta is part of wealth-generation through cost-free-ness.

Why…

…are we not afraid of beta?

When we make an underlying cost-free, there are two parameters that are of prime importance, in the game that we are playing.

First up, speed of cost-free-ness.

How much time has it take us to reach the desired stage?

Too much time?

Work at the strategy.

Short time?

Great.

With large betas, we take lesser time to reach cost-free-ness.

Cost-free-ness is a state of mind.

Also, it is a function of parameters prevailing.

As a result of internal synthesis, we know in our mind when it’s time for cost-free-ness creation.

Once cost-free-ness is created, we move on to the next play with the same objective.

Next up, we have quantum of cost-free-ness created, per capita time.

Higher the quantum, in lesser time, why, that’s optimal.

Again big beta.

Without big beta, there’s not much chance of achieving large quantum in less time.

How do we exploit big beta to attain objective?

Get in on huge margin of safety. Get principal out when exuberance prevails. Scrips being played are those of which you are convinced. Meaning, that you are mentally in sync with very long-term holds of cost-free-ness created in these scrips.

Also…

…as a general game-enhancing practice…

…get in and out with multi-day or multi-month triggers. Don’t look at the markets while they’re on. Take emotion out of play. Nil market forces out of your equation.

Here one sees, how, amongst other factors, a big beta allows one to generate long-term wealth through cost-free-ness while…

…acting on one’s own terms.

Harness

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Market forces are like Wifi.

When we connect to them, they…

…connect to us.

When we’re indifferent, …

… we’re in a different world.

When we create systems, and put them on auto-pilot, we mostly do away with the ability of market forces to act upon us.

A successfully implemented system on auto-loop is like making time stand still.

That’s our goal; that’s where we want to be.

In the act of getting there, we are subject to compelling market forces.

How do we deal with them?

Rather than suffering KOs from their punches, we devise systems…

…to absorb their blows,…

…understand the implications of these,…

…to, then,…

…harness them.

What am I talking about?

Why give market forces so much power?

Why not?

They’re there, right?

In abundance, too.

Why not use them?

How?

You can go back to George Soros’s back pain for starters.

Have you developed such physical systems?

I’ll tell you what I implement. It’s a me thing. You’ll need to develop your you thing. I’ll share with you my me thing, though.

When markets are down, I do feel bad, it’s an initial reaction. I wait for it to intensify. I wait for myself to feel awful. That means markets must be really down. As awfulness rises, I start buying. When awfulness is uncontrollable, I buy big. When it makes me puke, I buy maximum. Meanwhile, I’ve rewired my nervous system to accept the awfulness as a marker for buying, and I’m not sad that I’m feeling awful during market crashes. Hmmm, I know it sounds a bit crazy, but this a successful harness-methodology of otherwise overwhelming market forces.

When markets are up, I feel buoyant. Earlier, when I felt buoyant, I used to buy more. Now, I do nothing. Market-nothing, that is. Non-market, I’ll do many things. That’s harnessing buoyancy. As markets rise further, I do even more of market-nothing, and when I can’t control it, I then start creating cost-free-ness. When buoyancy is uncontrollable, I create maximum possible cost-free-ness, and hopefully, then, I can go on market-vacation. Before I do that, I make sure to transfer the cost-free-ness created to a dedicated holding platform for my cost-free-ness.

Ideally, new market activity needs to only commence upon the next set of opportunities. Sometimes, one needs to wait long for these to develop. The act of bridging time comes in handy here. Market is not giving action. We harness even that. We have accumulated lots of pending tasks, just for this kind of period. Now, we do these. Ultimately, an opportunity arises. A new cycle of cost-free-ness-creation starts.

Development of you-unique systems helps you harness the market in a winning fashion.

Wishing you lucrative investing and lots of cost-free-ness!

🙂

Urges

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Market forces need to be understood…

…to win in the markets.

When do market forces start affecting us fully?

When we put our own money on the line.

That’s why…

…don’t…

…ever…

learn finance from someone who…

…doesn’t put his or her money regularly on the line.

When we put our money on the line, market forces start changing our psyche.

If we’re holding funds, we develop the urge to buy.

If we’re holding underlyings, we develop the urge to sell.

Early in our career, we give in to these urges at precisely the wrong time, resulting in loss-creation.

As we become more seasoned, we are able to resist such urges, till conditions provide profit.

As our market career continues, this is where fine-tuning matters the most.

How long are we able to resist the urge to sell as the market climbs?

How long are we able to resist the urge to buy as the market crashes?

These are pivotal questions.

One of them is playing out now.

As new highs are made, many have already sold out.

Some have sold partly.

Very few retailers are still holding on to whatever they might have left.

It’s institutions buying and selling.

New entry at these levels are a dizzy proposition.

I won’t hide that as markets climb higher, I experience a very strong urge to sell.

It’s…

…over-compelling.

How do I deal with it?

When such urge is too compelling, one does oblige.

One sells…

…little…

…and that’s the tough one.

One needs to oblige the urge lest some piston bursts, but simultaneously, one needs to hold on to as much as one can…

…since markets are on a roll.

One can’t learn this from a book, or in college.

After selling early many, many times, for more than a decade and a half, one finally learns to hold on to a chunk of one’s underlyings as markets go ballistic.

As heights get higher, this mechanism will make one sell, though, little by little…

…and that’s ok.

Let’s make sure that we do keep holding a chunk of the stuff we really like, though, after having taken the principal out.

Otherwise, how will we allow multibaggers to blossom?

Easier said than done, I know!

Bridging the Gap

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How does one bridge the middle overs?

Sure, a blogger who is simultaneously a cricket fan…

…will dish out analogies from cricket… 🙂 … !

We’re in the business of identifying extremes…

…and acting upon such identification.

Whatever is in the middle of these extremes…

…is, for us, an area of…

…inaction.

Do we know how to not act?

There is an impulse for action in all humans.

In these loaded times, this impulse is extreme.

Why do we not want to act when an extreme is not there yet?

During times of complete pessimism, one is able to purchase underlyings for a song.

Similarly, during times of total optimism, one is able to secure good exits for stuff that one wishes to get rid of.

How one behaves in between adds or subtracts significantly to or from one’s market success.

Selling early means lesser profits, and the same goes for buying late.

This is the kind of behavior that lessens our multiple, sometimes greatly.

This kind of behavior would be absolutely ok if one were trading.

We, @ Magic Bull, are in the business of effecting multiples.

Anything coming in the way of that is behavior we wish to avoid.

With markets normally trading between extremes about 95% of the time, this leaves us with a lot of time in which we do not act.

Also, it brings us back to the pivotal question – how do we manage not to act when everything and everyone around us is screaming for action?

We do – everything – else.

Apart form market action, there’s business activity, charity ventures, extra curricular activities, family time, sport, leisure, entertainment … … one’s day is packed.

There are two portions of the day when one is driven to the edge of action, though.

The first is after studying market opening.

This is when one does a half-hour call with one’s broker and just sheer discusses everything one is observing.

Strike 1.

Then, as one studies the close, this situation can arise again.

One writes, for example.

Or, annotates charts.

Observes prices.

Collects impressions…

…and demarcates patterns.

That’s sufficient.

Strike 2.

There’s no room for strike 3 – one just doesn’t let strike 3 happen.

Rewiring 3.0.3

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We grow up, being taught to win.

Slowly, we learn to expect shocks, but only sometimes, in sparing intervals.

We prepare fancy resumés. 

Life must look five star plus all the time, that’s the standard. 

We see this standard all around us. It encompasses us. We become it, in our minds.

It’s not like that in the markets.

Markets are a world, where loss is our second nature. 

If we’re not accustomed to loss, we die a thousand deaths, in the markets. 

What kind of loss are we taking about?

Small…

…loss. 

Your stock holding going down to 0…

…is a small loss…

…when compared to another holding multiplying 1000x over 10 years. 

Both these scenarios are very possible in the markets. They’ve happened. They will happen again. 

How do we react?

Our stock going down to zero mortifies us. We do something drastic. Some of us quit. 

When our potential 1000x candidate is at a healthy 10x, yeah, we cut it. 

Then we quickly post the win on our resumé. 

We must look great to the world, at any cost. 

We keep reacting like this…

…and, like this, we’ll perish in the markets with very high probability.

We can’t take a hit, and are nipping our saving graces in the bud. 

When does this stop happening?

When we rewire.

Rewiring is a mental process that happens slowly, upon repeated market exposure. 

For successful rewiring to take place, real money needs to be on the line, again and again and again, as we iron out our mistakes and let market forces teach us the tricks of the trade. 

While we’re rewiring, we need to play small. 

When we’re partly rewired, we wake up to the fact that this is the age of shocks. 

High-tower professors who’ve never had a penny on the line and have put together theorems about six-sigma events (black swans) setting on once in blue-moons have led us to believe that black swans are rare. 

They are not. They have become the norm. Our first-hand experience of multiple black-swans in a row teaches us that.

Once we rewire fully, the expectation of black-swans as the norm is engraved in our DNA. Then, we use this fact to our huge advantage.

How?

We realize the value of our ammunition, i.e. our liquidity. 

Whenever we have the chance, we build up liquidity. 

We become savers, and are not taken in by the false shine of the glittery world around us.

Also, when markets are inflated, we sell stuff we don’t want anymore, boosting our ammunition for the next onset of crisis…

…and, we stop preparing fancy resumés.

Markets have humbled us so many times, that we now just don’t have the energy to portray false images. 

Whatever energy we have left, we wish to use for successful market play, i.e. to make actual money. 

When that happens, yeah, we know for sure that we’ve fully rewired. 

Welcome to rewiring three nought three. 

Sitting – III

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Mood-swings…

…happen all the time…

…in the markets.

If we don’t get used to dealing with them, we’re pretty much gone.

When pessimism rules, it’s quite common for one to develop negative thoughts about a holding. 

Research – stands. 

There’s nothing really wrong with the stock. 

However, sentiment is king. 

When sentiment is down, not many underlyings withstand downward pressure.

Eventually, you start feeling otherwise about your stock that is just not performing, as it was supposed to, according to its stellar fundamentals. 

If your conviction is strong enough, this feeling will pass. 

Eventually, pessimism will be replaced by optimism. 

Upwards pressure…

…results in upticks. 

Finally, you say, the market is discovering what your research promised.

You feel vindicated, and your outlook about the stock changes, in the event that negativity had set in.

You’ve not ended up dumping this particular stock.

If your conviction had not been strong enough, you would have gotten swayed. 

Market-forces are very strong. 

They can sweep the rug from under one’s feet, and one can be left reeling. 

In such circumstances, solid due-diligence and solid experience are your pillars of strength, and they allow you footing to hold on to. 

However, if your research isn’t solid enough, you will start doubting it and yourself, soon (and if you’re not experienced enough, make the mistake, learn from it, it’s ok, because your mistake is going to be a small mistake just now, and you’ll never repeat it, which is better than making the same mistake on a larger scale at the peak of your career, right?! We are talking about the mistake of doing shoddy due-diligence and getting into a stock without the confidence needed to traverse downward pressure).

With that, your strategy has failed, because it is not allowing you to sit comfortably. 

Please remember, that the biggest money is made if first one has created circumstances which allow one to sit comfortably. 

Basic income. 

Emergency fund.

Excess liquidity.

Small entry quantum.

Rock solid research work, encompassing fundamentals and technicals both. 

Margin of safety.

Patience for good entries.

Exit strategy. Whichever one suits you. It should be in place, at least in your mind. 

Etc.

Fill in your blanks. 

Make yourself comfy enough to sit and allow compounding to work. 

Weed out what stops you from sitting, and finish it off forever, meaning that don’t go down that road ever again.

Very few know how to sit. 

Very few make good money in the markets.

Make sure that you do. 

Make sure that you learn to sit.

Technically speaking, how are you doing?

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Hey,

How’re your technicals going?

The whole world looks at the same or similar technicals, you know.

For example, if there’s support, everyone knows there’s support.

If a Fibonacci level has been reached, it’s the identical story.

When a trendline is broken, yes, you guessed it, the story hasn’t changed.

Yeah, we’ve got a problem.

What do we do here?

We don’t have an option but to think a couple of steps ahead.

As in, when a support is reached, we’re still talking about support at minus let’s say 3%, ok? Decide whatever number you wish to for yourself here, but till support minus that number is not breached, in your book, support still hasn’t been broken.

Thinking around, that’s what we are doing here.

Why?

We don’t wish to be pushed into market behaviour till something is happening.

We wish to forgo noise.

When we act, we wish to do so in a more sure-shot fashion.

A thinking-around approach thus becomes inevitable.

Similary, it’s not a Fibonacci bounce-off till let’s say (Fib62 + x) has been surpassed. Decide what your x is.

Or, a trendline is not broken till the close says so, or till there are two simultaneous closes below or above it.

You get the drift.

Make your own bye-rules.

That way, for all you know, you could still end up using a potentially defunct technical machinery, which, because of your thinking-around exercise, has suddenly become a powerful and potent tool.

🙂

Give Me My Table & I’ll Undetach

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Detaching…

… .

My work is done for the day.

Enjoying the remainder of the day is now a priority. 

Would that be possible without detaching from the workplace?

No.

Is it that easy…

…to detach?

No.

Am I successful in detaching?

Reasonably.

Just like that?

No.

Meaning?

It’s taken me fifteen years to learn to detach reasonably well from the markets, …

… and, there are still times when external factors cause unwanted and untimely re-attachment.

The next time I wish to undetach (yeah, just made up this word!) is the next time I wish to engage. 

To undetach, all I need is my work-table. 

Rest follows on auto. 

However, when I’m not on my work-table, mostly, I don’t wish to undetach, …

…and surely enough, someone will want to discuss markets, …

…or someone switches on financial TV, …  

…or one catches a headline in the paper, …

…or a tip can’t be refrained from being given, …

…or, well, use your imagination.

Getting around peoples’ free-fund-attitude is the biggest challenge for a market-practitioner, in my opinion. 

You might master market-etiquette, and you might learn how to detach in isolation. However, people won’t spare you. 

Detaching despite people while living and thriving amongst people is one huge win. 

Getting there…

… 🙂 .

Control

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Who’s in control?

You?

Market?

Does the market control you?

Do you control yourself?

How do you answer this?

Why are these questions relevant?

Control is pivotal. 

It sets the tone for market life, and its overhang affects normal life too. 

That’s why it is essential to have such control in one’s hands, and not hand it over to Mrs. Market. 

So, how does one answer this question?

What triggers you to open your terminal?

The market?

Or you yourself, at a time and place of your own choosing?

If your answer is the former, the market controls how you act.

However, if you decide when and where to let market forces into your life, and for how much time, well, then you’ve not handed over such control. 

Bravo!

How did you position yourself to achieve this?

Primary income not from the markets? 

Not.

Don’t listen to tips?

Don’t.

Have a set time for work?

True.

Have a set place for work?

Roger.

Have a set system that’s implemented?

Affirmative.

Watch market TV?

Nope. 

Read financial news online, or in print?

Only while researching a company.

Do your own solid research?

Do.

‘K, you’ve not handed over control all right.

Sure. Hand over control and the next thing you know it’s your life you’re handing over. 

Listening to Time

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Market work…

…has some eccentricities.

One can’t work in the markets all the time.

That’s normal, right?

Well, yes and no. 

At a place of work, one should be able to work. 

Markets don’t always allow work.

So don’t other work places, sure. 

At other times, you don’t feel like doing market work. 

Aha. 

This happens multiple time a year. 

What do we do here?

We create an environment that incorporates this eventuality seamlessly. 

First up, why is this incorporation essential?

Let’s assume that we need to work in the markets all the time. 

When we don’t feel like, and we have to, well, then, we are likely to make mistakes. 

Read mistakes as losses. 

Mistakes in the market translate into losses. 

(Amongst other things), we are in the markets to …

… minimize losses. 

Therefore, when we don’t feel like doing market work …

… we just sheer don’t do it. 

So, back to square one, how do we incorporate this seamlessly?

By making market work our secondary source of income.

Our basic income needs to be sorted through our primary source. 

Now, we can shut off the markets at will without this affecting our basic income. Whether we can also emotionally detach is a discussion for another day. 

There are times when one just doesn’t feel like opening up the terminal. 

Listen to such times. 

Shut out the markets at will…

…only to open them up again when they’re a go for you.

We’re still at step 1, which you’ve just cleared for yourself. 

Now we try and gauge whether times are such that markets allow work.

Listen to such times. 

When you feel like working and markets allow you to work, go all out. Exhaust existing work potential. 

When you feel like working, and markets don’t allow work, do other stuff. Get your research ready. Become poised. 

Sooner than later, your action criteria will be met…

…and you will be able to act. 

Does your Exit hurt you?

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Good. 

Good? 

Yeah. Good. 

A proper exit – hurts. 

Huh? 

What about exiting on a high? 

Sure. 

Go ahead. 

Exit on your high.

Who’s stopping you? 

However… 

… who’s to say that the high won’t become higher? 

Exactly. 

No one knows. 

So, while the uncertainty about the high becoming higher is still out there – smarty – why are we going to not let it play out? 

Exactly. 

We are going to let it play out. 

Purpose? 

A new high might be posted. We then make more profit. 

Or, trade starts going against us, and we start to lose some of what we’ve gained. 

Hurt starts. 

When you can’t stand this hurt anymore – exit. 

That’s a proper exit. 

It’s leaving a bad taste in your mouth in the end. That’s when you know it’s a proper exit. 

You’ve stomped out the possibility of a new high. 

You’ve taken what the trade has to give. 

You’ve let the hurt set in. 

You’ve let the trade arrive at its logical conclusion. 

Now, you are exiting. 

Congratulations, you are exiting properly. 

Continue like this and you’ll become a great trader. 

What, have I let the cat out of the bag? 

Don’t worry, one can say it a million times and 99% of all traders will still continue to exit improperly. 

It’s human nature. 

Human nature works against the mindset of a winning trader.

That nagging nagging push towards action 

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Yeah, it’s always lurking… 

… in the background…

…waiting for an opportunity… 

… to catch you unawares… 

… and spring to the forefront. 

Market-play is a mental battle. 

Your mind wins or loses it for you. 

Make your mind understand the value… 

… of action… 

… and of inaction. 

Make your mind pinpoitedly choose… 

… the time for action… 

… and for inaction. 

Make your mind automatically switch from…

… a state of action… 

… to a state of inaction… 

… and vice-versa… 

… and feel perfectly normal doing the switch… 

… again and again and again. 

The above by itself is a winning state of mind for you, which you can build upon. 

🙂 

Decoupling One o Two

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Trade on.

Market forces.

You.

Connection.

Attenuation.

Life normal.

This is the real decoupling.

What was the other decoupling?

The myth one?

Myth?

I mean, Switzerland is kinda financially decoupled. The CHF just keeps its own despite anything.

Israel is also sort of decoupled. Despite everything. Functions on its own tangent. Matter of opinion.

These are exceptions. They prove the norm.

There are remote chances these exceptions won’t exist tomorrow. Having said that, let’s hope nothing like that ever happens.

However, permanent decoupling is mostly a myth. We’ll be better off not incorporating it into our investment or trading strategy.

Decoupling one o two is a different matter.

It is very welcome.

It gives longevity and harmony to a trader’s market- and normal-life.

Happy trading!

🙂

Additive Connectivity

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What’s your market footprint like?

Meaning, where do you tread?

How do you tread?

Are you making a hash of it?

Do you connect the dots?

Are you organized?

Does your one action span across multiple goals?

What exactly are we talking about?

Chaos. 

You are your own light. 

Nobody can help you, except you, ultimately. 

Therefore, gear yourself up, to win the game for yourself. 

It possibly won’t come to exist, that you do one market thing. 

Market activity is multi-faceted. 

Even if you’re trading one single entity, there are many actions that go along with this one single activity. 

Yes, we’re talking about market actions. 

The sum total of your market actions is your market footprint. 

Make your actions additive. 

Meaning?

Each action should add to you. 

If an action is not adding to you, don’t do it. 

Even an action that stops further loss adds to you, for example. 

Also, make your actions connect across segments. 

Meaning?

Let’s say I’m eyeing a stock for a possible purchase, or a repurchase. Stock gaps down next morning, before my action. Aha. Hold. 60-70% of all gap-downs play out further. There’s a solid reason for gap-downs. So… hold. Yeah, action on hold. Why? I will possibly get a better price for reentry later, there’s a 60-70% chance of that. Thus, an action now won’t add to me. Action postponed. What do I do with the money set aside for the repurchase? Liquid mutual fund purchase. Online. Seamless. Connecting across? Absolutely. I’m simultaneously accumulating liquid funds to later go in for a private-placement NCD. Therefore, my one action from the equity segment has connected across to the debt segment. Yeah, connectivity. Additive. Stopped me from possible high entry. Made upcoming NCD purchase more possible by adding to its intended corpus. Additive Connectivity. 

Yeah, make yours a winning footprint. 

Before signing off, I’d like to share with you that i’ve just decided to take additive connectivity to the nth level for myself. 

Sure, I’ll be sharing more examples. 

Sharing brings joy to everyone, even to the person who is sharing. 

When are you doing it Right?

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There’s something called the Line.

You feel it.

It’s abstract.

You have to be its master.

Then, you’re doing it right.

Controlled, the line won’t disturb your life.

It’ll very probably add to your life, in terms of wealth.

If you let it control you, everything is finished.

Goodbye.

Life. Wealth. Peace of mind.

It pays to master the line.

How do you feel the line?

By being invested, or in a trade.

How do you master the line?

By being invested or in a trade, again and again, again and again, and then some. Simultaneously, you’re nipping your bad behaviour in the bud, while the line is on.

You control your temper. You don’t lose it.

You develop patience with loved ones.

You learn how to position-size the line, while winning or losing.

You attenuate all kinds of disturbance.

You keep going on and on like this, till one fine day, the line’s presence becomes a part of your life. Line-switch being on doesn’t change you or alter your behaviour in any negative manner anymore.

That’s when you’re doing it right.

Effects?

Trade on = like when trade was not on.

Investment? You’re not thinking about it.

You sleep well.

Good family life… not disturbed by the presence of the line.

Yeah.

Line.

Master it.