Do retail traders need to shed their humanity to succeed?

The Lobby
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This is a kind of lateral thinking topic.

Retail traders are, understandably, engrossed in the issues of how to make money - and as much as possible - and as quickly as possible. This is not just greed. It is also based on an understanding that trading full-time does not offer good long-term career prospects! You’ve got to earn it quick or not at all.

It is quite clear from many YouTube producers that full-time traders also end up seeking non-trading income from advertising, subscriptions, mentoring, merchandise sales, etc. If their trading is consistently positive, why is this? Why the need to diversify?

So how does a retail trader focussed entirely on chart movements also remain human? And should they? What is the point of “being human” anyway? Do you know why?

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Its a deep issue, but us humans are a curious bunch!

But think, is true satisfaction gained just from personal success? in achieving one’s own goals? Or does it go even deeper when one fulfils one’s responsibilities for others, or takes one small step in making another being’s life one step better?

For example, why do humans take animals as pets? It is not all about the fun, there is also the commitment, responsibility and costs. Why do we do that?

How can we, as retail traders, not lose sight of our humanity and intelligence, as the dominant guardians of fair play, equality, and responsibility for all other life on our planet?

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If one does not understand the issue, let me present a situation:

Today was NFP day, the biggest data release of the month, any month, every month!

Every speculative retail trader in the world is watching it, including me! OK, so the GU initially dived, then rebounded, then looked weak, I sell it, I make 20 pips in 10 mins on the reversal, I am ecstatic… so what? Later in the evening I remember that I haven’t checked on my mutual fund investments today - in fact, I haven’t checked on them all week, almost forgot they were there! OK so they are actually doing ok, especially the defence industry funds.,Hmmm…

I watch the news, horrific things going on in the world, is WW3 around the corner? Yes it surely is! But I am happy because my defence industry investments are doing fine! Am I really happy? Well. yes, at least for as long as the war is not on my doorstep…

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I was driving home tonight and passed a dead squirrel on the road being pecked to pieces by magpies. Nature is beautiful, but it is so savage!

So where do we fit in the picture as humans? Are we part of nature? or beyond nature? Above it or below it? When we have destroyed ourselves, either externally with nuclear weapons or internally via AI, will nature again just close over us and carry on as though we were never there? Maybe we are not so smart after all!

When I walk my dog in the forest, I often past trees which have stood on the very same spot for maybe 100 years or more. Imagine, the same spot for 100 years! I can’t do that for 5 minutes! :smile:

We are part of a massive reality in so many forms, yet trading is so miniscule in its focus. How do we blend them and still meet our responsibilities? Indeed, our very obligations, given our superiority in intelligence over all over forms of life? Perspective is a complex issue!

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It’s simple people like Greg secker and mamba fx are course sellers , which means they gave up trading for themselves because they kept losing , which makes them losers in the game overall .

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If something goes wrong with your car or computer or washing machine, etc, you take it to a service centre where it is dismantled and repaired.

When you wonder why your trading is not going well you will get plenty of immediate advice that the problem is between your ears. And that the solution is to take out your brain and dismantle it on the table and remove all the bits that make you human. No more impatience, no more emotions, no more spontaneity, no more impulsive reactions.

And if you have trouble doing that then there are many, many books you can buy that will guide you in dissecting your personality. Now you have a trader brain.

But, apparently, one can achieve a dual-mode brain set-up where you can flick a mental switch and toggle back and forth between your normal self and your trader brain. I.e. switch on when you enter a trade and off once it ends. Once the trade ends and you toggle back to “normal” brain, then you are again free to explode emotionally about the trade result, gain or loss…until the next trade and flick of the switch…

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Food for thought there Sovos
Good to get the broad view perspective now and again to keep the mind open.

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no feelings, you can’t feel sorry for the price if it falls, or feel sorry for yourself if you are in the red, just be smarter and more experienced

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Yep, when I read through the various posts here on BP I often get a picture that traders are intensely involved with their trading and their own psychology, maybe even obsessively so. Certainly more so than most other jobs and pursuits. But is this healthy? Is it even human?

Many jobs and tasks require deep concentration at certain times but do we tend to overshoot the need as traders? And at the same time we are supposed to suppress all emotion and intuition?

Interesting what @VladislavK says above:

That is fine - if it comes somewhat naturally. Some people are pretty cool about such things and don’t easily get flustered. But what does it matter is one is naturally emotional? Price can often be erratic, losses happen, stops get hit, etc. It is all part of the game. But what does it matter if one feels frustrated when things don’t go right?

The main point surely is that one trades as a professional and with a clear strategy and not just haphazardly and acting on a whim. Whether one gets heated, frustrated or ecstatic is only human. Why do professional sportsmen and women react emotionally when they win or lose? Is that wrong?

If one can also remain unemotional then there is nothing wrong with that at all. We are all different. But whoever we are, as @VladislavK says, we should learn from all our trades, build experience and work smarter - naturally and personally. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Nah, profitable trading isn’t about being emotionless or shedding one’s humanity.

It’s like an alcoholic or drug addict who are emotionally addicted to getting intoxicated / high asking if they need to shed their humanity or become emotionless robots. Normal people who aren’t addicted to alcohol or drugs never even consider asking themselves this question.

Profitable traders never worry about being emotionless or shedding their humanity because they aren’t addicted and controlled by their P&L.

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I read this quote on another thread, and I am sure @EmeraldEyes won’t mind me quoting it here as the context here has nothing to do with that thread.

I think this is an incredibly important insight that all traders should think about.

If we were to always enter trades on a random basis then we could expect, over time, to get the direction right on approx 50% of our entries…and yet we find that 80-95% of traders lose money - consistently, year after year, after year, after year. Just look at the published losing percentage data required from regulated brokers. It hasn’t significantly changed at all ever since the regulations were introduced.

So what does this tell us? Well, let’s add another dimension to this. How often do your trades immediately go negative after entry without ever showing any kind of profit at all? Very few, I would guess.

So there is an important principle here. It is not the entry that causes the losses, it is the exit. In trading, the 50/50 right/wrong of random entries is only part of the equation. The real issue is whenever we are right (or wrong) at which point do we act on it? We need to ask ourselves, “how can I be right 50% of the time and still lose money!”

To answer this, we need to move away from the individual trade and look at the overall picture.

If we consider losses as the equivalent of overhead costs in any other business then the answer is clear: If your overheads consistently exceed your gross income from sales then eventually then you are bankrupt. It doesn’t matter how good you are at selecting the right products and the right quantities. If your overheads are too high with respect to your prices then you are unprofitable.

In trading, this is risk/money management. We need to do our accounting just as much as any other business. It is no good being proud of a 70-80% win rate if the losing trades wipe them out completely.

The bottom line? (we have talked about this before) You have not made a penny when you enter your trade. It is only your exit that defines your result. Exit strategy is where it really counts. E.g. if you miss a 50 pip target by a couple of pips and get stopped out instead for 30 pips, you account status actually has nearly 80 pips difference between the two scenarios of a profit or a loss on this trade.

How many of us can truly say that we spend more time on defining the accuracy of our targets and stoploss levels than on our entries -(and how many of those that do spend time on this area are still losing overall?)

Sunday thoughts…time to walk the dog.

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I fully agree with you here…but… :slight_smile:
It is not really the profitable traders that we are dealing with here? They are already doing ok. But what about the other majority group of some 80-95% who are not profitable (yet)?

Neither profitable traders nor unprofitable traders know what will be the outcome of their next trade so what is it that profitable traders have so that they " aren’t addicted and controlled by their P&L", and that unprofitable traders are lacking?

Personally, I would say it is the confidence built from their historical results that achieves this.

So why are the 95% battered so often about their emotions?

It comes to mind that maybe in trading what we are referring to is not allowing unnatural emotions to arise that lead to irrational actions.

To say that a trader should remain unemotional about trades is like saying that if you are driving along and someone jumps in front of you and you drive into a ditch, then you just get out, smile and walk home!?

Humans are emotional beings and very complex ones at that. I guess the real issue is knowing ourselves well enough! :slight_smile:

My concern is that when we tell people to suppress their emotions and reactions in trading then we are driving them into a kind of half-life where they are never really quite fully in the real world and their heads are constantly in some smudgy, undefined trading world of "what if"s and "how about"s.

Trading is a job, it is not an obsession. :smile:

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Why do you need losing traders to be profitable? Your profits come from their losses.

The same thing that the weekend golfer lacks vs the tour pro. Amateurs are results (P&L) focused, professionals are process focused.

Because they haven’t taken the time to learn actual trading skills, while also basing their self-worth and emotional wellbeing on their P&L results (which have a certain degree of randomness). As I wrote above, they are result-focused.

You are confusing trading with gambling. To me, your phrase reads more like this:

To say that a gambling addict should remain unemotional about gambling is like saying that if you are driving along and someone jumps in front of you and you drive into a ditch, then you just get out, smile and walk home!?

Sure, but this doesn’t change the fact that profitable trading is actually very simple. The problem is losing traders can’t or don’t want to stop gambling (obsessing about P&L) and are looking for ways to continue to gamble just without the emotions which is of course impossible. As I wrote in my first reply, like an alcoholic / drug addict asking how they can continue to get intoxicated / high without the hangover.

Only losing traders are telling other losing traders to suppress their emotions and reactions. The professionals all say the same thing: focus on the process

As I said, losing traders can’t or don’t want to hear that because it’s no longer exciting i.e. gambling.

You can only lead a horse to water and all that…