Sunday 6 September 2015

Up and down

After I reached two days ago a new all time high, I am back to 0. Sometimes is hard, but as a trader you have to live with this variance.

Like I wrote yesterday, I have to improve my patience. In general I recognized that is better to trade the underdog than the favourite. The market often expects a turn around when the player with the bigger name is trailing. So the value is often poor. Yesterday Serena Williams started at 1.05 (against Mattek-Sands). Despite the number 1 was struggling, the market kept the trust. You could back her for 1.50 at the end of the second set for a while. Of course that can be an option (definitely better than back her at the start for 1.05), but the better way would lay her since the start. The worst case is loosing five ticks, they will not kill you.

Here I see a lot of potential. Instead of waiting for an expected comeback, it's often better to lay the big name at the start or at an early stage of the match. Many times the favourite doesn't start well. Even Djokovic (against Seppi) had some problems in the beginning. Unfortunately I traded for comebacks of Radwanska (against Keys) and Ferrer (against Chardy). Probably it was not a good valuation of the situation. The mentioned players have not the best season and Ferrer was even injured for a while. On the other hand their opponents are quite strong at the moment. I make still too often the typical mistake to go with the bigger name. I have to be more selective!

I recognized that another good blog (BIG PAIRS) is gone. In this point I have to agree with Cassini. It's astonishing how many blogs start with a lot of enthusiasm (and often good results), and suddenly they are not updated anymore. Probably it was another loudmouth. I was a bit suprised, how his profit was skyrocking. Often this is a sign that something is smelly. I am definitely not the most successful trader (yet), but at least I am honest. I try to keep the blog interesting, but is getting more difficult. My trading approach is quite stable now, it's just a kind of bad game selection I mentioned above.

Today I will trade the whole evening and night. I hope I can fight back from a small downfall. If not, it's not the end of the world. I just made an overview of my financial portfolio and recognized that my (virtual) Betfair account is only 2% of it. It's the part with the highest volatility, so I can't invest too much money at sportsmarkets. I am sure that this global view helps to strenghten my mind. In the end trading is mainly a psychological game. The long term winners have discipline and are mentally very strong. Caan wrote once again a good article about it: 4 trading fears. I agree with everything. Especially the part with successful people is interesting. Yes, it can be one of my problems. In my job career I didn't fail often. So it's still hard for me to lose trades. I have to learn and accept that only the long term is important!

Saturday 5 September 2015

There's a light on the horizon!

The strategies are stable since a while. I feel more and more comfortable with the new trading approach. I think about the market and not about technical aspects like risk-/reward-ratio, entry- and exit-levels or profit. The trading is in the flow now. The improvement also has an impact on this blog. I recognized that is a lot more difficult to write, when everything is going alright. Well, it's not a bad feeling at all. :-)

Of course the trees are not growing in the sky, I still have a kind of overtrading. Probably the small stakes have an impact on this behaviour. When I have spare time to trade I like to be involved in the market. With small liabilities the temptation to enter the market - even with an inadequate situation - is bigger. Like I mentioned at an earlier post, I set a monthly budget. I didn't use this (new) money yet. Every month I will put more money on this virtual betting account. So I can rise the stakes steadily.

On the left side you can see the devolopment of the profit since I rised the risk-/reward-ratio to 1.0 and above. The variance is a lot higher than before, but real hurtful downfalls are not expected. Before I had to win four trades after a lost one to be be breakeven. Now one is enough to be in the green zone again. In general I am more relaxed. This feeling has a positive impact on my trading.

It's still a long way to go, but I feel the progress. There are no more doubts about the strategy. The practice will help to become a better trader. Full time trading is no target anymore, I feel 100% happy about my new job. Sportstrading should be an interesting side income and a good diversity to the stock markets.