Last update: July 2021

Hello Tackle Family!

What a week this has been! Sunday we watched the Eagles fly high and win the Super Bowl then come Monday morning while America was tuned in to the aftermath of the celebrations from Philly fans, traders watched as the DOW took a plunge along with other indexes. One after another every alert I had on got triggered as the DOW kept dropping. Now here we are on Thursday and as I write this blog the DOW is down 570 points. Take a look at the chart and notice that the last time we had such a huge spike in volatility and was in August of 2015. So if you are a new trader this is most likely the first time you’ve seen the VIX this high and probably experienced some bumps and bruises in your accounts however we live to trade another day. So let’s get on with it.

Now, this blog is for all my traders who have brought bad dating habits into the world of trading. So, in this case, I’m addressing ALL OF US myself included. One of the very first things I heard early on as a new trader from experienced traders was “Trade with no emotions”. Sure, that’s easy for you to say, you who have traded for years and can identify support and resistance levels with a blink of an eye, and place a swing trade, calculate the SET method (Stop, Entry, Target) mentally without a calculator. My emotions were all over the place when I was a new trader. From scanning to technical analysis, to picking a direction, to picking a stock, position-sizing, order entry then finally hitting confirm and send. Then, came the waiting time for the order to fill. That’s when the emotions kicked into gear. I’d think that the order not filling right away was a sign that I should cancel the order and find another stock to analyze. The market gods were trying to tell me something. LOL! Then finally the order fills and YES!!!!! I’m in the trade. THIS, my friends, is when the real emotions kick in and this is the part that traders tell us to not trade with emotions. All the emotions I just described leading up to getting filled on your trade will happen and over time will be non-existent as you get comfortable clicking buttons. However the one emotion we battle with and need to eliminate is that of managing your trades. (Bellow, you will see a true image of me at the beginning of my trading journey)

We may not do so with every trade but we are all guilty of holding on to one, maybe two trades that have gone bad and we think we can fix it. When you find yourself in that place battling cutting your losers, your emotions are in the way. When you start evaluating your trades like a first date gone bad and you find reasons to justify why you should go on a second date yet all the signs are telling you to run the other direction, we got a problem. When on a date and things aren’t going well, we are known for giving the benefit of the doubt and allow for the second date and on occasion it way work out however in most cases it does not. I googled dating do’s and don’ts and picked a few to see how they relate to trading. I replaced the writers dating thoughts on these 5 things with my own thoughts on trading. It’s been a tough week and I thought we could have a little fun with this.

I – Know your non-negotiables – before entering into a trade know your stop loss, entry, and target. This will make managing less emotional when you’ve already set those orders to trigger. Do not deviate from your rules. High volume stocks/ETFs with options. Position size according to account size. Morton’s Steakhouse and Outback Steakhouse both serve steaks but don’t assume they are the same.

II – Don’t limit yourself – if you have a losing trade don’t try to make your money back while you are still on the losing trade. Cut it loose. You can always it the other if there is a clear reversal better yet, there are plenty of other stocks in the sea so MOVE ON!

III – Don’t lie. Don’t even inflate the truth – Don’t lie to yourself by thinking you can fix a losing trade! Especially when you are new to trading. If a chart is bullish, you have on a bearish trade, and you hear yourself saying things like, “it has potential to turn back around” you are lying to yourself! Pick up the phone, call a trading friend, and have another set of eyes look at what you are looking at.

IV – Pay attention to the red flags – well this is a no-brainer! EARNINGS is one of those yet we make the mistake of holding through earnings and we are not yet trained to know what to do if….. Unless you can hedge, i.e. (create a V-shaped risk graph) on a stock why take on that risk?

V – Watch the alcohol – Oh boy. I personally would not attempt to manage trades after having a cocktail or two but to each is own. If I did attempt there would be someone at the end of the transaction thanking me dearly. LOL

Now that we’ve gone through the do’s and don’ts of trading dating style, let’s actually look at the world of dating and actually make some money shall we? Thanks to google search all my social media ads are now related to dating apps and websites because I looked up dating tips for this blog. This leads me to research publicly traded dating companies. Our trading community certainly has single guys and gals who probably pay subscriptions to these dating companies. How about we pay to trade a dating company rather than try to date them! Take a look at this chart of Match.com MTCH! Great technical, fundamentals and people are certainly using the company’s services. It has more than 45 different brands and is used in over 190 countries. So there you have it folks until next time!

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