Trading in a Fog

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John Forman - The Essentials of Trading author

I’m glad I don’t have to actually do any trading today. Thanks to a late night watching the Red Sox finish their sweep of the Rockies in the World Series, I’ve been walking in a fog most of the day. I’ve had to keep my brain moving, after a fashion, just to keep from getting that thousand mile star and mentally checking out all together.

In spite of the fog, or perhaps because of it, I find myself reminded of a call I hosted with Brett Steenbarger (The Psychology of Trading, Enhancing Trader Performance) a while back. Brett made a lot of great points during the call, as he almost always does. The one which sticks out in my mind today is how important focus is for trading, especially for day traders. Without it, your trading is totally compromised.

I made the point in The Essentials of Trading that sometimes you just shouldn’t trade, and I’ve repeated it in other places as well. I’ll keep doing so because we all have times when we’re distracted. In a sort of micro sense it could be fatigue, hunger, needing to use the rest room, and things like that which draw our attention away from the screens - subtly sometimes, but away nonetheless. In a macro sense it’s things like relationship issues, financial problems, travel, social commitments, home projects, and any number of other culprits.

The point is that when you cannot give trading your undivided attention, you should very seriously consider not doing until you can.

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