Hi all,

I am writing in a somewhat frustrated mood at the moment, so I will apologise in advance, but here is what is getting under my skin ... what I now refer to as the humbug trader. For those that celebrate christmas, they will be familiar with the story of the Christmas scrooge, who didn't understand the spirit of Christmas, and who said "Baah humbug!" to any who made references to it, and as such tried to ruin everyone elses christmas, this is the type of person I refer to when I reference a humbug trader.

Trading is so much about emotion and attitude, i'm sure you would have noticed that if you are in a negative frame of mind, your results suffer, you become fearful of losing, place tiny targets and giant stop losses, or worse still .. no stop losses, and generally try to avoid losing rather than trying to win. It is so important to recognise your mood before you even sit down in front of a screen with wiggle lines and decimal points, because if your mood is not right, you are just setting yourself up for a losing day (which of course just feeds the negativity).

A humbug trader though is worse, they are in constant denial, they like to think that the market is against them, they are the type of person who likes to keep discoveries to themselves and who don't take responsibility for losses, but loves to gloat about wins, and who simply refuse to believe that someone might want to share their trading secrets purely for the reason to help others. It is this last one that is really getting up my nose at the moment. Tonight I spent a little time looking around at different trading systems as I do some research into a new segment that I will be writing shortly. It is amazing how many times I read things like (actual quotes off strategybuilderfx):

" Yeh sure! .. if your system really worked then why would you share it with us"
" If the guy could make money consistently he would not have all the trouble to go and sell his indicators and turn into yet another trading guru ..."
"If I make that much money I won't be talking to you guys"

Now don't get me wrong, I know there are conmen out there who say they are making glorious money but have never traded in their lives, I know that, I'm dumb but I ain't stupid, but why is it so hard to believe that someone who is successful cannot also be generous? The perception that if you have money you don't need to care about anyone else anymore is something that dissapoints me. Kerry Packer, who was the richest man in Australia befor epassing away recently, was viewed that way by many, but only now on his death are we finding out just how much he did for children, charities and fundraising.

... people can be successful and generous, in fact, more money should mean more means to help ...

Some of those quotes was in reference to a video at forex.com, where a chap by the name of John Carter (don't know him from a bar of soap just for the record) shows how he turned a $5K into $40K in just under 4 months, using his bollinger squeeze technique (see it here), and the amount of scepticism around is amazing. I am familiar with this system, and in fact have traded something similiar (although with much less indicators) before, and it is something worth looking into, and his results I believe are genuine as I know the techniques potential.

I guess my point, (I think there is one :)), is that investigate things yourself, don't brush off things you hear as a con. If you can investigate it (without dishing out money of course) independantly, then you never know it might be something that will help you. People can be successful and generous, in fact, more money should mean more means to help. Maybe it is just the eternal optimist in me, or perhaps I am just dillusional from not enough sleep, but those with a negative mindset are doomed for failure in trading, and you can be sure they will blame luck, the market or their dog, anyone but themselves.

Ok I've vented ... I feel better. Have you got a thought on this? ... leave a comment below ... more coming shortly.

Happy trading!

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 04, 2006 at 11:19:00 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.