Trading Guidelines

• Plan your trade and trade your plan.
  
  
• The successful trader is not afraid to buy high & sell low
  
  
• Avoid getting out of the market just because you have lost patience or getting into the market because you are bored.
  
  
• Avoid getting in or out of the market too often.
  
• Losses make the speculator studious -- not profits. Take advantage of every loss to improve your knowledge of market action.  
  
  
• The most difficult task in speculation is not prediction but self control. Successful trading is difficult and frustrating.   You are the most important element in the success equation.
  
  
• The basic substance of price change is human emotion. Panic, fear, greed, insecurity, anxiety, stress, and uncertainty     are the primary sources of short term price change.
  
  
• Avoid allowing a big winning trade to turn into a loser. Stop yourself out if market moves against you 20% from your peak profit point.
  
  
• Successful trading requires four things. Knowledge, disciplined courage, money, and the energy to merge the first 3 properly.
  
  
• Expect and accept losses gracefully. Those who brood over losses always miss the next opportunity.
  
  
• The key to successful trading is in knowing yourself and in knowing your stress point.
  
  
• Since there is always the possibility of surprise in thin, dead markets, less capital should be risked there than in markets which are broad and moving. 
  
  
• Believe that "the big one is possible" -- be there when it starts. Have the power to act, be rested mentally and physically, and cut your losses quickly.
  
  
• Have you taken a loss? Forget it quick. If you have taken a profit, forget it quicker. Don't let ego and greed inhibit clear  thinking and hard work.
  
  
• Somewhere a change is occurring that can make you rich, or poor.
  
  
• Recognize that weather markets are inherently more volatile. Therefore, widen out your stops and give market plenty of room to move so it doesn't take you out prematurely.
  
  
• Re-evaluate your position in the market if charts have deteriorated and fundamentals have not developed as you expected.
  
  
• Beware of large positions that can control your emotions and feelings. In other words don't be overly aggressive with the market. Treat it gently be allowing your equity to grow steadily rather than in bursts.
  
  
• Capital preservation is just as important as capital appreciation.
  
  
• When a market's gotten away and you've missed the first leg you should still consider jumping in even if it is dangerous and difficult.
  
  
• Work hard at understanding the key factor(s) motivating the market(s) you are trading. In other words, the harder you work the luckier you'll be.
  
  
• Never add to a losing position.
  
  
• The news always follows the market.
  
  
• To buy on a rising market is a most comfortable way of buying. Buy on a scale up. Sell on a scale down.
  
  
• Commodities are never too high to begin buying or too low to begin selling. But after the initial transaction, avoid make a second unless the first shows a profit.
  
  
• The principles of successful commodity speculation are based on the supposition that people will continue in the future to make the mistakes that they have made in the past.
  
  
• Don't pioneer highs or lows. Let the market tell you a high or low has been made.
  
  
• As go the oats -- so go the feed grain markets.
  
  
• Except in unusual circumstances, get in the habit of taking your profit too soon. Don't torment yourself if a trade continues winning without you. Chances are it won't continue long. If it does console yourself by thinking of all the times when liquidating early preserved gains you would otherwise have lost.
  
  
• Avoid getting rooted in a trade because of the feeling that it "owes" you something -- or, just as bad, the feeling that you "owe" it enough time to show what it can do. If it isn't going anywhere and you see something better, change trains.
  
  
• Optimism means expecting the best, but confidence means knowing how you will handle the worst. Avoid making a move if you are merely optimistic.
  
  
• Repeatedly re-evaluate your open positions. Keep asking yourself: would I put my money into this if it were presented to me for the to me for the first time today? Is this trade progressing toward the ending position I envisioned.
  
  
• What was once support, now becomes resistance. The reverse is also true. What was resistance, now becomes support.
  
  
• As a rule of thumb good trend lines should touch at least three previous highs or lows. The more points the line catches, the better the line.
  
  
• In bull markets sell signals will not always work, and in bear markets buy signals will not always work.
  
  
• The clearest and easiest way to determine a trend is from previous highs and lows. Higher highs and higher lows mark an up trend, lower highs and lower lows mark a downtrend.
  
  
• Standing aside is a position.
  
  

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