"Just Because It Wins, Don't Make It Right" By A.S.

I didn't really plan to write this piece but it was something that popped into my head while looking at my charts.  Every night around 9:00 go through my list of charts and either review trades that I made during the day, or update my notes for the next morning. I watch a lot of pairs, so I'm constantly writing notes about what I see and what I predict will happen. Because I watch so many pairs I often miss out on trades during the day, but that's a story for another time. While checking my charts this evening I noticed that a few pairs completed at price points that I predicted and turned around to what would have been profitable trades, or at least trades that were in the profit zone. Immediately I thought to myself "darn it I missed this winner, or man that would have been another 50pips." (Glimpses of the old me still exist apparently). But when I looked at the trades a little closer I realized that I didn't have an order placed for a reason. And yes this particular trade happened to win, but on the other hand the same reasons that kept me from taking the trade, allow me to not get involved in similar trades that lose. I don't know about you but I'll take not being involved over losing any day of the week.   

During my training I was thought that the most important rule of trading is "don't go broke."  Don't get me wrong, I am a very aggressive trader, but at the same time I like to control my risk, because I've done the gun ho trade everything I see approach before, and it never ends well. Just because a trade wins doesn't mean that it's a good trade. And just because a trade loses doesn't mean that it's a bad one. What matters to me is if I executed the trade by following my rules.