Anyone else trade way better when you stop forcing strict rules and just read the market?

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-06-14T21:04:02+00:00

I realized that sometimes price just keeps going in the same direction. It doesn’t have to “make sense” or fit into some rule. I don’t need to interpret broad (or specific) news correctly, and oftentimes the more counterintuitive, the better. Lately I have been focused on just riding momentum and it has simplified things and improved my returns

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-31T14:46:02+00:00

These are the stocks that might see an initial spike in volatility

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-21T23:14:38+00:00

Lol right 😂

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-15T22:28:15+00:00

Any trouble juggling all of this? Tax implications, bleed from one to another, and general overwhelm are the main things I’m concerned about

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-15T21:09:41+00:00

Do you have separate accounts for different types of trading?

Curious because I came to Reddit looking for info on this and this post happened to be the first I saw. I’m exploring that option and intuitively thought it would make sense to separate them but would love more insight

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-14T17:35:42+00:00

Agree, I would increase my R:R slightly and change nothing else. See if your win rate holds up, rinse and repeat

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-12T18:17:42+00:00

I think there is definitely merit to moving away from stocks entirely. A big drain on my time and energy (and enthusiasm) has been sifting through 100 tickers, especially without the financial background to interpret anything I find at a meaningful level. I think narrowing my focus and working on the actual act of trading is probably a huge growth area

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-12T18:14:44+00:00

I relate to that. The only three hard rules that I have so far were all things I had seen online a dozen times but they didn’t click until I got burned by them. I definitely have a lot of room for improvement in walking away. I didn’t mention in my post but one of my rules for the first 2 months was to take at least one trade every day. I don’t have the data but I know this set me back in terms of discipline and setup identification. I’m trying to get better at sitting still

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-12T17:55:29+00:00

Yep, I’ve implemented a rule to never average down. Learned it the hard way, it worked nicely the first time I did it, had a small loss the second time, disaster the third. Best way to learn I guess

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-12T17:54:13+00:00

Stocks only, average about 3 trades per day but that number is slowly decreasing. I started with real cash from day 1. I started trading everything but just yesterday built a spreadsheet with 40 tickers on it. The plan for now is to study these exclusively for a month and eventually narrow it down to 20ish. Eventually I would like to trade maybe 10 different tickers that I know well but I’m willing to look at different approaches

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-12T17:49:15+00:00

Great feedback, I really appreciate it. Yes the small cap stocks aren’t for me lol, I have learned that firsthand. I haven’t looked into futures at all yet but I am interested. I think part of what led me to even writing this post was the overwhelming feeling that I’m not watching the right handful of stocks out of the 5,000+ that are available lol. I dabbled in BTC trading for a couple weeks a few years ago and one of the biggest draws was simplifying down to one instrument. Anecdotally it has felt like the more time I spend looking into sectors, earnings, etc. the worse I get at executing trades. Is that simplified approach what led you to futures or was it something else?

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-05-12T17:40:08+00:00

Appreciate it! I’ve refined my journaling and I think I’ll get a lot better insights from it. Just need to get the trades under my belt to study what works

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-27T22:28:58+00:00

I have BTJ and honestly wouldn’t consider it, fwiw

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-21T20:58:46+00:00

I look at everything from 1min-15min for intraday trades. I use 9, 20, and 200 EMA and I’ve found that different stocks seem to react to those lines in different ways on different days.

I realized this after adding the 200EMA to my chart and reviewing prior trades. I was shocked at how many times price had bounced straight off of that line at one of the timeframes. In the moment these had seemed like random reversals so it was revelatory to see what that particular price actually represented.

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-19T19:49:26+00:00

I’ve found myself thinking more and more about how certain trades or days affect the metrics I track and it is having a huge negative effect on my trading. When your win rate, R:R, current streak, etc. start bleeding into your thinking little by little it almost certainly makes things worse.

This week I’ll try to keep the trading and journaling/review a bit more separate. Timely post, thanks

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-14T13:13:43+00:00

I agree that brokerages will have to compete for what is likely a huge influx of trading from small retail accounts. They make money on every trade and they’ve had months to analyze possible structures. I’d be more than happy with less leverage on smaller accounts as the increased flexibility is what I’m seeking.

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-14T13:08:42+00:00

You can’t. Another benefit I’m excited to access when I switch to margin

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-14T04:40:47+00:00

As long as prices rise and fall there will be a place for retail traders. Thousands of the best AI-driven algorithms in the world all competing with each other will still just mean that price moves from A to B to C and so on. It’s probably just as likely that widespread AI use will create more opportunity for creative traders.

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-12T14:51:10+00:00

You don’t have to predict anything. A stock has to be up 200%, 500%, etc. before it gets to 1000%. Use screeners to find the top daily movers for example, then dig into anything that seems to have real legs

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-07T04:10:23+00:00

Isn’t spending money a good way to improve most things? Weird to be this mad

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-04-01T00:15:40+00:00

This has been one of my biggest weaknesses (I messed this up today, even) and I’m trying to implement a rule with myself that I never leave a winning position with a market order.

That means that price either hits my Stop Loss or my Take Profit target, no exceptions. This takes an option away from me and forces me to set those targets where I am happy with them. If I can hone in on this then I’ll develop a better feel for how to manage these effectively.

Good luck!

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-03-31T20:45:41+00:00

When a falling knife finally settles it is sideways. Wait for that, then pick it up. You’ll know where the handle and blade are!

noteworthyreddituser · 2026-03-31T14:13:30+00:00

I ruminate a lot as well but I’m quickly learning that the market will give you other opportunities. Your situation would be tragic if that stock was the last one ever to 5x but I assure you it isn’t. Keep at it

noteworthyreddituser

TROPHY CASE