Recently, I got profiled for the SGX StockWhiz Online Investing Competition, and was asked to share some of his experiences with the participants:
To read the full interview, click here.
The point of a resume is to provide your future employer or headhunter a glimpse of your achievements and skill sets, and the purpose of this is to stand out sufficiently, so as to get an opportunity for an interview.
After looking through many resumes and talking to many employers, I have a pretty good idea of what they are looking out for, and what should be avoided in your resume. Here are some of my personal guidelines:
If you have any additional tips to share, feel free to add them in the comments below.
Good luck! 😀
The cheetah, while the fastest animal on the African plain can outrun any of the prey it feasts upon, always chooses to go for the young, weak, or sick. Once identified, he attacks with laser-guided focus and effectiveness. It is only then that the kill is likely. This is the epitome of a professional trader. Be the cheetah.
Here are some common questions I get from people:
“Sometimes I can’t find good setups in the market, should I trade the less optimal setups or should I look for more different stocks to trade?”
“The setup I learnt from xxx course was working fine a few months back, but it doesn’t seem to be working now. Should I continue using it?”
As cheetah, we should always go for the easy trades. But quite often, for the newbie, the easy trades are staring them right in the face but they do not see them. This is because they are only familiar with a few simple setups (with simple rules/formula) that work best only under specific market conditions.
All these questions have a common theme. Traders who learn one or two simple setups think that they can trade successfully, but when the market changes, quite often the simple setup or system that they are using cannot adapt to the market, and becomes discarded.
Hence, a good trader cannot keep relying on the one same setup. Rather, he needs to know the basic form of a setup, so that from there, he can create a wide variety of different setups that are best suited to the current market situation. That is why we teach a variety of setups (and certain proven variations), leaving them the core skills to tweak setups to adapt to any market situation.
If you would like to learn more about trading psychology, also check out: “The Complete Guide to Investing & Trading Psychology”
Yesterday, I attended the Shares Investment Conference, and here are some insights I got from the talks, as well as from chatting up the speakers during the private VVIP lunch session.
Jim Rogers is a very charismatic speaker, sharing not only market wisdom, but also wisdom on living life to the fullest. He had tons of interesting travel stories to share (especially since he travelled around the world).
He is bearish on the US and European markets, for obvious reasons, at least throughout 2013 and 2014. He also talked about a possible bond bubble in the forming, especially in the longer term.
For his portfolio, he is short on US stocks, and has large holdings in Singapore stocks. He is also buying up china stocks (during a crash), expecting a long-term bull for China, at the same time also accumulating the RMB. Other up-and-coming investments include Myanmar and N. Korea, which are starting to show some signs of opening up.
His most bullish sentiments lie in the commodities sector, especially in the area of agriculture. He spoke of cycles of supply and demand for these markets, such as natural resources, land, and commodities. Hence this new cycle is expected to usher in a new era of prosperity for farmers. If one is interested to invest in US real estate, he recommends areas like Iowa and Texas.
On a non market-related note, Jim says that the most important thing is to find your passion in life and do it, then you will never have to work a single day in your life. Trust your heart, and don’t let others discourage you. He ends off by suggesting that investors study philosophy and history, the former to teach us how to think, and the latter to help us draw from the past to cope in a world that is ever-changing.
Mike is a famous proprietary trader in New York, and the trading firm he started, SMB Capital, is now one of the top trading firms in New York. He was featured in the famous TV series, Wallstreet Warriors.
Mike started off the talk by stating upfront that there is no need to predict the market in order to make money. He said that many professional when asked will not be able to give a view on the market, simply because it is not necessary to have a view on the market to make money.
When training his new traders, he tells them not to dwell on a losing trade, and instead focus more on the winning trades. One should not celebrate a trade simply because one has made money on it. One should be asking “could I have made more on this trade? Did I manage the trade well such that I got the most out of it?”
When asked about his views on high-frequency trading (HFT), he said that it resulted in more whipsaws, and stops getting taken out more frequently, but the way to go around that was to be ready to re-enter a position upon getting stopped out, and using a time filter to aid in this decision-making.
Someone in the audience asked him what parameters he used for his indicators, to which he replied that he preferred not to use indicators at all. This got me sitting up in my seat, because I had been telling my students the same thing. He said that newbies tended to get bogged down by indicators, but professional prefer to use a blank chart to read the psychology of the market. In fact, the messier one’s chart is, the more likely he has no idea what he is doing.
Over lunch, he shared with me some useful tips on starting a trading firm, and I am very grateful that he is willing to share his experience so generously. Overall, I had a great time at this conference, and I would like to thank the speakers and organisers for the great insights and excellent lunch!
Some of you might have heard the term before, but are not really sure what it means. So what exactly does self-actualisation mean?
Maslow’s Hierarchy: Trading Self-Actualization
The term originally came from Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, which represents the things people strive for as they grow and evolve. As we progress from basic needs like food and shelter to more complex ones like esteem and knowledge, what awaits at the top is self-actualization.
Simply put, it is reaching your full potential, and in the context of trading, it means being able to become the “ideal” trader which you envision.
If you’re been trading for many years, you should have acquired many different skills and experience. But are you putting these to good use? How is it possible for you to reach your full potential?
The key lies not in using everything you have learnt, but rather in knowing what is not essential. Once you learn to think in essentials, you will realise that you will have to discard most of what you have learnt, and focus on the 10-20% that works. Clinging on to old baggage will slow your progress.
Now, I want you to visualise a circle. Label this circle “Current Reality”. This circle represents what you are currently like – your habits, your style, your results, your skill level, and your attributes. Take some time to do some self-reflection, and figure out what is wrong.
Next, visualise another circle which partially overlaps the first circle. Label this circle “New Reality”. This circle represents what you want to become, and is a blueprint of the “ideal” trader which you have envisioned, and embodies all the essential attributes of such a trader.
The overlapping region is the zone of self-actualization.
Let me give you an analogy. If you want to lose weight or get fit, the “Current Reality” could be someone who does not exercise and eats unhealthily, while the “New Reality” is picture of the gorgeous body you saw in some health magazine. The zone of self-actualization is then simply the series of steps you take to bridge the gap between dreams and reality.
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results. This means taking the time to learn from your mistakes. The bottom line is, if you want different results, something has to change.
If you would like to learn more about trading psychology, also check out: “The Complete Guide to Investing & Trading Psychology”
