The Disciplines Required To Become a Successful Share Trader - By Chris Strudwick

The average person who begins trading in the share market often has little idea or knowledge as to what is required to become a profitable successful share trader.Due to this lack of knowledge they have unreal expectations of how much money can be made or lost depending which way the share market is currently heading.

Invariably they join in when the share market is in the middle of a bull run. (A Rising market.) They are spurred on by the media hype of rising share prices, the rumours of takeovers and rising company profits.

They experience early success and knowing no better assume that money is easily made. They are not prepared for the sudden downturn in the share market which inevitably happens. Only to see their profits suddenly evaporate and become large losses. Some become disillusioned and leave the share market never to return. While others hang on hoping for a return to the good times to return which sometimes can take moths and in some cases years.

The disciplined share trader realises that losses are perennial and are part and parcel of the behaviour of the stock market and have learnt, sometimes by bitter experience, to take the necessary steps to keep their losses to an acceptable level.

One of the first disciplines they have learned is patience. Because they have experienced first hand that impatience invariably loses them money, either in paying too much for a stock or a loss in profit because they sold too early.

They have learnt the difference between being a "day trader '' and other types of investors. They have found which sort of time factor suits their own personal trading pattern whether it is short or medium trading or when it is necessary to take a longer time frame. The patient trader realises that "Time" can be his friend or his worst enemy depending on the type of trade they have decided upon.

The second discipline is the setting up of a "Trading Plan" then once it is completed they  stick to it religiously. The factors involved in their trading plan comprise of knowing in advance the amount they have to invest, the time frame involved and the amount they are prepared to lose if things do not go accordingly to plan.

They always employ stop losses (conditional orders) to either lock in their profits and to minimise any losses that might occur.

The percentage profit they expect to make is also worked out prior to the purchase of the stock.

They have already established a preset criterion of guidelines which their future prospect must pass before they will invest their time and money in them. These criteria will vary depending on what the guidelines the trader deems as important.
They have a ready made list of prospects usually around the 20 to 30 in number. This is updated regularly as names will always be deleted as they become unacceptable trades as they do not meet the preset criteria already formulated in their trading plan.

The disciplined trader realises that if nothing meets their criteria then it is not imperative to trade and they will patiently wait until an acceptable prospect shows itself before entering the market again.

They have the discipline of doing their own research and not relying on others for this. They invariably do "Fundamental Analysis" first then followed by ""Technical Analysis" if further research is needed.

Once the choice is made and the preset criteria's have been met then and only then will the trader