Sergei Riazantsev - Investor, trader, player. Greed is bad

Or the craft of a boxer. With all the attractiveness of championship belts and high fees – not every person, by nature, will agree to earn a living like this. To stay in the hospital for a long time after concussions and many other injuries. Spit out broken teeth into the boxing ring. To train when you don’t want to. Continue the fight when you can hardly stand on your feet. There is something similar in trading – if a person is not ready to fight and go to the end – it is better not to start.

A sniper needs natural shooting abilities (sharp eyesight, calmness, etc.). Daily training for many years. You need to know your weapons thoroughly. By itself (psychologically), a shot at a living person is not easy and many cannot do it. Psychologically, a shot at a living person is not easy and many people cannot do it. The shooter is sometimes forced to lie for days (for example, in the snow), tracking the target, and all this for the sake of one accurate shot. Professionally engaged in trading, you will sometimes have to “lie down” (waiting for entry into the market or exit from it) no less.

Having made the wrong choice of profession initially, people then regret it. Work turns into a daily torment, devouring all the time, money and nerves. God knows how many arrogant traders who dreamed of big and fast money could not earn. I have heard about trading for 20 out of 24 hours a day, when a person has no time to go to the toilet. And the results of these guys, as a rule, are not high.

They burn every day in the fire of greed, then fear. They spend long hours trying to guess where the price should go. What and to whom the price should be, we will talk more (the correct answer is to no one and nothing). Making up to 500 or more trades per day, these people eventually come to the loss of savings and burned nerves. And it’s also good if these are your savings, excess money. It is much worse when it is the last money in the family or borrowed funds. Acquaintance with collectors or bailiffs – you will not wish the enemy.

There are four levels of skill (competence):

This scheme resembles a ladder (climbing from a complete amateur to a real master) and it is applicable to almost any field of professional activity of a person. You can’t immediately get to the third or fourth floor by jumping over the first and second floors – you will inevitably fall and break. As the Russian artist Ilya Repin said:

At first, the artist draws simply and poorly.

Then it is difficult and bad.

Then it is difficult and good.

And only then it is simple and good.

It is important to understand: that being at any of the levels of professional skill we have named is not good and not bad in itself. It’s not a shame and it’s not scary. This is just a fact, the current state of affairs, a reference point. And the worst thing you can do here is try to deceive yourself. To try to appear, not to be.

For example, a five-year-old child suddenly decides to drive a car himself. With a high degree of probability, the case will end in an accident. And this does not mean that the child is underdeveloped, or the car is no good, or something is not working properly. This only means that the person has taken up the wrong business. He took on something that he can’t do yet.

Let’s briefly list the characteristic features of a person who is at the first level – “Unconscious incompetence” – in relation to trading. We repeat that there is nothing to be shy about, in itself it is not bad and not good.

So, from personal experience, I went through all this myself:

– The lack of a clear action plan for any of the possible options for the development of the market situation. A set of simple algorithms “if… then …". Example: a trader expects a bullish trend for EURUSD, and the market (as always – suddenly) goes down powerfully. You need to know what to do. And what not to do.

– The illusion of having any absolutely working laws on the market: “Now it looks like the end of the third wave, which means that the price should… there is good news on unemployment in America, which means that the dollar will go up… statistics on Europe are worse than the forecast, so the euro is sure …". A person who has traded for at least a couple of weeks himself knows the real price of these “laws”. You can’t rely on them completely.

– Fear, based on nothing, at the exit of the trade in the “plus”. With a minimal decrease in profit, the trader recalls the proverb “A small bird in the hand is better than a big bird in the sky”. And he closes a profitable deal with his own hands. Thereby cutting off profit. Which is why we come to the market.

– Intuitive hope (for a trend reversal, for reducing losses without your participation, etc.). All these endless “I think… I think… I think”. Paradoxically, many people can look at growing losses for days, weeks, months. Without taking any active actions, as if under hypnosis, or with his hands tied. Because there is hope: “it seems to me that the trend will turn around” . Sweet false hope.

– Not understanding the importance of commissions paid to the broker (spreads, swaps, etc.). In the long term, these small amounts, cents and dollars, can grow significantly. And to nullify even profitable trading.

Perhaps these five signs are enough. If you have noticed at least one, know that you are only at the very beginning of the way. The most interesting way.

If you are still interested in trading after all this, go ahead.

Let’s talk about the second stage – conscious incompetence.

I think many people have heard about the organization “Alcoholics Anonymous”, at least the name. Recall: this is a non-profit partnership that helps people suffering from alcohol addiction. It helps with phenomenal efficiency. This method is based on the “12 steps” program.

We sometimes see it in the movies. The person gets up and says: “Hello, my name is Jack, and I’m an alcoholic”. The most important first step is to admit your powerlessness in front of the problem. Everything else later. There will not be this first correct step – there is nowhere else to go. If a person sincerely does not see the problem, says: “I sometimes drink, it happens every day, but of course I’m not an alcoholic…” – it won’t work. Many people get drunk and die without finding the strength to admit the obvious.

Let’s draw an analogy with the levels of competence of a trader.

You are a beginner, you are only taking the first steps. Gradually realizing that for some reason there is no permanent profit. In the market, you lose much more than you earn. You make mistakes in your forecasts every day. You are tormented by panic fear, then animal greed, unwillingness to lose even one dollar. As soon as you open an order, a bearish trend instantly turns into a bullish one, and a bullish one turns into a bearish one. The market seems to have taken up arms against you personally, does not allow you to earn a single cent, constantly deceiving you.

Is this a problem? Without a doubt.

What should I do? To begin with, recognize the problem – incompetence.

Everything else later.

The beginning of recovery begins with the recognition of the disease. Any ambulance doctor can tell a hundred stories when people really died, trying, for example, to cure pneumonia – paracetamol, an acute attack with a ruptured appendicitis – aspirin, chronic bronchitis with laryngeal edema – warm milk with honey, etc. These people did not want to admit their problems and paid for it.