10 Habits of Successful Traders

Some forex traders never reach their potential, sometimes because they start off badly and never recover. Others start off too well, they make money right off the bat and are completely unprepared and over leveraged when the bad times hit.

To be successful takes many years of discipline and practice. Many of the most successful traders lost money at the beginning and many went broke more than once. But those who came through have a few things in common:

Stop and reverse

One thing that separates the really successful traders from the amateurs is that while an amateur may be able to cut a losing trade a successful trader has the ability to not only cut the trade but to reverse and go the other way. When momentum changes quickly, sometimes the best move is to quickly change direction so you don’t miss out on any more profit.

Getting aggressive

Amateur traders sometimes get nervous when holding a winning position and already start to think about banking gains. However, the really successful forex traders have the opposite approach. They become way more aggressive when they’re winning and only scale back their risk when they’re losing. Successful traders know that wins tend to come in streaks.

Admitting they’re wrong

It takes a new trader a long time to understand one of the basic principles of trading – that the market has no ulterior motive and cannot be controlled. Successful traders have learnt over many years to treat the market with respect. They cannot control it, they can only control themselves, so they stop trying to predict the market and learn to go with the flow. This means successful traders have no problem admitting when they’re wrong and this is crucial in order to get out of losing positions.

Enjoying the job

A big part of what makes a trader successful is that they really do love what they do. Some traders think they enjoy trading but the truth is they only enjoy the rewards. They don’t actually enjoy the process of watching charts and making trades. The best traders find trading an immensely satisfying thing to do and this is why they are able to spend long hours at the desk putting in the hard yards.

Taking it seriously

Finally, another thing successful forex traders have in common is that they treat it seriously, like a business. They never trade when they’re tired or when they’re drunk. They never come to the markets late and they always make risk management their number one priority.