Paper trading and Getting out on a Friday.......

I mentioned paper trading and how it can help hone your trading skills in earlier entries, but today I wanted to  elaborate a little more on paper trading..  The number one thing paper trading does for me is gives me experience in trading without the pressure of using actual money. This gives me the ultimate environment to trade in, emotionally free. Often when we are trading with our money we get caught up in our want and desire to make money. This can cause us to make emotional and rash decisions and forget our game plan of limiting our losses or getting to a certain preset profit percentage on a stock. Fridays tend to be very erratic and unpredictable as other traders sell off to take either profits or losses for the week. Remember I usually dont hold a position through a weekend unless I know for sure a position I am holding is long term. I tend to like to try to sell by the end of day Thursday so as to avoid the mess that Fridays can become. If for some reason I am unable to sell on Thursday I will use the first hour of trading Friday and the increase in volume to move my stock. Make sense?  The more a stock moves the easier it is to buy or in this case sell it and start looking for my next ride. Setting stop losses allow me to limit the amount I lose and setting a specific profit percentage in my mind allows me to grow my money consistently rather than erratically. Give me 30% profit on my money on every trade and I will run all the way to the bank smiling my best smile. In conclusion I want to again say keep the emotions OUT of your trading and you will become a much better and more consistent trader and hopefully richer than if you trade on emotion. This weekend Ill be writing about the ways I read news on companies leading into next weeks topic...... In depth Due Diligence.

Keep it simple

Three very key words in a successful small business. Its pretty basic. The more work I can do myself the more money goes to my bottom line. I believe the more involved a small business owner is in the day to day affairs of the business,  the better the chance of more long term sustained growth. Keeping costs in check as the business grows is key to creating a good foundation. It is very easy to get wrapped up in early success and increase the costs too dramatically. Ive seen my share of small businesses succeed early and then go boat shopping, house shopping, lavish vacations etc etc., then when the economy goes south or business slows there is no reserve. Ive been taught to accept the best and prepare for the worst. I like the simple idea of stashing away 6 months personal and business expenses to cover tough times. By tough times I mean a sustained slow down in business. I look at it like this put the money aside and FORGET about it. I dont touch that money until all reasonable (and some unreasonable to the untrained mind) resources are exhausted. Im not saying dont treat myself here and there to some of the things I want, I just think "Am i secure enough today that if business slowed and my income diminished tomorrow can i continue to operate?" Well thats it for now, tomorrow I will delve more into business foundation as well as having FUN and allowing my mind to rest so as to not create business burnout.