"The key to trading success is emotional discipline.  If intelligence were the key, there would be a lot more people making money trading" - Victor Sperandeo

August Overview:  The month started off slow for me.  The set ups that I prefer were not presenting themselves.  After taking two trades to start the month, losing one and then winning the next, I took six losing trades the next two weeks.  Although I kept losses to a minimum this effected me greatly.  Set ups I liked began to present themselves, but my confidence was shot and I became gun shy.  During my watch list review I would read my notes and see my higher rated stocks going with my plan and many times outperforming it, ouch.  Thankfully when my mind is falling off track, my wife is great at correcting it.  After a few minutes with her my confidence was back.  With my confidence back I got a little sloppy. The last week of trading I got a little of my discipline back. Hopefully I can build off of that as I seem to be carried by my own momentum whether up or down.  

By the Numbers:  From a net P/L this has been my worst month so far.  This is the least amount of trades I have taken since April which was my first full month of trading and I got similar results.  My win % is better this month compared to April, but my $ win avg dropped by 50% while my avg loss stayed about the same.  I can argue that having the same $ loss avg shows progress because in April I would buy 250-500 shares and now I buy 300-1500 shares, but that does not make up for drop in my $ win avg.  NOT GOOD.  Win % dropped 13% from last month. Again, NOT GOOD.  I have taken a couple of steps back this month. 

Journal Review:   Looking at my journal there is no reason why I cannot clean up my losses.  Nine of my 13 losses this month could have easily been corrected or improved upon.  I had two trades where I went in without a plan, two trades where I didn't stick to my plan, two trades that I took during the lunch period and three trades where I went against my rules.  That is five trades I should have completely stayed away from and four that I could have refined, traded better or stayed away from all together.  With an avg loss of $54.10 this last month I could have easily saved $270.50 and would be feeling a lot better right about now.  

September Attack Plan:  I am going to start this weekend by reviewing the entirety of my journal and paying especially close attention to May as that seems to have been my best month so far.  I was winning 58% of my trades and had a nice little profit at the end of that month (A lot of this has to do with not having to pay commissions that month).  I can't continue to have my $ win avg being comparable $ loss avg so I will need to take a closer look at my risk/reward set ups. I need to work on being a little more consistent and disciplined.  For now I am going to scale back on the amount of shares I buy.    

September Concentrations/Reminders (same as last month)

*Cut losses quickly

*Trade only the best set ups

*Trade with 2 plans (Conservative and Aggressive)

*Always know your R/R

*Wait for the breakout to prove itself

*Let the pattern come to you

*S/R is an area and NOT a specific price

*Trading is counter intuitive

*Trade to trade well

*Only trade your plan