Bitcoin Forum

Keeping a journal is critical for new and experienced traders to maximize their profitability. 3 reasons why you should use a journal if you don’t already ➕ what to include in your journal. 📓

1. Discipline
The self discipline needed to maintain a trading journal helps fortify a trader’s discipline in sticking to their trading plan. This is a valuable skill to build, and can only be built through doing. 🛠

2. Accountability
Recording your trades holds you accountable for your performance. Did you have a plan before opening the trade? Did you stick to that plan? 🎯

3. Analysis
Once trades are consistently being recorded, you can analyze those trades to improve your strategy. 📈 Example analysis of one’s trade journal might reveal that stop losses are getting triggered more than they should be. With that information, you might conclude that you are either buying too high or that your stops are too tight. A solution could be to focus on getting better entries, even though you might miss some opportunities by not buying sooner.

When looking for a journal or template, consider journaling both each individual trade as well as each trading session. Break down the profit/loss details for every trade, and reflect on your performance and emotions for each session.

❓For those already using journals - what have you learned about your trading since you've started journaling?

When I was new in a trading field, i had a strong desire of writing down my trading journey. Journals as you said, will help us to become a successful trader. It may help us realize our mistakes and will improve our trading skills. I haf started it actually. But I did not continue to write down my tradings. I was depressed when I lose huge amount as a margin trader before. And I forgot that I did start writing a journal.

Here's what I jot down at the first page of my journal:

- The do's and dont's

1. Greed will mess up the trades.
2. Patience will make you success.
3. Do not Enter trades hastily.
4. Always use stop-loss.
5. Do not FOMO.

The next pages is the indicators or the technical analysis I am using before. Their uses, the use of timeframes, etc.
I almost forgot what I actually write down in my journal. It is because I was too pessimistic before that is why I ignored it.

Anyway, I do appreciate your tips here. I actually screenshot it on purpose for my future use. Thanks, buddy. It made me recall my "old journal".

You're right, a trader has to be disciplined and also avoid being greedy. Sometimes greediness can cost you the little profit you have been able to achieve in a day, due to you wanting more you can end up losing that little one you have managed to earn that day. So it is good for every trader to avoid anything that has to do with being greedy. Always set your target and stick to that and don't let anything change your mind unless you're 90% to 100% sure that it is going to work out then you can try it out. But if not, just stick to what you have started with.

This is an important tool to successfully be in the market, yes.
This covers a whole area of trading psychology including not being greedy when you have made a profit.

Money management is crucial in the trading (either forex, or crypto, or futures, ...). Proper allocation of capital for each trade, trading session helps the most for consistency in trading, in my opinion.

Majority of the traders are accepting your thought, so all the peoples are expecting and depressing at anytime. Nowadays those are want to quick profit they will take risk and some beginners are make big drops in trading. The tools are never proved the future reference so brilliant experience is a major tool for trading platform.

Using a journal is just kind of wasting your time, instead, spending time to write on it, you can do such time in studying and analyzing the graph price movement in the market. Those OP's stated above was right but no need to write it down to your journal just keep in mind these tips and probably sooner or later you will be successful soon. I think you may distract on this by monitoring the market price.

Yes, those are theory but it's quite difficult if you implement in real situation.
There will be always factor X that will disturb our judgement especially when crypto consider as risky investment.

Overall, I just hold it rather than short term trading because It's less stress  :D

I used journal to record my success rate and how I'm doing with my trades. I'm only old school, I love to write everything down not just my trade but almost everything. When I do write, I tend to look at how I did right or wrong during a particular trade, so that I can avoid those mistakes in the future. Of course TA will always be there to analyses graph, however, as I have said, sometimes its better if you have something in your hand to look at that could spell success or failures in the failure.

Best tool?Lots of them actually but I would tell you this which theres no such thing about consistent profits yet losing trades cant be avoided and having a loss of a certain day.
Its always been part of a trader but atleast with due experience and having sufficient knowledge on using up indicators and utilizing news or fundamentals you can somehow lessen the certain risk involved.

I think the journal part is more crucial than many people think. I have started out trading without actually trading and that was thanks to my journal.

I woke up everyday trying to find what would be the next coin I would buy if I would buy any coins that morning and write them down both with name and the icon (like bitcoin and btc) and then I would write the price of it at the second and then next day I would check how I did and for a week I would check how I did and that was it because as a "trader" I wouldn't look further than just a week, that way I would know if I am getting any better at picking right coins everyday without actually spending any money.

I kept that up even during my actual trading days and either actually bought coins or bought only few of them but still wrote others and it helped me a lot.

Indeed a very good tool a trader can use when trading. Discipline is important in a trader to make sure they are able to control their self not to be greedy and whether they have to hold coins or scalp a portion of it. Accountability is also good for you to be able to revisit your trades to check if there could be some areas that needs to improve and possibly create a strategy that will make you even better in trading. Analysis is I think the most important thing a trader need to have because it will determine whether you lose or make profits, it is a must that a trader knows how to analyze the market better to make reasonable and profitable trades.

A trader should be a smart one or has a knowledge on basic trading or better if advance trading. All traders should posses this one. Plus, there are two which i consider the core on having good decisions. Its patience and controlling of emotions. With this three you can trade wirh greater and consistent profit.

Journals will definitely be very helpful in trading here in cryptocurrency knowing that everything is very volatile. This will help you a lot when the market turns from bearish to bullish and vice-versa. This might be an additional task but worth the effort.

I too used a journal when I started trading so that I could force myself to analyze the things that went wrong in a particular trade I made and correct it in the future. I would highly suggest doing this early on when you start trading and even later in your trading career so you don't become complacent and you stay alert in your trades; it's pretty incredible when you realize how many mistakes you can make in just a single trade when you break down how things happened.

You should also never overtrade. If you don't like how things are going (like right now and the chop BTC is in), just stop trading and wait for a confirmed breakout or a better entry and then trade. Better to have money unused than money lost, especially if you don't know what's going on.

Well, those are two very important points between patience and emotional control in market turmoil, often people who are emotional at seeing market movements by thinking it will be very profitable quickly and after the market is in a downtrend they take to withdraw all their money and get losses, analysis is also very important because to be able to determine market movements going forward, but I have never been convinced that what everyone recommends is a consistent profit, all cannot be considered easy.

Losing trades can be avoided, what can't be avoided are only paper losses you see in your portfolio it's really up to you if you want to make it real by actually selling it at a loss. Now I'm not saying that selling at a loss is a bad idea, some people actually includes it as a part of their plan to reset their strategy within the trade. But if you think that the paper loss is only in a short term and its actually a good time for you to add more into your position then you are at a good spot to gain more profit in the future.

It is important condition I trading to become patient and to keep your desirers limited, it is very easy and good way to have success and profit but there are some rules needs to follow such as never become worry for falling price and never take advantage of sudden rise, as some are scammers there who do this to cheat you, be careful ten everything is possible in trading.

I believe trading is not really easy because you have to study the market harder and monitor the market closely so that you will come up with good analysis on the price movement.But what is good in trading is that it can be learned and if you have that good strategies and skills in trading,you will have more chances to make consistent profits in trading.

This can't be emphasized enough. You'll never succeed in the long run if you don't have a well-defined system (including strict risk/reward and stop loss rules) and consistently stick to it.

In my first couple years trading, on one of my mentor's recommendations, I kept a list of rules taped to my monitor so I saw them every time I might enter or exit a trade. Things like "Minimum R/R 2.5" and "Never remove your stop loss!" It helped ingrain these vital rules into my head.

Which is also the hardest thing to do besides patience. Actually, we don't have to be too rigid in these disciplinary rules. we must be able to adjust the situation.

I love the mental image of my monitors covered in sticky notes, trying to see the screen behind it.

Neat idea! Definitely helps reinforce your rules.

Keeping records of what had happened through the days of trading will certainly give helpful information if not now, may be in the future transactions. Evaluating past transactions somehow give insights and probably better decisions. Remember that trading is not just as easy as it seems. It is a professional tasks.

Discipline play the big role here, your emotions will influence your actions having a right views and knowing your position each time you make the trade,
if you control such emotions you won't do anything that will harmed your investment, you can find time to wait and hold while the market still moving not according to what you expect.

  Precisely, trading must be deal with accurate deliberation in order to gain massive profits. I probably used my experiences to overcome consequences and to evade loses. And I think having enough knowledge will conquer all possible conclusion and will lead to gain enormous profits.

right, discipline towards personal self does play an important role, analysis can be studied with limited time, but trading psychology will be different from the time needed for everyone in mastering it

Traders have been losing most of the time because they are greedy, they want to make huge profits. If they trade in a disciplined manner and set their target to a decent profit then it is most likely that they would succeed.

Most traders that you see following these decent profit taking parts are usually pro trader that has had experienced in life and has seen how greed can really consume and destroy ones trade. Most of the traders we have now are still learners and has not gotten burnt before in their trade, once they lose their major trade one or twice, they will understand the danger of being greedy, and the remedy to solve those greed problems, which is usually to be self-disciplined first and then make use of some of the trade tools that is available on the trading platform to set trade and also take trade at a particular time.

I usually don’t advise new trader to manually trade if they really want to overcome greed, I ask them to just set their stop loss at 3 percent and then set their profit for 2 percent which they should practice that way for long for them to get use to taking decent profits when they become a pro trader.

I think timing is everything if a trader do proper work in the perfect time then he will definitely get the the result for that positively otherwise we don't have documents to get the success very easily so my opinion is if anyone want to be a proper and successful trader then he will need to keep the time properly.