cut my watchlist to 6 names and i trade better
used to scalp. 40+ tickers on screen. hands always moving.
quit that last year. burnt out. account chopped to bits by fees and dumb re-entries.
now: 6 names. same 6 for months. i know how they open, i know how they behave into lunch, i know when they go dead. rebuild the list maybe once a quarter if something stops moving.
rules i actually follow now:
- no orders in the first 5 min. i just watch and write down the range.
- one setup per name per day. if i miss it, i miss it.
- max 3 trades. hard stop. if all 3 are done by 10am then i'm done by 10am.
- alerts do the waiting for me instead of me sitting there itching
what changed most isn't the win rate. it's that i stopped taking the trade after the trade. that revenge one always cost me more than the loss did.
downside: i'm bored a lot. genuinely. sitting on hands is harder than clicking.
question for the room. how many names do you actually track. and do you cap trade count or just cap loss. i've seen people say a daily loss limit is enough but for me the count cap works better, i can hit a loss limit slowly with 9 mediocre trades and feel fine about it which is the problem.
