Hi I'm Ross Cameron and this is my podcast where we'll explore everything related to day trading. You'll hear me recap trades, analyze strategy, dive into trading psychology, and interview other traders. I'll share with you the biggest ups and the biggest downs of being a trader, and you'll pick up tips and tricks along the way that you won't hear anywhere else. If you love what you hear and you want to keep learning, you can check out more free content over on my youtube channel or visit Warriortrading.com to see my premium members only chat rooms, scanners, and trading courses.

I want to remind you as always that trading is risky and my results and experiences as a trader are not typical. There's no guarantee that you'll find success whether you trade on your own or you learn from me. So please take it slow and practice in a simulator before you put real money on the line. And remember, these episodes are for educational purposes only and are not financial advice or buy sell recommendations.

So let's go ahead and jump in to this episode. In today's episode, I'll be interviewing another trader. During these interviews I always ask traders to share with you, the listener the best piece of advice they wish they'd gotten when they got started. So make sure you stay tuned for some really good stuff here today.

In the description of this podcast, there's a link to the all-star Traders page over at Warrior Trading. This is a blog that I wrote after interviewing millionaire traders. I discovered that many of the most successful traders share similar personality traits and employ similar strategies, both in terms of actual execution of trades, but also from the perspective of managing risk and dealing with losses. On that page, you'll also see another interview that I conducted that was a panel of profitable traders.

so I hope you check it out and try to get yourself in the mindset of what it looks like to be a professional trader. So let's go ahead and jump in to today's interview. All right everyone. So we're going to do a interview here with Jess, Member of the 100k Club and a Momentum Trader for sure.

Jess. Uh, you are trading basically the same strategy that I trade pretty much every day. We're looking at the same stocks and everything else. So let's um, let's why don't we get this started with um, you giving us a little um, introduction of um, uh, where you're from and how long you've been trading and high level your strategy? All right? Cool.

Yeah, so what's up guys? Um, first I do see Mark says I got the best hair in the game so you know that's that's a huge bonus. Yeah, part of my strategy. Um, but yeah, you know I'm I'm obviously I'm from New York. You tell by my um, my accent or apparently the accent that I have.

So yep, um, I've been trading for a long time now. You know, since I think I opened my first uh brokerage account in maybe 2012 13. okay, um and I was. I was dabbling a lot.

You know, just in. you know, the average person just kind of buying a stock, selling a stock, not really knowing what I was doing. um and then for for a while I was, um, you know, just trending sideways. I'm like, all right, let me let me get into this a little bit more.

So I was actively trading almost every day, just just going sideways. and I did that for a couple years. until you know, until I joined Warrior Trading and then from there. I you know, I obviously learned from you and I learned your strategy and it wasn't.

You know it wasn't instant, it wasn't instant for me. Yeah, it took me time. I you know, I I went through your classes probably six times. Okay, well I was.

yeah I was. I was hearing you while I was sleeping. I was hearing you while I was traveling. I was just Ross's voice was it was part of me and you know it took some time for me to to really to get a hang of it.

And it's It's because I'm a hard learner. I it takes me a while to learn something, but um, I think my drive behind it um really helped me kind of pick it up. and um, that you know, stick sticking to something. Knowing that I do see people that are making money trading.

I do see that you can be profitable doing this. Yeah, and that's what. That's what helped me. You know, you know carry to be becoming a profitable trader.

So some people, um, you know will struggle with momentum on small caps because they're so it's like wild west. Sometimes they're so fast it's like zero to 100 and then back to zero. I mean it's like whoa, this is crazy. It's it's too hard and they'll decide to switch over to large caps.

which usually are. You know the it's tapered back a little bit. It's not the crazy crazy stuff, still sometimes crazy. but um, you did you ever try that or did you? why didn't you do that? Um, you know I I did.

I did. I kind of branched out but it was a very quick um you know I I saw the the momentum behind the small cap stocks. Yeah and you know when I switched to I did look at large cap. I was like maybe I'll try this and I just couldn't see it.

I just couldn't get it. I just I didn't see that. Um, you know those those huge you know, four or five hundred, a thousand or even two thousand percent moves, You just don't see that. So I was like, you know, um, I don't.

I don't see anything in this that fits even my personality. Yeah, so I that's what really brought me back to the small cap stocks. Now tell me a little bit about kind of your financial situation. Whatever you want to share with us.

that sort of before you got into trading because a lot of people know that when I got into trading I was like had almost no income. I was making very little money. I was lose. I was spending more money than I was making.

So trading for me began kind of with like a bit of like desperation. like if I could make twenty thousand dollars this month that would make a huge difference in my life. So bad pressure. What was it like for you? Yeah, you know.

um I. I was actually on the other side. That's not how I started. Um, I've never traded in a Sim.

uh when I was getting started, I traded with real money. you know and that would have been money that, um you know I was losing. That could have saved by trading in the Sim. yeah for sure.

and you know when I got started I was. I was also a business owner so I had, um I was and I was making decent money. Okay so I was able to, you know I was like oh you know this might be something. um this might be something cool that I can try out.

You know I can throw money at it. And I had, um what I was doing was I just had you know, disposable money that I could. I could afford to lose. You know it wasn't going to kill me if I lost.

Um, you know, ten thousand dollars or twenty thousand dollars. Yeah. and so that's kind of like my Sim money. Almost and interesting, you know.

And so when I was when I was trading, I was like, all right, yeah, I can. I can play with this and see how I can see how I do with it. Yeah, so that I mean that. That's definitely a little bit of a different perspective.

So you were you had the benefit of a, um, essentially of of income so you didn't need to make money trading in those first couple years you were able to keep. You said you had other income coming in. Yeah, Yeah, Exactly. So I was.

It was. You know, it was making me good money so I can, just, um, I could just take stabs at things. And the funny part is is, you know a lot of people think if if oh, you have money, you can make money and that's you Know that's not what happened, it was just I was not making any money. Yeah, you know I would rather have started with an education and you know, lower money than you know, just wasting my money having no sense being in the market with no education, right? So it sounds like you had a period where you were spinning your wheels.

Um, do you have and I know you've talked about joining Warrior and going through the classes as being kind of part of your turning point. But do you have a specific trade or a specific kind of period of time of something that happened where you kind of broke out of going sideways and started to actually like ascend? You know it wasn't a lot of a lot of times. I see that um you know you'll see all the internet. Everyone's like oh, I had that light bulb moment or I had that that aha moment or something like that.

and that's not what happened to me. It was. You know, I had, I had losers and I had winners. So it was kind of like this huge gap of of trending sideways and then it was tightening up my losers, you know.

But which also tightened up my winners. You know. So I kept. I learned how to tighten up my the strategy.

Okay, and then um, which essentially is is trading exactly how you trade in red. Um, so we're trading the same stocks. I'm like, all right, I see how he's doing it, I see how other people are getting it. let me see if I can get dialed in better and then from there it was just I'm keeping my losers to a minimum and then starting to slowly increase my winners.

and then so yeah, so over a point in time it's you. look back in your your break, even on the month a lot of people like oh it's frustrating and to me when someone says that it's I see it as a good thing and now you know what you do next is you're treading water. Yeah, next month, um you know you look back on the month you'll be like wow, I made a thousand bucks right? so that you know and that's how it slowly started to grow and then you know I. I looked back, um over a period of a few months and I'm like wow, I'm up like 30 grand or something like that, over you know, x amount of time.

I'm like so I'm getting it and now it was. From there it was keeping it, keeping yourself in check, keeping the emotion in check, and right, Um, keeping yourself accountable to all those traits and and then from there yeah, it just it keeps going up. Yeah, that that's an interesting, uh, that's interesting. You had it that way.

For me, there was definitely a kind of rock bottom loss where I was like I just blew my account and now I've gotta sell stuff in my barn on Craigslist to put more money in my account and I'm running out of stuff to sell. Realistically, I sold a car and there's an older car that I had that I was kind of fixing up but I was like I'll just sell it, I'll get the 45 grand and you know, So for me I was like this is my last shot because I I've accumulated this credit card debt. I am now have minimum monthly payments just to keep up with the interest and you know I I could take everything that's out of my trading account to pay those. but then my trading account is gone.

So that's why I was choosing to let things ride up on the on the credit card balance and keep the cash in the trading account. But then of course when I would lose it. So for me it was that final loss where I kind of felt like I kind of hit rock bottom and I was like either turns around right now or you're done. You can't add more money and that forced me to.

You know at that point the stakes then were pretty high and it forced me to follow the rules in a way that was much more serious from what I had done before. So and I think that that is common for some people too. But I think that what you experience is also not uncommon, which is that sort of slow transition from kind of just consistently losing but not maybe getting crushed to then kind of treading water a little bit, just sideways. and some people could be sideways for and churning sideways even for years.

you make a little, then you give a little back. You're not losing a lot, but you're not really making a lot either. You're just kind of sideways and then all of a sudden a couple months go by and you're like whoa. My account balance is like up by 20 30 grand and then that's when.

sometimes it starts, at least for me to get a little scary because now you're like it almost feels like you're It's almost like a fear of heights. You're like yeah, like don't don't blow it. How did I get so high up I didn't even realize and then inevitably you do have a loss. So what happened? Do you have any memory of one of those first kind of big losses and how you handled it? Yeah it was.

and honestly, um, it was as I was going up and that's exactly I was going up. and I was. I think I looked back. I was like oh, you're up um 10 grand and I was like oh, I'm I'm gonna crush this next trade and I just go back right back to break even over my past like few months of time.

I'm like like you just, you know, you just gave all that back all that effort. Yeah, um, but you know that's when, um, you know a lot of people decide to quit when they do that, like oh my god, I'm starting at Zero again. But um, no, I always looked at it as a chance to keep going. You know, get back up and and try again because you know you did it before.

so why can't you do it again right? Well I think that that's that fight or flight response and I think that we both have that fight instinct after a big loss to get right back in and that can border on revenge trading which is start to get sloppy and I think you like me, we both have a hard time knowing when to walk away and we'll have days where it's like dude, I was up five thousand dollars and now I'm down five thousand. How did this happen exactly And so I think that that's a little bit of that is kind of kind of hardwired but I think some people have the opposite which is the the pain of losing is so bad that they're like I just I can't I can't possibly come back. I can't possibly come back and try to recoup this. I and I and that's I mean I felt a little bit that way after losing the 300 000 in the beginning of um, February or the 275 whatever and it was just sort of like oh my god that amount is so big I can't possibly I can't possibly come back tomorrow and just literally come in here to only make two grand.

My commissions were more than 2 000 on that loss. Like I can't possibly. It's um, it's definitely interesting to see that too because from the outside you know I at least you know people like myself, I was looking at you, I was like, you know that's it's really not that bad. Yeah, you lost a lot, but you know if you look at the big picture it was like wow, you're doing amazing right, you know, But you know yourself kind of giving.

looking at yourself in like a third person type of view, you're like wow, how are you gonna get out of this? Definitely hard, especially when you think those those big losses. Yeah, yeah, no, they're they're they're really hard. um and we're always so connected to them that it's hard to have that outside perspective of like hey man, you're still green on the big picture, you're still this or that. But of course then there are other people that will have that experience.

Um, like when I had kind of my big gloss that became the turning point where I wasn't able to say hey, at least you're still green on this whole thing of trading. I was like I've lost this amount of money. I have this much credit card debt, I have nothing to show for this. I'm embarrassed.

this is then and so that created a little bit uh for me of kind of that. um you know it's like that that perfect storm in a bad way where you've got the desperation from financial emotional ego and you know you've got a time limit of i need to make this by this amount and that can create a very volatile situation where you could start to do some crazy crazy stuff with a you know, big account throwing huge amounts of money at the wall. Oh for sure. Yeah, because you know you're you're You're coming at this whole new type of career out of pure emotion, right? Uh, and when you do anything out of pure emotion and no logic behind it, that's when you know you can really get bent out of shape.

and off course it can, it can set you back quite a bit. So what do you do right now when you have, um, you know, a big red day, or a red week or a red month or whatever it is, How do you? How do you kind of get yourself re-centered Uh, you know I it's it's not as bad anymore. Um, to me, I can. If I take maybe a six seven, eight thousand dollar loss, you know, and it's and it's out of a decent trade Or may say I made a mistake or something like that, I can, you know, do the paper stack and be like all right, you know, on to tomorrow, You know I can.

I can brush it off pretty good. Okay, it's after, maybe after. If I'm I come in the next day and then I take a hit and I come in the next day and then same thing I'm like oh you know, like how do I break out of this Diamondback red days? Yeah and usually um you know, obviously talking to someone about it helps because other people are are having that same that same situation that we have. But it's mostly what I like to do is I like to kind of re-center I take, you know I avoid setups that are high risk.

Um, I just go back to the basics and that usually serves me the best. So um, you know I'll stick to like a five minute setup or trade only stocks with maybe 10 million shares of volume. or you know, very high volume. Yeah, um, that'll tend to uh, set me straight and then once I do that it's like all right, yeah, you're back in the game, you know Now just keep that trend.

Yeah, I think that that for me is um, it's that. Getting back to basics. I think that sometimes when trading is going really well, it's easy to get a little complacent and to start to kind of take higher risk setups because sometimes they are paying off and then when you're in a period where you're struggling it's like okay, I really need to dial this back into my go-to setups that the most confidence in and some of these ones that are the wild card setups that maybe sometimes work. This isn't the time to be swinging from, it's just the risk is too high.

Well I'm wondering. um, you know, as you kind of are continuing to trade, what's your goal in terms of continuing to scale your strategy? I mean you see, obviously kind of where I'm at in the last year how I didn't think it was possible necessarily to scale more than half a million or maybe a million on a great year To all of a sudden, 5 million in one year? What's your thought? Kind of seeing that from me and maybe seeing other traders out there who throw down some really big numbers? Is there a part of you that's trying to stretch? Or are you trying to kind of just keep it like nice and steady? What's your what's your goal? Yeah, you know that's a that's actually a really good question and it's something that, um, you know I think as traders it's always going to be inside of us to want to. Um, you know I could easily come in here every day and just say, you know what? I'm going to take a thousand shares, you know, make my whatever profit you know type of profit I'm looking for and walk away. Yeah, we could.

you could do that as well, but it's I think as as a trader and you're seeing you see the potential in the market. Um, you want to scale, You know you want to, you know, grow And and that's exactly what I've been doing is. um, you know, taking bigger sides, but also trying to, you know, take better. Um, you know better trades.

You know more accuracy, better, you know, just all around just better. My trading. um and then incorporate that in a larger share size. So you know, when I used to trade a thousand two thousand, now I'm up to maybe you know, eight and ten thousand on my on like a hot day or something like that.

So you know from there, um once I really start getting that, yeah, I would like to actually scale up to maybe 25 30 000 shares eventually. Yeah, I mean it's it's definitely possible it can be done certainly with bigger size. The sacrifices that, uh, sometimes what would have been a base hit With small size 5 000 shares, you could jump in and out 20 cents and be up a thousand bucks. With 20 000 shares, you might not be able to get in and out as quickly.

You might get five cents of slippage on the entry. You might get another five on the exit. So what would have been 20 cents might only be 10. Maybe it's actually flat.

Maybe it's red. And you know of course if you get in those situations where you do get that, um, that kind of big flush, then all of a sudden with bigger size, you're gonna have the bigger the bigger losses. So I think the the thing there that we've talked about quite a bit is that emotional conditioning And you know sizing up gradually is is the best way to do it. So from eight to ten thousand, maybe at some point you increase your size.

Now you, um, in terms of the platform you use. I know you're using direct access software, so you can. you can route your orders directly, you've got your hotkeys all dialed in. You're using level two a lot.

So that's all basically the same as how I have it set up. Um, what do you use as your default share size? Like when you jump in a stock? Are you doing it the way I do it of like two or three orders of x thousand? Or are you going all in in one order? Yeah, usually. um, when it when you know the market is really hot, I like to. I like to adjust quite a bit based on the hot market.

and um, you know, maybe a slower market. Um, and that's in terms of you know how many times I'm adding. um, obviously my share size I'm not just gonna, you know, regardless of the market, just always take every position with, you know, 5 000 shares? Sure. Yeah.

So when something is working out. yeah, I add in tunes. that's my current deal. Okay, well or two by meaning two thousand shares.

Okay, so two thousand, Two thousand, Two thousand. And then, um, more times than not if it's something that's working out really well, I'm yeah. I'll probably cap out around an average of maybe six or eight thousand shares. Okay, so I that was very similar to what I was doing for a long time and what I did was, uh, I just jumped into my order default which I'm just kind of putting on the screen here and this is, uh, the continuation of my kind of, uh, that's my my day But in any case, um, change from 2000 and then just bumped up to 2 500 and then I went to 3 000, which 3 000? I've had it like that for a long time.

That's kind of easy because three orders is 9 000 and then I go to 12 and then 15. you know, So that kind of works in that range. Jumping up to 3 500 is a little tricky because you get to funny numbers. You you get to 7 000 and then 10 500 and then 14 000.

You know it's just kind of weird. 4 000 can very quickly get me into 16 20 000 shares and I'm size too high, you know. And then I'm like, uh, this, that's a little big. Occasionally in a hot market I will increase it to 5 000 and I'll just be punching, you know, in 25 000 shares or 30.

when things are really hot, but generally I've left it at three and I keep kind of wanting to bump it back up. you know, or take that next. kind of move higher. And you know it seems like the days I do it like today, you know I don't want to do it today because I'm I went from up 65, down 55.

I'm really only up 10. I'm I. I don't feel like I'm I keep kind of feeling like okay, it's time and then I'm like nah, nah, I can't I'm not quite ready. but that's essentially that's that's basically what I started doing.

A combination of slowly increasing my base size. So instead of by twos by threes, and just like that, you've increased your share size, right? Um, and then the next. The next step is also being more comfortable punching that button four times instead of just twice or three times. Yeah, and that's a lot of it too is is you have to be comfortable? Um, if you're very uncomfortable trading, you know that amount of share size, you're going to be trading out of all emotion, right? And maybe I think that's a lot of it is.

I'm not ready to jump that high. so you know everyone is in their own place. Yeah, obviously as a trader and you'll know when you're ready. Yeah, For anyone that's you know, making your way up and making your way up to share size.

Yeah, You definitely know when you're ready. Yeah, yeah, I mean you will. You'll start to feel like okay. I'm dialed in.

I'm feeling comfortable. It's time to get size up a little bit bigger. You'll start seeing the winners getting bigger and then you'll have a couple of those losers where you're like, whoa, this is a much bigger loss than I'm used to having. Yeah, you know, and but then you you know you can't usually will handle it, rebound and then you're kind of okay.

I guess I got through that and now I'm kind of acclimated to taking a 15 20 000 hit on the bigger size And I can. I can totally like where you're at brushing off six to eight thousand. At this point, I can brush off 18 to 25 30 000 loss very easily. It doesn't exceed my daily average in terms of profit really so.

But when I start to get up to 47.55 that read on that one account. That's right. that's a little too much. That's a lot.

Money sting a little bit. It's all relative. You know? I mean 300 000 is a lot of money. That's a lot of money for anyone, but in the market.

Um, I recovered that within two weeks. You know. So if you keep trading at that level. But um, so let's see.

Um, when you're when you're looking at a trade, when you're in the trade, are you focusing? Are you really like dialed in and staring at that level too? In time. And sales? like where's your eye at when you're in the trade? Yeah, so when I take so if I'm looking at like we'll say we'll call it the perfect setup. Okay, so I'm looking at a really nice trade. Um, I like to see.

obviously my main focus is the chart. So I'm looking at the chart. my moving averages my you know the price action kind of how the candles are are working their way up to um, whether it's a pivot point or a breakout point or something like that. Um, and then I.

I can easily set my my entry price. so I'm looking at a key level to get in this to the trade. Okay, um, as soon as I um, I'm ready to take that trade, I start focusing. um, all my energy on the level two and time and sales.

Yep, um because that's gonna show. obviously what's what's going on. So we wanna see if lots of people are buying earth or if no one's buying? Yeah, so I'm I'm laser focused on level two. Um, just watching the bid in the ass and climbing sails.

Um, maybe a big bid pops up or something like that. It might make me more inclined to take that position. Or when I'm in the position, that's exactly how I manage it as well. I take obviously my my trigger point yep or my entry point and I watch the level two.

I watch the the price action on the chart. um and they'll tell me if the trades working in my favor or hey, maybe it's time to stop out and look for a new entry or something like that. Got it? Yep, that's that's definitely the same for me. Uh, I've noticed that sometimes you'll have a really good entry and the stock will you know, squeeze up and you take it off the table and then it's consolidating.

You're like, I can't get back in up here. So what's that about? Because I usually will get back in. I mean, if it's genuinely like, very extended, we've got six green candles in a row. Maybe I'll hesitate, but if it's forming just a new one-minute setup and it's just two dollars a share higher, I don't have a problem buying it up there so, but you sometimes seem to.

So what's that? What's that about? Yeah, so um, and that's you know that's that's probably the main difference on our trading. Well you you, you have no problem getting back in and it and more times not it works out. Um, whereas I see I've already had the perfect position and then I've sold the stock and now it's like, all right, why would you rebuy higher than where you sold it? You know, because it's kind of contraindicating on you know what buying and selling something would be. You know you've already owned it at this price.

Why would you buy it again at this price, right? Um, and I think that kind of comes with my, you know, like a business background. Yeah, so it's It's something that's kind of burned into me that I've been actually trying to work my way out of. um, doing. Um, so I've been getting better at adding you know, higher and retaking a whole new position higher.

Yeah, well, it's I mean, you know it, it can work and then also, there's times where it can be. It can be a real problem for sure. I mean, there are times where I'm back in. You know, I had a good average at you know, 35 dollars a share.

Then all of a sudden I'm along full size at 48 dollars a share and it drops back down to 38. and I'm like, you know, I get back in so high but try and trying to have that presence of mind when I'm trading. uh, as it's going higher and higher to reduce my share size and to not continue to trade with the same size I might have had when it was several dollars a share lower. That way, if I do lose, I'm at least not going to give back everything from that good entry because that I think that can be a trigger for sure.

Oh yeah, exactly. It's um, yeah, if you're you know it's I think it's wiping out what you had, um, in terms of the actual trade and just applying a whole new trading. um, setup. Yeah, so all right, it's still setting up.

so it's it's a viable trade. It's a brand new trade, though. I didn't even take the previous one, I guess. But yeah, this is what you have on the day, so you got to be careful not to lose.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now you have been a big advocate of doing trading in small accounts. So whether it's a it's not really a small account challenge. Specifically, it's just you sort of prefer to have a small account.

you are restricted. therefore on kind of how crazy you could go. You know, with a with any of the other brokers, a small account has to be at least 25 000. and realistically, you're probably going to keep it around 35 or 40.

Which means you could buy a hundred and twenty thousand dollars in stock. So what's your kind of thought process on working small accounts instead of bigger accounts? Yeah, you know, I I think because that's where I started. Yeah, well, I started in a big account. I should say you know it was a normal account with E-trade but when I started becoming an active active day trader, um, you know I found that the small account, you know, really appealed to me because I didn't have to lock up.

You know, 50 grand in an account or something like that? Yeah, um, so that really appealed to me. And another thing that, um, I found that is kind of a trigger for me is that if I have, you know, a fifty thousand dollar account, you know I'm trading. Before I know it, I look down. I'm you know, maxed out my buying power, I maxed out my training and I'm just getting reckless, right? Whereas um, you know, trading in a you know, relatively smaller account, it keeps me.

It keeps me mindful of the risk I'm taking, and it keeps me kind of grounded. Yeah, that's you know, that's that's a it's a smart thing you do that. I find myself at times. and my account right now is really bigger than it's ever been.

And through the Gamestop move, I was using a full two million dollars in buying power on some of those trades, which you know, given the price of three hundred dollars, you know three thousand shares is 900 grand. It didn't take that many shares to hit my buying power max. and but then I would have those moments where I was like, what if I'm putting literally two million dollars into this what if Right now the second I'm in, it gets halted and the exchange halts it and they say we demand an answer from Gamestop and Gamestop says we have no news to account for this move and it resumes at fifty dollars a share or they or halt trading in it for a month. You know, I mean now that none of that stuff happened, some of that stuff is a fear of kind of an imaginary um, outcome.

That's probably not very likely, but there are some scenarios: A halt for a month is probably unlikely on a big stock like Gamestop, but a halt for a few hours and then no news that could have happened. Given how much volume it had, I don't know how much it would have actually dropped, but there is that realization of like wow In the heat of the moment, I just kept pressing shift one and all of a sudden I'm now seeing max. You know, buying power. This is a lot of money on the line and I sometimes feel like I can't really trust myself not to use the buying power when I have it, because when I have it, I use it and maybe it's only occasionally, but when it's there I will.

There's times where I'll see something ripping up and I'm like whether it's a four or five dollar stock and I'm it's really good volume and I'm like going in 10 000 shares, 20, 000. 30. 40. there's a seller there at the half dollar.

I'll buy it up Now I'm in with 75 000 shares. I had a couple trades last, uh, December where I think I was in 95 or 100 000 shares. and you know, the three dollar four dollar stock. That's three Four hundred grand.

I mean, that's not a crazy all things considered amount of money could go to zero and I could still recoup that in a couple weeks. But when they start getting a little higher price above 10, 15, 20, 30 and I'm doing that, that's where I start to worry about the it only needs to happen once in my career to be such a huge hit that it could just, I mean, you know it could. I don't know, it could like break me. it could be like such a huge loss.

Like let's say, I lost a million dollars or a million and a half bucks on Gamestop how devastating that would be. and that the fact whenever you're trading is that you do have that capital at risk. So for you with a smaller account, if you had that happen to you, you're not giving back. And realistically even for me, even if I lost a million, I still made five million the previous year.

So all things considered, I'm still not giving back more than I made in the previous year. I guess because I've taken money out of my account. But um, you know you hear about people that that do just kind of roll all the money in the account and then just go bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. And then ultimately it's that final loss that knocks it down in half.

and then it's It's such a yes relatively to how big they were going, but it's such a big loss. The emotional, the emotional damage is like yeah and that and I think that's that you. You hit it perfectly because if you do say you did, um, you know lose a million bucks on getting locked up in something that was halted. Um, you know you'd be fine.

But the emotional aspect behind you know trading the next day would be so great that it would it. You wouldn't even be trading the strategy, You wouldn't be trading what you know you'd be trading all out of just fear, right? I'm thinking like oh my god, What if this one does it Or what if you know the next one does it And so you'd be trading all out of fear. And and that's something that yeah, if I there's a comment, you know if that ever happened to me in a in a small account I can, I can just reload. Yeah, it would never.

You know it would never be devastating to me. so I kind of. It's kind of like like you always say you're you're rock climbing and you're setting your your pin. Yeah, if you fall, you know it's it's yeah, you'll fall.

but um, you know, is it going to ruin me? No, right? Yeah, Yeah. Because that's the thing with those big losses. It costs you not only the money of the loss, it then costs you everything you lose in the coming weeks because you're trading fearfully. You're nervous, you're anxious, and you're not yourself.

And it takes. It takes time to recover, and then sometimes that can be the beginning of this sort of downward spiral. And of course, the worst timing would be that that's the peak of the market. and then it fades hard and then there's no chance, because now it's just so choppy for weeks or months to really make back those losses in a serious way.

you're just sitting with them and so that that comes into you know, the head space of trading. So what would you say? percentage-wise of trading is skill and psychology. Um, I, you know I would honestly put most of it. Um, you know I would put more than half on psychology.

You know Anyone who can. Anyone can learn a strategy. Anyone can sit down and be robotic and trade the strategy and probably come out ahead. Um, it's it's um, you know such a strong mental game.

When you're trading and you're seeing, you know the emotion of of profit loss. Or you know. especially when you're a new trader. You want to take the trade and you want to lock in as fast as possible because you don't want to experience a loss.

So you're You know you're taking those little one cent winners or something like that and you know the next one. You take the end screen that flushes on you so you know you're capping your losses. Then you or you're tapping your winners and you get a big loser and it's just there's so much emotion behind that that that's kind of what triggers you as a trader. Whereas if you're completely robotic behind it, you know it's it's It's better for you to be honest.

How do you stay grounded when you know you have a day where you make like 8 000 bucks and then you're going to the supermarket and you know you can load up your entire grocery cart and not spend like more than 300 dollars Like you could be like you could be walking by people like you. I could buy your car today. I could. I made more than every single one of you might made today.

I mean, how do you? How do you kind of like? Because that's such a i mean eight thousand dollars in one day. That's more groceries than you'll buy in. I mean, a year Like, How do you kind of compartmentalize those gains and not kind of rent? Go and buy the Lamborghini or go and just kind of, uh yeah. You know it's I have.

I've done that. You know I've been like oh, I lost. I'll say like eleven thousand dollars today and it's like I could have bought. You know, quite a bit of stuff.

With that I could have. You know, I could have given that to someone that needed it. Yeah, and that's um, something that you don't even wanna go down that road. Yeah, right, Yeah, you don't.

You don't want to do the math of how many cups of coffee, How many, How how many little things of pineapples could I have bought with 300 grand? This is. This is the 6.78 thing of, uh, pineapple. I could probably fill that entire part of my little office here with dried pineapple. Yeah, yeah, it's It's definitely hard to do.

I think the best thing for you if you ever or for anyone that experiences that is, Um, you know you got to look at what you're actually doing and you know what we are doing in the market. It's it's you know, it's it's so rewarding yeah that you know you got to look at those gains as well as those losses. You know, because they will, kind of, um, they'll bring you back to reality. You know you have a huge loss combined with the you know, an even bigger gain.

You know the gains can do the same thing. You make a make thirty thousand dollars in one day. It's be like oh, you know I'm a hero right? I can't be stopped and then the next day you know you lose half of it. So right? right? Um, I think the gains and the losses will keep you grounded for sure.

Do you feel that? um, do you ever feel like trading is kind of like addictive and hard to walk away from? Like do you ever like, but both in the sense of like on an individual day, but even just in like at a certain point, let's say you've made like a million dollars or whatever it is, you know and you can just say i'm I'm done Like I'm gonna stop. Like could you ever actually stop? I know, I kind of stopped. I couldn't I couldn't Yeah, I couldn't Um, a lot of times you know what there's like that joke is what would you be doing if someone handed you? You know, 10 million dollars and you have to work a day in your life? You know I would still be trading. I think it's a lot of it is.

You know, I have a a very deep interest in the markets trading in general that it's not really. Um, yeah, it's the reward behind it, the financial reward. But it's also, you know, kind of like that gamer background that I have of you know, being right. yeah, making the proper setups and that gratification.

Yeah, a sense of fulfillment of like yeah, I mean it's not. Uh, we haven't created something physical, but we've achieved. we've solved the puzzle. We've passed the level exactly.

and every day that you get that you get a little kind of like dopamine reward of like yeah yeah, another good day and then on a bad day it's looking. You know the next good day I'm gonna. It's then contrasted because then I'll feel so much better. Yeah, yeah, it's um.

I mean, you've done, You've done a really good job and you're So. tell me a little bit about your experience now because you've been helping with Um with mentor sessions and stuff like that. And something that I've said is that I think the teaching can make you a better trader. So sometimes when we have students that are doing well, um and I kind of see the potential for you to maybe do really well, I want to try to give you that opportunity to teach a little bit to see how it helps you.

So what's your experience been so far? Beginning to teach and mentor and and help you know it's it's been really, um, rewarding. Um, and it's not something that's nice, it's rewarding in a non-financial way. Um, because I see other people saying hey, you know you made me mindful to maybe try this Or um, you pointed something out that I didn't see in it. You know it turned my trading around and that was.

Um, that was kind of like a big, you know, big reward for me. I'm seeing someone being thankful for. You know now that they can provide meaning for the family or you know this is their newfound passion and maybe that will spread to someone else. And you know that on top of that, it's made my trading.

Um, I was. I'm much more mindful of my trading. Okay, you know it's always and I think a lot of it is. Do I want to be held accountable for this? Well, this is terrible trade? Do I want to take this, um, super high risky trade Just to you know.

Do I want to beat my chest and say you know here's my 50 000 winner? No, it's it's I want to be able to show what I did and you know, provide a good education to someone that wants to learn. You know that trade or that type of setup or something like that. What you said about accountability is A is a big one because when you when you talk about your trades as you know, sort of A if you're posting your um, your P L or whatever it is or for me posting my broker statements, there's certainly that pressure that okay, I really, um, you know I don't sweep losers under the carpet, you know. And and so if I have a big loss or I do something stupid I you know I'm definitely going to be talking about it.

And I think that that does kind of. It sometimes encourages me to kind of second-guess myself a little bit like is this is this really the right one and you know I still make the wrong decision sometimes and may have that loss and then I do talk about it. But that accountability system I think is important and I think that you get a little bit as a mentor and I get it as a as a teacher and before we were doing that you know I had Ted and I would have my sessions with Ted once a week where I would bring in my trades on an Excel and I had them kind of highlighted as these were the ones that were really like, not good and we would hone in on those like what did you do wrong I basically you know I needed to pay someone to help me be accountable. Um, I couldn't I didn't have a friend or that I that was had the interest in trading and my spouse at the time, um wasn't interested in being that so you know.

But for a couple hundred dollars or whatever it is to do sessions with some type of life coach or counselor or something like that, um a psychiatrist or whatever. I don't know, psychologist, whatever it is to me it was money well spent because it I had to create that accountability system because I was so good at just kind of like not following the the rules of the strategy and I still struggle with that. It's so easy for me to at this point say well, I've I've I've made, I've made enough money. I clearly I know what I'm doing.

I don't have to. Yes, I should stop trading here because I gave back half my gains. but you know I can also just keep going. You know, and that so that accountability is really important.

both as a beginner, but even for where I'm at. Yeah, that's a it's a good point because if if you weren't here, let's just say you were, you were just trading out of your house or something. Uh, you may have you know, way bigger winners. But you'll also probably have you know, massive, massive losers because you know no one's you know you're no one's really holding you accountable.

So who cares? You know you could make you know two million dollars in the trade and then lose three million dollars on the next trade. It's just, you know, there's nothing to support what you were actually doing, right? Yeah, um. well. let's see.

I think we're coming up close to an hour. maybe not quite. Um, I'm curious if um, is there any setup that you really strongly would avoid Like a biggest loser? Some something that you're just like. I will never trade that again.

Or I don't know, a stock or a setup or something like that that you just really don't like? Yeah, um, usually what if it's like a game stop type of um, stock? I think that one's kind of burned into me now because I I couldn't get a read. Um, where you had a read on it when you were trading it A lot of times when those stocks are just like you know, whipping around ten points and like, I don't know if I can read this. Yeah, um, if I can't read the level two and the time and sales in the actual chart and you know, um, make sense of it to myself, I'm definitely avoiding those types of setups. Um, another one that I don't like is the double top.

I just I use eight double tops whereas a lot of traders will see it as you know, a breakout. I like to look at maybe a double top for you know, like a cup and handle sharper set up. so I want to see that that slight pullback after the double top. Yeah.

and then I would say yeah, so not buying right into the double top, but wait, yeah, pull back and form that. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, those are good. Do you have any, uh, any last words of words of wisdom to share with someone getting yeah, um, you know for anyone you know, if first when you're getting started, you know, cut your losses.

let your losses quick. Yeah. cut them even quicker. Cut them even quicker.

Yeah, don't average down on a terrible position. Do not average down. It's just you know you're you're doing yourself. You're doing yourself wrong for trying to, you know, situate yourself as a stock is failing.

Yeah, um, other than that, I think, um, you know, beyond trading, the strategies and I could tell you what setup to take and stuff like that. I think, um, self-belief is is the key. You know you got to believe in yourself and what you're doing and um, how hard what you're doing actually is. So give yourself some time, right? you know? give your so if you lose a little bit, it's part of it.

You know losing is part of trading. So yeah, yep, that's absolutely right. Yep, it's a learning curve. So okay.

awesome. Thank you. Well um. I think we'll We'll end this here.

and of course people watching this, um later after the fact you can see Jess uh in the chat room. Uh, but thank you for uh, joining us today. I think people really appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

I'm glad we could. You know, kind of talk about all this stuff. It's awesome. Thank you.

You're welcome. thank you for tuning in. I hope you really enjoyed this episode. Make sure you check out the All-star Traders page over at Warrior Trading.

There's a link right in the description to this podcast. It's a blog that I wrote after interviewing millionaire traders and discovering that some of the most successful traders out there share a very similar set of personality traits and strategies, both for executing trades and also for managing stress and dealing with losses. So make sure you check out that interview and I hope you tune in for the next episode right here on the podcast.