As the green candles were rising faster than space shuttle Endeavor toward his stop, Jim’s eyes were no less impressively wide while he fought a compelling urge to move his stop-loss.  The price action belonged to the YM E-mini 5 minute chart, which had been trending downward however in a highly volatile manner.  Jim knew better than to tinker with his stop in violation of his trade plan, but no matter what he told himself he really wanted to avoid getting stopped out.  He had identified what to him was a supply zone on the 60 minute chart and had executed a short on the 5 minute chart.  Just then, as if a phantom hand grabbed his mouse hand, he had clicked the stop to move it a couple of points higher.  A few moments from that it happened again and again until Jim had done it several times leaving him with a hefty loss by the time he closed his position.  A considerably larger loss than he would have experienced had he followed his plan and simply allowed his stop to do its job.  Now Jim felt angry, stupid and sick to his stomach as the realization that he had gone down the very road that he swore he wouldn’t.  Jim was caught doing something that was intuitive; that is, to attempt to avert a loss by keeping the price action from canceling what he hoped would be a winning trade.  Of course, the behavior that is required for consistent successful trading, which in this case is based in allowing a small loss to avert a bigger one is “counter-intuitive.”  

Trading is a counter-intuitive process.  In the above we looked at how the  fear of failure can and often does drive decision making as described in Prospect Theory also known as “loss-aversion” theory as proposed by Kahneman and Tversky, two psychologists in the early 1980’s.    They state that people value gains and losses differently and will base decisions on perceived gains rather than losses.  As we saw in Jim’s case his compulsions to move his stop and keep the hope alive for a profitable gain outweighed his desire to keep his losses small.  In other words if a person were given two equal choices, one expressed in terms of possible gains and the other in possible losses, people would choose possible gains.  Some other “intuitive” trader mistakes are holding losers to long and exiting winning trades prematurely.  Here we have another instance of the importance of holding and following through on counter-intuitive thinking, emotions and behaviors.  Additionally, Terrance Odean in a paper written in The Journal of Finance, October 1998, discussed in his research that traders and investors have strong inclinations to “follow the crowd” and either jump impulsively on poorly planned trades or put money into popular stocks that do not merit investment.  Similarly, it is counter-intuitive to “wait to buy” in a demand zone as the price action is screaming straight down when the natural tendency is to jump in on the short or to fearfully stay out due to an inability to pull the trigger.

So, what do you do when your body, mind and emotions in their natural tendencies tell you to disregard plans, violate rules and break commitments to yourself?  One way is to embrace an approach that is emerging as an important field of thought regarding the financial markets; that is, behavioral finance (accepting and tracking markets as more than cash flows, earnings, and interest rates that are commonly researched, when more-to-the-point these variables are actually psychological thermometers that are indicative of the current mood of traders and investors).  According to James Berman, a behavioral finance expert, this notion of “counter-intuitiveness” is extremely important when preparing, analyzing, processing and executing your investment strategy or trade.  Considering a behavioral finance approach means dropping the traditional assumption that the markets are driven by rational decisions and realizing that cognitive psychology (how people think…and often the irrational quality of thought processes) drives much of the inefficiency of the markets.  This realization that the markets are unpredictable will help you, if you are counter-intuitive, to avoid the frequent bubbles that surface from time to time like the dotcom bubble that left many investors out in the cold when it burst.  Or in the words of Warren Buffet, counter-intuitive trading and investing in part means, “Be greedy when others are fearful and fearful when others are greedy.” 

Another approach to employ that uses the information from the psychological thermometers of the markets is to extricate yourself from “herd mentality” as a novice trader and investor.  You must be able to track the order flow and identify when the losers will quit which means the market will retrace or reverse.  The order flow is created from a natural imbalance between buyers and sellers; this imbalance becomes the price action.  Your order must be ahead of the next wave of orders in the direction of the price action. You must understand what prevents you from seeing where the loser is…because as a novice you “are” the loser at this point.  In many ways your thinking is the same as every other novice out there.  This is paramount to your trading because these changes in the markets, and the beginning of substantial moves, are where trading and investment profits are realized. In order to remove yourself from the crowd you must monitor your thinking. Leaning how you think gives you clues to how they (the herd) think.  Identifying those times when you feel the urge to do something that is out of line with your stated plan or a violation of your rules is to be documented.  Remember, you can’t change what you can’t face and you can’t face what you don’t know.  You must track your thinking, emotions and behavior.  This is key to getting the results that you want.   

Clarity of thinking and emotional patience precede counter-intuitive behavior.  Furthermore, your A-Game depends on it.  Master your mental game by first becoming aware of what you are thinking and then you are in a better position to change in the direction of growth in your trading outcomes.