How To Analyze Your Swing Trading Results and Make Money in Choppy Markets

Do you want to make money in stocks by swing trading?  Do you have a job and would like to make some extra income part-time trading?  If you do, one of the most important things you can do is to analyze your trading results.  In this post I will show you how I analyze my trading results and go over how I still made money during my recent trading slump.

How to Analyze Results

The first thing I do when analyzing my trading journal is calculate my win rate, my average win and my average loss.  Since I started the Trade Report and alert service two months ago, I have made $16,054 off 32 trades, with 17 wins and 15 losses.  My win rate is 53 percent.  The average win is $1375 and the average loss is $488.  Take a look at the results:

While the overall win rate is decent, it fits within the 45-60 percent range that I strive for.  My trading methodology is not based on a high win rate.  Rather, I expect my profits to come from rigorous risk and trade management.  We want big wins and small losses.  The average win should at least double the average loss.  Currently my average win is $1375 and my average loss is $488, giving me a 2.8:1 win to loss ratio.  That is the trading result I want to see.  With this ratio I only need to have a 35 percent win rate to break even.

How to Make Money With a Slump in Win Rate

I firmly believe you can make money in any market.  There are always good trades to be had.  Choppy markets with no strong up or down trend are tough to trade, but if you follow the 23 laws of trading religiously, you can turn a profit while others are either sitting out or losing money.

While in an overall uptrend, the past few weeks have been tough to trade.  Mr. Market has been choppy as it figures out if the trend will resume, or if we are entering a deep correction.  Many successful traders have been sitting out, which is fine.  Losing traders have been trading as usual without adjusting and lost money.  During times like these I like to lower my aggressiveness but still take some stabs that will result in lots of small losses.  My attitude is win rate be damned, I’m here to make money.  I know I’ll take some small hits, but my wins will more than make up for those losses.

In this choppy market over the past two weeks, I have made 11 trades with 5 wins and 6 losses for a 45 percent win rate.  My average win has been $763 while the average loss is $447.  During a tough period to trade where my win rate has slumped, I’ve locked in a $1133 gain.  This may not sound like much compared to the gains made during the previous month and a half, but over time consistently trading well using strong risk management in tough markets will do wonders for your bottom line.

Take a look at the last 11 trades, which resulted in a 45 percent win rage but $1133 in gains:

How have you done trading over the past few weeks?  Leave a comment and let me know!

Remember the importance of reviewing your trade results.  Make sure your wins outpace your losses.  Rigorous review will turn a losing trader into a winning trader and a winning trader into a great trader.

Every trade in the spreadsheet was sent to Trade Report members via email alert.  If you would like to receive the Trade Report and Alerts, sign up for the free trial.  Follow me on twitter or email me at [email protected]

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