daytrade diaries... september 15 part 2, page-25

Canyoubus, some interesting observations there and worth expanding on.

The key to successful trading IMO is finding the method that's the right fit for a person's personality. Could be scalping, day trading, short term trading, investing - they're all perfectly valid so long as you make a quid. Finding the right fit can take years of experimentation but once you have found it, it's gold.

HotCopper has a handful of prophets who seem eager to declare that theirs is the one true way. If it works for them, great. If their ideas work for you, great. But "one-size-fits-all" thinking is nonsense.

One lesson this thread has taught me is that there are a thousand ways to skin a cat, from Ipod and PJ's talent for scalping 1 cent moves to Young Trader and Tweety's gift for identifying undervalued penny dreadfuls, Kevi and Gizard's brilliant eye for chart patterns, Poly's ability to identify and capitalise on a developing market trend - I could go on but you get the idea. The key to profitable trading is to find what works best for you. If it's not day trading, that's fine.

The benefit of hindsight shows that a 'buy and hold' strategy back in March would almost certainly have delivered superior returns to day trading. But there was no way of knowing that at the time. And bear in mind that the last six months have been exceptional. Enjoy this long unbroken bull run while it lasts because it will end soon enough. When it does, many day-traders will continue to make a good living from intraday trading while the buy-and-hold school flounder, as most did up until March.

The key is to develop an array of trading strategies for any market conditions - up, down and sideways. That's what separates genuine full-time traders from bull-market fly-by-nights.