The Danger of Stubbornly Insisting Being Right in the Stock Market Is Significant

Being right can be recklessly dangerous in trading. In day trading or scalping, you must recognize when you're wrong every minute. Delays can be costly, especially with large bets. In long-term investing, delayed acknowledgment is even more damaging due to the time factor.

In scalping or trading, you might win 8 out of 10 trades, but two losses can erase a week's gains. In long-term investing, one loss can wipe out a year's gains or even 10 years of gains/dividends collected.

Most retail investors are long-term, which explains why 98% lose money. They are often too slow or inflexible to admit they're wrong, believing time is on their side while ignoring the significant risk it poses.

Lesson learned: Don't be inflexible. Lock in your profits. I admire how Mark Minervini trades.

Ultimately, trading is about personal development. You owe it to yourself to learn from mistakes, which is why I sometimes title my trading recap posts "Notes to Self for Personal Development." You are accountable for your mistakes. You don't owe anyone an explanation but yourself.

When you realize your mistake too late, your options depend on the price level and market reaction. You can either repair your position through Dollar Cost Averaging (DCA) for a potential rebound or exit and take the opposite direction, though this is less preferred if a pullback is imminent. Example, last Thursday, I chose the first approach after missing my exit due to emotion, incurring a $10k loss in less than a day but managed to recover all by added to short but this time from the top huge reversal (ironically is the first short was insisting being right and was right but bad timing i.e. fell to market makers' manipulative moves push-up too big before huge reversal) ending the day with only a $200 loss. It all depends on the stock's daily character. Yes, I understand when you're losing big very fast, it takes a lot of skill and emotional strength to be able to make fast and calculated decisions to turn it around fast.