My 2 cents, on everyone else 2 cents

One of the most difficult aspects of being a beginner trader is filtering through all the opinions out there. One of the most annoying parts of this, is that everyone so fundamentally believes they are right, that they have the only legitimate opinion that exists in the entire universe.

This market experts (some who are very successful), will make statements such as 'Using volume indicators along with a trend following indicators, is the only way to consistently make money trading.' 'Technical analysis has been proven unsuccessful over the last 50 years, fundamental analysis is proven to be far superior in the long run.'

This may be a little bit of an exaggeration (but not much). These experts talk as if they are the only ones who have the answers to how the markets work. When the truth is, there are successful fundamental traders, technical trend followers, swing traders, day traders... I'm sure there is even a few traders that trade on gut feeling and are quite successful.

So this is the big thing that has taken me almost a year to get over. Some of these experts do have very valid and useful opinions. How do you filter the information to something you can use in your own trading. The important point being here, is that every trader is different. Your emotional makeup, skills that you have, and a variety of other traits have a large impact on how you trade (and how you should listen to different experts, and even technical indicators that you use).

One person may use the same experts opinion to go short on a stock (for a short-term hold), while another goes long (for a long term hold). Each may end up having a successful trade by there own measure. This easily works the same way for technical indicators.

If this sounds familiar, the ideas are not original. I read the Van Tharp book a few months back, but the point didn't really hit home until the last few weeks of trading. It really is important to know yourself, and know your goals. When you do that, it will make it a lot easier to filter through the enormous amount of information that is out there.

I think it's fair to say that I am still in that discovery process, but I believe I am moving a lot faster through the discovery process as I actually trade the market and backtest a variety of systems.

One other note, I am getting awfully curious about futures now. I have a good understanding of equities now. I have a little understanding of options, but so far, I am not too impressed with any of the option trading strategies I've seen. I really like the idea of trading futures, however I can't say I know much about the futures market, except there is large risk (lots of levarage used).

I'm considering opening a second brokerage account with Interactive Brokers to trade futures, while continuing to take trade equities at Fidelity (cause I really do like the wealth-lab product... which only available in the US through fidelity). The only problem, is it costs a fee if you don't trade in the account, and I just need to start following a few of the futures markets before I ever place a trade. I need data on prices and contracts, and ideally would like to backtest some futures strategies before jumping in.