by Ben Ang

Created on: June 04, 2009

Every trader begins their own arduous trading career by taking baby steps in learning and improving their knowledge and skill in a continuous manner. They need to focus all of their energy and effort to improve the probability of wining in every trade made while simultaneously learning to deal with emotions. Everyone of us are unique individuals. We look at the same situation but we react and also analyse it differently. While the basic knowledge for trading, both fundamental and technical analysis are similar for most financial instruments, an example can be the analysis of the potential of a certain company stock to make money. However, the methods of trading, the trading plans,level of discipline and emotional aspects for each individual are very different. This is why it can be difficult to make money in the market and have a trading career if the individual trader does not improve on his areas of weaknesses.

So what are the attributes for a successful trader? There are 10 attributes that are crucial to the success of a trader. But one thing to note that even though you may have all of these attributes, the probability to lose money is always present as the market is a place where human emotions congregate. Just like weather and the moods of a woman, it is difficult to predict and impossible to say that you will always win in every trade you make. This is the most important thing to take note of when trading. For beginners and other amateur traders, it is always good to keep learning as trading is one of the toughest careers in the world. The 10 attributes are:

1) Properly capitalized with money that you can afford to lose.

Trading is a difficult career, if you are not properly capitalized with money you can afford to lose, chances of losing money is always present and high as we will definitely make mistakes during the learning curve. One of the common mistakes tend to be over trading in a single trade. When the market moves according to the trader's prediction, he will surely be happy. But again, what happens when the market moves against that persons' position?

2) Understands the financial instrument being traded.

There are many different types of financial instruments available for trading in the market. Understanding the instrument you trade is essential. What good are you doing yourself when you don't know how the financial instrument you are trading works? This is especially more important for derivatives since the presence of many factors in

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