Trading basicsUpdated 2 min readBy the FXNOD team
How to keep a trading journal
Keep a trading journal by recording every trade when you take it: the market, the setup, the stake, the planned exit, the result, and whether you followed your plan. Review it once a week and look for patterns in your own behaviour. A spreadsheet is enough. The journal only works if losing trades and broken rules go in it too.
What a journal is for
Your broker's history already shows what you traded. A journal records what the history cannot: why you entered, what you planned, how you felt and whether you kept your own rules. Those are the things you can change.
What to record
| Field | Example |
|---|---|
| Date and time | 9 Oct, 14:20 |
| Market and contract | Volatility 75, Rise/Fall, 5 ticks |
| Setup | Bounce from the hourly support zone |
| Stake and risk | Stake 2, session stop loss 20 |
| Planned exit | Contract expiry; stop for the day at +10 or -20 |
| Result | -2 |
| Followed the plan? | Yes |
| State of mind | Calm; second trade of the session |
| Note | Entered a little early, before the candle closed |
The column that matters most
Followed the plan, yes or no. Sort your trades by that column after a month. Most traders find their planned trades roughly break even or better and their unplanned trades carry nearly all the losses. No indicator will tell you that. Your journal will.
Journaling a bot
A bot records its own trades, so journal the runs and your decisions about them: the settings, why you chose them, how the run ended and what you did next. The entry that reads restarted with double stake after stop loss is worth more than a hundred rows of trades.
The weekly review
Count
Trades, wins, losses, average win, average loss, net result.
Split
By setup, by time of day, by planned and unplanned. Look for the group that loses.
Find the biggest loss
Was it bad luck inside the plan, or a broken rule?
Choose one change
One rule to add or one habit to drop next week. Not five.
Keeping it up
- Write the entry before the result is known, while your reason is still honest.
- Keep it short. A journal that takes ten minutes per trade is abandoned in a week.
- Add a screenshot of the chart at entry if you trade from charts.
- Never delete a row.
Questions people ask
- What is the best format for a trading journal?
- The one you will keep. A spreadsheet with ten columns beats any specialised app you stop opening. Paper works too.
- Do I need a journal if my broker shows my history?
- Yes. The history shows the trades. The journal shows your reasons and whether you followed your rules, which is where improvement comes from.
- How often should I review my journal?
- Weekly for patterns, and monthly for the bigger picture. Reviewing after every trade invites overreaction to noise.
Practise it with virtual funds
Trade Pilot gives you a live chart and Deriv's contracts on your demo account. There is nothing to install; check the required package in Discover.
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