A bird in the hand...

[JollyGreen]

is definitely worth two in the bush...

You can translate this to trading and it shows how people will regularly gamble in the hope of a greater reward. I was trying to help someone with there trading and it was a joint venture. He was driving the PC and I was advising him when to get in and out. We were on fire and before you knew it we had £90 on a horse that was trading at 1.2 - a nice position to be in. I told him to green up but he was adamant the horse would win.

That is the typical gambler's mentality and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get him to take the £75 guaranteed, he wanted to hang on for the extra £15. The horse lost and he stunned me by saying "At least we didn't lose anything"

Now I appreciate that long term we will end up in the same position with regards P&L but I am certain this person will continue to gamble and find himself in positions where he will end up losing money. If you are tempted into this method then perhaps the lure of the in-running "get of jail" trade is not too far away!

Give me the money every time!!

JG

[jimrobo]

I can't say I've ever had the problem of not hedging but the "in running easily scalp yourself out of trouble" trade has always been a tough one to resist for me!!

[TraderGray]

In my early trading days I always had this problem of hedging or not. I took many trades in play and, most of the time greened (or redded) for a very small profit or loss.

This in itself is not a major issue but on the occasions that the profit or loss has been larger I can only recall 2 instances where the profit was larger. Many times the profit has been a much bigger loss than I would normally have taken and in these cases one wrong decision can set you back, at best, a few days profit.

Fortunately this year I have been far more structured and disciplined in my trading and have no problem closing my positions before the race goes in play, whatever the result.

Whilst I am not making massive profits this discipline has been the sole reason for my trading bank stability and the small profits I do make.