Scalp, Swing or Position Trading?

I was thinking about this today and I'm sure we've all thought about this at one point or another. Compounding, Risk, Market Exposure etc all play a factor in each style of trading.

The question I was asking myself today was....long term,
which trading style typically makes the most money and outperforms the rest?

Scalping (short term), Swing Trading (mid term) or Positional Trading (long term)

Your thoughts?

In my opinion, swing trading is the best. Spread will eat up portion of your profits if your are scalping, and it's stressful. Position trading, you will tie your money with this kind of trading method. When another great opportunity arise, you might not be able to take it because your money is tie to the previous position. Swing trading is just buy low sell high, which every businessman will do to run their business in order to gain profits no matter what kind of business they own. And that's the reality way to earn money in this world no matter what you are doing. Just my 2cent. Happy trading

Well, i think that i am not the one who began trading with scalping because that is psychologically easy to trade - enter somewhere and, if succeeded, get some pips, even if not, you can always wait another some minutes to take your profit. Truth, this is stressful trading style -> some newbies looking at the chart and seeing something different from what they expected to see, begin to panic and exit at the wrong time. Swing trade is the best option of three in case you have MM, exact enter and exit. Advantage is that you can put your order and forget about it for some time. I have not tried position trading, but think that you should have an enormous initial deposit, so that you can be not so tied with only one position and even earn money for a living.

It depends on the Market Type - exclusively.

That is the reason why your trading system (method, strategy or tactic) needs to be flexible and capable of properly identifying which type of market condition exists, so that the right tool can be brought to bear on the market, at the right time.

It is precisely because there are different Market Types, that you see different types of trading styles, or techniques being deployed. The most profitable, would be a trading system that successfully integrated all three (3) Market Types into one cohesive trading operation/function.

The difficulty? Conceiving, designing, developing, engineering, analyzing, integrating and optimizing such a flexible system is not easy, and it takes a tremendous amount of research. Can it be done? Yes, I have done it myself. Will everyone be able to do it? Absolutely, not. It will take the time, energy, patience, tenacity, focus, sacrifice and motivation that most Traders simply don't have and won't sustain.

So, what can a Trader do? If one does not have the above attributes, then one can simply decide to focus on one, or maybe two Market Types. This is why you see people calling themselves things like "Trend Trader," or "Channel Trader," or why they might consider themselves just a "Scalper."

One does not have to engage every single Market Type. One can be very successful by focusing on just one (1) Market Type and then honing that skill-set to the limit. One can become an expert in just one (1) of the three (3) Market Types, and do quite well for themselves on a long-term basis.

Others will seek what they call the "holy grail," and attempt to Unify all Three (3) Market Types. It is a very intellectually challenging task, that only the most tenacious and the most creative Traders ever succeed in doing correctly. It is MORE than a full-time job successfully integrating the three (3) into a singular trading system that works a high percentage of the time.

Get really good at one, then move to the next and then the next.

Finding (striking) the right balance of connective algorithms that allow you to fully integrating all three (3) will be your biggest technical challenge - maybe the biggest technical challenge of your life (not knowing what your technical background looks like). If you have a degree in any of the Engineering disciplines, it will help during the integration phases a great deal. Having any technical degree, will help during the integration phases. But, a technical degree is certainly NOT a prerequisite, nor is it the litmus test for success as a Fully Integrated Trader.

The Fully Integrated Trader (FIT), is truly a rare bird. You won't find may of us on these boards and you wont find many even willing to talk about what they do. For some, it is a dark art of sorts and they feel the need to protect what they do.

Others (precious few) don't necessarily mind talking about what they do, but don't want to get too deep into the details of exactly how they do it. I don't know of any FIT who broadcasts every single thing they do, or simply hands it over on a silver platter to the general public - myself included.

Start with one style that you think you might like and give it a whirl on the demo account. You have nothing to lose and important information about yourself as a Trader to gain. Test out each style and see which one you think suits you the best for now. Play with the style, have fun, but don't get to serious "minded" on the demo account. Its just a demo, after all.

After a while, put away the demo account, shut down the demo trading platform and open up blank spreadsheet. Create column headings for Open, High, Low, Close and then go get some historical D1 data from your Broker. Dump that data into the corresponding columns (you should be able to get a formatted .csv file from MT4 - just google for the script) of your spreadsheet and start getting familiar with the way the data flows from row to row (bar to bar). One row in the spreadsheet is the same as looking at one D1 bar on the candle chart, but close the chart and focus on just the RAW data inside the spreadsheet.

Pick any row of D1 data and make it your focus row. Look at the prices on your focus row and compare them to the prices on the row just ABOVE and just BELOW your focus row. Note the differences in price and use the spreadsheet to calculate the differential in pips between each data point on the row just ABOVE and just BELOW your focus row. This is called the Price Delta.

Notice how each and ever row (bar) of data contains not just four (4) price Deltas, but 16 different Price Deltas for every two rows of data. That's very important to remember. That's 16 different pieces of information contained within just two bars of raw data. Do the math. How many total bars of D1 data did you dump into the chart!

Looking at raw data this way, will help you begin to see patterns in the data relative to its movement from one row to the next. You cannot see, nor appreciate these Price Deltas by simply looking at a candle chart. You have to calculate the Price Deltas for each set of two rows. With a spreadsheet that is as easy as copying down a formula, after you code the first one in the adjacent cell next to row number 1.

You've just been given an introduction into the creation of your very own Price Delta Indicator, from which there are literally an infinite number of Price Delta Types, that tell you a whole lot about the behavior of Price and how to predict such behavior before it happens.

It is the basis of StealthTrading. Learn to use the tool of Price Delta wisely, for it reveals things about the market that no other form or type of indicator can.

The Price Delta is unseen by any other indicator in existence. It is the 'hidden' mechanism behind every movement in price that you see in the market. It is the connective tissue that binds ALL price movement in the market, through every time frame. It is the 'Blood' that runs through the veins of every single traded market in existence.

No Price Delta to yield, no market to trade.

Therefore, it must be extremely important and something you might want to know about, whether you classify yourself as a Scalper, Day Trader, Swing Trader, Position Trader, Investor, or Fully Integrated Trader.