The Lawrence Chan Blog

I have diverse interest in many things from science and technology to martial arts and ancient health practices. Obviously, discussion of these topics should be done within my own blog as oppose to keeping them here. Hence my blog is created so that I can have a venue to express my creativity and thoughts on my other interests. For those of you who share similar interests, you can check out my site TheLawrenceChan.com

Due to the sheer volume of articles I have written about trading, many of which are trading related yet not technically in line with what DaytradingBias.com is offering, they have to be split from my blog into yet another site. Hence for my non-technical writings about trading, videos I have curated from various sources that I think are useful for traders and my reviews of trading related products, you can find them at the site Essence of Trading

The reason why I picked the Tai Chi picture above for this page is best explained by my article Tai Chi Traders in a World of Chaos at Essence of Trading.

Below are the old blog posts that were originally posted here. To avoid broken links from other sites, I have decided to keep them here.



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The Benefit of US Dollar Rally

2015 Feb 2 Mon 8:40:47 | by Lawrence

US Dollar made a move against Canadian Dollar (Loonie) last week. Loonie forced to test its highest level over past 10 years.

To put it in perspective, we are talking about a whopping 10% jump since the end of December and a enormous increase of 20% from the beginning of year 2014.

First thing I did last Friday was rush to the bank before it close to convert a large portion of my US dollar trading income from year 2014 back into Loonie.

Thanks to the insanity of the central banks, my trading objective this year is just 20% closer without extra work.

2 comments


Next Phase In Life

2015 Jan 20 Tue 11:19:20 | by Lawrence

turn the pageEver since I started trading as a teen and then on the floor of Toronto Stock Exchange, a parallel career as a consultant on trading related matters silently developed over the years. It all started out from helping the older traders to setup their computers so that they get to check out the charts at home. It then evolved to writing indicators for these guys and small firms. Thinking about it, I would never guess one day I get to work for institutions as a retainer consultant.

This side job of mine sees me through good and bad times. It is a nice cushion helped me grow my trading capital quickly. Interesting enough, although I keep my consulting hours to low 20s per week, it generates income like a very good full time job thanks to steady increase in my billing rate. This side job also enabled me to fund interesting projects like the daytradingbias.com website.

Frankly, I am not the type of person who loves to grind at the computer. Given the break I have over the past two months, I am considering lifestyle changes. Taking on fewer work hours is one goal. Doing things I am more interested in is another.

To reduce work hours, it has to come from somewhere. Reducing trading hours is one way to do it. Reducing my consultant work is another. Dropping my consulting work all together is difficult because it is like a security blanket for me. It will be an interesting challenge for me as a trader because the changes to my bottom line can affect me in ways never happen before.

I like the idea of helping traders to trade better. But not everyone is in a situation where they are suitable to be trained. It is a very personal matter and it takes the commitment of both the trainee and the trainer to work together to make things workout. As some members asked if I can be their trading coach couple years ago, I have to decline back then because I do not have the emotional capacity to focus on their needs. I was preoccupied by my family difficulties at the time and I knew it would be unfair to them.

But what about now?

I am much more open to the idea but I guess I will not take on too many students either. Grooming one good trader at a time is more satisfying than opening a boot camp and let the fittest survive. The way how my mentors helped me with my trading is probably what I would like to do. Maybe with the exception to the part that some of them have me under contract to pay half my trading income over several years. Just thinking about that brings back good memories.

No matter how the changes unfold though, this will be a very interesting year for me.

2 comments


Interesting Concept On Trader Training

2014 Dec 23 Tue 11:23:04 | by Lawrence

I have all these extra time lately that I get to spend on thinking over things I have done over the past few years. As I write down my thoughts and reflections I notice something very interesting emerged. It seems to me that although I try not to be a teacher, trainer or coach in trading, somehow I am doing that indirectly. And the results are remarkable since I have received many emails from my members that I changed their lives for the better as they can now trade better, with less stress and more profit.

This makes me thinking with many questions:

1. Should training traders be the focus of my website going forward?

2. What have I done correctly on the site that positively impact these traders?

3. Why the specific combination of things offered on the website has such an impact on these traders?

4. Most important of all, why it works while other approaches failed?

I am gathering the facts and reviewing my notes at this time. A proper summary will be posted.

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Trading Records from Year 2000

2014 Dec 20 Sat 11:27:29 | by Lawrence

I am going through old stuff to destroy and found boxes of trading records.

This is just 1 out of 3 boxes from year 2000.

image

I guess I just find myself an interesting side project to do – search and destroy!

Comparing all these paper work against the electronic records nowadays, I say I like the modern way much better.

As a minimum, I do not have to keep physical records like those in the photo for at least 6 years (Canadian legal requirement).

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Musing About Discount on Trading Courses

2014 Dec 16 Tue 19:50:40 | by Lawrence

We all know that consumer products and services are sold mostly during the end of the year. All kinds of discount and specials going wild attracting you, the consumer, to spend money on them. Many trading related products and services follow this trend and offer discounts to their clients during this time.

I can tell you, with very high confidence, this year-end discount strategy does not work with anything that are related to career change and learning new things that improve a person’s income potential.

Why?

Here is the chart I posted last year in November on people’s cyclical behaviour on job seeking:

googletrend_jobs_2012Nov

 

In short, job seeking is put on hold during the 2nd half of the year and keep declining into year end all the time.

People put the thoughts of starting over on-hold during the holiday season. The tradition dictates how people behave and in turn affects the economy in a subtle way. Any training related products and services should offer discount right after New Year when people are actively seeking change.

I think I am a better forecaster than those economists who secretly use the Excel linear regression to project the future economic data results. At least what I observe has practical value.

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2014 Dec 16
Avatar vs. Real Photo and Other Amusing Questions

Some readers asked about my avatar. Why choose an avatar over real photo? Does it really look like you? Do you really have moustache? They are good questions although not really trading related. I will answer them all here. Avatar vs. Real Photo Un …

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2014 Dec 11
Catching Up

Playing catch up is more difficult than I expected as the pile of things to get done has been making new high with the market over the past 2 weeks. Luckily, similar to the stock market, when it crumbles, the pile also disappear pretty quickly. Orig …

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2014 Dec 6
Asking for Trouble with My New LinkedIn Handle

My marketing guru asked me to change my LinkedIn to something more human friendly and catchy … After many unsuccessful combinations of my first and last name, I came up with this one and it works! So here it is, my bold new LinkedIn handle, http …

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2014 Nov 19
Snow? What Snow?

Snow in Buffalo, NY   But north of Buffalo there is Toronto. And no snow, yet.   Lucky! =) …

2 comments


2014 Nov 13
Death, Taxes and Paperwork

During this time of grieving to cope with our loss, one thing we never imagine is the amount of paperwork to deal with. It turns out it is not that easy to handle the final matters for someone in our modern society. There are endless number of calls …

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