The Daily Trading Coach
- 2009
- First edition (Wiley Trading), 2009
- hardcover
- Wiley
- 9780470398562
AskNex reference artwork. The publisher's cover appears only under an approved rights record.
by Brett N. Steenbarger
A psychologist's programme for becoming your own trading coach: observe your patterns as data, journal states as well as results, and change one behaviour at a time.
Turns the vague advice to control your emotions into a practice with feedback.
AskNex explains and applies the ideas in this book in its own words. Nothing on this page is quoted from the book, and the page does not stand in for it: the argument, the evidence and the voice are the author's, and reading the original remains the deeper path.
The core idea
You cannot coach what you do not observe. Record decisions and emotional states, not just outcomes; set goals for the process you control; and rehearse one change until it is routine.
The ideas
2 mental models, in the order they build on each other.
- 01
Patterns as data
Your worst trades share a state. Find the state, not the villain.
- 02
Process goals
Judge the week on rule-following and preparation, not profit.
What the book argues
AskNex's own paraphrases of the positions this book takes, as they are held in the knowledge graph. Not quotations, and not the whole book.
Revenge trading is a frustration response; recognise the state and step away before it drives the next decision.
Record decisions and emotional states, not just results, so you can see which states produce your worst trades.
Coach yourself by observing your patterns as data, not as verdicts on your character.
Set goals for the process you control, not the profit you do not; results follow process over enough samples.
Self-coaching and review
Treating your own decisions as data: record states and choices, find the pattern, change one thing.
Emotional regulation under pressure
Recognising the state that drives a bad decision before it drives the next one.
Trading discipline
Following a defined method through wins and losses without needing any single trade to be right.
Habit formation
Behaviour that persists because it is cued and repeated, not decided.
Position sizing and drawdown
Sizing each commitment so that no single loss can end the series.
What actually matters
- Revenge trading is a frustration response; the fix is recognising the state and stepping away.
- Wholesale reinvention fails. One rehearsed change at a time sticks.
Where it applies
Practical moves the book supports. Each one is a place to start, not a rule.
- State journal
Before each trade, note your mood and energy in one word. Review weekly against results.
- One change
Pick the single behaviour with the largest cost and practise only that for a month.
Questions worth asking
Which emotional state precedes my worst decisions?
What did I do well this week, regardless of P&L?
Problems this book speaks to
Recurring situations where this book is one of the sources AskNex draws on. Each opens a public orientation page.
What are you trying to figure out right now?
AskNex will answer your situation using the ideas in The Daily Trading Coach alongside every other source that applies — including the ones that argue against it.