We often hear that a perfect Trading Routine is what differentiates a good professional trader from an amateur trader.

In fact, without an effective trading routine, you just move from one trade to another without any order and planning. The result is that you trade by pure luck and chances are that your performance will be negatively impacted.

On the other hand, when you develop a good trading routine, you will understand the power of consistency and you will build a solid performance over it.

Let’s make one thing clear!

It doesn’t exist the “best trading routine”. There are many routines and it is you that should understand which one works best for you.

In this article, you will learn one good Trading Routine that many fellow traders have found effective and have then adapted to their personal trading style.

#1 Prepare early

Being prepared is an essential characteristic when trading.

So, are you ready for the 5:30 wake up?

I guess you’re not, in fact you don’t need to!

Preparing early doesn’t necessarily mean waking up very early in the morning.

It means being prepared before you sit down and start trading.

So, what does it actually mean?

For instance, having the right attitude before trading. If you feel it’s not your day, than you should stay away from the Markets and take the day off.

It also means knowing how to react to news events, because they usually have sudden and significant impacts on the price of an asset.

Essentially, before starting trading, you should have a clear awareness of what your about to do and be prepared to do it at your best.

#2 Update your watchlist

Not every day will offer the same opportunities.

For this reason, you should always keep a fresh watchlist with the symbols under your radar.

It doesn’t matter whether you are a day trader or swing trader, you should update your watchlist at least once per day.

In this trading routine we like to do it in the morning.

We review all the assets that we usually trade and save in our watchlist only those symbols that are set to offer a good opportunity during the trading hours.

By doing so you only need to go through a shorter list during the day and you rather concentrate on the opportunities.

#3 Highlight setups on the chart and set alarms

A watchlist is great, but it is not enough.

Once the list has been filled with all the “interesting symbols” for the day, we go through it again and highlight the setups we are able to identify.

This is a very personal step but to facilitate your trading you should always highlight the setups ahead of time.

Additionally, we set alarms so that they are triggered as soon as a setup completes.

By doing so you will remove all the stress of going through your watchlist again and again.

#4 Wait and chill

After you updated your watchlist, highlighted the setups on your chart and set the alerts, you can sit back and relax.

All you have to do is to wait for an alarm to be triggered and review the setup.

Is the setup good?

If so, then you can enter your trade but remember to always trade according to your Trading rules!

If you do not stick to your rules because, for instance, you feel very confident in a setup and you end up risking to much, you will compromise your future performance for the bad.

Just wait for an opportunity and trade it only if it respects your rules.

#5 Log, analyse and reflect

Every trading routine is not complete if you do not log and review what happened.

You could do that for every single trade or maybe at the end of the day, or at the end of the trading week.

Once again, it is very personal but you should always take the time to log a trade in a trading journal and analyse what went wrong or right.

By doing so you will not only learn from mistakes but also recognise what you did correctly and build confidence more rapidly.

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We just described a simple but effective trading routine that is used every single day by many fellow traders.

How is yours?

Let us know and we’ll be happy to share it with the community.