Ed Seykota: Timeless trading lessons from reclusive market wizard Ed

While the names of market gurus like Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffett and Peter Lynch are known by nearly everyone in the investing community, there are several traders who generate exceptional returns but do not want to come in the limelight. One such name is Ed Seykota, who may be one of the only traders who also wrote and starred in musical performance of his trading strategy ”
The Whipsaw Song“.

Although almost completely unknown to the investment world, Seykota’s achievements rank him as one of the best trend followers and traders of his time.

Seykota believes a trader’s psychology is the most important part of operating any trading system.

As a trend follower and money manager, he amassed millions in the 1970s and 1980s for his investors. He is basically a mechanical trend following trader who built the majority of his systems around exponential moving averages, with some reliance on pattern recognition.

Seykota has always kept a low profile and caught the public eye only after his interview in Jack Schwager’s ‘Market Wizards’ books.

He began his trading career in the 1970s, when he was hired by a major brokerage firm. It was in that brokerage firm that Seykota developed one of the first commercialized trading systems for managing money in the futures market.

After a few disagreements regarding the way management was interfering with his system, Seykota decided to part ways with them.

Investors over the years have learnt many invaluable lessons by following his trading philosophy. Let’s look at some of the trading rules that he mentioned in an interview with Jack Schwager.

Cut your losses
Seykota believes that the most important trading rule is to cut losses because protecting one’s capital is the primary job of a trader.

He feels making money should be the secondary goal in the priority list of traders and they should embrace trading losses.

He believes to stay ahead in the trading business, traders need to learn to lose like winners which means accepting losses the moment the market refutes their trade idea.

“If you make the mistake of hoping for the market to turn around in your favor, you’ve already lost. The best way to embrace trading losses is to have a plan. Combine that with small bets and you’ll be lightyears ahead of other traders. If you can’t take a small loss, sooner or later you will take the mother of all losses,” he said in an interview in Jack Schwager’s ‘Market Wizards’ book series.

Seykota also believes that losing a trading position is aggravating, whereas losing one’s nerve is devastating for a trading portfolio.

“The best way to ensure you never lose your nerve is to cut losses early. It’s one of the simplest ways to maintain your discipline and avoid emotional decision-making,” he said.

Ride your winners
Seykota is of the view that trading isn’t about having a win rate of 70% or 80% but it comes down to how much investors make when they’re right and how much they lose when they’re wrong.

He…