Learn · Glossary
Trading journal, trade review, win rate, payoff ratio. The core concepts of keeping a record, and how to write and review your own trades — explained plainly. Not investment advice.
What Is a Trading Journal? How to Keep One
A trading journal records each of your trades with the ticker, dates, return, and your reason for buying. Learn what it is and how to keep one consistently.
Read more →Trade Review: How to Look Back on Your Past Trades
A trade review means reopening a closed trade to check, with facts, whether your reasoning held up. Learn how to review and what to look for.
Read more →Win Rate: How to Calculate It on Your Own Trades
Win rate is the share of your trades that ended in profit. Learn how to calculate it and why win rate alone never tells the whole story.
Read more →Payoff Ratio: Average Win Divided by Average Loss
Payoff ratio is your average win divided by your average loss, comparing the size of a typical gain to a typical loss. Learn the formula and how it pairs with win rate.
Read more →Profit Factor: Total Profit Divided by Total Loss
Profit factor is your total profit divided by your total loss, showing the overall efficiency of your trading at a glance. Learn the formula and how to read it.
Read more →Expectancy: Your Average Expected Result Per Trade
Expectancy is the average result you can expect per trade, combining win rate and payoff ratio into one figure. Learn the formula and how to read it.
Read more →Win Rate by Holding Period: Splitting Your Trades by Duration
Win rate by holding period splits your trades into duration buckets, like intraday, swing, and long-term, to compare win rates. Learn its meaning and how to read it.
Read more →Trade Reason Tags: Tag Why You Bought, Then Review by Reason
Trade reason tags label why you bought, like earnings, news, or chart, so you can compare performance by reason on your own data. Learn how to use them.
Read more →What to Record in a Trade Entry: The Fields That Matter
Each trade entry records the ticker, buy and sell dates, return, your reason for buying, and the market context. Learn the must-have fields and the easily missed ones.
Read more →Trading Journal App vs Excel/Notion: Which to Use
Should you journal trades in an app or in Excel/Notion? Compared on automation, consistency, and built-in context. Here are the trade-offs of each approach.
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