Vince Stanzione : Why women are better financial traders

When I first started out working for a large bank in foreign exchange (FX) back in 1985 we didn’t have any female dealers, the few women that worked on the dealing floor were in admin and operated telex machines as many FX deals were made and confirmed this way and no men could type fast enough.
Fast-forward 28 years and while the majority of people I teach how to spread bet and trade and those opening spread betting accounts are men, I am pleased to see a good number of new female students achieving excellent results and beating their male counterparts.
The ratio of men to women is still around 85% in favour of men so there’s still some way to go to reach equality but it’s far more common to see female traders and I encourage more women to take up trading.
The big factor leading to more women trading is the internet and the fact that you can trade without having to speak to an arrogant male dealer – and trust me the majority still are which can be very intimidating. The excellent online platforms mean that everything can be done without ever having to pick up the phone.
Women are still in the minority but they have a few tricks to teach the men so for the male readers try to pick up some tips from your female counterparts.
Here are five possible reasons why women generally do far better at financial spread betting and other areas of trading.
Men hate to be wrong
As a trader we have to realise that many of our trades will be wrong and it’s just part of the business but generally men hate to be wrong and are more prone to “blind hope” that a trade turns around.
The correct approach is to follow a trading system or strategy, trade a relatively small part of your trading capital and cash in losses quickly rather than stubbornly sticking with a bad trade.
Remember you can have more losing trades than winning ones and as long as you keep the losing trades small and the winners big - you’re still ahead.
Women traders are better in a crisis and less emotional
Contrary to popular belief I have found female traders to be far more disciplined and less likely to panic than their male counterparts.
Detaching the emotional side of trading from decision making is a very desirable trait to have. From my experience the reason men panic more is normally that they have overextended their accounts and allowed little margin for errors so price movements are exaggerated.
My experience with women traders is that they never risk everything on one trade and normally keep higher cash balances/reserves.
Women can say NO
Sometimes the best trades are the ones you do not make, women are more selective and picky with new trading opportunities where as the men are quick to jump in and make a trade just because they want to be part of the action.
Also women were happy to let winning trades run longer where as men had to fiddle often causing them to take profits too soon.
Women read the manual!
As part of my course I produce a 200-page workbook (Making Money from Financial Spread Trading) and two DVDs, yet many of the men never read it or if they do they just go straight to the trading system pages and ignore the rest.
The DVD has a trading quiz and I deliberately placed the answers in a different section of the workbook which would require you to read the workbook or check the contents page, yet many men email to say that the answers are not in “their” copy.
Not only do women read the manual they are by and large the only ones who also email for help and clarification. Women also keep better trading records and keep trading diaries.
Women do more research – men dive in
Overall women spend more time researching a trade and asking questions and are less likely to trust a news headline or market “guru” tip without doing far more digging before going ahead.
While this can mean that sometimes women enter a little late into a trade overall it is better and more profitable to do so and make a little less and play it safe.
Men tend to like to learn from experience, often sharing trading war stories on chat forums whereas women will try and find out enough up front to be able to sidestep them.
Summary
Regardless if you're trading using financial spread betting, contracts for difference, options, margined FX or just buying and selling via a broker, then if you want to improve your results and you do not possess the requisite X-X chromosomes then maybe instead it's time to think more like a woman.
More from Vince Stanzione on the basics of how to spread bet here.