Short Term vs Long Term Trading

What time period is the easiest to predict direction?  It is something that varies for each individual.  Based on experience, the longer the time frame, the better I can correctly predict price direction.  It is why I have eschewed daytrading and trying to predict how the SPX moves in the next 30 minutes/1 hour/2 hours, and focused on how the SPX moves in the next 3 days/7 days/30 days.

I have found daytrading to be more and more difficult as the HFTs dominate the price action in the intraday time frame.  I am better at predicting what others will do over the next 3-7 days than I am over what they will do
over the next few hours.

And this game is mainly about 2 things:  1) risk management - to stay in the game 2) prediction - to profit off of futures movements in price.  Don't believe those who say not to try to predict price, or have a bias, and to follow the price action.  That belief leads to chasing prices and buying a lot of tops and selling a lot of bottoms.  That is how you get chopped up and chewed out by the market.

Also I have found that trading less reduces stress.  When you don't have to constantly focus on whether to buy or sell, that frees up more time to analyze the market to predict where it will go.  There is a constant background noise level of stress that one gets from holding a big position, but if you do it often, usually your body will adapt and it won't affect sleep or everyday life.  If it does, then you probably need to trade smaller positions or stick to daytrading, which is a hard way to make an easy living. 

Scalping and daytrading are ways people try to take risk out of a risk business.  The more risk you take out of trading, the more return you take out.  Theoretically, the safest and most risk free trade (other than "risk-free" arbitrage, something that really doesn't exist anymore) would be to buy and immediately sell, and vice versa, not letting price move at all.  But you don't make anything, and end up paying the bid/ask spread and commissions.

If you are a long term trader, or investor, then you forego a lot of opportunities by not taking advantage of some high probability short term movements that are in the opposite direction of your long term position.  But definitely, it is a much better to err on the side of trading too little than too much. 

The animal spirits are active, and stocks like TSLA are going parabolic.  Speculation is rampant as the futures gap up big.  We are getting closer to the short zone around 3200, and I am watching closely for entry points.