Grade the process, not the P/L

MAC — FOUNDER, TRAPPER'S EDGE · FORMER FIDELITY TRADE SPECIALIST (SERIES 7 · 63 · SIE)

Your P/L is lying to you. Not about how much money you made — about whether you traded well.

I lost $75k learning the difference. Here's the metric I use instead.

The most expensive weeks are profitable ones

A green week that broke your rules isn't a good week. It's a loss that hasn't arrived yet.

Variance paid you this time — and taught you the wrong lesson at the same time. You banked the profit and you banked the habit, and only one of those compounds in your favor. The most expensive weeks of my trading life were profitable ones: they're what convinced me the rules were optional.

The whole formula

That's the entire thing. No black box, no AI magic, no "proprietary algorithm." A clean trade is one that followed your plan — your setups, your size, your stop. Every broken rule on a trade costs half a point.

Notice what's not in it: profit. A disciplined red week scores 100. A sloppy green week scores 40. Because you control exactly one thing in this game — whether you follow your own plan. The market controls the rest.

The bands

• 90+ ELITE — you trade like someone a firm would fund
• 75+ SOLID — the leak is small
• 60+ LEAKING — the plan is decorative
• <60 BLEEDING — you don't have a trading problem, you have a discipline problem

The score runs over your last 30 closed trades, so it moves when your behavior moves — one clean week won't launder a sloppy month, and one bad day won't erase a disciplined one.