Why You Shouldn't Watch Your P&L While Trading

The more you watch your profit and loss, the worse you’re likely to perform

Every trader has been there: staring at their daily P&L, watching those numbers fluctuate with every tick, feeling their heart rate spike with each swing. It’s natural to want to know how you’re doing. After all, the whole point of trading is to make money, right?

But here’s the problem: the more you watch your profit and loss, the worse you’re likely to perform. Constantly monitoring your P&L is one of the most common mistakes traders make, and it can sabotage even the most well-researched strategies. Here’s why stepping back from the scoreboard might be the best trade you never make.

Emotional Decision-Making Takes Over

When you see red numbers flashing on your screen, something primal happens. Fear and panic don’t knock politely at the door of your rational mind—they kick it down. Suddenly, your carefully planned strategy goes out the window. You might exit a winning trade too early because you’re terrified of giving back profits, or you’ll hold a losing position far too long, hoping it will magically reverse.

The opposite is equally dangerous. When you’re up big, that rush of euphoria can make you feel invincible. You start taking bigger positions, ignoring your risk parameters, convinced that you’ve finally “figured it out.” Both extremes—fear and overconfidence—are enemies of consistent profitability.

“we feel losses about twice as intensely as we feel gains”

Behavioral economics has shown us something crucial: we feel losses about twice as intensely as we feel gains. This isn’t just a trading quirk; it’s hardwired into human psychology. When you constantly watch your P&L, you’re essentially amplifying this asymmetry. A $500 loss creates more psychological pain than the pleasure from a $500 gain, creating an emotional rollercoaster that clouds your judgment.

This becomes particularly destructive over the course of a trading day. You might have five small wins and one larger loss, ending net positive, but because you felt that loss so acutely in the moment, you walk away feeling like you had a terrible day.

Short-Term Noise Drowns Out Your Strategy

If you have a sound trading strategy with a genuine edge, that edge typically plays out over weeks, months, or even years—not minutes or hours. Intraday fluctuations are mostly random noise. The problem is that when you watch every tick, that noise feels significant. Every dip looks like the start of a collapse; every rally looks like a rocket ship you might miss.

This constant stimulation creates an irresistible urge to “do something.” And in trading, doing something at the wrong time is usually worse than doing nothing at all. You end up making impulsive decisions.

Watching P&L Causes Stress and Overtrading

Constant monitoring is mentally exhausting. That exhaustion leads to what psychologists call “decision fatigue,” where the quality of your decisions deteriorates throughout the day, because you’re making decisions from a depleted mental state.

Overtrading is particularly insidious because it feels productive. You’re doing something, taking action, staying engaged. But in reality, you’re often just generating costs while decreasing your returns. Most successful traders know that sometimes the best trade is the one you don’t make.

Conclusion

Your P&L is a scoreboard, not a dashboard. It tells you where you’ve been, not where you should go next.

The most successful traders share a common trait: they focus relentlessly on their process and let the results take care of themselves. They know their edge, they trust their system, and they execute with discipline. When you’re constantly watching your P&L, you’re letting outcomes dictate your behavior rather than letting your process generate outcomes.