The "SET Roadshow Chiang Mai" is an educational event on finance and investment organized by the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET), which recently traveled north to provide knowledge to investors in Chiang Mai over the past weekend.
Throughout the day, participants attended four lecture sessions covering topics from identifying investment goals to strategies for profiting from various financial products.
One of the sessions delved deeply into investment mindsets suitable for individuals to survive various market conditions, titled "Opening the Mindset with a Professional Trader," presented by Akkharapong Khuangthanachai, owner of the Stock Manday page and a full-time trader who applies investment psychology to analyze market directions and technical charts.
In the investment world, the most crucial factor determining who survives or fails is often not just the tools used but the Mindset or framework of thought. Each person’s mindset is shaped by experience, beliefs, and attitudes, which manifest in their behavior.
Akkharapong illustrated the mindset on risk with the analogy "ants don’t enter sugar mills." People typically think that sugar mills, containing vast amounts of sugar, would be swarmed by ants just like a sugar bowl at home. However, in reality, there are no ants in sugar mills because the high heat, low humidity, and protective systems make the area highly risky, so ants avoid it.
Unlike ants, investors know that the stock market is risky, akin to a sugar mill, yet they can apply a Growth Mindset—meaning a mindset that can develop and grow—to learn, understand rules, and manage risk to safely extract benefits from this "sugar mill."
The heart of the Growth Mindset is taking 100% responsibility for oneself. When a trade results in loss, a professional trader does not blame the market, the system, or uncontrollable external factors but instead introspects to identify flaws and plans corrective actions.
One investment option Akkharapong recommended to attendees to broaden their investment mindset was "investing in TFEX."
He noted that many people have a Fixed Mindset, believing TFEX is a high-risk market requiring large capital, which discourages them from investing in it.
"People who trade TFEX won’t go back to trading stocks."
This is Akkharapong Khuangthanachai’s perspective on investing in the Thailand Futures Exchange (TFEX), Thailand’s derivatives market regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission and a subsidiary of the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET).
Akkharapong shared that a good investment mindset can be divided into three main principles:
1. Avoid greed: Invest according to your actual capacity and risk tolerance without overextending or rushing, especially in markets with high leverage such as TFEX, which typically offers about 10 times leverage from the start.
Therefore, investors do not need to use additional leverage aggressively. If they understand and allocate investment capital appropriately according to the leverage they can handle, their portfolio will not be at risk of blowing up.
2. Avoid overtrading: This is a major cause of portfolio damage and failure, with two aspects:
Financially, limiting investment amounts to avoid overexposure. Investors should set an investment proportion suitable to their own capacity.
Mentally, maintaining discipline to cut losses when investments go against the plan. Consistent adherence to cutting losses according to rules and plans demonstrates good discipline.
If an investor starts to hesitate or stubbornly refuses to cut losses, it indicates an overtrade mentality, which is very dangerous to the portfolio.
3. Trust the method: Investors must follow the established process and plan, trading in line with market trends, and strictly avoid making decisions based on personal feelings or intuition.
Statistics show most investors who fail rely on personal feelings on the spot, despite having accurate trading processes and plans.
Akkharapong compared the importance of a mindset deeply ingrained in the psyche to lighting a fire: no adult would dare to put their finger in the flame because they understand the risk and pain.
In contrast, a small child lacking this mindset might touch the flame out of curiosity once or twice, but after experiencing pain the third time, the child will never dare touch it again.
Investing is similar: when investors learn from losses and truly understand reality, they accept and trust the trading process rather than relying on feelings again.
At the session "Decoding to Create Profit Opportunities with Futures and Options in TFEX," attendees were introduced to diverse investment opportunities.
Akkharapong explained that, from his viewpoint, investing in futures contracts is an excellent financial tool enabling investors to profit in any market condition (two-way betting), whether the market is rising or falling.
However, before making profits, investors must pass the first gate by changing perspectives and opening a new mindset.
If you hold beloved stocks and don’t want to sell, but the market faces negative factors with a high risk of short-term decline,
the trader’s option is to open a short position (hedge risk) in products like Stock Futures, similar to car insurance — you don’t want accidents, but insurance covers damages if they happen. Moreover, TFEX offers products matching various risk levels and portfolio sizes, such as:
1. SET50 Index Futures: Based on the top 50 leading stocks in the country, notable for its structure that facilitates speculation with high liquidity and trading volume, unlike small-cap stocks with low volume.
2. Gold Online Futures & Mini Gold Online Futures: Provide opportunities to profit from the volatile global gold prices, with Mini Gold Online Futures lowering margin requirements to help small or new investors use less capital.
3. Currency Futures: Tools for profiting from and managing foreign exchange risk, such as USD Futures, allowing investors to leverage fluctuations between the baht and the US dollar to generate profits and protect export-import businesses.
Ultimately, a mindset framework is most effective when you can implement the plan and strictly maintain trading discipline.
Embracing and learning tools like TFEX is not only an option to survive and profit in volatile markets but also a lesson that transforms behavior and helps portfolios grow.
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