Qualities of a Best Investor in 2022

THE BALANCE INVESTING

6 Personality Traits of the Best Investors

Successful stock market investors have several traits in common. The more your own style mimics the greats, the more likely you are to produce profits. These successful traits include patience, focus, and doing your due diligence in researching your investment

Key Takeaways

Successful stock market investors have several traits in common. The more your own style mimics the greats, the more likely you are to produce profits.

A few of the key traits include patience, the ability to tune out the noise, and staying the course.

Other important traits include remaining calm, doing the homework, and asking for knowledge.

Patience

Above and beyond all the other traits, the degree of patience you possess with impact your final results. Perhaps this is because patience is actually the exact opposite of the profit-killing emotions which plague most investors, such as impatience, greed, and fear.

In fact, a steady hand will often eliminate all the stock market mistakes which come along with frustration or anger or regret. In the world of investing, patience means profits.

Ability to Tune out Noise

This personality trait will serve you well, whether we are talking about the stock market, mainstream media, or even noisy kids. With constant distractions, and the constant interruptions of advertisements each day, how can anyone survive unless they are able to ignore the commotion?

Even if we focus solely on the stock market, the deluge of data points and numbers is still far beyond overwhelming. The better you can get through all the mixed messages and contrarian opinions, the greater your final trading account balance. Don't get discouraged, you will find that you get pretty good at this stuff, and pretty quickly too!

Staying the Course

Have you ever sold a stock, only to watch the shares climb higher? Similar to its close cousin "patience," staying the course should typically help you remain ahead of the pack.

Said another way, trading more often does not usually result in greater or better trading profits. Quite the opposite, actually—the frequency of trading is typically inverse to profits.

Calm in the Storm

When the sky is falling, and crowds are trampling one another to dump their shares, the investors who remain calm win. In fact, the relaxed and thoughtful people among us will be able to recognize all the undervalued opportunities that others miss during the frenzy.

Doing the Homework

Rather than bet on opinions based on limited knowledge, successful investors continually learn. Most people make decisions based on sound bites or partial arguments. ​

In contrast, the greatest stock market traders conduct their own due diligence—and learn—until they know which investment moves will pay off. When they aren't sure about a trading move, they learn more—until they know plenty, and have a pretty solid understanding of their potential choices.

Asking for Knowledge

Great stock market investors are wise enough to know what they don't know. They lean heavily on the opinions and knowledge of experts and specialists.

They are also not too proud to ask questions, and they tend to spend the time, in the beginning, to get all the facts, rather than doing their learning once it is too late. In other words, they make sure that they are well-informed and well-prepared.

The beauty of all of these personality traits of the great investors is that they can easily be replicated by you, right now. You won't need to be Superman or some trading troll in a dark basement with seven monitors—just put in the work required to make wise choices, and stay calm even during the greatest market panics.