A weak jobs number lands while you are in a trade. What do you do in the first sixty seconds?

The 2 October jobs report showed payrolls up 29,000 against press-reported expectations of about 84,000 to 90,000, with July revised to a loss (full report). Reports like this arrive at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time exactly, and anyone holding a position through it has seconds to react to a number that may look good or bad depending on which line you read first.

The first minute is when many traders make decisions they later regret: closing a trade that would have recovered, adding to one that was about to reverse, or freezing and doing nothing while the spread widens. The people who handle it best usually decided in advance what they would do.

We would like members to be honest about this moment:

• If you hold a trade through a major release, what is your plan for the first sixty seconds? Do you have a written rule?
• What does your body do: do you refresh the page, check the clock, hold your breath? What have you learned to do instead?
• Describe a time you acted in the first minute and wished you had not, or a time you waited and were glad.
• Do you avoid holding positions through releases altogether, and if so, did a bad experience start that?

Position sizing explains how a fixed risk per trade makes any single reaction easier to live with, and non-farm payrolls explained covers the report itself.

Please keep replies to your own experience. Posts that promise a direction or sell signals will be removed.