How to Record Exit Reason in a Trading Journal?

Exit reason refers to a written record of why and how a trade was closed — for example, whether it was closed via a pre-set take profit or stop-loss order, manually closed based on a change in market conditions, or closed for some other specific reason.

An important distinction to record is whether an exit followed the pre-defined exit criteria (covered in the Trading Essentials module) established before the trade was opened, or whether it deviated from that plan — for example, closing a position early out of anxiety, or moving a stop loss emotionally (a mistake covered in the Trading for Beginners module and revisited in the Stop Loss unit of this module).

Recording exit reason, alongside entry reason, allows for a meaningful comparison against the planned risk-to-reward ratio (covered earlier in this module) for that trade — showing whether the actual outcome aligned with what was planned, or deviated from it, and why.