Statements: if Along can do it so can I
I don't don't like traders who claim to be successful but don't post statements. I read in a forum on trader who said he had been trading for a little less than three years but said he was super amazing was so good he had a winning streak of 693 trades at one point. But he wouldn't post a statement and he got seriously flamed for it.
-
-
I funded a live account because of excitement off a big win in the demo. I had no plan, didn't understand why I won. The demo account overall was down a lot. But I thought I was ready.
-
-
So here it is. The first two are two days in Oct 2011, the 5th and 6th. Very sad story. I was trading $1 pips on an account with $300-400 value. Really over leveraged. Notice how many trades are made - showing over trading. Notice how there are a million wins that are tiny and a few huge losers, showing fear, poor money management. I had no idea when to take profit or where to place a stop. Notice how few SL's there are. That's fun until the power goes out or internet connection drops. One loss was $53 because I was over leveraged AND trading against the trend. Double stupid. I was grumpy all day because of that. That was so discouraging. Even my wife was disappointed and said: "I thought you were supposed to make money doing this." OUCH!
-
-
View attachment 5270View attachment 5271
-
-
The next two include the beginning of the turn around in November, 2011. There is an $11 win in the beggining of Decemeber that was a real turning point. I was so discouraged and considering giving up at this point. Looking back, I put my TP and SL on psychological levels, pretty amaturish. But I got lucky. Don't remember the rationale for the trade but it was two positions and they both won big. So I got encouraged and read more. Notice a gap during the first three months of the year. I was trading demo only. I was positive but I don't know how much total. Probably 6-12% total or something like that. I didn't trade at all for about two months.
-
-
View attachment 5272View attachment 5273
-
-
You can see from the balance I'm not a wealthy guy, so don't stalk me!
-
This is what I learned and am learning:
-
1. Dropped position size. Literally just followed the advice of every successful trader. What's better: a busted account in 6 months or a 30% increase in one year? 30% is pretty boring but a busted account is really sucky. I chose boring.
-
2. Developed a healthy fear of losing money. "Rule #1: Don't lose money." - a Warren Buffet mantra. "Loss of opportunity is preferable to a loss of capital." - Joe Dinapoli. This helps you wait for the right pitch. Preserve your capital and the account will grow.
-
3. Got a mentor. Everyone should get a mentor. In my case, I have been following the trading principles of the James 16 group, but using knowledge from Joe Dinapoli's book, and Sive's trading method. Also, I almost completely reject everything I read from Raghee Horner's book. Basically choosing not to let her mentor me. Honestly don't know if she is successful in Forex or not but apparently she made money in commodities and stocks. Get a mentor, no need to reinvent the wheel.
-
4. Stopped looking at indicators, worrying about EA's, moving averages. Stopped looking for anything else. Can I have those months back, please? The successful traders say you don't need all that stuff. Every commercial EA belongs in the scam folder, in my opinion. The working EA's aren't available commercially. If my EA worked I wouldn't tell anyone about it and I wouldn't sell it and hire a million people to manage it. I would make money while I sleep and go to the beach, like a real waverider. I don't have butterfly patterns or other gartley patterns on my console. I don't have ea's that highlight consolidation. Why do I need that crap? Can't you look at a screen and see consolidation?
-
5. Wrote out my trading plan and strategies. Literally just followed the advice of every successful trader.
-
6. Worked on weak spots like multiple entries, paying attention to news schedules, constantly correcting myself with regard to fear and doubt and greed, overtrading, ect.
-
7. Trade with the trend. Literally just followed the advice of every successful trader.
-
8. Don't let anyone tell me when to buy or sell or why. I have respect for Sive but he will not always be around to tell us what to do. Better to teach yourself how to fish. Sive has been wrong before. Because he uses a different method than I do and his method says no or wait and mine says go, I go. Or he says go and my method says wait, so I wait.
-
9. Got studious and read about classic chart patterns and candlestick patterns. I keep a cheat sheet with me in the car and on the desk so I can keep reviewing.
-
The biggest paradigm shift was realizing market psychology was herd mentality. You may not always agree with it but one individual can't change it. Also seeing that there are wolves in the heard. Stop grabbers and failure patterns are caused by predators, often. Also, understanding what confluence means and why it works - also part of herd mentality.
-
-
What's missing in my trading is any real amount of money. It's easy to hang on when there is $6 at stake. What about $60 or $6000? Hopefully my positions will be so low compared to account size, it won't be too hard to handle.
-
The opening size of this account was $600 in early September 2011. The lowest point was in late October, about 2 months later, at $167. In November I started trading a trusted method, one trade per day, small lot sizes, and decided to stop being stupid. It is now $222.43. That's a 33.1% increase over 6 months and 3 of those months I was only trading demo or not at all. No I don't feel bad about the loss or that I have to make it up. When I got serious I decided to forget the loss and start new. Every week or trading day is a new hand with a new probability and nothing else matters. 31% is lot better than I expected. And the purpose of a baby live account was to learn, not to make a million dollars. Hopefully I can keep honing my skills. I feel like I know very little still. Good luck everybody.