Tell me if this is reasonable

I can get to my home computer from work (thanks logmein.com!) and have been practicing my trading everyday with a goal of making $20 a day profit on my $5K live account. How long do you think I should try to do this solidly before trying to trade fulltime and make $200 a day?

Is that even possible? I am making teeny, but successful trades.

Hi

If you are making calculated entries, managing ur risk/using stops and managing to keep it up and stay possitive after a couple of months then id say go ahead.
If you dont mind me asking, what is the size of your average winner/losser, (% or pips or $ is fine), the comparison between the W-L is what will give me a better stance to give you an opinion from.

Good Trading.

Leon

My suggestion is not to try and calculate gains in dollars, but instead try to calculate gains in pips. This helps remove the psychological shock which can sometimes affect a trader who is moving up to higher lot sizes. From whatever net pip gains you have in a period, calculate that as a % gain or loss in the account.

If your percent gain is consistent, then you should have no problem scaling up your lot sizes.

You should do it long enough to build a stake that will allow u to make 200 a day w/o over trading your acct. Trading full time on 5k - with bills, mortgage etc. is gonna put a lot of pressure on you.

Until you don't have to ask.

Yes, you need to build your stake, not just increase it by adding funds. If you can actually grow your account by trading, you'll prove to yourself that you are trading well.

Another thing to consider. When you start trading larger amounts you might suffer what I like to call P and L Shock. It happens when you start trading standard lots and within seconds of entry, price moves 4 or 5 pips against you. Combined with the commissions and spread you are instantly down several hundred dollars and fear sets in even though your trade (and account) is far from doomed.

By building your account and increasing size gradually you'll likely avoid P and L shock. And if it rears its ugly head, simply remove the P and L window from your screen and judge your trade buy price movement (like RR said) instead of the dollar amount.

No one likes drawdowns, but they are inevitable. It'll be tough to trade correctly through a drawdown when trading for a living if you've never done it during your learning phase.

Before you trade for a living, make sure you are okay with the fact that money from the market doesn't come the way we'd like it to--in predetermined amounts on a regular schedule. If it comes, it'll come in hunks of varied size and not always when the bills are due.

It's possible, but you need to prove it to yourself by doing. If you you truly prove your method to yourself under many different conditions, you'll know when to plant your flag.

All the best
Bill

Ronald Raygun hit it on the nose.

You've got to think pips! $s are dangerous for he mind

Maybe so on a personal level but a pip doesn't mean anything. All my 'pips' have different values as each pair has a different pip price and I gear my lot sizes according to the amount of risk I am willing to tolerate and so factor in the distance of entry from the stop loss. An intraday trader could make several times more money than a position trader trading the same account size and hauling the same number of pips. Pips don't mean a thing, and you certainly can't spend them in the shops.

I think smatrader missed the bit where I try to relate pips to percentage of account.

Hi Guys

Was just trying to get behind Rosieposie's 'teeny, but successful' trades.

If you are are making pips, then that is winning the physcological battle and building confidence, necessary steps to successful trading (not that I know what that feels like )

'Out of little acorns.......

I will continue on with my small trades and tell myself that each day I do OK is a day closer to full time trading.

Thanks for the advice!

"$'s are dangerous"
You need to get past this kind of mind talk. Until you realize that the money is only "inventory" for your business you will struggle with this fear.The key is that this is a business, not some great big interactive internet game.
Pip counting is for mugs.. -old FF poster-

So what is the best way or most advantageous vantage from which to view your account? Is it dollars, pips, or something else? I cast my lot toward something else.

Mrgreen is right when he says you need to take your eyes off the money. When I'm trading I don't even have my balance visible. Inevitable you will begin to think things like, "I just lost my car or mortgage payment," or "there goes that dream vacation I've been needing." If you see your dreams rise and fall with your account balance, you will no doubt self-destruct in short order.

You could gage your performance in pips, but you may not be seeing the whole story if you do. A thousand pips a month may sound like an outstanding return, but what if you lost 3 thousand during the course of that month? Doesn't sound as attractive any more does it? The greatness of your gains can only be seen in the light of your losses.

Another way to view performance is by percentages, and this is really the method I prefer; although, like with pips, you still have to account for drawdowns. With percentages you can discuss your successes or failures and not have to refer to how many dollars you hold or how many pips you have gained. It levels the playing field, so to speak. When I discuss my trading with local traders, I will only talk in percentages. I know one of my trader friends has over a half a mil, while another has significantly less that 100k, but when we speak in percentages, we can more accurately compare our performances. We could speak in pips, but one trader is mid-long term while the other day trades. The long term trader gains more points, but his stops are much further out. If he only referred to pips, it would seem like he outperforms me, but actually, my account is consistently gaining higher percentages. Do you see the difference?

I guess in the end it’s a matter of preference, but perhaps this is something you can consider in the future.

Art

I think that is one of the best ways to describe how to look at $$.. as "inventory for your business"

Ultimately this is how you will evaluate yourself and your performance.

I can see % gained as the best tool when your comparing your performance to another trader, but for self examination its all about the benjamins or lack there of.