(can) small accounts make a living ?!

Not looking too good here, but not quiting yet.

£110 - £390 in no time kinda proves the theory, but the £390 back to £50 kinda points how it's tricky to do consistently.



Attempt 42 starting later this week!!

What seems to be the problem?

H. Rearden

Can GBP2,000 per month adequate for a single foreign visitor to live in London? Apply monthly return rate of 10% means we need at least GBP20K starting capital to trade and live in London. I think this is quite hard to achieve as we must constantly have 10% profit per monthly or else we will have difficulty in living.
Or we may choose a relatively cheap city with good Internet Connection to stay, maybe Beijing in China? Any suggestion?

Why do you want to live in London?

H. Rearden

You know some places take weeks to process Funds Transfer, some have unstable internet connection, some dont even allow FX trading. Maybe London is an ideal place for FX trading, eg plenty of foreigner in the cities, good facility to cater for foreinger etc. Stay in China is a bad idea as I heard they restrict currency trading.

Come Singapore. No tax for capital gain

You can trade asian, london and 1st 1/2 of US sessions without sacrificing your sleep

I am not quite sure whether the fund transfers depend on your precise location. As far as I am aware, it is more an issue which broker and which bank you use.

As for London (or any other major capital city), unless you earn above the average national income, I would not consider living there. House prices (or rentals) are usually the highest in preferable areas in those cities.

I left London myself whith an average annual income of over £200K since the quality of life is much better outside the city in my view (but that depends of course on the individual). For the same money I was able to have a nice penthouse flat in the West End of London, I could eventually buy a mansion on the south coast with 8 bedrooms plus tennis court and pool.

Internet connections are possible almost everywhere and banking can be done remotely as well. I know a few guys who trade while they are constantly on remote beaches around the world if that is something for you.

H. Rearden

A combination, of :-

Over Confidence.
Greed.
Stupidity.
Lack of Sleep.

What type of trades are you looking at (e.g. short term for small gains, longer term or position trading)?

H. Rearden

hello h.rearden, there's not been a update from u 4 a long time. what r u busy with??

ahhh, my friend turveyd,

the sins of trading runs in u yet. go n apply 4 bemac's class in the thread a mentor in the rookies section. he will tell u what 2 do

sorry, maybe it my bad English but i can't understand your point.

in trading or your signal give enoguh profit to cover the losers when it goes wrong or you have a super ultra winrate that almost every trade makes money.

if you don't bother in lost 40 pips in a losing trade even if in the good trades you make only 2 pips, it is because for any reason you have almost 100% winning rate. I don't know if you have.

Giraia,

That post is regading the winning/losing percentages of traders not trades.

I wrote it because I have seen many members being overly concerned about the apparent statistics proclaiming 95% (or so) of all aspiring traders lose.

H. Rearden

Hi,

I had no questions directed at myself, and the main thread was more or less completed; so I only check sporadically.

H. Rearden

hello h.rearden,

let's talk abit about the win/loss percentage of traders. do u think the # still stands as more n more traders r better educated about forex b4 they trade? the percentage has been thrown around for ages since i started 2 learn about forex. no latest or ongoing survey has been conducted after so long also. i mean about your trading update when i mention it just now. thanks


by the way, can u introduce me 2 a few of your friends who trade from beaches??? would love 2 b 1 of them.lol

I think the number is completely irrelevant - how many medicine students become good or excellent doctors? And should the percentage (if against you) discourage or encourage you to pursue that specific career?

If you learn a profession, the only aspects that matter are the ones which enable you to complete the task - not the percentages that tell you how many might make it or how many might fail.

You don't choose your profession based on those percentages.

H. Rearden

Awesome post.. Mr. Rearden....Thanks a lot!!

Rearden,

I just want to say you make a lot of sense... your % winning thing is great itself.. for me it is End of day is my book positive...


V

.

I have read every post until page 20 and this has been a really interesting thread so far. Just wanted to share my experience, that I gained during the last year.

The first experience in trading that I made, is a little more than a year ago. I started with a small 700 Euro (~$1.000) account that I have almost burned. I was down to 120€ and already wiped this money out of my mind. It was pure luck that the market reversed the other day and I ended up with more than 1.800€, which I traded down to 1.300€ some days later. I withdrawed my money before I lost even more.

Before this experience, I traded on a demo account for one month and had great results. I thought I could do the same with real money - but this was obviously not the case. I had no system, I had no idea about risk and money management, I simply followed some market outlooks that I found for free in the internet.

It was then, when I decided to give it another try. This time with a strategy and much better preparation. I read many threads here at FF. I read books. Many book. I borrowed books from the library about technical analysis, read books from real traders and about successful traders and tried to read between the lines: what did they all had in common?

50 different traders with 50 different methods, but each one of them was profitable. Fundamental or technical traders, using indicators or price action only, longterm or shortterm, bonds, forex, stocks... one thing they had in common was, that they all became masters in the way they traded the markets. They found a system and a market that fit to their personality and they have achieved the discipline needed, to be successful over a long period.

My ultimate goal - or my dream if you want to call it like that - is to trade for a living, too. I started a new attempt and funded my account with only $100 this time. My first experience was more than enough to show me how easily this market can kill my account and I don't want to pay more than this amount for learning purposes.

I know that I cannot make a living with my $100 account, but I can learn what it takes to make a living from forex. And that is, test my system for profitability, adjust it and what's most important: learn to become disciplined. Learn to not become greedy and to deal with the fear that every trader has.

After 5 months, I have more than doubled my account. Sure, I am aware of the psychological aspect, that if I lose this money, I could easily refund it the next day - it wouldn't hurt me. Losing $10.000 would be something completely different. But if I should lose my $200 account, I would also lose my self confidence in becoming a trader one day. And this is why I don't want this to happen.

When I will do fine for the next few months, I will put in some more money. And later on, some more again... until I reach an account size with which I can trade for a living.

Here are some examples of people that started small and made huge earnings:

 

1. Richard Dennis
   "...leaving him a scant $400 for trading. Incredible as it may seem, he eventually transformed that tiny stake into a fortune, which as been estimated by some to approach $200 million."
2. Nicholas Darvas
   "Darvas came up with this approach and plan for trading stocks that was to see him achieve $2,450,000.00 fortune in just 18 months"
3. Tony Oz
   He describes how he trades his account to make a living. I know that $50.000 is not a small account. But it's something that is at least not very unrealistic for many of us.
4. Tim Sykes
   Made a $1.65 mio from a starting account of about $13.000

I know, this are success stories that many of us dream of. And it's not 100% related to the topic on if one can make a living with a small account - Tony Oz is approaching a similar strategy in his book. He withdraws all his profits at the end of each week, starting with the same amount of money each week.

What I wanted to show is, even with small accounts you can make a living by trading. Start small, learn the rules of the market and stay focused.