Hi everyone, my first post in the forum.
I have been lurking and reading for the last few days and the amount of information available on these forums is astonishing but a bit overwhelming.
Some history about myself and my trading:
- I’m 30, based in South Africa, and have a full daytime job as accountant.
- I’ve always been interested in markets and trading so have some knowledge about the markets, fundamentals, technical analysis etc. I have a decent equity share portfolio which I have built up over the last few years but this is a long term investment. Mostly South African shares listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
- For the last four years I’ve earned a very nice second income by playing online poker in the evenings and over weekends. I believe there are a lot of similarities between poker and trading. You have to put in a lot of hard work and studying, then be very disciplined, have a lot of patience, apply proper money management, and you have to be able to control your emotions at all times. The last few months have been slower though and I’ve also become bored with playing poker.
- I’ve played around on the Oanda FX game irregularly for the last three years, mostly just taking trades based on support/resistance levels or gut feel, then resetting fund balances and profit/losses after some unsuccessful trades.
- I’ve played around with South African equity options and agricultural futures contracts but my decisions were more based on what others say than my own research. I’ve always taken a conservative approach though.
- About a year ago I decided to give trading a serious go, I bought a few of the recommended books on forex and futures trading, read some parts of them, opened an account at Interactive Brokers and deposited $5000.
- I took a subscription with Puretick and started trading the YM. My intention was to stick to the Puretick signals but I soon started overtrading, taking some other trades suggested by people in the chat room, and then some of my own trades. I was also often late on the Puretick signals and my account balance also didn’t allow me trading more than one contract at a time.
- I basically lost money on most of the trading days until my account dipped below $2000 and I wasn’t allowed to trade any further. I gave up. My account is now at about $1400 and I’m paying a lot of monthly fees for nothing.
For the last week I’ve started playing around on the Oanda game again, I’m spending hours reading some forum posts etc and I take my trading books to bed when I go to sleep. I’ve downloaded Metatrader and played around a bit. Basically all I can think about is trading.
I really want to become a successful trader and I’m willing to do whatever it takes. I realize it will not happen overnight.
I have $20,000+ in cash available for trading but really want to keep away from significant real money trading until I’m confident with an instrument and trading style. I don’t want to blow another account and I’d prefer to start with a lesser amount.
At the moment I feel really lost, where do I take it from here? If a person asks me to teach them how to become a profitable poker player I think I can provide them with a very good guideline on one page. It will then be up to that person to put in the hard work.
I just find the whole trading environment a bit overwhelming. There are just so many instruments, timeframes, brokers, software packages, strategies, indicators, books etc. Just where do I start?
I’ve decided to try the forex market for now. How do I decide which currency pair/s to trade, which type of trading and which timeframes? I would prefer active trading where I can do a few trades in a 2 to 5 hour session and not have overnight positions.
At the moment I have 2 – 5 hours available daily, how do I spend it best to enable me to become a profitable trader?
Any advice will be really appreciated. And flame me if necessary, I will take it like a man.
I have been lurking and reading for the last few days and the amount of information available on these forums is astonishing but a bit overwhelming.
Some history about myself and my trading:
- I’m 30, based in South Africa, and have a full daytime job as accountant.
- I’ve always been interested in markets and trading so have some knowledge about the markets, fundamentals, technical analysis etc. I have a decent equity share portfolio which I have built up over the last few years but this is a long term investment. Mostly South African shares listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
- For the last four years I’ve earned a very nice second income by playing online poker in the evenings and over weekends. I believe there are a lot of similarities between poker and trading. You have to put in a lot of hard work and studying, then be very disciplined, have a lot of patience, apply proper money management, and you have to be able to control your emotions at all times. The last few months have been slower though and I’ve also become bored with playing poker.
- I’ve played around on the Oanda FX game irregularly for the last three years, mostly just taking trades based on support/resistance levels or gut feel, then resetting fund balances and profit/losses after some unsuccessful trades.
- I’ve played around with South African equity options and agricultural futures contracts but my decisions were more based on what others say than my own research. I’ve always taken a conservative approach though.
- About a year ago I decided to give trading a serious go, I bought a few of the recommended books on forex and futures trading, read some parts of them, opened an account at Interactive Brokers and deposited $5000.
- I took a subscription with Puretick and started trading the YM. My intention was to stick to the Puretick signals but I soon started overtrading, taking some other trades suggested by people in the chat room, and then some of my own trades. I was also often late on the Puretick signals and my account balance also didn’t allow me trading more than one contract at a time.
- I basically lost money on most of the trading days until my account dipped below $2000 and I wasn’t allowed to trade any further. I gave up. My account is now at about $1400 and I’m paying a lot of monthly fees for nothing.
For the last week I’ve started playing around on the Oanda game again, I’m spending hours reading some forum posts etc and I take my trading books to bed when I go to sleep. I’ve downloaded Metatrader and played around a bit. Basically all I can think about is trading.
I really want to become a successful trader and I’m willing to do whatever it takes. I realize it will not happen overnight.
I have $20,000+ in cash available for trading but really want to keep away from significant real money trading until I’m confident with an instrument and trading style. I don’t want to blow another account and I’d prefer to start with a lesser amount.
At the moment I feel really lost, where do I take it from here? If a person asks me to teach them how to become a profitable poker player I think I can provide them with a very good guideline on one page. It will then be up to that person to put in the hard work.
I just find the whole trading environment a bit overwhelming. There are just so many instruments, timeframes, brokers, software packages, strategies, indicators, books etc. Just where do I start?
I’ve decided to try the forex market for now. How do I decide which currency pair/s to trade, which type of trading and which timeframes? I would prefer active trading where I can do a few trades in a 2 to 5 hour session and not have overnight positions.
At the moment I have 2 – 5 hours available daily, how do I spend it best to enable me to become a profitable trader?
Any advice will be really appreciated. And flame me if necessary, I will take it like a man.