There is something that I would like to share today about trading. It's nothing that special. Nor is it the holy grail to trading. IT's about how I begin my journey as a forex trader, the experiences that I've had, the help that I've received from some very special folks on this forum and how I am beginning to piece them all together for myself.
A word of caution though. If you are looking for a trading system, you will not find it here. I advise that you stop reading and proceed to other threads where many different systems are discussed. I do not mean to be rude. I just wish not to waste your time.
===========================================================
Ok. For those who are still interested, let's get started. I came from a background with no financial training of any sorts. If fact, I am a trained electrical engineer. And like most of my peers, I became very interested in the financial market after the credit crisis started in U.S in 2008. I had a casual conversation with a friend who works for a broker. He introduced me to forex trading and ever since, I got stuck with it. The initial part of my trading journey would sound extremely similar to many. I started with a demo account with forex.com. Paper traded for a couple of weeks and had zero idea what I was trying to do. Despite being unprofitable with demo, the gambler in me decided that I should start live trading to get a feel of how things are like. So, like many here, I start a live account with ~$5k funding. Traded for a couple of weeks and lost half the account. I immediately withdraw all funds from my account and tell myself that forex is not for me. And guess what? Yes. You got it right. Not long after the defeat, I started another account ~$3k and traded for another couple of weeks. But this time, I was smarter. Or so I thought... I started by reading up on trading books, subscribing to "gurus" like rob booker, ventured into MT4 algorithm trading (my engineering background did helped on that part
) and tell myself that, "This time, I will do it right!" And yes, within 2 months, I blew that account by taking a huge position. I gave up for a second time. The feeling sucks... I thought I had it figured out this time. I did as much research as I could and tried almost every "successful" systems that I could get my hands on. It seems that I have exhausted all possibilities and still I've failed.
This time round, I really took a break from forex. I was away for a couple of months, thinking to myself that trading is not for me. But, there's something about me that brought me back to forex trading. I once told my friend, "A trader can always smell another trader." And indeed, I believe that there's something in each and every successful trader that push him/her to the next mile, despite countless setbacks. So this time round, I start with demo trading again. And I spent a lot of time reading the threads in forexfactory. One thread that totally changed my perspective about life and trading is the one started by fti. You can find it under the discussion forum... it's probably the most read thread. I have tremendous respect for fti and I addressed him as Chief in his thread. This man, shared his life with the trading community. He gave all he could to the forum, hoping that some would learn and benefit from what he has to share. I was not sure if I could do the same in the past. But now I know that I would. I would give the little that I have to make the world a better place.
Having read most of his thread, I started to improve on my trading. I started to be profitable for most part of the time. However, I realised that it only take one failing trade to wipe out my efforts for the past few months. It was very disheartening. It's not so much losing the money that hurts... it's losing the balls that kills every trader in the end. At least, that's what I believed. I was almost on the brink of giving up. Than, in one of his post, fti said this to me, "It's not what you are looking for. It's what you are looking at." Those words, striked something in me. They echoed in my mind for a long long time... than at one point, I had a revelation to those words. In his first post, fti laid down the 3 key ingredients to be successful as a trader. Market Structure, Capitalization and YOU! I have read that sentence countless times. But I never spoke to me the way it did until many many months later. This was it. It's knowing yourself. Knowing who you are dealing with and how they deal that makes you a successful trader. I know you are probably disappointed that I took so long to come to this statement. And you probably tell yourself that you already know this and have heard them countless times. But, do you really understand this statement? Think again. Trading is in fact as simple or as difficult as the above statement. That's all there is to making or breaking you as a trader.
The last piece of advice that I think would help you is on capitalization.
Capitalization + trade sizing = Army size.
Think about the above very carefully.
That's all that I have to say and they all came from fti's thread. I do not take credit for it and you should read his thread to find out more for yourself.
Regards
P.S in case you are wondering what happened to my trade below, I did not deployed rescue x13 in the end as the price never broke 1.3220 level. Eventually, I got out with small profits. During the downwards movement to 1.31xx level.
A word of caution though. If you are looking for a trading system, you will not find it here. I advise that you stop reading and proceed to other threads where many different systems are discussed. I do not mean to be rude. I just wish not to waste your time.
===========================================================
Ok. For those who are still interested, let's get started. I came from a background with no financial training of any sorts. If fact, I am a trained electrical engineer. And like most of my peers, I became very interested in the financial market after the credit crisis started in U.S in 2008. I had a casual conversation with a friend who works for a broker. He introduced me to forex trading and ever since, I got stuck with it. The initial part of my trading journey would sound extremely similar to many. I started with a demo account with forex.com. Paper traded for a couple of weeks and had zero idea what I was trying to do. Despite being unprofitable with demo, the gambler in me decided that I should start live trading to get a feel of how things are like. So, like many here, I start a live account with ~$5k funding. Traded for a couple of weeks and lost half the account. I immediately withdraw all funds from my account and tell myself that forex is not for me. And guess what? Yes. You got it right. Not long after the defeat, I started another account ~$3k and traded for another couple of weeks. But this time, I was smarter. Or so I thought... I started by reading up on trading books, subscribing to "gurus" like rob booker, ventured into MT4 algorithm trading (my engineering background did helped on that part
) and tell myself that, "This time, I will do it right!" And yes, within 2 months, I blew that account by taking a huge position. I gave up for a second time. The feeling sucks... I thought I had it figured out this time. I did as much research as I could and tried almost every "successful" systems that I could get my hands on. It seems that I have exhausted all possibilities and still I've failed.This time round, I really took a break from forex. I was away for a couple of months, thinking to myself that trading is not for me. But, there's something about me that brought me back to forex trading. I once told my friend, "A trader can always smell another trader." And indeed, I believe that there's something in each and every successful trader that push him/her to the next mile, despite countless setbacks. So this time round, I start with demo trading again. And I spent a lot of time reading the threads in forexfactory. One thread that totally changed my perspective about life and trading is the one started by fti. You can find it under the discussion forum... it's probably the most read thread. I have tremendous respect for fti and I addressed him as Chief in his thread. This man, shared his life with the trading community. He gave all he could to the forum, hoping that some would learn and benefit from what he has to share. I was not sure if I could do the same in the past. But now I know that I would. I would give the little that I have to make the world a better place.
Having read most of his thread, I started to improve on my trading. I started to be profitable for most part of the time. However, I realised that it only take one failing trade to wipe out my efforts for the past few months. It was very disheartening. It's not so much losing the money that hurts... it's losing the balls that kills every trader in the end. At least, that's what I believed. I was almost on the brink of giving up. Than, in one of his post, fti said this to me, "It's not what you are looking for. It's what you are looking at." Those words, striked something in me. They echoed in my mind for a long long time... than at one point, I had a revelation to those words. In his first post, fti laid down the 3 key ingredients to be successful as a trader. Market Structure, Capitalization and YOU! I have read that sentence countless times. But I never spoke to me the way it did until many many months later. This was it. It's knowing yourself. Knowing who you are dealing with and how they deal that makes you a successful trader. I know you are probably disappointed that I took so long to come to this statement. And you probably tell yourself that you already know this and have heard them countless times. But, do you really understand this statement? Think again. Trading is in fact as simple or as difficult as the above statement. That's all there is to making or breaking you as a trader.
The last piece of advice that I think would help you is on capitalization.
Capitalization + trade sizing = Army size.
Think about the above very carefully.
That's all that I have to say and they all came from fti's thread. I do not take credit for it and you should read his thread to find out more for yourself.
Regards
P.S in case you are wondering what happened to my trade below, I did not deployed rescue x13 in the end as the price never broke 1.3220 level. Eventually, I got out with small profits. During the downwards movement to 1.31xx level.
