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  • #81
  • Feb 26, 2013 12:02am Feb 26, 2013 12:02am
Quoting 2+2=4ex
Seems to me like the markets taught you a lesson today. Reading another post of yours from earlier today just confirmed it. That's not to say that you are completely wrong. Trading for a living (as in to pay monthly bills) does require a large account (as well as skill/experience). 2% of $100K is only $2K. That's probably not enough for most people here to pay their monthly dues with. And very few can crank out an average of 2% monthly (consistently). Only those with lots of experience can manage that. However it does not mean that it is not worth...
my bank does better than 2%. i just don't get why (in general) so many people are willing to piss their money away or dick around breakeven when a savings account would accomplish so much more with zero effort. that's a nbob type of effort, and we all know how that goes.

silat50 : $25k for stocks isn't just pulled out of the air, nor chosen because of the reasons you seem to associate it with. you have to cover the trading commissions for starters, but more importantly you need to be able to buy enough volume for the price movements to matter... this isn't balls to the wall leverage all the available forex margin on a $50 account hoping for a few bucks. apples and oranges! then there is the variance in profits which means some days are better than others. after all of that is taken into account you can't get anywhere, or will simply go broke, with a lame pocket change grub stake in a stock trading account.

i don't know anything about you, but your posts smack of being copy pasted, or atrociously retyped from elsewhere. if that is the case then cut the bullshit.
Congratulations ScalaFX for coming out of the closet!
  • #82
  • Feb 26, 2013 12:08am Feb 26, 2013 12:08am
Quoting nubcake
my bank does better than 2%. i just don't get why (in general) so many people are willing to piss their money away or dick around breakeven when a savings account would accomplish so much more with zero effort. that's a nbob type of effort, and we all know how that goes.

silat50 : $25k for stocks isn't just pulled out of the air, nor chosen because of the reasons you seem to associate it with. you have to cover the trading commissions for starters, but more importantly you need to be able to buy enough volume for the price movements to matter......
Quick tell me which bank does 2% per month?
We are all One. Be present. Be the Observer
  • #83
  • Feb 26, 2013 12:13am Feb 26, 2013 12:13am
Quoting Iamfx
Quick tell me which bank does 2% per month?
no you are right. i'm delerious (no, really, i am). i take it back. one part i misread, and another part i brain-farted. oh happy day. the rest of the post should be somewhat non-fiction.

here, have a pony. daww it thinks it's a lion...

http://horsebreedsinfo.com/images/shetland_pony.jpg
Congratulations ScalaFX for coming out of the closet!
  • #84
  • Feb 26, 2013 12:44am Feb 26, 2013 12:44am
here's a forex caculator for you guys
Attached File(s)
File Type: xls TmmForexIncomeCalculator.xls   123 KB | 4,823 downloads
  • #85
  • Edited 8:00am Feb 26, 2013 3:00am | Edited 8:00am
Quoting Ishtana
Wow, that's a very interesting story. I envy your life Phil. Money doesn't create boundaries around it anymore. I just feel life is too precious to be limited by money.

Anyway, I can totally relate with your tax man story. I used to work as accountant and the ATO really does have problem letting things go. Even when things happened 10+ years ago. LOL. Hmm... you must've owned a large business to employ that many people.

I agree that conventional wisdom often doesn't work. Anything in life, contrarians often end up being the winner.

I'm really...
Technically, it was a small business, as defined by the Australian Govt which said in the 1990's that anything less than 250 employees is not big enough to called a medium size business. It's 22 years old and still running well as far as I know; though perhaps not the household name to the same degree it was back when I started it with massive advertising.

I dislike intensely the processes of owning and running a business. The only employees I can like and enjoy are on someone else' payroll. And so yes, Forex is the perfect way for me to live free of all constraints and rules money and society normally imposes on us.

It would take you a few seconds to knock up a spreadsheet to show what happens to $200 when compounding growth at 20% per day. 20% growth compounding per day is only 8 pips a day for my current way to trade. It was only 20 pips a day when I started out with my current system.

It is common for me to not trade for 3 days, then make 60-150% on a 4th day, then not trade for many days. It very much depends on the market's mood, and my mood in relation to the potential trading day.

I never trade unless I have seen an entry that I predicted with my system come and go first. Doing this satisfies me that the market and I are in sync, and that it is OK for me to join the fun.

I've always been a large-lot trader with respect to my account equity. 200:1 leverage never appealed to me when 400:1 is available.

With 400:1 leverage, I started out at 1 lot/$1,000 of equity. I currently trade at 2.5 lots per $1,000 equity. My broker does not bust out trades when free margin gets to zero; rather they only bust out trades when 80% of equity is gone.

I 100% hedge at minus 10 pips and sort out/close one leg of the hedge at the next entry point of my system.

$200 to $100,000 came in 4 months, because I was still developing, and as I said, I was trading smaller lot sizes compared to my equity and not trading every day.

That first $100,000 seems such a long time ago now.

But then so does business ownership, and the stresses and strains of living a "normal" life as defined by society and Govt. Such conventional wisdom leads to an early grave and so much of life not yet experienced.

I refuse to stop having a ball.
  • #86
  • Feb 26, 2013 3:32am Feb 26, 2013 3:32am
I have learned few years ago that trying to help people to not lose their money in Fx is a futile endeavor. Normally, people are not listening to the few. Instead they are flowing with the stream of a crowd. And are flushed away. This is why it is very interesting to read 'dancingphil's' thoughts here. They seem to be genuine. The question then I have why to post your success to show off? It's somehow inconsistent what I know about 0.1 % Fx traders which are profitable.
To repeat what I have tried to say already in my previous post about trading and market to OP:

1. There is no consistency in a market.
2. Therefore there is no system.
3. Therefore there is no such thing as a trading the market. It's always a gamble.

Something in response to some posts here:

1. 10 % of equity is really doable in a week (5 days). If you only manage to raise 2 % it is good. It is still better then 99.99 'retail traders' achieve.
2. Trading Fx is on the contrary to what a most of you believe is easy in the way that a profit does not depend on the hard work you are putting in. Like dancigphil noted few hours in a three or four days of trading can make you tens or hundreds percents of equity in profit.
3. If you had spent the same amount of time and will by trying to find the one who really trades profitably and learn from him instead of reading FF you would know how to not lose your money in Fx (or other financial markets). FF can be of use if you know what are you looking for.

Happy trading.
For my fallen angels.
  • #87
  • Feb 26, 2013 4:38am Feb 26, 2013 4:38am
Agree with Big_A.

Technical indicators and systems induce the possibility to predict future events with past data - impossible.

It is every time an educated guess and proper risk management.

Profits must be driven by risk assessment not by target levels (for example 10% per week or something) - when market is at your direction - use it boldly - when it is not - cut losses and wait for the conditions to change (a day, a week, a month - your choice).

Nobody wants to "screw the retail traders" - I doubt they make more than 1-2% of the daily capital flow so anybody to create conspiracy to fuk'em up. Traders screw themselves as bad actions induced by their psychological and emotional state.

As I use to say often to my friends "FX is just the same as any other enterprise - you need only 2 things: patience and prudence!".

Happy trades!
  • #88
  • Feb 26, 2013 4:58am Feb 26, 2013 4:58am
Quoting 2+2=4ex
Seems to me like the markets taught you a lesson today. Reading another post of yours from earlier today just confirmed it. That's not to say that you are completely wrong. Trading for a living (as in to pay monthly bills) does require a large account (as well as skill/experience). 2% of $100K is only $2K. That's probably not enough for most people here to pay their monthly dues with. And very few can crank out an average of 2% monthly (consistently). Only those with lots of experience can manage that. However it does not mean that it is not worth...
2+2, Yes, the markets ripped me a new one today. The fact that I only lost about 5% of my total acct which is more than I would have liked to, doesnt upset me as much as the fact that I was on the RIGHT SIDE of the trade and the blatant manipulation of giant wicks and 400pip candles which would be investigated for sure by the SEC if this happened in a regulated market, adds salt into my wounds.

But yes, I agree with you 110%. I told a few stories to make what yu said very interesting. And that is: If you cannot compound your money, if you have $1000 to start or $500,000 top start your account, you will lose it, or at the very least,it will become a total waste of time, when you have that one period of breaking even and you have to live off the money in your account. Yes, I agree.

Why not assume that with slippage,silly mistakes, brokerage firm errors(its always their fault.lol), unknown factors,etc, that you will not GROSS more than 25-30% on your money for the first 2 yrs no matter how much or little leverage you use.(Now you gotta pay taxes) I implore those of you whom did not read my first post here 3 posts down to see why Warren Buffett and Soros DO NOT REGULARLY TRADE THIS MARKET!

Show me a "professional" that has 5 STRAIGHT winning years, loses for 6 months, then takes 3 months off to re-group, travel, enjoy his money and then come back and he is still ok.................THAT'S A PROFESSIONAL TRADER!

Also,food for thought...Most people on this thread even agree, that every system sooner or later fails. Why do you think you can but the most successful system in the world by the Turtles called "The Turtle System" for like $1500 online?
  • #89
  • Edited 5:20am Feb 26, 2013 5:00am | Edited 5:20am
Quoting michaelpelly
Agree with Big_A.

Technical indicators and systems induce the possibility to predict future events with past data - impossible.

It is every time an educated guess and proper risk management.

Profits must be driven by risk assessment not by target levels (for example 10% per week or something) - when market is at your direction - use it boldly - when it is not - cut losses and wait for the conditions to change (a day, a week, a month - your choice).

Nobody wants to "screw the retail traders" - I doubt they make more than 1-2% of the daily capital...
I don't believe the purpose or correct use of indicators is to predict the future. IMO, people who think that way are doomed! Indicators indicate the very recent past, not the future. Their purpose, as far as I'm concerned, is to help show a good entry point, or at least a reasonable entry point, and the rest is up the the user to apply his discretion.

There are many, many threads here at FF that use all kinds of indicators and other mumbo jumbo to predict the future, and the users state exactly where the price is going and when it's going to retrace etc etc etc The reality is that no one knows where the price is going, and to try and predict it, no matter the method employed, is nothing more than a crap shoot much of the time.

Predicting leads to bias, and bias leads to missed opportunities at best, and failed trades at worst.

Indicators, much like the indicators in your car, they signal an *intent*.......not an absolute.
Doing what you like is Freedom. Liking what you do is Happiness.
  • #90
  • Feb 26, 2013 6:21am Feb 26, 2013 6:21am
Quoting realjumper
I don't believe the purpose or correct use of indicators is to predict the future. IMO, people who think that way are doomed! Indicators indicate the very recent past, not the future. Their purpose, as far as I'm concerned, is to help show a good entry point, or at least a reasonable entry point, and the rest is up the the user to apply his discretion.

There are many, many threads here at FF that use all kinds of indicators and other mumbo jumbo to predict the future, and the users state exactly where the price is going and when it's going to retrace...
I 100% agree with you RJ, and I'll go an extra step further.

Because there is no reliable certainty with any one set of indicators, there cannot be one Expert Advisor to trade the market.

Forex robots can be great at mechanical functions like trade management issues, hedging, etc. But as algorithmic traders they can never be all things to all market conditions.

Whilst an indicator is only useful until the next tick of data comes in, the "intent they may be indicating" is often the "self fulfilling prophecy" of all those who use indicators.

Banks and massive lot traders do not stick a wet finger in the air to determine which way the wind is blowing, but after consideration of the market sentiment/news, they and the swarm of retail traders do tend to create certain realities based on the use of indicators.

Pivots, Fibs and their respective support and resistance levels are a case in point. When such a level is reached, was there some fundamental analysis that can explain why price action in the tug of war paused at this point? Some Technical explanation behind it?

In many places, many people are going to be saying yup, and just as many others saying nope; depending on which indicators they are looking at.

Every Forex trade is made based on an AGREEMENT on price, but a DISAGREEMENT of value. That is, the trade got done at the price agreed, but one thought the value was in the buy, and the other in the sell because of a belief in future price action.

It's all a tug of war.
  • #91
  • Feb 26, 2013 8:02am Feb 26, 2013 8:02am
LOL! With all the experts making serious talks about serious stuff, they moved this thread to the Rookie talk section. I personally think this has to be one of the main topics in forex trading to clear up major and common false expectations that everyone will have early on their trading career.

Anyway, what you guys are saying are so true it hurts. Trading seems a bit depressing knowing all these.

I guess if I can recommend the typical success path of a forex trader would be this:

1) keep your day job and trade part time on demo account.
2) keep studying the right things and don't ever stop studying while trading part time on demo account.
3) once you've found your system, mastered your MM and mindset, trade part time until you double your demo account.
4) keep your day job and trade part time on live account.
5) keep studying the right things and don't ever stop studying while trading part time on live account.
6) keep trading part time until you can pay all your monthly bills using your profit alone while maintaining sufficient balance to keep trading. At this stage it's a matter of using bigger lot size to trade.
7) you now have the option to quit your day job and trading full time. At this stage it's a matter of doing more trades. By this stage your profit alone should be able to support your lifestyle and more.

Some steps might take you years, some in a day (like step 1 & 4). But this is what the paying the dues all about. You're willing to take it slow and to take it seriously. Personally, my path is nowhere near this straight, but if there are listening ears out there, I'd be very happy to know if you follow the steps above.

@phil:

Thank you for your reply Phil. I have to say your trading is phenomenal trading. Although I can understand the compounding power, but I cannot envision the 20% growth in a day, let alone 60-150% growth that makes the compounding possible in the first place.

You're the minority trader who has made it big. I'm striving to be like you, and I tip my hat off to you for not giving up and achieving success. Enjoy the wealth that you've respectfully earned.
  • #92
  • Edited 8:46am Feb 26, 2013 8:34am | Edited 8:46am
Quoting Ishtana
@phil:

Thank you for your reply Phil. I have to say your trading is phenomenal trading. Although I can understand the compounding power, but I cannot envision the 20% growth in a day, let alone 60-150% growth that makes the compounding possible in the first place.

You're the minority trader who has made it big. I'm striving to be like you, and I tip my hat off to you for not giving up and achieving success. Enjoy the wealth that you've respectfully earned.
You are welcome. I will leave you with some final things to think about.

1 Forex is most suited to young teenagers and women. Young teenagers see Forex as just a computer game they push themselves to master. They think nothing of blowing up a demo, and leaping immediately back in as if it were just a reset button and a game of "pinball". Women have a greater "sense" of the pattern recognition required, and less ego problems with managing their positions. But men can still make it too.

2 The beauty of Forex is that with demo accounts you have every tool at your disposal to practice your stuff long before you ever need to put cash on the line. Demo trading is exactly the same, EXCEPT for how your emotions are different when real money is involved.

3 There truly is no need to begin live trading with more than $200. Anyone who says you need more is delusional and a pessimist looking to explain their own failure to achieve mastery. Whilst $200 is enough to exponentially grow, do allow for 5 x $200 to blow up before you master the emotions of live trading compared to your trading system development with demo accounts.

4 Have http://www.forexfactory.com/news.php and http://www.forexfactory.com/calendar.php open and handy so that you can monitor new information due to enter the market, and as it enters the market. I avoid major news events with my own trading.

5 Don't live trade until you can triple your money routinely and reliably within one week. By all means drop down your lot size when you begin live trading; but with your demo trading you should be able to triple your account weekly as a ROUTINE to know you are ready to consider going live.

6 WHEN you blow up your first $200 live account, penalize yourself with a self imposed probationary period until you can fulfill Item 5 above; all the while reviewing in your mind WTF you did wrong with that $200 you just screwed.

7 Get back in the saddle with your next $200 and go live again.

Attached is a demo account; $200 to $1,700 in a week. It's not special. It's not hard.

Good luck with your thread.

Phil

Attached File(s)
File Type: zip Just an old demo account.zip   7 KB | 802 downloads
  • #93
  • Feb 26, 2013 9:16am Feb 26, 2013 9:16am
My God Phil! You never made a loss! That's beyond crazy! Who are you? =)
  • #94
  • Edited 11:46am Feb 26, 2013 9:40am | Edited 11:46am
Quoting Ishtana
My God Phil! You never made a loss! That's beyond crazy! Who are you? =)
Stop Losses are a conventional wisdom. I don't use them except to lock in a minimum profit.

Why do they confuse Stop Losses with Money Management when in fact it is LOSS Management!

I did hedge, twice from memory in that demo to later trade out my hedges for profits on both legs of both times.

My entries were NOT all sweet and serene. Effective hedge management is important.

But each to their own style.

Do thank your God that you are not American. Their Govt makes it illegal for them to trade with hedges, or anything like a decent leverage level.

And good luck to you and your thread.
  • #95
  • Feb 26, 2013 10:05am Feb 26, 2013 10:05am
http://www.pib.com.ua/en/individual/deposits/maxrates/
Quoting Iamfx
Quick tell me which bank does 2% per month?
  • #96
  • Feb 26, 2013 11:37am Feb 26, 2013 11:37am
It is absolutely possible. If you work hard consistently, you would eventually get it.
  • #97
  • Feb 26, 2013 10:46pm Feb 26, 2013 10:46pm
Quoting dancingphil
Stop Losses are a conventional wisdom. I don't use them except to lock in a minimum profit.

Why do they confuse Stop Losses with Money Management when in fact it is LOSS Management!

I did hedge, twice from memory in that demo to later trade out my hedges for profits on both legs of both times.

My entries were NOT all sweet and serene. Effective hedge management is important.

But each to their own style.

Do thank your God that you are not American. Their Govt makes it illegal for them to trade with hedges, or anything like a decent...

Your system looks good. Did you try live trading with it ?
  • #98
  • Feb 26, 2013 10:51pm Feb 26, 2013 10:51pm
wow, a lot of opinion in here.

1. Before that anyone know what is the true successful "professional trader" is?
are they the one who are listed in 100 top trader in forex factory? with max return to equity?

for me a successful professional trader is the one who can stay and active in the market for a long period of time not the one with the high return to equity. Unfortunately, what i see from many website they only listed the traders with the biggest return to equity. the biggest % ROE the higher the rank.

2. Forex looks like gambling. Nobody knows the future or the price movement. Up or down. Win or Loose. Do you think if someone's put their money into a football game is a gambling? Yes, if they don't know how to analyze the game and the squad and doesn't know the projection. But if they analyzes the team squad, compare their abilities, etc etc. I don't think it is a gambling, but the favorite team will always has smaller payoff.

Forex is better than gambling, without any system, the chance of winning is 50%. with good system the chance of winning is 60-70%. the payoff is actually the same minus spread. Therefore, before jump into forex, you must find a good system that work for yourself and i'm not going to debate what is the best system in this thread.

3. Forex is one of investment vehicles so treat them as an investment not a daily day job. I don't trade and watching my position until it hit TP or SL. once i spotted any opportunity, i will put my position complete with TP n SL and leave and forget it. after couple hours i just check the position using mobile phone. So you can do your routines as usuall
Everything in the world has its own rhytms
  • #99
  • Feb 26, 2013 11:15pm Feb 26, 2013 11:15pm
Quoting Mad Russian
http://www.pib.com.ua/en/individual/deposits/maxrates/
Well its not 2% per month. But still 7% per year not too bad these days.
We are all One. Be present. Be the Observer
  • #100
  • Feb 27, 2013 2:54am Feb 27, 2013 2:54am
Quoting dancingphil
Stop Losses are a conventional wisdom. I don't use them except to lock in a minimum profit.

Why do they confuse Stop Losses with Money Management when in fact it is LOSS Management!

I did hedge, twice from memory in that demo to later trade out my hedges for profits on both legs of both times.

My entries were NOT all sweet and serene. Effective hedge management is important.

But each to their own style.

Do thank your God that you are not American. Their Govt makes it illegal for them to trade with hedges, or anything like a decent leverage...

That is a bold philosophy - wait until your positions come to profit - whatever it takes. But this should be combined with low-risk ratio to the capital - I know several people went to margin call over weekend with deep losses on trades which never came back.
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