I am an ex-mid-level poker player, actually an university student, with good mathematical and analyitical skills but horrible psychological management (like tilt). I have blown up some accounts in the past and this time I am going to try to make 10.000€ starting from thin air, and get on the good way once and for all.
As I applied for a free no deposit bonus to kill boredom, and started trading in the zone again, I regained a lot of confidence and self-esteem in my trading, time when I decided to create this threade and start serously this challenge.
I can say with no shame at all that by today I am a net looser in financial markets, loosing a bunch of what I made grinding the online poker cash games. And that what's going to change: I have the knowledge, I have the experience and I have the willingness, the only things I have to master are patiente, the ego and emotions.
I don't specially care if many people reads this journal as my main goal writing it is to focus harder in my trading and improve my weaknesses.
So let's go:
- Step 1: 8$ no deposit bonus at NordFX; 0$ to 31$
I have already done the most difficult of all, which is the start. At the start of this month (March 2014) I was off trading for a while and felt bored, was surfing the web and found a NordFX ad, and signed up for 8 free dollars from NordFX with their Welcome Account promotion. I traded the account up to 31,82$. This was the first time I felt confident while trading (even trading with forcents) and then made this thread. Here you can see the equity curve in M5 timeframe:
After this hot and overleveraged run, when I decided to take seriously trading again and decided to start this challenge, I realized I couldn't continue trading with NordFX's Welcome Account, which is quite limited for serious trading; for example 2 pip spread in EURUSD, 3 pip in GBPUSD, 4 in EURJPY, and so. After all, it's a welcome account; so I transferred the funds to ICMarkets and there is when the serious challenge begins.
Giving back the 8$ to NordFX, I had 23$ which equal to 15€ after paying Neteller in/out fees (my ICMarkets account is in EUR). Happily I managed to make 15€ without risking any dollay, which for a loosing trader is great.
- Step 2: ICMarkets: from 15€ to 100€
Money is ready and everything is set up and working. ICMarkets is great for this challenge because minimum trading size is 0.01 lots on an ECN (low spread-low cost) environment, and 500:1 leverage. Yes you are right, this step will still be very risky and with great chance of ruin, but at least less than the first one.
RULES AND CONDITIONS FOR STEP2
-Philosophy: Trade with odds shifted in your favour, waiting with patience for high probability trades, focusing specially in getting involved in high +EV situations. Analysis will be based mainly in order flow and price action mixed with some technical analysis. We are playing the long run, not the short run.
-Trading style: Intraday trading and swing trading when less risky as equity grows
-Minimum Risk-Reward ratio: 2:1, which implies a minimum success rate of 33%
-Money management: Fixed fractional ratio, I will risk a maximum of 5% of the account on each trade at this early stage. I don't want to be trading cents for 2 months.
-Instruments traded: At this early stage of the challenge I'll focus on the most liquid currency pairs (hence lower spreads) in order to minimize trading costs and increase expected value, mainly EURUSD, USDJPY, GBPUSD, AUDUSD and XAUUSD. Also I will take some shots at less liquid but more volatile pairs like EURCAD, USDNOK or EURTRY when any nice R:R spots come up for swing trading, but it won't be my main focus.
-Leverage: 500:1
-Commissions: 43€ per million traded (thru IB). I will have additional advantage as commission with 0.01 lots are 0.04 and not 0.043 (10% cheaper costs), anyway if I dont get ruined and equity grows this will soon disappear.
- Progress
17 March: start 11.10€; end 16.90€
18 March: start 14.24€; end 24.26€
H1 Chart (Last update 18/03/2014)
In this main post I'll write the latest updates of the challenge, rules, steps, equity evolution as well as H1 and D1 candlestick based equity charts (like the M5 above). Of course will also post charts and trades with thoughts and mistakes. There are still a lot of things to put in here, which I will do when I have more free time.
Cheers & gl!
