Institutional Equivalent Education?

Ray and Compas are just about to start a new 'Course' - really just another period where Ray does 5 or more 3 to 4 hour sessions covering as many of the concepts as he can, followed by extra training content in his normal daily US session coverage and post US Session close Briefing Sessions.

If they don't get enough new students, there is a chance that Ray will lose interest in this project and quit - after all he has been teaching up to 7 hrs per day every trading day since April 2014 with only 1 week off.
So I am copying their email below. If anybody does sign up, then I strongly suggest they contact me about joining the Self Help Group (completely free) which I co-founded, since we have many extra resources to help speed up learning.

Hi Ian,
In this replay, Ray shows traders how to layer the proper elements and stack the odds in your favor for high probable trades. He said, “Without the proper Market Trade Model and continuing to only rely on indicators and patterns traders will continue to struggle”. He gave traders facts and backed it up. BAM
It is the REASON Tuesday we were able to show traders how using 1 contract you could have done over $4,000.00 in one session, the reason I have been able to have a 71% gain in 10 days, the reason Joe says he can pay for the class 3 times in a day, the reason Juanita told traders yesterday that she did $1,200 and does that on a consistent basis…what are you waiting for? Yes there is risk and past performance is not indicative of future performance.
Instant Replay Recording
http://compassfx.omnovia.com/predatoryexp
Password: quality
What’s in your Market Trade Model?
We had a great opportunity to spend time in Live Trade Sessions and the Live “What’s In Your Market Model” webinar to give traders a chance to see WHY The Predatory Trade Program is an extensive, comprehensive program that not only teaches you how to get the same laser sharp, execution as the institutions, it helps you develop a market model that institutions use to layer in elements that give them structure and context for High Probability, High Percentage Trades.
**********************
“I strongly recommend this predatory trading room without reservations. I have been in this room from the beginning. Ray's teaching’s surpasses by a huge margin the many other rooms that I have been in over the last several years. I do not believe there is another teacher that will cover all the aspects of trading that Ray covers daily. I feel very, very fortunate that I discovered this trading room.” Charles C.
**********************
If you missed yesterday’s webinar, you missed the missing piece for most traders. This is the piece that keeps you up at night stressing. Good news, you can fix it…just listen to Charles!
The missing piece shows WHY not having the proper Market Trade Model keeps you taking risky trades. If you are tired of the trade setup that you rely on, that lets you down over and over and you can’t figure out WHY…you need to stop right now and head into the Predatory Experience Room and watch the recording.
If you want to build a proper Market Trade Model with high probability trading (which I know you do)
JOIN The Predatory Trade Program

We are almost ready to kick off the next class for new students this coming Tuesday August 4th at 3:00 pm Eastern.
If you have any questions or you want to speak to me, reach out. I am holding an Orientation Session for New Students Sunday afternoon…are you in? [email protected] or Skype: ForexKim
Don’t be left out, here is what just a few more of the students are saying.
“The Compass Prop Room will totally blow away your wildest expectations it will be the best investment you could possibly make in your trading career - truly a game changer!” ~William Y

“I have said this several times, today i have made more in gold and oil not to mention bonds to pay for the class several times” ~ Joe B

“We LOVE what we are seeing. We can easily understand Ray and recognize that he is not only a phenomenal trader, but also an incredible teacher and coach. We simply could not be happier.” ~ Alice

“I’m new and I’ve looked at quite a bit of trading education. I think this course defines “exceptional value” ~ Bryan B

“If you are still deciding on joining or not, this class is real and you will never regret…guarantee ~Bennett L
Okay…Joe, Bennett, Bryan, Alice, William, Charles and the rest of the Predatory Traders say JOIN!

~Kim

@Hostwey,
Yes Steven Patterson has finally gone. Compass worked hard to persuade Ray to ditch him, but eventually Steven had yet another emotional blow-up and tried to drive wedges between Compass and Ray and between our Self Help group and Compass. Steven's high risk scalping 'Floor trader' style was never really that compatible with Ray, though Steven's teaching was much less extreme than his actual trading ( + 200% one month -95% the next , reload the account and continue).

Now that Steven has gone, Mark Coe is prepared to spend more time in Ray's trade room and he asked his friend Elliot (retired Market Maker on the Canadian Dollar for a big Swiss Bank) to join him occasionaly. I don't know if Elliot has an official position or not, but I think he enjoys the interaction.

So far as the students who now assist with the Room, both Jason Mauney and Peter Fan are still active in the room, as is the young South African student Nic.

I heard that Steven set up or tried to set up a trade room and course in opposition to Ray, certainly he contacted sever Self Help Group members saying they would never make money with Ray and they should come over and learn more from him. So far as I know only 1 out of more than 140 of the Self Help Group students bothered to check out what Steven was offering. And I am confident that if anybody could not make money from trading after following Ray's teachings for a reasonable time, then there is absolutely no chance that Steven would do anything but confuse them and make their losses even bigger.

**** Clarification ******
FF decide that I was a 'Commercial Member' , so I cant reply to PMs.

The Self Help Group does not kick members out if/when they stop subscribing to Ray's Trade Room, but restrict their acccess to only the information that was current whilst they were a subscriber. Thus protecting the investment of current students/subscribers.
If you wish to contact me about Ray's Course / 'Prop Desk in the retail space' or about the Self Help Group then either:

email me ianf0ster at aim.com - that is a zero in my name
skype me ianf0ster - same as in the email address

Please state the reason for contacting me - otherwise it is likely to end up in the trash.

Ian Foster

I have just had an email saying that Compass are opening up the regular Sunday Market Week Briefing (6pm Eastern time today) free to anybody who registers for it.

I surprised that they are giving so much away. In this Ray usually covers what the latest COT means for the market, upcoming important news to be positioned for and important Macro levels.

Institutions prepare before the trading day, sometimes several days in advance. This is a chance to see how Ray does that.

Here is the link to register:
https://invest.infusionsoft.com/app/...03867af31c878b

Would an M or W pattern resemble Ray's 'low volume tap back' though Ray obviously has the benefit of more accurate volume information than is available to a retail trader on an MT4 platform for example.

But once again its a matter of 'context' not blindly trading an M or a W pattern.

I fully get Ray's opinion that volume may be the 'secret sauce' of trading, and that by fading you might be just hitting a brick wall of volume.

But Ray should have a discussion with 'Dr Fib' in Dean Malone's trade room!

The 'value' I put on the room is about $100 a month. If that is the cost I'd sign up. Compass should do a 2:1 deal where you get Ray + Dean for $175 a month !

Have to say I have rather warmed to Mark and Elliot.

Sadly will miss tonight's briefing session due to visitors but I recommend people take a look and see what this course has to offer.

Hi Hostwey,
Ray's low volume tap back, has a much more complex definition than an M or W in the Steve Mauro sense. Both the volume and the candle colour must conform in order for it to be an LVTB. It is also usually a much smaller pattern than one might think of for an M or W.

Personally, I don't see Deans room being compatible with Ray's. Dean is much more reliant on indicators than is Ray and thus he appeals to those looking for the 'Easy Button'. Why use indicator derived levels rather than drawing your own ones in Ray style? If you do it for yourself, you know the context which applies and can have much more confidence in trading when you see the right price action at those levels. But perhaps that is just me - after looking for the easy way since I started indulging my interest in Financial Markets back in 1972, I have recognised that for me at least there is no substitute for learning to really understand what is going on.

The reason why I persist with this thread is just that I would not wish that waste of time,effort and money on anybody.

Oh and the Room (after the Course) gives you approx 26 hours of Ray + several hours of his helpers per week and naturally is priced at a lot more than $100 per month and worth much more still, at least until you can do most of what Ray teaches for yourself.

The guests in the open to all Market Briefing last night were interesting for what some guests said:

1). Somebody said why should he join when there are thousands like Ray. And I thought, yes there are lots of Guys you are Quants and lots who are Prop Desk Traders and perhaps as many as a hundred or so who are both, But the point he was missing is that he will never come across any of those guys because A). they are tied by their contracts (if they are not employed then they cant be that good) and B). Unlike Ray they are not prepared to miss out on extra Bonuses by spending time teaching dumb Retail Traders!

2). Another said that Ray only shows trades after the fact. He obviously misunderstands, because up to that point in the Briefing, Ray had given out at least 10 trades (those were the ones I noted for the markets I trade). He said which price levels he would trade at and gave an example of the price action he wanted to see to take the trades when price gets there. One problem i have is that Ray mentions these so casually that I often miss them and only when a trade takes off do i think - 'Oh sh1t - didn't Ray say about taking a trade at that level in last nights Briefing?'

3). Another says they are put off by how much Ray's students love his teachings. He says it is sychophantic. - He should obviously sign up with a teacher who's students hate him and think his course is rubbish - LOL !

Yes I think this attitude is a problem, due to the retail market desire to see 'live deals' and often Ray's style is misinterpreted as hindsight trading. However the right hand edge is for execution only and you can't press the trigger without the left hand context.

I used to subscribe to strategies on here, that were run on the basis of well 'price went up because green crossed over red on my indicator.' Well no, you got lucky. Price went up due to the context of what had happened previously, which was often ignored in the overall strategy.

The nearest thing I can find to Compass offering is FutexLive and that is completely different. They provide daily briefings from an array of traders, run courses on market/volume profile and using the DOM. Price is £120 a month for the top package. Whilst they may teach you how to use the tools, not sure if they teach you how to trade and interpret the markets quite like Ray.

I would however like to see Ray trade live, using his footprint charts. I recently had the opportunity of looking over the shoulder of another trader Tom Dante, who uses MarketDelta. Tom trades the Bund predominantly but it was a very worthwhile experience. You can sign up for his weekly (free) Sunday briefing session/webinar.

It has been a while since I posted here. I got an email today asking about Ray and the Self Help Group that I run:

To: ianf0ster <[email protected]>
Sent: Thu, 24 Sep
2015 22:00
Subject: prop trader training self help group
Hi Ian,
am considering subscribing to the prop trader course but am
concerned about how much I can absorb in just one month. From what I gather most
of you stay in the course on an ongoing basis. Is it possible that the knowledge
gained translates into sufficient financial gain to afford this as I could only
afford the first months subscription? I understand this is a difficult one to
answer, I have been trading small accounts for around 18yrs now, am a manual
worker so save up, fund an account and trade until I have to go back to work
again, and would consider myself a break even trader, and have traded options,
futures, shares and spread betting. I am determined and have learnt a great
deal over the years but still something missing obviously. I would be able and
willing to study full time for several months but have to start seeing some
tangible account growth to make it worthwhile and some income to defer going
back on the tool again. How does the support group that you have started benifit
the learning experince? is it structured or more a collection of
material?

Hope you can find the time to read and reply, if not I fully
understand and wish you every success. Obtained your e-mail from your thread on
FF by the way

Thanks
Mark ########
Hi Mark,
I really sympathise with you, I have only been trading for about 12 years
(investing for over 45 yrs), 'full time' trading for 8 years. So I know how hard
it is to keep going and have faith that it is possible to become consistently
profitable.
It isn't possible for me to give definitive answers to your
questions about how much, and how quickly it is possible to learn, nor how soon
you might see some sort of consistent profits - or even an improvement in
profits.
Everybody is different and is in different circumstances. In my
case Ray has taught me more than enough to be hugely profitable, yet too often I
don't see the scenarios and trades at the correct time or my trading psychology
problems manage to mess things up for me. None of this is a fault of Ray or the
course. I am getting better, but it is a slow process. By this I mean that in a
small live spreadbet account of £5,000 I find it easy to make £100 to £300 per
trading day (2% to 6%) when I risk 0.5% to 1% per trade; and I know that if I
traded more in tune with my total knowledge that could go up to over 10%
(occasionally over 30% ) in a day. Then for one of various reasons I just lose
it and crash with a -10% to -15% loss in a day (it used to be a 15% to 30% loss
in a day).
After that you may think that either I am full of bullshit, or
that this is the 'Holy Grail of Trading'. Neither is the case. Whilst it is very
difficult to find out what people are actually making, I am confident that there
are at least 6 traders who were break-even before Ray and are making somewhere
in that 6% to 30% per day consistently.

Could you manage that within a 1
month or 6 week course? - Highly unlikely!
Could you do say 1% to 3% per day
consistently after taking 3 months or more to absorb the material from the
course and then coming back into the room to add the extra finesse? - It is
possible and I think at least 4 people have managed that. But that is still a
low percentage.
Might it take longer than 3 months (after the course) to get
to 1% to 3% per day consistently, but still be achievable? - Certainly! Were it
not for my psych problems I would have hit at least that much after 4 to 5
months.
Until I started with Ray, I honestly did not know I had any trading
psychology problems at all ! There were so many other reasons for my
losses.
I am from a computer programming and Maths/Science background and
find patterns quite difficult. I have tried lots of indicators and indicator
based systems and only found one that works - trouble is it doesn't work for me,
hence getting nowhere until I found Ray.
Ray is an ex-military officer, a
Quant and a Trader. He is not an educator, he is getting better at teaching and
the 'official courses' are getting better structured, but he is what he is.
Which is one of the main reasons for a support group.
OK, when I add that I have worked harder at this than anything else in my life and that I have found
it incredibly frustrating when not quite 'getting it' then that is all of the
bad news out of the way.
I call the group that I run a Self Help Group.
Some say its a bad name because it is a lot more fun than that. What it isn't is an
alternative education or an alternative trade room. We share experiences,
information, do our own research, help each other to learn and also try to give
feedback and apply subtle pressure to Compass in order to improve the course and
live room. I and another member worked hard over several months with Compass to
produce something with a little structure, unfortunately it is lacking much of
the clarity and many of the insights that Ray subsequently introduced in his
most recent 'official course'. The problem was that 'only Ray knows what Ray
knows and what Ray is trying to convey'. We also have a repository of
information and recordings, but again the structure isn't great.
I and most of the active members would never have managed to keep going without the support
of our group. Ray is an alien from the planet Tradeon ! - If you take the course
you will come to believe this, it is the only explanation as to how he is able
to spend 18hrs per day strategising, trading, teaching and just talking about
trading. He has done that every day when markets are open from early April 2015
until now (with the exception of 1 week when his company sent him to Athens for
some work). So you see the only way to come close to keeping up with him, or at
least knowing the best bits to go back and review, is to have group members in
all time zones (which we have - over 160 members in total).
After an 'official' course ends, the education continues at a slightly slower pace in the
same live room (at a reduced subscription cost. So the 'course' really never
ends until you either become an institutional level trader, give up, run out of
money or die! Unless numbers drop off too much or Ray loses interest. I know
others say this (and in most cases it is complete Bullshit) but Ray only does it
because he is passionate about it - the money would not be meaningful to him
even with 10 times as many students.
That said, several of the successful
traders either no longer subscribe, or only open the live room when not actually
trading. Thus is because whilst trading, many (including me) find that the room
can be distracting.

I hope that this helps, I have spent a
lot longer than I intended in trying to give you the fullest picture.
All the best with your trading,
Ian

Hi Mark, 2 things I fogot to say:
1. This is mainly for if you don't join, but even some people who do join just don't get this:
Many retail traders vastly underestimate the added difficulty of 1 lot trading , or of trading All-In , All Out.
Most Institutional traders have the luxury of being able to average into positions within a general area, they get their biggest size on at the most advantageous price. This means that to a certain extent, the more price goes against their initial position the more they like it because they are able to get even more size on in the trade.
They also rarely get out of their position (if it is a decent size) all at once, they take some of at a point where they think there may be some profit taking etc. reducing it in stages so long as price continues to move in their favour, not completely exiting until they want to reverse trade direction.
The relative lack of flexibility for a retail trader is huge, as is the extra pressure to get the best entry and best exit price. Whereas an Institutional trader just needs a decent aggregate price.
So don't make things harder for yourself by trading single lots. It is (within reason) more important to have an account that enables you to trade mico or mini-lots than it is to have a really low spread. Also the smaller the unit size, the faster and easier you can compound your profits.

2. No individual trader can trade as many styles and as many markets as Ray does. He teaches as much of the whole as is possible for a retail trader to emulate, but in the case of gamma Scalping for example it is only possible for a rich full-time trader with big bankroll and lots of resources.
Ray has a whole team 24 x 5.5 to support and assist him e.g. taking trades he has mapped out in advance whilst he is asleep or eating or in a meeting etc. Plus he has the very best equipment, news subscriptions, data, traders gossip etc.
It is by far the best approach to just concentrate on the market (note the singular, though up to 3 may be possible) and the type of trading which best suit your personality, your account size and your resources.

Cheers, Ian

I am pleased to report that Mark didn't hesitate, he has joined Ray's class on the 'earlybird' deal - he just paid the standard amount for the 'offical classes, but has immediate access to the live trading room, the ongoing education, the Structured Training Modules and the recording of the last official classes that Ray did in August - which are thought by us long term students to be by far the best ones he has done so far.

Oh and just about the first thing he did was to join our independent and completely free Self Help Group.
I can see that Mark is on a mission to finally trade the smarter way, like an institutional trader in the retail space.

I have just read one of the most stupid emails I have read. But it is from an investor I trust.
The trouble is he was talking about trading.
I will show you the content and then in the next post I will say why I think it and most of the people he mentions are so stupid about trading:-

THE WEALTH EMPIRE REPORT
Thursday October 1, 2015
They Trade Better Than You
I used to manage a CTA fund.
CTA stands for Commodity Trading Advisor. It is a managed program similar to a hedge or mutual fund, but only trades commodity futures - oil, nat gas, ags, indexes and the like.
I didn't trade it.
I worked with a well-respected trader in the industry. He traded the accounts. I handled the paperwork, clients, brokers, give-up fees, allocations, etc.
We started small. We raised a little less than $10 million and set out to establish a track record.
The goal was simple - return a steady 8-10% a year with minimal drawdowns (minimal being less than 5%).
Do that, and we were assured that it would be no problem to raise another $50 to $100 million.
Five months later the fund was down more than 27%.
Some investors used notional funds. They added leverage with the hopes of even larger gains. They lost everything.
I thought this trader was a god. Thousands of people followed him and hung on his every word.
I watched him trade his personal accounts for years. I knew he was legit.
He called me once on his way in to the office to get a quote on Apple. I gave him the stock price. He then asked me to close out a "little trade" he had put on the day before.
I closed out the position for a $207,000 profit - not bad for a day's work.
A year later I watched him make a million dollars in a single day.
If this guy couldn't make money trading a fund, who could?
I stayed away from CTA's for a while after that. I was sour on the whole industry. I thought the whole thing was a scam.
Last week I had lunch with David. He's a good friend of mine works in the same building as I do. I've literally known him since we were 14 years old.
I've always known what he did, but never took much interest in it.
David raises money for CTA programs. But unlike the rest of the sharks in New York and Chicago, his obligation is to his clients (weird, right?).
I would compare his job to that of an independent insurance broker.
Instead of calling a dozen agencies to get quotes, you call someone who can compare rates and coverage for you.
Need to insure your mint 1951 Jaguar XK 120? They know what companies specialize in collectibles.
Have a perfect driving record? The insurance broker knows what companies will best reward your impeccable history.
This is what David does, but for investors.
If you have a low risk tolerance and want to earn a consistent 6-8% he knows what programs are best suited for you.
If you are a former day trader who doesn't bat an eye and 25% drawdowns, he may suggest CTA's with much higher potential returns.
I sat down with him this week to find out more and get an inside look at the managed futures industry.
I wanted to know, once and for all, if CTA's are a viable alternative investment.
After grilling him for several hours and asking to see everything short of client statements, I was surprised at what I learned.
Question 1. I asked him point blank: "Why would I invest in a CTA?"
"They trade better than you." His answer came straight-faced, without missing a beat.
I appreciated his bluntness. The financial services industry makes a living with slick rebuttals and well-rehearsed answers, so his response was a breath of fresh air for a fellow straight shooter like myself.
So I continued.
He knows about my CTA experience and my skepticism over an industry that racks up more commissions than a busy eBay weekend.
As I suspected, not all of them are such legendary traders. Out of the more than 1,000 CTA programs in existence, David only recommends 6 to 7 of them to his clients.
Just like top stock pickers, he only puts money into thoroughbreds - those expected to offer less risk and greater upside than their peers.
So what should CTA investors look for?
First and foremost, you want to see above-average returns over a rolling 12-month period. The fund needs to not only have outperformed in the past but still be doing so. It doesn't matter if they were hot three years ago. As the saying goes, 'What have you done for me lately?'
David also recommended a MINIMUM 24 months of proven track record before one considers investing.
The minimum is for those traders with proven pedigrees. Maybe they ran a successful program previously (if so, the details will be in the fund's disclosure document). Maybe they spent a decade on Goldman's commodity desk.
If their resume doesn't impress you, require at least 36 months of solid returns.
Every day someone decides to hang their shingle and trade other people's money. A vast majority of them, like my former colleague, crash and burn. As a potential investor, I want to see that the trader has performed satisfactorily under different markets and conditions.
The key in judging performance, from what I can tell, is the ratio between drawdowns and average returns.
Drawdowns are defined as the maximum fluctuation between high and low values. Some may refer to it as peak-to-valley moves.
A 20% return is not appealing if the fund regularly sees 50% dips. Conversely, 10% per year with a 2% max drawdown is very attractive.
In fact, the annual return percentage doesn't even matter.
The reason? Notional funds.
Unlike traditional mutual funds, CTA investors can partially fund their accounts. This adds leverage and amplifies both gains and losses.
The CTA terminology is "units."
Let me give you a hypothetical example.
XYZ CTA program has a $100,000 minimum initial investment. So every $100k is referred to as a unit.
Some will trade one contract per unit. Others may trade several. It all depends on the market and volatility of the fund.
The XYZ program has an average annual return of 7% and its largest drawdown was 2%.
Since the program has been in existence for many years, odds are they have risk parameters in place designed to avoid anything larger than their maximum 2% decline. Nothing is guaranteed, but this would be my educated guess.
As an aggressive investor, 7% may not do much to wet your whistle. To increase the potential returns, you can simply trade more units.
Pretend that you have $100,000 to invest.
Instead of trading 1 unit, you may decide to trade 5. This will increase both gains and losses by 500%.
In essence, the CTA will be trading a $500,000 account in your name. But you are only required to put up $100,000 to fund it.
By trading 5 units instead of 1, the program's average return increases to 35% (7% * 5) and the largest historical drawdown would be 10% (2% * 5).
This is the concept of notional funds.
The same managed futures program can be very low risk or very high risk depending on your personal tolerance. As the investor, you are in control of how many units you wish to trade.
This is why the ratio between returns and drawdowns is so important. You have the power ratchet up or down the performance of any program through the use of notional funds.
At first glance, a CTA that is regularly returning 50% seems appealing. But if the downside swings are equally severe, I'm not interested in participating.
And why would I? I can make any fund average 50% returns. I just need to be comfortable with the corresponding drawdown risk that my use of leverage creates.
So enough hypotheticals. What are these people actually making?
David has been in business for almost four years. He has around 100 clients. He estimates that, on average, most of them make about 35% a year.
Remember, most of these people are trading with notional funds - some as high as 10 times leverage. Many also come from a trading background and are comfortable with higher risk levels.
I cannot give you a performance number to target. Every investor must weigh the historical returns with an educated guess of the risk based on the program's history.
Is a managed futures program right for you?
I can't answer that. I will say that like any other investment, you don't want to put all of your eggs in one basket. Diversity is key.
One of the appealing things about these CTA programs is their lack of correlation with the overall stock market. A fund trading meat futures (apparently one of the best ones out there believe it or not) is not likely to be affected by interest rates and corporate earnings forecasts like a stock fund would be.
And having investment dollars that can produce a positive yield during lean market years is never a bad thing.

Well if the record of the best 6 or 7 CTA's his friend recommends is even average, the first line is complete Garbage.

They trade better than you : - No they bloody well don't. As I told a cold caller trying to sell me a so called managed account run on Binary Betting
" 11% per month for all that risk? I wouldn't even get out of bed for 11% per month!"
How about yesterday when I traded the Crude Oil INV event the way Ray has showed us and also the way that an eminent member of my group trades it.
OK so two trades in less than 1hr on a single news event with max risk 2% (and I didn't even trade it well), so how much did I make? 8%.
OK now full disclosure I am having persistent internet problems and so have not dared trade my live account for 2 weeks - Boy am I having withdrawal symptoms. But in the past my typical gain in my live account trading that event has been between 3 and 6% with only one loss since January - and that was only 6% !
I admit that the Crude Oil Inventory trades are the highlight of my trading week, but come on , I could 'work' a 4 hr month for at least an average of 12% per month. ANd he thinks a shitty CTA trades better than a student of Ray - surely he is insane.
But no, he isn't insane, he just doesn't know ant better!

And he suggests leveraging up a 'low risk' ( 2% max drawdown per year) by 5 times = 10% max drawdown per year for a measly 3% profit per month !

Oh come on, you have got to be kidding me on!

I have just been alerted to a thread in the main FF section. It is called 'Exposing MT4 scams' . The main problem with the originator doing this, is that it is over 5 years too late! ​
All this stuff was exposed to retail traders over 5 years ago. Regulators started taking action and apart from FXCM (who don't seem to mind getting fined), the Brokers who are registered with decent Regulators such as the UK and Australia are very careful to stay clean! I really don't know if the US is a decent regulator or not, but since they prohibit Brokers from offering a Segregated Client Funds - then I wouldn't do business with any US Spot FX
broker.

But people need to get real! Retail Traders need Retail Brokers, without them we would not be able to trade since our trades are not worthwhile for the Banks to quote us a 2 way price.

There are several Broker business models, but they do need to stay in business - see above!
Some good Brokers take the other side of your trade directly. Thee ones can offer some of the lowest spreads. The good ones, wont cheat you, but have to offset their aggregate position in the interbank market.
Others pass off every trade you make to a 'liquidity provider'. They may not have a trade desk themselves, but it is almost certain that their liquidity provider does have a trade desk. Thus many so -called ECN or STP are only pseudos.

But why should you care about all this? You need a retail Broker, so do your due diligence and pick a regulated Broker - unless you don't mind if you can never withdraw your profits. Which doesn't matter to at least 95% of people who don't read threads such as this - because they won't have any profits to withdraw !

Hi, there is finally a thread in FF main area (non-commercial), by somebody who seems to either have had some decent training or has just stumbled upon some of the simplest indicators that actually work in trading. Too bad he has not learned to do them on the most suitable/best/cheapest serious charting platform.

For any cheapskates who don't want to learn from the best - which is obviously Ray. You can learn some of what he teaches in a single lesson. From The Delta Volume - Cumulative Delta thread by Sciurus.
Though why anybody serious about trading would NOT want to learn fro the bes is completely beyond me.

I actually came over here today to mention Boris and Kathy again. Boris has a habit of getting things half-right and so it is with his latest email:

"
The Worst Trading Habit That Makes You The Most Money

Ever since I first picked up a trading book -- more years ago than I care to admit -- the one undying advice of conventional wisdom was "Let your profits run and cut your losses short." I would venture to say that this "kernel of brilliance" is responsible for more losses than any other trading tenet ever devised.

In actual markets there is absolutely no way to let your profits run while cutting your losses short. You either cut your profits or cut your losses, but you can't have it both ways. That's because markets -- and especially speculative markets like forex -- almost never move in one direction.

Anyone who has ever been able to "let his profits run" is simply a lucky idiot who like a befuddled lottery winner guessing a random number, just happened to catch that one big breakout and then was stupid enough to believe that it would continue without retrace and then was lucky enough to have that once in decade occurrence actually happen and lastly -- and this almost NEVER happens -- was smart enough to exit before the whole trade went right back to where it started from.

Don't believe me? Go ahead keep making bets with 3 to 1 4 to 1 5 to 1 payouts and we can talk again when your account equity is down to 10%.

Now "professional gurus" would be horrified at my blasphemy. They would tell you that one of the worst things you can do as a trader is to cut your profits short. After all, how are you supposed to pay for all those stops?

The problem with professional gurus however is that they are great at trading the left side of the chart.They are awesome at picking prime examples of trends AFTER they take place, but I have yet to see any of them succeed in my domain -- at the right side of the chart where fear and uncertainty control every tick and real capital is won or lost on your tactics rather than your theories.

In that world -- the real day trading world of the markets -- taking your wins too quickly is one of the most profitable things you can do.
Why?

Because successful day trading is not about making money. It's about NOT LOSING money. There are three basic classes of day trades. There are trades that make money right away -- anywhere between 1 and 30 minutes in duration. There are trades that lose money right away usually in the same short period of time. There nothing much to do about either one of those types of trades and you just take them as they come.

There is however a broad middle ground of trades that appear to be uncertain as to whether they want to be winners or losers and this is where all the bad habits of impatience actually pay off big.

Now as traders whether we are Hindus in New Delhi, a Jews in Tel Aviv, a Moslems in Dubai, Chinese in Singapore or just jolly old rogers in Melbourne -- we are in fact all Anglo Saxon at the core. What I mean is that if we live in the advanced industrialized world we have all internalized the Protestant work ethic and with it the core belief that we must sacrifice in order to succeed.

Generally that's a great rule to live by -- except when it comes to day trading. Good things do NOT come to those who wait. We must not endure pain in order to make profit. The speculative markets flip all those long ingrained behaviors on the head.
You got out of the trade a bit early and gave up 10 more pips of upside? Who cares. There is another trade right around the corner. In the meantime, you know what you also did? You got out of trade that could have turned sour and made a 5 pips instead of losing 100. You know what you also did? You freed your capital to look for other opportunities instead sitting in front of the screen paralyzed like a deer in headlights, hoping -- nay praying -- that you can get back to even while other traders are banking profits elsewhere.

The most important thing that you did was NOT invest. Not invest your time. Not invest your money. Not invest your psychological capital. By selling too early you became a true day trader rather than a quasi investor.

So go ahead -- get out too early. Give up the profits. Once you start doing that on a regular basis the only thing you'll regret is not picking up this bad habit earlier. "

Congratulations on being half right again, Boris ! - That is a lot better than most Forex Commentators.

Why is he only half right, you may ask? Well , cutting your losses and taking profit before it turns into a scratch or a loss is only the first stage in trade management evolution. In fact it is pretty easy to do compared with the second part. When I say easy to do, obviously you do need to get a decent entry of course.

What is harder is to extract every last pip from a trade, and I know of only 2 traders who can do that: Ray and Eusebio.
Eusebio is probably going to beat his all time record da-trade quite soon, since he has been using Ray's teaching to improve his trading. BUt even befor he heard of Ray, Eusebio was a 'Carlsberg Retail Trader' i.e probably the best retail trader in the world.
I can't remember the exact figure, but he made his all time record trade in 2008 and and was for greater than +130% on his account using a maximum risk of only 0.5 %.

It is impossible to do this if you are constantly exiting you trade for a snatches profit. Eusebio teaches a style of scale-in at appropriate times using accumulated profit, and scale-out at appropriate times to bank profit and use part to fuel future scale-ins.

He already had a pretty good method fro determining scale-in and scale-out points, but Ray has taught him some ways to refine those.
So as I said, I am expecting him to beat his all time record anytime soon.

Boris and Kathy are real people, Boris is interviewed on CNBC. I follow them on Twitter. I've mentioned another Compass mentor/trainer Dean Malone who is a registered broker.

I've no idea who "Eusebio" is (unless its the Eusebio behind the Max Trading System).

I've liked what I see about "Ray" too (from what I've seen from the free video's) but we've no idea who he is either really.

Why all the secrecy?

Hi Ian, thx for pointing to me during the last webinar done Friday October 9, by Mark to your FF thread.

First time when I lend on "Ray" webinars was in 2014, I was just starting with FX business, for few weeks and just finished the "advance" training that my broker provide on a local "trading school". It was totally different than classical text book, way different!!! It was a big WOW effect.

I just want to say that it was just mind blowing, looking to the way that man talks and navigate thru charts and ideas, and gave u a certain level of confidence. I just was looking for hours to all those free webinars. The thing was that I opened a small live account of 2000 euro (I'm at 1500 now, but stop for a few months, trying to find an edge!), and hope with pieces of information that I "fish" here and there, and with my little understanding, to try to understand; I was enthusiastic as everybody at the beginning... but my enthusiasm always finish when get to pay the full course, I just can't afford, I wasn't able then and the same is now, for me this is way to expensive, that's why I try to limit to basic swing trading and basic PA.

I say to myself almost everyday, that if I'll manage to get those money at some point, this is the ONLY course that I'm willing to pay for...
I would love to use that information, if I would get and master, to filter more the basic PA trading, and to get to that level of confidence.

Till then I enjoy every free webinar that Ray and the team does, and hope that they will start a new session soon, this means new free webinars.

Thx,
Cris

Hi Hostwey,
You are correct, that Boris Schlossberg and Kathy Lien are both well known to retail traders having both worked for SpotFX brokers in the past. My information about them is that they are both basically self taught and had no institutional training.

Eusebio Nanni is the main instructor for 'The MAX' - a trading system originally taught by Dr James Pruitt (deceased). Eusebio has further developed it and is the only instructor to teach the most advanced MAX courses. The MAX courses are very good if you are happy to trade using lagging indicators without understanding why it works sometimes and not understand why it fails when it fails. It is (overall) more expensive than Ray's training, but may well suit some people better than Ray's, since it involves less study.

I don't know if there is any 'secrecy' about Ray - sure you can't Google him but why should he have an online presence? All it might do is to make his institutional employers more wary of him. Note that nobody in his position is allowed to have a personal trading account nor are they allowed to provide trades to anyone. He may well be using a pseudonym, if not he is taking a risk with his career prospects. What matters is that he has proved over and over again that he is a Quant and a Trader and that he is in the unique position of both being able to and wanting to teach retail traders just for the challenge and satisfaction.
My constant concern is that he may get bored or tired of doing it. Even when there is no official course running, Ray spends over 12 hours per week every week actively showing us stuff.

Hi Cris,
You are welcome. I had another person from that webinar contact me via Skype. He said that Ray seemed too good to be true, so could I prove it was not a scam.
I don't know if I was able to convince him, but here is what members of my self help group said about it:

[2:05:42 PM] Danxx: @Ian: it would take a bit long to explain here. But really, what kind of evidence he is searching for?
[2:06:15 PM] Danxx: how would we define sthing as a scam?
[2:06:31 PM] Danxx: an indicator based crappy system is not scam per definition
[2:06:42 PM] Danxx: but in terms of content, it is
[2:07:32 PM] Danxx: (i just do not like buzz words used by everybody without having a clear content)
[2:09:40 PM | Edited 2:10:23 PM] Ian Foster: I think he wants to know that what Nic and I and other students and ex-students said in the promotion in the PropExperience room on Friday was actually coming from students and ex-students and not from people being paid to say things about how good Ray's teaching is.
[2:21:46 PM | Edited 2:22:04 PM] Sean xxx: Ian, give him a one time pass to this room and he can ask the whole group any question he likes, Don't forget to charge Kim for the promotional activities of our group (chuckle)
[2:31:43 PM] Greg xxx: Well isn't that what the promotional vids are for...for the new classes? If he listens to Ray and is still not sure if its the real deal....how are we all going to change his mind??
[2:32:18 PM] Ian Foster: I really don't want to start allowing 'tasters' in here before people sign the Non-Disclosure Agreement. I have compromised by just copying some posts from this Skype. I chose a period that doesn't give away any of Ray's content. I hope he at least contacts Kim. His written English seems good, but then he could be using Google Translate - like Sam. In which case he would have even more difficulty understanding Ray than most of us do.
[2:34:48 PM] Ian Foster: Ray was still in the main room for that Promo. Only Mark Coe, Kim , Nic and I plus a few others went across. One guy asked if the 'course' was just Support and Resistance - an understandable reaction to hearing Mark do the same thing yet again.
[2:37:28 PM] Greg xxx: OK, but I assume that Ray will be doing one (or some) as well...plus Kim has the older ones he's done..Ii think if anyone has been trading for a while, that listening to Ray should seal the deal as to whehter or not it's just another BS teaching or a scam... It think Kim would give those promo vids to anyone who asked...
[2:38:05 PM] Greg xxx maybe not...I don't know......
[2:43:14 PM] Greg xxx: It's tough, because I think people want hard facts and "proof" so to speak....there is so much BS out there these days...people want to see account balances, winning trades, proof on myfxbook, etc etc. And I understand why..... I remember well over a year ago, someone in the room "questioned" Ray a little....asking to see some sort of proof of his trades, rather than after the fact comments....and Ray went balistic on the guy.....I understand Rays position of course...but i also understood why the guy asked as well....
[2:45:35 PM] Greg xxx: and you cant really blame people becuase $2K a month for the first month is still a lot of $$ despite even more expensive courses being thrown around...people are skeptical...
[2:46:53 PM] Sean xxx: Good point Ian
[2:50:57 PM] Sam xxx: Absolutely Greg, people should be skeptical.
When I heard Ray for the first time I knew immediately this one is the real deal. But not everyone is convinced that easily. Certainly if you are convinced you can read the market via indicators.