How long does it take to become a successfull trader, so u can quit the burger king job, and move out of the trailor park…? 
And make some serious dough
I dont know diddley squat about charts ,or what a market is… But I’d give it a try.
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Well, it’s 1.000.000 Dollar question.
It really only depends on you. For some the process to become a consistent trader (in my opinion, success in trading is consistency) is a fast one. For others it takes years if not forever. A good start would be reading through the school here at Babypips and get a foundation and then try to identify your strenghts and weaknesses and focus on them to improve.
On the bottomline, there is no specific answer to your question. One thing is for sure though: If you intend to pursue Forex trading with the “get rich overnight” mindset then I suggest you leave it be.
Good luck! 
It took me 3 years.
Therein lies the problem.
Until you understand what your doing ‘a little knowledge is a dangerous thing’. Most of the 95% figure for failure we hear so much about are ‘jump in with both feet’ newbie traders. Little wonder they don’t stay the course. I’d suggest you don’t ‘give it a try’ unless your really prepared to put in a serious amount of study and screen time.
QFT! good luck
I suggest you start a demo account practice and read…a lot, then when you think you got it down, read more. practice and then practice more, develop a trade plan, practice and read more…then when you finally have it down, the market will humble you. Step back and regroup, learn where you made your mistakes, pay close attention to news releases this time, develop a revised plan, hope to break even and maybe even walk away with a small profit before you get bit again. If you keep at it eventually you’ll become profitable.
trading is tough, becoming consistent in trading is even harder. It can be done for a living and thats my intention, leaving my career of 18yrs and doing something different with my life but not until I have sufficient backup of about a years salary and I’m a consistently profitable trader.
just as a comparison, i went to college to become a commercial pilot and learning to trade is as tough if not tougher than learning to be a pilot.
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10,000 hours screen time, around 3 years seems to be very commonly quoted, with a very much of if I knew then what I know know would probably knock 2 years off that, i.e. it takes 2 years to find out what the right things to do are.
and just when you think you have it figured out. It changes.
But once you have figured it out, it don’t!
In my opinion you can shorten the learning period by having some tuition, that might save you some of the blind alleys, but I often bang that drum on here and many, many people do not agree with me… but it took me six months to become profitable. It is a large investment up front, though, and is not for everyone. Also, handing over the money before you know whether you are suited to trading (not everyone is, by any means) is a risk… but then you are planning to become a trader, so you might as well embrace a little risk from the off!!
ST
I would use the analogy of "how long does it take to learn tennis from scratch?"
Answer: it depends on the person, their commitment, how much they practice. Some people will learn faster than others but most importantly you need to learn from as many people as possible. Good luck.
PS: I’m still on the learning path, it’s been 1 year so far and still on demo.
I am at three years plus a couple of months, and last month I did make 2% profit. this month I am up over 2% already, but I do have a negative position open so it may well shrink by tomorrow.
I guess I feel like I am really really close – it was a statement from purplepatch, and a little pep talk from Master Tang that kept me going this time… .
The best way to cut time off the 3 year suggestion is all up to you and how quickly you learn and jump into trading. It’s about how smart you are when you are reading advice from others. You don’t want to buy a trading course and spend 6 months doing it, only to realize that you learned nothing when you start trading. Research, research, research. Research credibility of whatever article you are reading, research credibility of strategies, research credibility of your broker, just research. That is going to be a key part in cutting down the time it takes to be trading rather than working at Burger King, or Sonic for me
Here are two practical ideas that might help you reduce the learning curve:
1a) Use a testing software that allows you to compress time; in other words, “speed up” real life and practice trade;
1b) If you want to do it on a shoestring, you can definitely do this free with Metatrader (or any platform that allows an extensive chart history); simply move back in time and play the “what if” game. Option 1a is better because it can hide the upcoming candles so your mind (and indicators) really doesn’t know what will happen next;
- Consider a short timeframe to “learn the ropes,” such as scalping. In my opinion this can teach you really quickly how to identify patterns, deal with psychology, and determine whether or not a strategy is working. Once you do get that method down pat, your constant repetition will become a positive reinforcement;
If you want to save time learning then I believe if you understand the next statement then you can start your journey in the right direction.
For all of the profitable forex traders that exist out there, do they all trade the exact same system, the exact entry, the exact same exit, the exact same S/R, all at the exact same time?
My answer would be NO, therefore if you understand and agree with that, then the system is not what makes the money. It helps you feel like you have control of the making money but ultimately it is not the system. Don’t get me wrong, try to find something that put the probabilities in your favour eg trade with the trend, etc but the biggest mistake and learning curve all new traders make is looking for the holy grail. Hours are spent in front of charts looking for the perfect setup, exit, etc.
The things you have control of as a trader is, the amount of risk you take when you enter a trade (money management), and how you control the trade once you enter (psychology). Probably a few more but the important ones to me are those two. Commissions / spreads will impact small accounts or over-trading too.
Therefore to win you need to skew the figures in your way and understand how to do that. To me when I see a comment you need only need 51% to be profitable, I know the trader doesn’t understand the figures and ultimately the edge required in trading. The important figures to understand is win % combined with R/R. For example, 50% win at 1/1, is not as good as 40% with 1/2, but as humans we always go for the higher win rate because we are taught to be right.
Now having said this if you understand the maths behind profitability first, then look at ways to trade with probabilities favouring your maths then you can save a lot of time of staring at charts looking for the magic indicator. And the reason I believe this is if you understand that if I get 4 right out of 10, but at a minimum I will always aim for 2 reward to 1 risk, and understand the expected run of losses in a row for a 40% system might be 17 in a row, then when you are demo trading or real life trading and if all still fall into those expected parameters then you don’t have to panic and go looking for the next you beaut system. Therefore 10 losses in a row on a 40% with 1/2 is well within expected parameters. Might hurt a little but over the next 10000 trades it will be a blip to your overall trading.
As a newbie or previous newbie, how many systems did you try or will you try before you settled on your current one, and how long did you give yourself in forward testing to give yourself a chance? Most will say heaps of systems trialled and a few days or 10 trades and I had 3 losses in a row so the system was crap.
Alot will disagree but as someone mentioned above, the reader has to find gems from all the anonymous posters on forums and decipher the gold from the dust. Hope this helps someone.
Cheers
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[B]Smithy[/B] I agree with your conclusions in most part. But do feel a trader needs a proven tried and tested system in addition to probability. Don’t get me wrong, I agree even with a tried and tested strat you still need a very good entry point mostly based on experience and in no small measure probability (who amongst us ever really knows with certainty the high or low of a given move). But with a great deal of practise/ experience we can get close and on the odd occasion ‘nial it almost to the pip’. I also think trading the longer time frames greatly tips the odds in our favour but have been banging on about that for the better part of two years here on BP and no ones listening. LOL.
You can rest easy: some of us listen!
You know:
I’m pleased somebody asked this question (especially in the manner in, and the honesty with which, it was asked).
(By the way R Carter: I’m ‘right with you there’ on the longer timeframes)!!! LOL!!!
This is something that has perplexed me especially over the past two or so years I’d say.
Not to be contentious here in any way but do those of us ever wonder if maybe, just maybe, we ‘over complicate’ or ‘over think’ this business (yes purplepatchforex: I know everyone had a ‘over thinking’ vs. ‘over complicating’ rather humorous discussion some time ago)!!! LOL!!! I’m by no means saying I’m ‘right’ or that I’m ‘wrong’ or that anybody else is 'right or ‘wrong’ here i.e. I’d be really interested in taking this discussion a bit further and my reasoning for this is given below.
I, to this day, and for at least the past two years, have wondered about what is needed to ‘make it’ in this business. And I have found myself, especially of late, thinking that ‘how long it takes’ to become profitable depends largely on your reasons for wanting to trade for a living. The answer SHOULD be obvious i.e. to make money. But as obvious as the answer may seem (SHOULD be): is it REALLY that ‘cut and dried’???
I am (what I believe to be) a fine example to use to demonstrate my point and my reasoning for saying that it depends on your reasoning for wanting to trade for a living and this reasoning is in direct proportion to ‘how long it takes’ to become profitable.
In the beginning (what are we talking about now: five and half years or around there now) I decided that I wanted to trade for a living. True: most of my life I’d had slightly more of a ‘casual interest’ in the stock market but only decided to take it further a few years ago (as noted). In hindsight and I honestly believe this to be true (in my case anyway): even although I THOUGHT that it was to make money (and loads of it too) I honestly do believe that it was something more than that (more important to me than making money as strange as that may sound but, as I’ve noted, this only realised in hindsight). Why do I believe this??? Well: I wanted to learn and know all that there was about the markets. How exchanges worked. Why they were there. What made up the S&P 500??? What was 'Dow Theory’??? Who WAS Charles Dow anyway??? What was, and what caused the crash of 1929 and October 87??? Alright, and at that time, FOREX ‘came into play’ too. What made the price of a FOREX pair move??? What were 'Commdolls’??? What was a Central Bank??? What was the FOMC??? What was the Federal Reserve??? Who was ‘the Ben Bernank’ or ‘the Paulson’ or ‘the Goldman Sachs’ (remember that cartoon clip that I posted somewhere a while back)??? The list is endless (and if I continued on this could well become one of my longest posts on record and, as you all know, that would be quite something)!!! LOL!!!
But if I look back now: has any of that research and thirst for knowledge in any way aided me in becoming profitable today??? I really don’t think so (but that’s the conundrum i.e. I’m not sure about this and I’ll never know as there is no way of ‘turning the clock back’). I mean: I love HAVING the knowledge (and believe me I’m probably talking about only ‘the tip of the iceberg’ here) but when it really ‘comes down to it’ what do I use on a daily basis to trade (and, finally, make money). What did I NEED to know to get here??? A few obvious and obligatory things e.g. how to use the trading platform (application software) of my choice. How much time and effort is REALLY involved in that??? What a bar is. What a timeframe is. What is meant by the words ‘open’, ‘high’, ‘low’, and ‘close’ (price)? How difficult is that all to learn and understand and how long can it reasonably take??? Alright: let’s ‘throw in’ the different types of orders here and how to place them and execute them (which is a part of learning to use your trading platform anyway), understanding what a spread is, what slippage is, what being re-quoted means. Again: how difficult is all of that to learn about and understand and how long, again, can it reasonably take??? My guess is to someone of average intelligence: all of the above could be accomplished in a month??? A bit longer??? A bit shorter??? But surely not a ‘materially’ longer period of time??? Alright: let’s include understanding risk and money management here too (in this same period of time i.e. it’s not rocket science). Other than the above: what else is required??? A fairly decent, proven to be profitable over time, paper-traded or back tested, trading system of which, let’s face it, there are probably hundreds if not thousands, that differ only in degrees of difficulty in understanding and time and effort required to trade them. Many of them can be found on the Internet (and right here on BabyPips). Alright and in my case: I went out of a ‘book buying spree’. So: within the first few months (let’s say the first three or four months ‘tops’) I knew and understood the obvious and obligatory things noted above and had purchased several (possibly too many) books that contained trading systems befitting my description of trading systems above. So here’s the question (conundrum): why is it that it took me three years (maybe a little bit more) of live trading, reverting to demo trading, then back to live trading, and incurring humungous losses, to arrive at the point where I am today (don’t get me wrong: it’ll take ‘a month of Sundays’ to make my losses back but I’m at least getting there now)??? Today: I trade those very same trading systems that were detailed in the books that I bought relentlessly in the first few months and, for, probably 80% of this time, have been trading at the same broker too.
What I’m saying is this: in my own analysis of my own experience I NOW believe that it’s possible to become profitable ALMOST from the ‘get go’ by just knowing the few obvious and obligatory things noted above and a fairly decent trading system. Of course: having a ‘mentor’ of sorts (or even ‘a BabyPips’) is a big help of course (should I say having ‘a BabyPips’ is quite possibly a necessity). But in reality: what more does it take??? How difficult is it to identify a trend by just looking at a chart???
What prompted my posting here today was this: before I added another trading system to my forums at techtradercentral.proboards.com (yes I’m ‘giving it a punt’ i.e. I’m lonely over there and it’s embarrassing that I have so few members when compared to BabyPips) I had just had a ‘quick scan’ of BabyPips and noted this thread. The trading system added is John Carter’s HOLP and LOHP system. I don’t trade it very often i.e. it’s normally a ‘if there are no signals from any of the other trading systems’ type of thing. What do I need to know to trade this particular system??? I need to be able to identify a trend. I need to be able to identify the bar that made the highest high (I’m assuming an uptrend here) and I need to be able to identify when a bar closes below the low of the bar that made the highest high in the uptrend. When this happens I go short at market and place my stop above the high of the bar that made the highest high in the uptrend. Alright: there’s HIS method of trailing a stop and there’s my own alternate method but in both cases all I need to know is how, where, and when to place my trailing stop.
Now just read the above carefully and while you’re doing that: think about the things that I NEED to know in order to initiate that trade??? It’s a VERY short list I assure you.
Do you see what I’m trying to say here??? Or am I ‘oversimplifying’ matters here???
Another way of explaining what I’m getting at here: ‘think Turtle Trading’ and the Turtle Trading Experiment. What did the Turtles ACTUALLY have to know to be able to trade profitably??? Certainly not ONE TENTH of the amount of superfluous information that I’ve managed to glean over the years I’m sure.
OK there is ONE ‘qualification’ that I WAS going to make here but thought that it’s not TOTALLY necessary (but then thought I’ll make it anyway):
There is a difference in trading long term and trading for a living. In other words: trading for a living obviously means that in a given period (usually a month) you have to have opened and closed enough profitable trades in order to withdraw your monthly living expenses WITHOUT having to withdraw ANY of your capital (and, of course, better yet, to have been profitable enough within that given period so that after withdrawing your monthly living expenses you’re left with MORE capital than you had at the beginning of the previous month). If you’re trading long term: that’s slightly different. The more profitable OVERALL trading systems of mine (well not ‘mine’ but the ones that I trade) are the long term trading systems (and I’m talking about trades that can and do last for MONTHS). You cannot simply ‘stop and start’ (close, take profit, and reopen) the trades when it’s time to pay the monthly bills. So in order to generate wealth (long term) and pay the monthly bills (short term) you do really need to have BOTH types of trading systems otherwise you’re STILL going to have to have a ‘day job’ (to pay the monthly bills while your long term trades accumulate wealth) OR you’re going to have to learn to live like a ‘bum’ until one of those long term trading systems signals your take profit (and I’m afraid I fall into the latter category for the most part)!!!
So there you have it. That’s MY ‘take’ on the subject.
And as a matter of fact: it’s but ONE reason for my own forums i.e. I’m trying to get my very own ‘Turtle Trading Experiment’ going BUT I’VE NOT TOO MANY TURTLES at the moment is the problem!!! LOL!!!
But it’s (this thread) really a discussion that I hope goes further.
Regards,
Dale.