I’m sure that title got a lot of people’s amused attention.
I’m new to the forums but I’ve been a user of this site for about 6 months already. This is my first post.
After some succss witrh demo accounts, I got started with a live account at the end of January- After initial success I went and turned 681 Euros into 15.
I’m not the first person here to blow an account, I’m sure- so I’d like to hear from those who’ve done it and and learned from it.
I’m not going to put any more real money down until I’ve gotten the education and practice I need. But I’m still going to run this experiment to see how far I can come back.
I created a blog to log what happens to my account good or bad- I can;t advertise it here sinc eit’s agaisnt the rules, so I might put it on one of the sister sites.
Please feel free to mock me or even give advice- there’s a link to my myfxbook there too that has the guts of my history open for all to see.
It depends who your broker is.
Oanda you can just downsize to a fraction of a dollar since they work in Units and not in dollars.
$ 15.- can go a long way on Oanda till you recover or bust.
Other brokers have Micro accounts and it would work too.
If your account is a normal account, how about save real money first and send the broker a check, switch broker or open micro account and keep on trading. demo accounts are for the pits, except to learn the basics for a couple month. Then you have to put some real money up (in a micro account) and trade with it. It’s the only way to get used to loosing and winning.
My 2 cents
I blew a couple, it is a good lesson. I found I was doing the same silly things, that is overleveraging after a string of winners, then of course losing big, then following that up by revenge/over trading trying to make it back. Those things produced a domino effect that quickly made the account dissapear.
Funny thing is, all of these things I was warned against here and from other sources. Some things you really dont learn well unless you botch if for yourself. Then you learn the real reason not to do it.
P.S. a trading journal/blog is a great way to point out mistakes that you repeat. Make sure not just to write down the mechanical stuff, but how you feel and why you take/exit trades. When I looked back at mine I could see very clearly the points I was just about to lose an account and what started the process.
I haven’t blown my account per-se, I’m still on my first live one which I hope is all I’ll need :p. I did place one extremely stupid trade out of greed which turned into 50% drawdown in minutes.
I’ve learned my lesson, news trading looks like it can be so much profit, yet once it draws you in, kick your a$s like never before haha. Until I get fundamentals down pat, I don’t intend on trying anything like that again.
In the past I had blown 5 times my account ( 800$ each).
I had changed the strategy a lot to fit the way I analyse the forex. I read a lot of forum and tested a lot of strategies. Then finally I read the article said that the system has to be simple et gives the edges of trading. Then last year I found the cowabunga system. I tested and made some modification of the system just to fit my personnality. Then I decided to trade 10 cent per pip and take profit 30 pips a day. In the weekend I took all the trades I did during the week then start to analyse why I lost or win the trade. I follow 100% of the rule, be patient, follow money management and especially be in front of the computer in a regular time (midnight to noon EST). Now my trading style is improved a lot. I thank to Pipsurfer because he put a lot of energy to help the fellows traders and want them to succeed in the business.
I recently blew a £2500 account and haven’t put anymore funds into my account and haven’t traded on demo either. The thing is being a newbie you are in your own cocoon with all the enthusiasm to win good trades without the necessary plan, price action knowledge, fundamentals, psychology/discipline, knowing when you are wrong or what you are doing is wrong. Improper use of stops or lack of use of stops.
It was tantamount to gambling. When I started trading I had some big winning trades too start with which fuelled my enthusiasm to fritter my forex account into the blackhole (my broker), my account lasted just under 3 months. Crazy I know, it depresses to know what I have done and I feel ashamed at times. But forex is a learning process and sometimes its worth paying the price to learn or albeit to find out that you do really have to learn and trade in a style/system which is fit for you.
My enthusiasm for forex has not dampened at all, I have spent my time hitting the books and bettering my forex education.
I’m at the point now where I am evaluating a trading plan and looking at a number of systems on here and part of me wants to trade signals offered by a third party? (lazy I know).
I would like to find a mentor, 1:1 face to face training is unbeatable, the markets are savage to those who don’t know, but for those that do it’s a pips paradise Im sure
There are some fantastic traders on here who dedicate their time to educate the masses on what is a fascinating and exciting subject.
IME experience demo is good for learning a new method, but not testing it to find if it’s a good edge. Once you know it the test should be live with extremely small amounts. The reason being is that the difference between demo and live can be like night and day. So, when you think you’ve, “tested,” something in demo, you really havn’t. The real test is live.
I’ve personally found that even 1cent per pip lot sizes can be very differrent than demo.
Ive gotten Margin called a few times… so 50% of my account since I use Oanda…usually when this happens I stop trading for awhile reevaluate myself mentally and Ive managed to recover that everytime…The key is to take breaks and stop yourself from trading more because it is more destructive…
I definitely want to share my progress with you all as it happens. I’m still working out the best way to do so.
Am I allowed to link to babypips sister site content here? I’m linking my account activity to mt4pips and posting blog updates on freshpips.
As a basic summary of what I’m doing, I’m making my first goal to get my 15 Euro up to 20 using strict 10 pip or less stops and planning to get out at 10 pips. My account only allows me to trade a minimum of 0.01 so obviously I can only take one trade at a time and I’m now forced to take extra special care about my entry points.
Also, I’m using forex rebellion in tandem with fib and trend lines to do this.
I also started with $100 in real account, went to
$313.
Then took out $100 from my trading account.
Then after some really bad trades I am now just left with $10 in my trading account.
Have`nt traded live since then. Just trying out on demo before I start again.
Yeah, for sure pyshological control was the biggest culprit in my case, followed by not being strict about putting stops in. I’m thinking that in an ideal world- one’s skills are honed enough so that a stop of a few pips is all thats necessary and if we get stopped out- it just means we were wrong that time. I was either not putting them in because I thought i was in control, or moving them back when the line was threatened. Of course I knew that this was a bad idea because I’ve done a fair ammount of study, but when the heat is on, remembering this stuff and adhering to pre-determined rules is a different matter altogether.
Why don’t you join me on a mad crusade to turn your account around? I feel that if we can do it, we’ll have learnt a lot in the process- in my case i feel that going back to demo only might well result in a repeat somewhere down the road- I’ll forget how much it sucks right now and do it all again.
The process of a Forex baby should be trading long term, entering with limit orders and have a big reward low risk ratio, for me the benefits are mainly psychological
If you’re a trader who place trades and stares at the chart and see the prices bouncing for hours without doing something else you’re damaging yourself you loose the real direction of the market because short time frame charts are mainly big noise, so it’s a good Idea to use at least 1h-4h charts and I bet you won’t do that again, or at least you’ll do it less frequently.
If you don’t place a limit order and instead place trades immediately after making a rushed analysis because you think the price is getting to a critical level you’re excited and emotions are ruling your trade, if you place a limit order and it gets hit then you’re more likely to make a good previous analysis and keep you emotions under control.
Other factors include “demo sucks” unless you’re a baby who doesn’t know anything or if you’re developing a new trading plan, start trading with real money, but little money, so you’ll see how psychology affects your trade, keep increasing when you feel confident wining and [B]losing[/B] according to your account size, don’t plan to start with 100k and winning or loosing like 2k per trade, you could end in a sanitarium.
srry for my english (if you see mistakes please let me know)
psychology is a never ending aspect, as all aspects of Forex.
