6 weeks into first test and my bankroll is still intact :-) overall roi 8%

Beginner Questions
1

trading plan,
motivation;secure improved financial prospects,more money=more choice
goals;part time extra income leading to poss full time
risk capital;to be set post system tests(originally thought £1k hence 10% risk at IG)
work hours;evenings,sat night,sunday,as time available at work(i have a great boss)
drawdown;@50% return to demo
tools;ipad,iphone,pc,grapevine
daily;keep journal,record location of trade ideas and reasons for trades,general market views and philosphy,document mistakes missed opportunities,keep ledger and record performance statistics,ensure trading plan and system adhered to strictly
periodicaly;reevaluate trading plan and trading system

trading system,
style;swing/day hybrid
pretrade;research at babypips(of course) twitter etc primary focus fundamental,sentiment,use tech learnt from babypips school and also twitters usual suspects
risk;per trade 10% only adding when prev trade at break even
entry point;wait for confirmation,candles to finish etc ultimately be extremely comfortable like a zen god and whatever happens do not force trades
exit points;use trailing stops and add to trades if moves are strong,when weak take profits at 20 pips plus and renter when appropriate
prove in demo for minimum 2 months prior to going live

i have managed to keep my journal daily recording instrument start day prices along with gold,silver,ftse,s&p500,ger30,jap225,the usa eur and gbp,IR,GDP,BY10Y,inflation,jobless,debt/gdp,also study economic calander and have daily macro alerts sent to my phone from my broker,my instruments of choice are eur/usd and gbp/usd(i know they are very similar but my view is to focus on 2 similar instruments and potentially add to other when situation occurs as a sort of hedge trade add)

so far i am ahead which is some sort of a miracle(my personal life has been extremely traumatic sapping lot of my free time but looking better now so will probably commence second 8 week test post this one) .my system is obviously flawed with to much risk but i like my brokers platform and am reluctant to spend time learning to navigate new platform at the moment,meantime i have been hounding them to offer smaller lott sizes u never know they may feel sorry for me eventually.my exit strategy is also a little weak but suits my style and time frame.

overall i am quite content and feel i have gained a great hobby if nothing else does feel so good when it works and with help from babypips blogs i am even coping quite well with my draw downs and rarely go on tilt.

any and all comments welcome :slight_smile:

2

This commendable part speaks very highly of your chances, and puts you in a very different classification/group from that of the overwhelming majority of aspiring traders. :cool:

I’m hoping this part was a typo for 1% (but I don’t really expect it was). That’s absolutely [B]huge[/B] position-sizing, Broodbaby.

It gives rise to several questions …

(i) Have you [I]proved[/I] (e.g. on a demo account) that your system has an “edge” (positive next expectation), before trading it with real money?

(ii) Have you read some introductory stuff about position-sizing (if not, may I take the opportunity strongly to recommend Van K. Tharp’s excellent beginners’ textbook “[I]Trade Your Way to Financial Freedom[/I]”, of which about the last third, as I remember, explains position-sizing).

(iii) Did I misunderstand you? Do you perhaps mean that what you’re doing is something like starting off with 1% position sizing, and adding up to an additional 9% in add-ons, adjusting the stop-loss as you go, so that the risk-exposure is realistically never more than 1% at a time (that would ease my vicarious palpitations!)?

That sounds like a lot to look at? Why do you think this will be better than concentrating on one trading instrument?

Wishing you well, with this endeavour … but I’m concerned about your risk-exposure (unless I’ve misunderstood it).

3

i record all information and some more thru day daily every morning only takes 30 mins or so and am slowly but surely memorizing stats strengthening my knowledge,
lol i know my risk has been huge like i say im still testing in demo just wanted to see what happens unless my broker concedes i will change to a broker that offers smaller lott sizes b4 i go live,i was trained to be a forex ninga but am still happy to experiment as not in a rush this is defo a long game took me 5 yrs to learn my trade and im 27 yrs into that now and still learning in that game whilst learning this one.

4

QUOTE=lexys;727546]This commendable part speaks very highly of your chances, and puts you in a very different classification/group from that of the overwhelming majority of aspiring traders. :cool:thankyou i was schooled primarily at babypips and know i will only get out of this what i put in,my work ethos has allways been to do my best and feel confident i can succeed in this one day.

5

risk is 10% per trade only 1 trade at a time added to if reasearch backs up but add only executed on breakeven of previous trade

6

week 7 ROI @ 22.5%
total losses 604 pips
total wins 843 pips
firmly stationed in demo.
miles away from sensible stack to burn unsure now that i will ever acquire one.
i have 2 smash my way in thru micros could take years without raising risk still living like a poor-per and squirreling some away but feel age is against me also time i am,noticing my age now.
well more the ppl around me personally ive never felt fitter drooped 4 stone since i turned 40 when my first son was born when i finaly felt like i had a reason to succeeded.still 18stone but fighting fit.
i refuse to study game as i feel it will cloud my employ,still confident throwing flaws in system,feel game needs application to suit my style, have no choice but to be confident i want to succeed as a trader confidence is a prerequisite.
tks 4 wishes i hope u r doing well 2 u haven’t misunderstood but id h8 4 u 2 feel concerned as i am in no danger:-)

7

Thanks for the update, and very well done, here (you’ve had a more profitable week than I’ve ever had).

People very often think this.

It isn’t necessarily true. There’s a small minority of people who, by showing that they can trade safely without raising risk, can find trading capital on a profit-sharing deal. That small minority aren’t people who know people, and they’re not people who’ve worked in the industry: they’re mostly self-taught people who can make small, steady consistent profits, and who appreciate that trading’s about risk-management, not about profit-maximisation, and can briefly but reliably demonstrate that to a potential investor. If you had to do it with your own money, then yes: it would take years without raising risk. The irony of that is that very often it’s “raising risk” that prevents them from ever doing it. I’m partly “thinking aloud” and partly “just saying” that there might be other options, if you have a real system with a real edge.

Confidence comes from results more than results coming from confidence.

Normally.

I think.

You have some very good results. Let’s hope you continue to - that will increase your confidence.

Hope you don’t mind my reply or think it strange: I intend it supportively, not critically.

8

bring on the criticism we only fail if we don’t learn and as much as i try to kick myself up my own butt its not the same lol i am primarily a solitary entity and have less than a handful of confidantes(none serious about trading even the X traders i know lol)(x merchant bankers old school elbow traders) so appreciate someone telling me my stuff stinks after all its a compliment and only your real m8s tell u that ur poop stinks so many thanks :slight_smile: i have completed first test and finished at 38.2% roi 28 total trades 16 wins 12 losses(losses include break evens) still analyzing results from journal and ledger but already recalculated risk down to 3%(thankyou) at a broker with micro account the account platform is dealing desk i have studied brokers at pipschool and still not altogether sure this is an issue to me with my puny £250 squid bankroll at 6 p per pip,but do know that once i hit 2k can switch dealing desk off,anyway i am set to recommence new test upon trading system reevaluation so hopefully will restart trading early next week,well not test really this is live as test passed so have authorization to proceed to live account.once again thanks for ur time has been much appreciated best of luck 2 u 2 :slight_smile:

9

reevaluated system made minor adjustments tweekd down risk to 3% added new trade idea and added new source of info at new brokers concidering opening more accounts just to get more acces to more oppinions
new trade idea was for major macros simple pre entry 1 buy 1 sell 20pip stops close to events,messed up on superthursday shouldnt have botherd as id called it anyway,messed it up more by jumping back on for bounce really quick(schoolboy error but i had to beat them lol) within 30 mins realised was loss as neglected USA data post BOE,it doesnt stop there i then neglected to close it and spent next 12 hrs watch it hit my 120pip stop, u must be thinking what an earth is this loon up to haha fear not its all part of the plan as its only a matter of time b4 these lessons are learnt i see it as posotive that i can at least see the errors.messed pre trade double entry on NFP also in different way(not familar with new brokers platform yet)(also was no need as had called this too) but saved it and got 130 pips in under 1 min v nice.didnt add to much to week 1 live ROI which ended up at a meger 3.3% on the bright side including demo weeks i have had 10 consective week of being up from original investment not by a lot but better than any of my banks deals on all of them even the 3.3 week.

10

early obsevations of ledger are a little unnerving as increased trade voulume almost doubled prev 9 week avv defo down to new trade idea think will leave out in future and treet as a green light trade,i trafic light manage my entries via an old pkr bankroll managment system read dan harringtons books if u r player