Somewhat, yes. It’s really a different ball game with your emotions when it comes to trading on a live account versus using a demo one.
I take it that you have gone through the school of pips n this site; you can start a demo account on any good broker platform to fine tune your trading skills. After which you create a real account and make money.
Hi there,
I am newbie as well, just like you guys.
But my take on all this is that maybe we do not need to try to trade all this “stuff”. I do not think it is even possible for someone to put these random bits of information together and “see clear picture”. You can always find an indicator that will match any turning point on any time frame and talk yourself into believing that this is what is happening right now…just simply because you want to find that answer, why price is reversing here or there.
How you can put an indicator on news, human fear, greed or just simply for “big guys” adjusting their positions at any given point or apply any system to it?
About 2 years ago I found this site and after going true pip school I thought: " this is it…I will spend all my free time on learning everything and all about the forex and make lots of money". After I read some fair amount of books, I somehow realised that there is no holy grail or anything like that, and there is no way someone can predict that next 2 days this pair is going down then 4 days up and then down again and so on.
It is actually somewhat way easier. (same old: trend/sentiment, discipline and very tough money management)
Of course I am still playing with everything and trying to find what kind of trading best suits me. While I was trading with fake money, I got the best results with simply just holding position for months (probably just got lucky and picked top of a movement).
But when it comes to real money…it is completely different ball game, now when I get into too big position… I am seriously nervous and do not like that feeling. I think trading with real money is the only way how you can discover what you are made of and what you should do and should not and what kind of trading fits you. And probably not with $100, but something a bit more meaningful.
I started to trade with real money about 5 weeks ago with £2000 (that is what I had spare at the moment and I would not cry loosing that) after 2 weeks I was at £2700, thought:"… well it kind of goes well, so I will up the stakes (position)…"oh boy I was wrong and within a week I was down to £1800 …I guess, I learned about too high leverage. Then after a another week I was back to £2400, but then I had to withdraw £2100 and I was left in beginning of this week with about £318 which is now at £415 (but it is pretty much a joke).
Anyway…I have been experimenting trading price levels and keep trades somewhat short and it seemed to be ok for now. As a beginner it is somewhat hard not to throw in some random trade here and there, but that is what I am working on.
Basically the idea is to buy and sell at round number price levels, no indicators or anything at all. I have been playing with GBP/USD so as the trend is going downwards I have been mostly selling and seems to be ok for now, even if price moves up in longer term, you can still make money because of relatively short trades.
Here I will post screen shot GBP/USD 1hr chart. But there are some random trades in middle of round numbers, those were made on influence of some daily news that I was trying to conquer here and there, some worked some did not.
Please remember I am just another newbie, that has been trading only for 5 weeks.
I hope some of my super short experience might help.
The Costs of Making Money through Forex Trading
The Costs of Making Money through Forex Trading
November 29th, 2014 by Chris Pottorff | Category: Market Analysis
Yes, the “costs” to make money through forex trading is what I am going to talk about today. What I mean by “costs” is different from what you have in your mind. It is not the costs that some traders handle, like costs of trading courses, seminars, e-books, DVDs, and also the costs of opening a live account, paying the spread, commission and swap and…
As I have already mentioned several times, you can learn to trade forex for free, and you don’t have to pay someone to teach it to you. The Internet is full of invaluable information that you have access to for free. You just need to know what you have to learn to become a forex trader, because to make money through forex trading you don’t have to learn everything found over the Internet. This is a different topic that I am not going to talk about it now.
Also, the costs of live trading is what any trader has to pay. You have to pay the spread, commission, swap, wire transfer fees and exchange rates when you want to fund your account or withdraw money.
However, the “costs” that I am talking about in this article, is not something that can be paid from your pocket.
- Time:
Time is money. Some others say time is gold. But I say time is more valuable than these things. Money comes and goes. You can earn money again if you lose. But if you waste your time, it cannot be back. It is gone forever. To learn anything, including forex, you have to “spend” time. It is one of the costs you have to pay to learn something. If lucky enough, you come to the right track from the first day, and so you don’t spend a lot of time to learn to become a forex trader. Some forex traders on the other hand, spend several years to learn forex, and still cannot make any progress. The reason is that they are not following the right track. A wrong track can never take you to the right destination. Do you agree?
So, time is what you have to “spend” if you want to become a forex trader. Just be careful, not to “waste” too much time.
- Patience:
“Patience” is an important part of making money through forex trading. When you learned what to do, you have to be patient enough to wait for the strong trade setups. “Waiting” is not easy. When you wait, you are spending something from your inner energy. Like “time”, “patience” is also something that you have to pay. However, you are not alone. This is what all the other traders have to pay too. They will lose money if they don’t. All the others with different occupations and businesses have to spend patience. Those who have 9-5 full time jobs, have to go to work and be on time every day. They have to be patient to wait on the train or bus lines. They have to be patient to drive sometimes for a few hours to go to work and come back. Teachers have to patient with the students and teach so many students with different knowledge and enthusiasm levels. Doctors have to patient to spend time with each patient, write and give the proper prescription. Lawyers, drivers, miners, pilots, and… have to be patient.
It is one of the important costs that each business has, and so does forex trading. I know it is not easy to wait for the daily, weekly or monthly time frames to form a too strong trade setup, but we have to wait. The good thing is that when the the too strong trade setups are formed, our patience will be paid off: Long Time Frames and the Patience that Pays Off
Another good thing is that you will get used to being patient. Time teaches you to be patient. Besides, when you see how fruitful is to be patient as a forex trader, you will enjoy it. It will not be a pain anymore. You pay it with peace of mind and happiness.
The other good thing is that your patience as a forex trader will get paid a lot more than the patience the others have to “spend” in their businesses. Even the time you spend will be paid a lot more. Let me tell you how:
If you follow the right track, it takes few months to one year or maybe a couple of years for a novice trader to become a profitable trader (The Last Step to Become a Profitable Forex Trader), depend on the free time everybody has to spend on learning. As soon as you make it and you become a consistently profitable trader, there will be no limit for the money you can make. You can grow your account and make thousands or millions of dollars. But the other businesses are not like that. They are limited and sometimes it is impossible to lift these limits. Read this and this to know what I mean.
So, by spending some time that is not too long, you can have a million dollar business. I guess it is worth to spend this time.
Also, it is worth to be patient and wait for the too strong trade setups, because your patience will get paid off once strong trade setups form on the charts. Isn’t it worth to wait for a few or few weeks for a too strong trade setup on the daily chart, and make 800 pips which equals $8000 if you trade one lot, or $80,000 if you trade 10 lots, or $800,000 if you trade 100 lots?
What about a too strong trade setup on monthly chart that makes 4000 pips?
Now, see what the difference of the patience you have to “spend” is with the patience that others have to “pay”:
When you achieve to become a consistently profitable trader, all you will have to do is that you “spend” about 30 minutes per day to check the daily, weekly and monthly time frames and look for the too strong trade setups. When there is a too strong trade setup, you take it. If not, you go and come back the next day. That is all. You can enjoy the rest of your time the way you want. What about the others?
Ask a dentist how many hours per day he works, and whether he can stop working for a couple of weeks or not? He will tell you that he has to work for about 8 hours per day, and sometimes he will not have any money if he doesn’t work even for one day.
We should be grateful for the business we have. Do you agree?
So, spend your time to follow the right track, and become a consistently profitable forex trader as soon as possible. Then start live trading and grow your account, and become a professional full time forex trader.
Are you ready to do that?
- Stress:
Stress is also part of any business. It is one of the other costs that you have to handle. Forex trading is not an exception. Some jobs are too stressful while there is nothing you can do about. You have to handle the stress if you choose those jobs. Some people think that forex trading is too stressful and risky. But this is not true. Forex trading is neither stressful, nor risky. The way that some people trade forex makes it too stressful and risky. I tell you how.
If you open a live account with a money that you really cannot afford to lose, and you trade with this money while you have not learned to trade forex properly and you have not completed the learning steps yet, then you will have to handle too much stress and risk. What happens if you lose this money? What if you take a position and it goes against you? You sit at the computer, watching your money that is going down the drain. But this is what you have done to yourself. You are your biggest enemy, not forex market, your broker, your children and wife and even your friend who introduced forex trading to you. You took a terrible step and you have to pay for it. Surely you have to handle too much stress. You can even have a heart attack.
Now let’s look at this scenario:
You learn forex properly and complete all the learning stages first. You master your trading system through demo trading and you become able to repeat your success and become profitable for 6 consecutive months at least. Then you open a too small live account and start “practising” with your first live account. As it is a too small live account, and it is opened with the money that you can afford to lose, you have no stress and you can treat it exactly as you have been treating your demo account. You repeat your success with your live account at least for 6 consecutive months, like what you did with your demo account. You build your discipline and patience and you master your trading system completely. So far, you have handled neither any stress, nor any big risk.
Then, you keep on trading with your live account to double it. When it is doubled, you withdraw your initial capital you used to open your live account, and then you keep on trading with your profit. Therefore, you are not risking anything from your hard earned money. Trading forex will have no risk for you at this stage and from now on. You keep on trading with your live account, and you grow it slow but steady and finally it will turn into a big trading account that a professional forex trader needs (read this if you think it takes too long to do this).
Now you tell me which strategy is stressful and risky. Risking too much money while you have not become a consistently profitable trader yet, or growing a too small live account while you have already become a consistently profitable trader?
As you see, forex trading is not stressful and risky. The way you trade forex can make it stressful and risky. It is your own choice.
Good luck 
You can open an account at OandA for $20
A pip is a pip, risk is risk
Practice, practice, Practice
Because practice does make perfect,
Sorry for the late reply, been out on a mini vacation of sorts, after cashing on cable. You can go live right away instead of a demo, there’s no bar. The point being that with a demo account you can familiarize yourself with the market, how to open and close orders, how to work out the indicators and even develop a strategy…you can do the same with a small live account, in the end its your pref…
A person can start from various sources but my personal experience is that you can get a lot of very basic information from reading all the section of study in babypips school section.
Download and familiarize yourself with your broker’s trading platform. I’d recommend using the free MT4 platform rather than a web-based platform as MT4 has more capability. But choose a platform and become familiar with it.
Focus on learning the 3 basic kinds of trading, one at a time. These are trend, counter-trend and range trading. Start with trend trading, it pays the best (you tend to make the most pips) and is the easiest of the three to learn. Yes it’s true any given pair only trends 25-30% of the time, but keep in mind that while it may be ranging or counter-trending on a higher time frame it can also be trending on a lower time frame, and vice versa.
Find or develop through your studies a simple trading system that has positive expectancy. A system with positive expectancy simply means it wins more often than it loses. Why simple? Because they work the best and it will keep you from getting caught up in analysis paralysis.
Don’t try to make your trading system do everything. If your learning trend trading develop your system to only trend trade. Focus on this kind of trading and practice in a demo account (provided free by most brokers). Risk no more than 0.5% to 1% of your demo capital per position because it’s good to start practicing sound money management early on - don’t wait to do so when you decide to go Live.
Once your net positive with your trend trading in demo, open a small Live account. Again, keep your risk small. First priority is to preserve capital. Making pips comes second.
Set achievable goals for your trading results. Do this for both demo trading as well as Live trading. And when you move to Live trading reset back to your first demo goals. Demo trading will help you learn the trading platform thoroughly but you will learn very little about your trading psychology and how it’ll impact your trading until you go Live. Better to be safe than sorry.
I wish I had someone tell me these things 5 years ago when I started. It would have saved me a lot of money and made the whole process less of a roller coaster ride.
Good luck with your trading!
Thank you all for your responses…
I will keep you posted on my progress
Start out with a demo account! Never start with real money. Then find a good strategy and practice as if it were your own money. Keep it consistent and always manage your risk/money. Never risk more than 2% of your account per trade. This gives you a lot of room to lose a few and make it back. if you risk 20% of your account, 5 bad trades and your account is blown.
If you want to start out with an easy and working forex strategy, you can have a look at This Thread:
Tdbarnard, super-valuable post. Thanks for this!
Trade demo, trade demo, and trade demo again. You can copy from etoro professional traders if you don’t want to go the hard way.
Vivid example, yet another proof of the principle where the easier is the trading strategy the more are the chances to benefit from it. I was never out of basic technicial analysis and news trading because I feel I’m handicapped with weak calculation ability but armed with strong analytical skill. And to predict market we don’t need any sophisticated systems, system of prisms to watch on the market in series of distortions which only move away it from you.
Conversely to the briskly demonstrated bias towards demo account, I would suggest you to start with live using micro or nano-lot size which make it possible to perfectly manage losses and earn profits too (let it be casual ones). Thus, you will be able to get a clue about spreads, platform speed, quality of price feed, and everything else essential in money making process. That’s why in my newbie time I joined micro Hotforex account, neglecting advices to start on demo, cuz [I]the more your learning process differs from those 95% who fails, the more chances you have to outsmart them[/I]
What I can suggest is to create a demo account at Etoro, and then you can gradually get Openbook so you can copy traders and learn at the same time. 
Yes demo account is a good start for beginners . They do not loose their actual money in just practice and experience gain . demo trained them well to analyze market and doing trading according to the funds,.
The first steps for every newbie should always be learning and then training with a demo account until you feel you are ready to trade in live.
Creat a demo account and practise forex trading at least 3-6 months, and also test your trading strategy. In the beignning of live account, should take strictly risk management plan for your trading.
In knowing what to read make sure you have understanding of the basic to help in understanding every other aspect of trading forex. Then you can practice in a demo account.
Get to know price action and go from there. Lots of good free info out there. Alot of traders start out learning about this indicator and that indicator firdt but its my thought spend time getting to know price action first. And of course MM.
Ok, Finish up the school, Great that you started you’re on your way now! Than once you finish the school, open a demo account, and Try things out, demo accounts are free and the money on the account is fake so you lose nothing. Look on this site for others systems that they use, and follow their threads and over time you’ll learn between following the thread and demoing for a few months. After you learn everything with the school you’ll have a decent understanding of what is going on, so you try to fly on your own and make a system of your own, which can be challenging for sure, But defiantly can be done! Or try out others system to get you going! We are all here to help if you need help along the way!
Best of luck
Jason