I enjoy reading your posts. Always sound advice.
Thank you ST.
p/s, why no pictures?? 
Sound advise. I like the part of Jenson Button as it remind me of his hot gf, Jessica Michibata. 
Awwwh thanks! Kind of you to say so. You make some good points, yourself. I have been lucky enough to receive some great advice from various places during my time trading, so I pass it on where it seems relevant.
You mean why no pictures of my charts? I only just learned to do screenshots (Master Tang helpfully outlined a method in Home of Golfâs thread) so I am a chart-posting rookie. Am building up to it, though! I uploaded one onto the Commdoll Corner AUD/USD thread, but one needed a microscope to see what I was talking about. Chart posting is on my âmust do betterâ list.
Well, becoming a multi-millionaire trader wonât hurt your chances of competing with Jenson Button in the girlfriend stakes, so I would start with working on that. Although Iâll admit, he has set the bar rather high!
Anyway, we really must keep this thread on topic, or Long & Short will (understandably) ask us to move this elsewhere. Apologies, L&S.
ST
Long⊠whether you can be successful in a year and on track for a million (or even profitable) is primarily a function of these concepts:
-
Does your method have a distinct edge? If not, you simply will never arrive.
-
how specific are the rules for entry? The more discretionary your system or method isâŠthe longer it will take to master.
-
how fast can you adjust psychologically to the markets, the money, and the method? The more your method is based on your own personal preferences and strengths, and avoids your weaknesses, the faster you will progress.
-
how much time it will it take you personally to absorb the seemingly vast basic information; and develop the skillset; to be able to start applying your method successfully? The faster you learn and the more time you devote, the faster you will progress toward your goal.
These things being said, Iâm going to assume that you have a method or idea with an edge to approach the markets with. From your posts it seems you do understand some basic principles of one type of approach to the markets that does provide an edge. This is actually a substantial assumption on my part. I am asking any trader that has had 3 months or more of profitability to comment on this assumption, as I expect the overwhelming majority (99% of profitable traders) would agree this is a substantial assumption.
- Specific rules for entry: As in⊠could you tell a computer exactly how to duplicate this? You mention pinbars. Define a pinbar. How big is the body to the wickâŠwhat about any potential wick on the âheadâ of the pinbar? where would it have to occur in a trend? would the candles around the pinbar have any bearing on whether you take the trade or not? what about support and resistance? define support. 3 touchs to a price point? 2? 1? 37?. How specific a zone is your price point of support or resistance? 5 pips? starting where? and why 5? arbitrary 5? or 5 because of XYZ (now define XYZ)⊠and so on.
The more you can define all of these questions with exact answers good enough to feed a computer, the faster you will be able to apply your system. Every question you cannot provide an exact answer to is going to require âdiscretionâ. And to develop the correct type of discretion cannot be taught per se. It must be learned via experience. This will take time. To learn by experience requires you see many incorrect ways of doing something before you learn to identify what the correct way is, when it changes, to what degree, any why. Think learning to ride a bike. Only by experiencing what DIDN"T balance at all gave you the insight on to what DID balance it.
By the way, a bike always balances when doing it right. A trade does notâŠin fact, it usually only âbalancesâ correct a few times more often than incorrectly. Makes learning to âride a tradeâ substantially more complicated then learning to ride a bike. Experience based learning needs to see the wrong ways and the right ways to do something in order to learn proficently.
Too bad doing the right thing will cause you to lose ALMOST as often as doing the wrong thing⊠and doing the wrong thing can sometimes lead to many many wins
- At one point, (probably by your 1st trade), the market will do something that you did not want it to do. How will you handle this? How do you handle situations that you have absolutly no control over the outcome, and at the same time have a massive amount at stake (your future career and bank account)⊠and about 30% - 60% of the time, you will watch this situation that you have no control over literally take money from your bank account, and you can do absolutly nothing to change this course of action.
How will you feel when this has happened 2 days in a row? how about most of the time during the last week? how about enough times over the last month to cost you money. A month goes by, and something you have absolutely no control over is literally sucking money out of your account seemingly on a whim? How will you feel?
Say you decide to take fewer tradesâŠonly the best quality trades. And now, you only take 2 trades a week⊠and a week later, you took 2 trades, and both lost. You not only didnât make money that week, you LOST money working. And you were absolutly powerless to change the way the market moved. How will you feel as you are, for that week, WORSE than unemployeed?
and most importantlyâŠhow will you ACT in these situations. How well can you accept this as a reality? And if you start to respond differently to these situationsâŠhow will you know? what will you do to identify a problem that needs correcting? remember, your stressed out, and already making bad decsions. how do you suddenly have the insight into yourself to know this, and let all emotional connections to this go immediately, and resume the proper psychological state to trade properly.
Oh, by the way⊠how will you know you are in the proper frame of mind when doing the correct thing may continue to cost you for a while before you post any real profits? 
- How much time do you have? and how fast can you change and accept a reality that is far different than that of human nature. Where you have no control over the outcome. Where a bad day at work doesnât get you firedâŠit gets you fired and sued simultaniously. Where you will never know from the time you open a trade to the time you close it how big your paycheck will beâŠor even if you get a paycheck at all, or worse (and quite often) how much the âlawsuitâ will cost you. Not to mention all the technical skills needed to tell a pinbar from A PINBAR BABY!!! or how much support is enough? how much is too much? and what fib retracement levels should you take anyway? Not to mention pivot points, order flow concepts, liquidity, macro and micro market structure, classical technical analysis, relevent (and irrelevent) news reportsâŠand so on.
the simpler your system, the less you need to know. maybe. you then need to accept if you know less, you can do less to improve it, or to correct it should it start to failâŠand to know when something is failing, or something just is in a drawdown period, or when its you that is failing, not your system.
In some ways, this post doesnât even need to be made. Any more than describing to someone what swimming is really like is. Eventually, you get in the water. And then you realize that itâs absolutly irrelevent what they told you. Nothing in the world could have properly prepared you the first experience of falling, jumping, or wading into a large body of water, and as easy as everyone makes it look, you instantly realize that swimming is actually pretty easy, if only you could shake that fear of DROWNING, master the technique, and apply it consistently, you too, could swim easily.
At least with swimming, you donât start sinking to the bottom 35% of the time you jump in water.
But hey⊠I will say this, it DOES look easy watching those folks swim laps doesnât it?
Jay
if i could i would like eremarkets reply twice.
Hi there folks
Thanks to all who have taken part in the poll of how long it took you to get consistent profitabel trades. ( i think i said profitable ) So it seems that so far itâs 76% to the 12 months and over and 24% to the 6 - 12 months. I know the sample group of this poll may cause the poll results to be not all that accurate, however, i think it is good enough to go by. Interesting none the less. Keep you results coming. I would like to add mine to it but that wont be for some time yet!!
NJ
Hi simon
Great response
So August seems to be a bit of a low point. Noted. A time for consolidation and moreso some mental time away from the craft (i speak of the future when i actually develop a craft that is!!). The same with christmas too. I like that. Having some fixed holiday points in an industry where not much is guaranteed.
Do you have an opinion on the following:
From what i can gather it seems that (roughly) these are the main pairs to trade ( i know a few will have others but lets just use this as the example).
EUR/USD
âȘ GBP/USD
âȘ AUD/USD
âȘ NZD/USD
âȘ USD/JPY
âȘ EUR/JPY
âȘ GBP/JPY
âȘ AUD/JPY
âȘ XAGUSD
âȘ XAUUSD
Now, in order to leverage ones time to get the greatest amount of high probability trades setups (that meet the criteria set in my trading plan), would you look at each one of the above 10 pairs every day to find setup opportunities? or is that committing a fatal mistake in doing too many?
Probably sounds like a silly question but for me i would say yes, monitor the 10. However, I am not familiar with how my thinking pattern/brain will react to trying to âeffectivelyâ watch 10 pairs. (this is in time, not immediately). Is it mentally viable to be watching 10 pairs a day? Or historically does the human mind not cope well with too many pairs to watch?
Please Keep in mind that the style of trading I have chosen is price action, day trading of the four hour chart and swing trading, on the 1 day charts.
Thanks for reading Simon
NJ
Hi Ramah
Good message
I must say, when i first read you message i thought the same, definitely the same. And as I responded to the initial message about not demo trading that was the case too. however, after reading simonâs post (great post too) about how he never used a demo account and his points for and against i have to say the i feel it can go either way depending on the person and their mental and/or financial position. (as long as it is not down to shear nievety on the gun ho newbieâŠhang aboutâŠi think thats me!! no just kidding)
But i can see that if you had enough cash and were disciplined enough that starting live first up can work, and i can also see that using a demo can work too. For example. In defence of the former, I can already feel after just looking over some charts and a trading account that a demo may have that same effect on me, that i wont take it as seriously as a live accountâŠand in my opinion when you dont take something seriously your not leveraging your self to full capacity. Theres that and the fact that my trading account will suffer dearly and live a very short life.
I will definitely do a demo account for two months as I certainly dont think that I could be worse off for it, and I think (at this stage) that it is important to have a complete experience of FX trading to achieve this 12 month goal.
With that said thoâŠdoes anyone have any reasons âwhyâ a demo account can hinder your live trading. A case of having to perhaps âunlearnâ some habits picked up using a demo?
Just throwing it out there!
Thanks for the response Ramah
NJ
Hi Finalz
Thanks for the response
That is a great messageâŠi have reflected on the $2740/day thing and it doesnt really work in a trading sense. If i was selling a digital info product on line, yes, it works greatâŠi work out the number of units i need to sell, i work out the conversion rate (mite be 2%) i work out the number of visitors i need to get to the site and i work out the traffic sources that will get me that number. Presto, you have your $2740/day.
In a trading sense which i now understand, you cant explain it like that. So, the closest to explaining it properly would to be to take an average over three months of trades. If you divide your winfalls by 90 days and it comes out to $2740 or more then yippee!!
The $2740 is more of figure to focus on. (as arbitrary as it is)
I totally relate to what you are saying about trying to stay above the negative consistency. I am getting myself into the mond set of being a trader of risk rather than a trader of money.
Which leads on to your last point. Its getting consistent, and with consistency the comes the compounding gains.
Great response, i really like it.
NJ
Hi Fozzy
Thankyou
I have to say that i am not out to make a million in my first year of trading, I am out to get to a piont where on average (say over 3 months) i can consistently trade the sum of $2740/day. Big difference in dollars (maybe $200-$300K rather than $1M)
I like your maths on the 240 days. The more i get into this the more setting a target of $2740/day doesnt make sense in trading
Anyway, the main thing is that i know what it means and that i follow it if that is what is the goal that drives me.
Can i ask you, which trader do you aspire to emulate?
Thanks for your message
It means alot
NJ
Hey M
Thanks for the reply
Yes i absolutely keep a trading journal. I have a notepad i write all my trades down on, and a thread i share all my wins and losses here on baby pips. However recently i havenât had internet at the house so i havenât been able to post charts like i used to. But the point is yes absolutely.
Nice one on the note pad journal. I think it is a great idea otherwise how do you know where you went wrong (or right?)
I donât trade gold or silver through spot Forex because the spreads are massive and i would prefer to use futures for them. But commodity futures aside.
I know what you mean. I looked yesterday and XAU spread was 100 pips. I am assuming because it is moving so much? I thought the higher the volatility, the less the spread as the brokers will be making money of volume rather than a sideways market? (clearly i have spent the last day writing my trading plan and not studying!)
I have gone through Nail Fullers Price action course myself recently. I thought parts of it were interesting, took bits and pieces here in there. But overall i donât think its worth the âhype.â At least it didnât help me as much. Now if your brand new and donât have a system yet then go for it, it is definitely much better than most of them out there.
Did you find Nials paid course better than the free content? There is so much free content (through the eyes of a newbie). I have read a couple of threads that say the free stuff on his site is just as good and that the paid stuff doesnât differ too much?
Regarding a post where you said there is no difference between lot sizes, i disagree. For me the fill time is completely different, unless you are with a market maker. If you have an odd lot its going to take longer to find fill and you will incur more slippage. This will continually contribute to losses, on both sides. Anyway i will keep popping in to see whats up. Cheers and good pippin.
Nice point on the lot sizes. So is it the case for exampleâŠthat if i am selling 5 standard lots that my broker needs to find a buyer for that exact amount? Or are the lots pooled in the brokers account and sold off in an order of entry? (they would need some sort of a float i imagine if this were the case to make up uneven buyers to sellers and vice versa)
Thanks for the chat M
Much appreciated
NJ
Good afternoon NJ (or at least, have just had lunch here, not sure if it is afternoon for you!),
Glad you found the response interesting. Yes, I try to time my main summer holiday for the first two weeks of August each year, as the trading weeks I miss generally arenât that great, anyway (and can be quite bad). Trouble is, my wife is talking about running a wireless network into the holiday home⊠so I can trade when weâre there⊠so I might need more discipline going forwards!
I completely get what you are saying about fixed holiday points in a pretty chaotic industry being a good thing, I agree with you - I always seem to do well in September and January, have really good months, and I do wonder whether that stems in part from the enforced time away. Not sure, but one to ponder. Maybe one month on, one month off all year round would be the most profitable approach. And would free up six months of the year for other thingsâŠ!! Wonât happen, I enjoy trading too much.
Anyway, how many Pairs to trade? Well, I might be in a minority on here (donât know, have never asked) - many seem to advocate specializing in one or two Pairs, learning how they move. I never bought that argument, personally, so I trade a lot of different Pairs:
EUR/USD
GBP/USD
USD/CHF (although not since the recent SNB intervention)
USD/CAD
USD/JPY (although not much since the BoJ intervention)
AUD/USD
NZD/USD
EUR/GBP
EUR/CHF (although not since the recent SNB intervention)
EUR/AUD
CAD/CHF (although not since the recent SNB intervention)
EUR/CAD
CHF/JPY
EUR/JPY
GBP/CHF (although not since the recent SNB intervention)
GBP/CAD
GBP/JPY
AUD/JPY
NZD/JPY
GBP/AUD
AUD/NZD
SGD/USD
So that is, what, 22 Pairs? It works for me, and I feel that it lets me focus in on really high-probability setups. It sounds like a lot of Pairs, but generally I am a trend-based trader. I scan on Sunday, looking at Daily, Weekly and Monthly charts. I am looking for trending Pairs, which I put in my watchlist for the week. Those are the Pairs I focus on for the week - I also make a list of Pairs that I wonât glance at that week. For instance, a few of the CHF and JPY Pairs did not make the cut for me this week. Then each evening during the week, I skip through the 240 chart for each Pair, looking for clear trends. Takes me sub-30 seconds per chart, so only a few minutes. That gives me a list of Pairs that I am actively looking to trade over the next 24 hours. I boil the 22 Pairs down to maybe 6-10 Pairs for a given day. So the day after my evening scan (or it might be an early morning scan if I am up early and didnât fancy working the previous evening) I only have 6-10 Pairs which I am actually looking at. I wonât look at the full 22 during the trading day. So for those 6-10 Pairs, I look at the Hourly and 240 charts for intraday setups, and take anything I see up to a maximum account exposure at any one time of 4%. I might have placed some end of day trades the night before, I might not, I will use only the remaining exposure for the following dayâs intraday trading.
So this week, I placed long trades on AUD/USD and Cable off the 240, and Daily short trades on GBP/AUD and USD/CAD. Four completely different Pairs, but four winning trades.
When I first learned Forex, I scanned a lot of Pairs, so it has become second nature to me, itâs the only way I have ever approached it. I know that many like to focus on one Pair, but the thing with Forex is that there are many ways to win, we just each need to find our own. Some people swear by indicators, others donât use them at all, but both can win as long as they understand what they are doing.
So if you want to study ten Pairs, I would say that you should try it and see how it works for you. I always felt that if I can spot a trend and plot Support/Resistance and spot Price Action on one chart, I could do it on any chart.
Hope that gives you what you wanted to know - apologies for the extreme length, turned into a bit of a ramble!!
ST
Just to pick up on this - no, I canât think of any way that demo could harm future live performance as long as one is realistic about. I think that some people emerge from demo trading with too much confidence, as they think that everything will just translate across directly to live and that they will make big money, just as they did with demo. However, then the psychology kicks in, their performance is not the same straight out of the box, they donât really understand why, then their performance dips again as they are doubting themselves. But as long as one understands that there is more pressure attached when there is real money on the table, that this will affect things like the ability to execute mechanically following a couple of losses, then no, there is no reason why demo should adversely affect live performance, in my opinion.
When I started, I had a ÂŁ2000 live account, I traded 50p a pip, risking ÂŁ20 per trade (1% of my account). I could afford the losses, but five losses was still ÂŁ100 so I noticed it and did not enjoy the losses. As I improved, I topped the account up to ÂŁ5000, so risked ÂŁ50 a trade. I still aimed for 50p a pip, so I was now able to cover trades with a wider Stop. Once I was consistent then, and had my nerves/psychology under control, I added further funds to the account, and then I was away. For me, that gave me the practice advantage of demo, while still giving me a financial penalty if I strung together too many losing trades. I risked 1% of my balance at any given time, so following some losses I would have less to trade with. I treated it like demo, but learned psychology lessons along the way.
It was not always easy, but I am very pleased with having chosen that route now. Train hard, fight easyâŠ!
ST
Greetings to all on the thread.
Itâs day 8 of the challenge and after a week of study I have put together a very very very veryâŠâveryâ, basic trading plan that is certainly open for all of your very welcome suggestions and critique. So with out a 2 paragraph rant, here it is.
[B]FX TRADING PLAN (draft one of many :-)[/B]
[B]1. Define your entry strategy.[/B]
â Day/Swing trade
â Focus on Pin Bar setups only on the 4hr and 1 day chart
â Enter the market "with" the trend
â Look for 3-4 signals of confluence
â Review NY Closing charts daily
â Trade your watch-list of quality pairs "only"
Signals of confluence: (these are all i have come up with so far, i know there are "many" more)
âȘ Pin bar itself (price action confirmation signal)
âȘ Is there Two or more factors of confluence that support the direction of the trend
âȘ 2 or more Previous bounces off the support or resistance points (depending on going long or short)
âȘ Trending line can be drawn (a line connecting 3 higher highs or 3 lower lows)
âȘ A Crossover of moving averages to the upside (long) or downside (short)
âȘ the area where a horizontal line (established by other points of confluence) meets the moving average
âȘ bounce of a moving average
*set horizontal lines (levels) on chart after identifying points of confluence to identify more points of confluence
Quality Pairs to trade:
âȘ EUR/USD
âȘ GBP/USD
âȘ AUD/USD
âȘ NZD/USD
âȘ USD/JPY
âȘ EUR/JPY
âȘ GBP/JPY
âȘ AUD/JPY
âȘ XAGUSD
âȘ XAUUSD
[B]2. Determine the risk to reward scenario[/B]
â identify a high-quality price action trading setup (this example is short)
â Calculate the risk on the trade setup first
â Mark risk level on chart
â place a stop loss at one pip above the most recent high (or below the low if it was long)
â the entry is a break of the low, one pip below the low
â the risk is the distance from the low to the high of the pin bar
â Calculate the reward as a multiple of the amount you have at risk (R)
â Mark reward levels as multiples of risk on the chart (2R = 2:1, 3R = 3:1, 4R = 4:1) (These levels can be used to mark my trailing stops)
â (optional) Employ trailing stops at 1R behind the market once you have reached your initial RR setting
- Do not define the reward first
- Do not set stop losses to close to trade entry level
- By concentrating on the risk first, instead of the reward, you become more aware of the risk on each trade setup
- Concentrate on ârisk managementâ, rather than the ârewardâ
- the best traders in the world know that consistent trading profits come as a result of managing risk effectively
- always calculate your risk and reward in dollars, not in pips, only use pips to mark the risk and reward levels on your charts.
[B]3. Adjusting the position size[/B]
âȘ Fit the lot size to the stop loss and not the other way around
(the following is one of nail fullers examples)
If your R value is $100 and your stop loss is 109 pips away due to the previous low or high point compared to your proposed entry point, then adjust your per pip amount to .917 (100/109) to keep your risk at $100. Otherwise if you kept the lot size at 1 you would then be risking $109 dollars (9% more)
- You must learn to take into consideration the strength of the price action signal in question but also the context it is occurring in as the same pin bar setup could have different RRâs in an uptrend to a downtrend to a ranging market
- Adjust the position size on the trade to meet the necessary stop-loss distance, NEVER adjust the stop-loss to meet a desired position size
[B]4. Know what your exit strategy is [I]BEFORE[/I] entering the trade[/B]
âȘ Have a set R value to place "take profit" order at.
âȘ Set the Take profit order relative to RR (the confluence of signals/trend/additional factors)
âȘ Set stop loss 1 pip below/above previous high/low
âȘ Set trailing loss after if/when you "reach" 1R above your original take profit order. Set it a 1R
âȘ Do not meddle with trade once started
âȘ Upon order getting filled or stopping out, remove yourself from the trading environment as this is your most emotionally vulnerable time.
Thats it so far
I know itâs a long way from the trading plan required to trade $2740/day (thereâs that silly number againâŠit just doesnt work in this scenario does it :-D) but this is day 8 and lets see what unfolds in the next 8 days
I look forward to your responses and thanks for reading.
Nick Jordan
Day 8/365
Earnings to date $0.00
heya, buddy, it is great to be looking for a goal, can i ask how much capital you expect to have in 12 months, as an example i work on the goal of 4% per month. (which is about 50% per year). so to be able to make 1 million i would need at least 2 million, probably as much as 4 million in float to achieve that.
Obviously there are ppl who work on higher expectations, but obviously they may have to shoulder more risk and drawdowns. another key is to remember that not all your days will be positive, some days you may be 2000 dollars down, and you just have to make them up another day.
Wow LaS! Iâm impressed with how much you know in only 8 days. When i was 8 days into this trading lark I was still trying to figure out what a currency pair was. haha. Loving the positive attitude/vibe you are producing. Good Luck
I like your energy and I think many of us have been dreaming about making a million in a short period of timeâŠ
I used to register all my profits on a spreadsheet everyday and calculate the average of my gains and so on. The point is that when you donât reach your target itâs quite frustrating. I mean, really frustrating because you can end up losing a lot, even if youâre experienced. You should focus much more on getting the experience first.
Also, consider youâll lose money for sure, so to get there it means youâll need to make [I]more[/I] than a million in one year.
So the math is more complicate than that, first of all you can only trade 5 days a week, not 7, and youâll then need 3846$ or something daily for your annual target⊠also, fridays are not great days most of the times, so take away some of them and holidays, and if youâre really in asia it wonât be convenient to trade the london market which I find is the easiest, so youâll really need a lot of money to start with, for this timeframe.
I think a great result you could consider first is to double your initial capital, believe me, even that can be really tough to get.
So all the best and weâre all in this together, just be careful not to burn your chances too quickly.
Good luck!
Hi L&S, looks like you are getting some good advice here, I am a newbie trader like you and for what itâs worth, hereâs my contribution.
Now youâve done your theory, open a demo account to practice trading, but look at the balance as if it was your money and try to feel the pain when it goes wrong (it will) Iâm not saying trade emotionally but itâs hard not to when itâs your hard earned on the line. When you feel confident and am making more wins (increasing balance) than losses, open a real account and trade small lots at first and increase with increasing confidence.
I have been trading now for about 2 months. I increased my initial deposit by 50% in the first 2 weeks of trading, got over confident and blew over half the increased amount in about 1 hour - ouch!. I then stopped trading for about 2 weeks after giving myself a good talking to.
What I am trying to say is it is very different in the real trading world than it first seems.
My advice is keep it simple, I tried all kinds of indicators and found they all work sometimes, none all of the time and found the best indicator is price action coupled with support/resistance areas and the occasional fibo along with japanese candlesticks. Above all good money management skills and try to understand what the big boys with deep pockets are up to as it is they who move the markets, we are just food for these guys. Learn to swim with them, not become their dinner!. My take is the market moves in cycles, namely accumulation, markup, distribution and markdown. Repeat as necessary. The big guys buy low and sell high, sounds simple? you would think so.
Try to ascertain which phase the currency pair is in before you place your trade and trade with the big guys, which is not necessarily with the trend as this is only your fair weather friend, it will give up on you at the end.
I am a newbie so my advice may be worth diddly squat, but I am learning and gaining experience, give yourself a year to learn and hone your skills before loading yourself with expectations.
I will follow your thread and wish you well, who knows, yo may just do it.
Iâm taking that one to heart myself! Thanks
" In real life, however, when x% of oneâs account is on the line, it is much harder to leave a trade open when the market twitches in the wrong direction. "
I do see what simon is saying, there is a large difference in trading demo then being live, subconsciously you know you arent risking real money, you wont feel the fear that you may encounter live, not that i suggest no demoing, but i do agree with opening a smaller live account as soon as comfortable. i demoed for about 2 months, and then l went live with $2000, over a year later im about to finance my float and am more ready now then ever, and it think it helps that i have live experience