Definitely agree it’s tough out there, and we are small fry in comparison but not to say you can’t make a decent profit from trading
This is very true for intraday traders. its alot hard to turn profit long term when trading intraday. I would suggest to pick a handful of pairs to concentrate on and trade them longer term on the weekly/daily time frames. You will find more success that way
Yes I mean exactly that! Have you taken a look at any of the Facebook groups for trading? It’s literally filled with absolute idiots that follow blind and terrible signal telegram groups in the hopes of getting rich quick! The fact is most people are stupid And looking to get rich quick.
1 Like
@Glastonburyk It’s funny how these new traders don’t realise that there is no easy way up. I mean yes take suggestions and ideas from those social media groups but don’t blindly trust everything they preach. The reason why 97%of the new traders bust their account in the first 30-60 days is because of lack of commitment and knowledge. They don’t want to read books, they think trading on demo accounts is a waste of time and are always looking for all possible ways to make easy money in forex which never happens.
2 Likes
I really don’t like to use the words ‘absolute idiots’ in reference to anyone. After all, there was no bigger idiot than myself when I began.
However, I do believe that the type of person entering the trading arena these days, might not have been the type of person entering it twenty or even ten years ago.
The advent of social media and the gamification of trading (god I love that phrase) has opened it to the masses, mean a whole load of new recruits are probably in it for the wrong reasons or have not the talent, discipline, or sheer determination to see it through the other side.
Like I said, I remember how dumb I was back in the day, so shouldn’t even be expressing my view here. I will say however that I think one thing that works against the new players is their lack of attention span.
I come from a time pre-internet when instant gratification of most sorts wasn’t an option. I think this gives many of us older heads an advantage (although I don’t know how -lol)
Also, I think COVID, job losses, and stimulus checks have only hastened the interest in trading, and if and when all that is over maybe we will see fewer ‘idiots’ (your phrase not mine) entering trading.
2 Likes
Its true John. At one time the lack of access to information was a serous obstacle to taking up trading - getting information, charts, news, strategies, even finding text books, making contact with other traders, finding trainers/mentors, tipping services - were all really difficult pre-internet.
Nowadays, what are the barriers to entry into trading? None.
Its surprising our failure rate is not north of 99%.
1 Like
many people trade for the wrong reasons and that’s why they lose money
Yea man, I also know brilliant traders that make immense gains regularly only to lack the discipline to hold on to it. There are many roads to failure and few to success as with all things.
Everybody heard of this statistics and start feeling depressed. You’d better tell us about your trading strategy, which indicators you used and how you managed your money. As for stop losses, I usually base it on the S&R leveles because they are much more indicative than just 1%. What was your risk reward ratio? Lots if traders have failed deals but they still manage to make decent profits with the help of the adequate ratio. Like if you are 50% right and your risk reward ratio is 1:2, then your trading will be profitable, just simple math. So, there are so many factors which could lead you to the loss and failure. If you really want to be a success on the market, you’ve got to analyse your mistakes and point out the factors which led to such consequences, but it is much easier to claim that usual investors are unable to gain profits from fx.
A study by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission of forex traders found **70% of traders lose money every quarter on average, and traders typically lose 100% of their money within 12 months. A study of eToro day traders found nearly 80% of them had lost money over a 12-month period, and the median loss was 36%.
2 Likes
They lose money because they can’t determine which way the market will be going. Many people who start with Forex trading think it’s easy. They think that they can predict where the market is going and get rich. It needs a lot of practice and patience to be successful in forex.
I guess it doesn’t depend on the trading style. Daytraders in this case don’t differ from scalpers or investors actually. All the categories of traders are susceptible to losses. Everything depends here on your knowledge, skills and experience. If you have lack of these features, then you will face losses even if you’re an investor or scalper. Actually, scalping is much more difficult than intraday trading and it’s much easier to lose money when you’re a scalper, because there are some special techniques and velocity of your reaction. Often, novices don’t have such a trait and lose their money.
Simply people are not well aware about how forex trading, rather they are in it just to make a profit and give up every time they are making losses, hence it is the one of the reason why traders are losing money.
Have you ever asked yourself ‘Why did I lose?’. It means that all of your trades should be analysed and you’ve got to find the mistakes that you made in order to make your trading profitable. The fact that 97% of traders lose has no connection to your trading. I know lots of people who manage to make money on trading forex, so every person can find themselves in those 3% if they are ready to pull full efforts to it. Most of the people give up and claim that it is impossible to earn anything ther (just because they failed). If I cannot drive a train doesn’t mean that it is impossible to be done. The same thing is about trading.
97% lose money because they trade on assumptions and not on solid trading approach. Forex trading is not easy it can wipe-out your capital away with a very small mistake. Always consider your risk appetite.
Who told you that you cannot be these 3%?
I wouldn’t call the majority of 97% the traders. The biggest part of trading losers are passers by. These are the people who think of forex market as a cash factory. They watch some videos and come to the conclusion that they can start trading and make profits right away without having appropriate background and knowledge. It is no wonder that such people end up losing all the money they deposited on their trading account.
The most important thing to bear in mind before starting to trade is the fact that successful trading is a result of hard work. Traders should study a lot in order to understand the principles of price movements and what is more important, traders should always resfresh their knowledge and improve their trading strategies in order to be in tune with the whole market and its tendencies. Moreover, traders should be good at controlling their emotions and psychological state. Sometimes it is better to make a pause in trading just because of the upsurge of emotions which were brought about by some recent events not only in trading but in their private lives.
So, we can see that a successful trader should obtain huge amount of knowledge concerning the market and economics and he should also be good at controlling his feelings and emotions. Do you know such people? There are very few of them, that is why only 3% of traders succeed in trading.
97% of day traders loose money can be interpreted in a few ways… If you loose a few trades, you lost money, but if your wins outweigh your losses, then you made money (but still ‘lost money’ at the same time). Statistics are generally skewed to support which ever narrative they are trying to support
Personally, I think there are lots of factor to consider, one of the few is that they tend to give up after losses.
I think that such a statistics can be explained by the fact that there are only 3% of traders who found the right approach to the market and don’t give up whatever happens there.
Trading is not a magical tool for making the money doing nothing. Trading requires lots of learning and practice which should be updated on the regular basis. Knowledge and skills are the cornerstones of the successful trading and they both should be mastered at the highest level. Apart from skills, a trader should also be psychologically stable and he should control his emotions so that they don’t interfere into his decision making process. The role of psychology shouldn’t be underrated as psychological instability usually leads to the failures and absolute loss.
Every activity needs to be mastered if you want it to bring you the money. Trading is not an exception as it requires lots of work to be done and mental consistency. You’ve got to go through a long and difficult way if you want to earn the money with trading. Not all of the people are strong enough to stand the challenges of the market, there are only the strongest who manage to keep their temper all their way.
A significant number of traders do lose money in forex trading. But mostly it’s the traders who take an unrealistic approach to the market and lack proper knowledge.