First time trader - Can I double £300 by Xmas

Trading Discussion Trade Journals
1

Can I double £300 by Xmas

I have being lurking on babypips on and off for years. Trying new strategies on a demo account blowing it or killing myself with trying to trade in a full time capacity whilst working and raising a family.

I came back a month ago and read Ballers trade journal which motivated me to take a different approach to trading. If not checked out it is well worth a read. (I tried to include a link here however apparently new users cant include a link. You can find it on the trading journals). You get to pick up on his laid back approach, his poor taste in pizzas (Domino’s all the way for me). There’s also an Eastenders episode half way through.

Anyway I was given a few quid (yes im from the English land) from Xmas’ and birthday for a couple of years and thought sod it lets do this thing. So since trading a demo account for the thousand time, I have opened up a live account with a massive amount of £300.

The challenge is to double this by Christmas.

The strategy; well this is a little loose at the moment however it will begin as;

  • 10% risk max on each trade. It’s an unwise and large amount however my view is its £350 I can afford to loose and isn’t required for bills, if I am to have any chance of doubling by Xmas then I need all the help I can get
  • Risk v Reward ratio - None. I spent weeks once trying to perfect the perfect risk to reward ratio where this was dictating the stop loss position. Baller has made me realise the stop position needs to be dictate by the chart and the technical analysis. The profit will be determined in the same manner.
  • Don’t focus on instant responses - be happy to leave trades open for days or weeks if needed
  • Limited amount of time searching for trade opportunities. I used to love the idea of being a trader in front of the screens all day. Not workable. So following advice from Richard Kirvo, follow the trend and as the Baller said follow the big boys
    • Group pairs into up or down trends on the monthly
    • Drill down into the daily / 4 hour / hourly to find an entry point in the direction of the monthly based on the support, resistances
    • Place the stop loss far away from the noise. Long stops and let the charts dictate the stop loss. The stops might be put above the last support line, or even above the last 3. The stops will also be an area, not a specific point.
    • Take profit where ever it seems sensible. Let the chart dictate and ignore the risk v reward ratio

I am creating this journal for my own purpose to keep myself motivated and have a history to try and remember what might have worked well or not. Let’s see how it goes. Feedback and comments are welcome. It might be nice to feel part of the community.

Screen shot of my last Demo account which gave me some confidence to go for this

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anything is possible if u know what ur doing and u don t let the emotions get the better of u

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Very easy , keep it simple and dont over trade.

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I agree with you on this.

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divide 100% with your leverage and see its too easy, even with 50:1 its just 2% or 200 pips…but I suggest you not to use more than 5-10X leverage as the margin call risk its huge

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Sunday 5th April

Adding these trades were really hard. My first ever live trades and it was difficult to pull the trigger.

Prep work - Monthly up and down - grouped pairs into the two categories

Monthly Trending up

CHFSGD - Ignored as I think the swizzled government will be doing something soon as its getting too strong

EURAUD - monthly up, daily ranging, 4hour was reversing down and has begun ranging. Set a price alert at 1.81374. If triggered look into buying, potentially setting loss 1.77000

EURSEK - Monthly trending up. Daily trending up. 4 hourly might be trending down. Set a price alert for 11.09654. If it has hit this it might be reversing the downward trend on the 4 hour chart.

EURTRY Monthly up, Daily Up. 4 hour was trending up but last reversal has come down a little too much. Not sure if this is going up or down. Put a buy order in, stop loss below the noise of the reverse on the uptrend on 4 hour chart. 7.15970. Take profit just below the height of the up trend. - when I put this trade on I have noticed the spread is terrible and instantly I was £9 down.

GBPAUD - Monthly up, daily up, 4hour looks like it has burnt out going up - hold and keep watch

GBPNZD daily trending up but looks like it has trended up quickly on the daily and is due a little reversal. 4 hourly has broken through a resistance level slightly. Keep an eye on it, wait for it to reverse and then catch it for the return up.

Monthly trending down

AUDUSD trending down. Stop loss at 0.62822. 4 hour is showing resistance on downward trend around 0.59000.

AUDSGD Monthly trending downwards, daily returning downwards from a push back. Weak 4hour downtrend. I think this might go up before it goes back down will keep an eye on it. Add a price alert for 0.87000 and look to jump back in if it goes up ready for a fall

EURHKD Monthly trending down. I think 4 hourly is heading down as well. Will enter stop loss at 8.08235.

EURJPY Monthly trending down so is the 4hour however it seems to be hitting against resistance. Watch and monitor

Probably more then enough opportunities given the small amount of funds I have at the moment.

Time spent - 1.5 hrs on and off in between dinner and movie watching with the kids. Also a bit of antiques roadshow watching. The Vase was crap in my humble opinion and so not worth £10k each

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Quick check in … who am i kidding i have been checking on the phone every hour and it is the first thing i check during the day. However only quick checks and no real time spent.

Took profit on EURTRY as planned. Looks like it has hit a resistance level so have a price alert to see if it breaks this and might think about jumping on again.

Currently having AUDUSD & EURHKD running as losses but have my stop loss set and will see what happens.

Little concerned about AUDUSD. My notes above were not clear and I was not sure when i pulled the trigger but let’s see what happens.

It does look like it is trending up now however no one knows for certain. I had a long stop loss which was the strategy to take it away from the noise. Let’s see how it performs.

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Time spent today 30 mins. Total time spent 2hours. Balance £310 +£10 week +£10 total

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I was a bit concerned when I read the title of this thread. Having read your post, I was right to feel that way. Theres a few things that I would not recommend. This is just my experience so please dont be offended.

However, I havent read that trade journal you mentioned so will go over and read that too just to get more of an insight into what has inspired you. Maybe I’ll change my mind after I’ve read it!

First of all, your trading account is all you have. When you say I can afford to lose it, this is not a good mentality… ever. Today its 300, tomorrow you could have 30k. Trade it like it’s all you have and protect it. You can get punched, take a knee, throw in the towel just dont get knocked out. Because then you have nothing.

I’m not sure about his 10% risk per trade. If it works with 300 quid it could work with larger amounts too but how can you stay emotionless when you’re risking 3k a trade with a 30k account. Also you have no risk reward, so if you lose you lose 10% but you’re taking profits at what 2-3%? I guess if your winning % is high enough it could work but its risky.

Why dont you lower your risk to 5% a trade. Itll keep you in the game longer and maybe not so hard to pull the trigger. Anyway, I just thought I’d drop a comment on my experience but I’ll read the trade journal too. Best of luck! :+1:

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AUDUSD stopped out. Maybe gut feelings are too be listened to however took a dent in the funds but that’s my risk appetite so need to shrug it off.

Spent a little time last evening trying to find better entry signals in front of a film; blue streak. I watched this as a kid and was one of my favourites. It didn’t age well although the eldest daughter thought it wasn’t too bad in the end and the wife was giggling too much.

Entered a new trade on the EURJPY. Monthly trending down and the analysis i did last night suggests I have a 75% chance of being right. Let’s see what happens.

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Total time spent 4 hours. Balance £278.73 weekly - 21.27 total -£21.27

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Emotions is the hardest thing to overcome I think. Trying to take some confidence from baller on this.

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Th am you for this. I had leverage of 500:1. I changed this to 50:1.

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No offence taken. If I was a snowflake I wouldn’t have added this to a public journal.

My problem with this approach I then wouldn’t tigger any trades. I know 10% max risk per trade isn’t for everyone and probably shouldn’t be for me. However I am working on the basis that if I have the mentality that I won’t miss this money it will allow me to trade. If it was my only source of income or I had a £30k account then I think your points will be very valid.

I might think about this. Sticking at 10% max for the moment but let’s see. I might change my mind in a week when I’ve lost 50%.

Cheers. Hope to hear from you again.

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now that s just stupid…but i guess that happens when there smillions of opinions outhere from teachers that don t trade… do ur own diligence dude, learn wtf is leverage and how u can use it to ur advantage without takin a huge risk, specially on a small account. i wish u good luck, and remember, there s a lot of crap outthere and u need to be able to separate the BS from the real deal. my opinion is to let the 500 to 1 lever and just set a % fixed risk on every trade, no matter how small or big the stop is. may the market be with u
cheers

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Truth always hurts more

Does the leverage you applied not link directly to the margin amount used by the broker?

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short version: leverage equals buying power. it can affect a small account in a negative way if u don t know what ur doing, where to place ur stop and u throw lot sizes like craps. set a risk in % on every trade and do not change that. that way no matter if ur stop is 10 or 100 pips ur risk is the same(dollar amount). if u doing something right an ur account grows, then the fixed % risk will grow 2 with the account. atleast that s my view and how i d treat a 300 pound account.
cheers

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Thanks 1odi - I’ve gone back to some of the PIPS School

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Friday 10th April - End of first week

Balance - £255.90

Overall up / down: - £44.10

Weekly Up or Down - £44.10

Total time spent - 7hours

Realisation that given the current markets this approach might not work. Only one trade went the way I thought it would all others tanked apart from EURJPY which i stopped myself as I just didn’t have faith the markets were heading in the right direction, picture analysis below.

I have changed the approach slightly and no longer looking at the monthly trend and trying to follow the direction. Other principals still apply although I didn’t apply the risk ratio on the two trades is added on last night. 10% risk (|i know its stupid) longer stop losses - don’t keep them tight on a line just because that’s they way the trend line is drawn, allow for fake breakouts, etc. Let the charts decide on the stops and not reference to risk versus reward. This has taken a bit more time an extra 2hours so I’m failing to keep to my other target of little involvement however i think the prep work is needed. Hoping I will still be able to add trades on without spending more then 4 hours a week in the future.

Couple of trades i added last night which were profitable during the day today however i have closed them off as its the Easter weekend and i am not confident they will continue after a long weekend break.

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I didn’t use the same risk basis (10%) because my confidence was completely shot. If I did however at the point of closing my trades out i estimate I would have been down £30 which would have been better but still not helping the “double before Xmas” plan.

Let’s see what the volatility provides next week.

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dude, i only gave my opinion on the matter, not to be taken as trading advice etc…and again, i d stick to a max of 5% per trade(and not 5 trades open at a time), even lower during this period cos of the volatility and uncertainty in the market, swings are way bigger so ur stop loss would have to be, therefore risk less. use the max leverage u can but fixed % of ur account on any 1 trade. and do same thing in terms of setups, over and over again and journal every trade, when u got in, why and the outcome. look back on them at the end of each day or week, write down what mistakes u did( ex not waiting for candle to close, or confimation) and if the loss could be avoided. look also at the trading hours, session etc(for ex i would lose more after 6pm cos volume dies off). bottom line, see what ur strenghts and weaknesses are do more of what u doing good. but again, do same thing over and over, for an extended period of time(nice sample of trades) so u can draw a line in the sand and say if ur market aproach is profitable or not, after that u can tweak things according to the mistakes u ve written down jornaling. it s the only way u ll improve, or atleast in my humble opinion.
cheers
PS: forgot to say that doing same thing time and time again leads to consistent results, good or bad, and that s what u should be striving for, consistency, not rags to riches.

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No worries. Your comments were useful so made me go back to the PIPS school on here to read up on margin and leverage again. It’s made me tweak a few things.

I’m in no position to ignore comments or advice however I’m big enough and ugly enough to end up taking my own decision. For example you’ve made me go off and independently research leverage and margin then make a decision however I’m still sticking to 10% per trade. The latter I suspect I will end up regretting.

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I read somewhere here not to over trade with i strongly agree, is it possible? then yes? but set some small goals, even if u end up break even on any given day its still good, if u make profit then dont gun for more. leave it for another trade and so on, most traders loose due to trade volumes, u make one good trade and it will push you to make another one and another one and another one etc. till puff account gone. haha and best of luck.