How do people learn to be a successful trader?

Beginner Questions
21

I agree with what Steve said. Higher timeframes make for an easier life.

I’ve been trading for 3 years and only now starting to turn a profit. I still don’t consider myself successful. If I can keep it up for the next year or so then maybe I’ll consider myself profitable.

Anyway I recently started trading price action signals from areas of support and resistance using the daily timeframe.

There’s a really great thread on here which can help with taking only the best setups.

I started trading this way in June and my account is up 4%. That’s about 1% per month. If I can do this consistently and make 12% a year I’ll be a very happy man.

Stick at it mate. All the best.

22

@SovoS
Very good response.

Just to throw in a little bit: The markets can also move sideways, so his strategy, if he has one, should match whether the market is trending or ranging.

23

Do the opposite for 10 days :

24

quit speculation, find one element that 100% reliable ,and build your system on it.

1 Like
25

I must say, back testing is much powerful than reading trading eBooks; real experience brings more clear visions!

26

4hr and daily T/F for me, using trend lines and the 21 and 55 SMA’s. Keeps it strict and simple. One more important influence! Only go long or short, if at least 66% of market participants are positioned the OTHER way :wink:

1 Like
27

at this stage ,you will need to feel desperate ,utterly hopeless before you give up everything you learn ,and advance to another stage.when you are there ,we will talk again.

28

so an update on this as I started the thread.

Still early days but it really feels I have turned the corner and I am having a consistently profitable month of October (increased my capital by 25% so far!).

So what have I done - narrowed down what I trade to only day trade the dax and the dow. I’ve always traded indices but thrown in the FTSE and nasdaq and then also included daft Forex trades. I now only trade DOW and DAX. I will trade the Dax from the morning bell for a couple of hours max and then similar for the dow. I check the news on CNBC and also IG (my broker that provides relevant news for each indice), look at 4 hr/1hr charts for support/resistance and then trade off the 5 min charts

The biggest shift however has been my mental approach. Someone in another thread recommended “Tradertom”. I had a look at his website, read his book and joined his completely free Telegram channel. This allows you to listen to him live stream while he trades. He also shares educational charts as to why he approaches trades etc. Listening to his discipline, approach to risk, losses and maximising profits made me realise how a professional trading acts. I’ve been ok at reading charts but terrible at controlling my emotions.

So I now know that providing I continue being disciplined and not a “knob head” I maybe can make this work over the long term. I know one month isn’t a long time however seeing the majority of the days in profit allows me to realise that I have a way forward and a strategy that could work for me. I call this the “no knob head days” strategy.

If I continue to be succesfull in another couple of months I will update again. If I fail I will slink off quietly never to read this post again!!!

PS on the Trader Tom telegram you can copy his trades as he trades live. I don’t want to do this as I feel I am cheating myself. What I really benefit from listening to his approach and his educational pieces. I also realised that the way he trades isn’t how I trade and this is about my journey. It also makes you realise what actually can be achieved. He had a challenge to trade using a £5k account and turn this into £50k. He achieved this in one month!!!

29

Books, videos, and blogs can only provide you with pertinent information on the subject. They cannot, however, force you to learn how to trade successfully. It is something you learn through your own experiences as well as by working in the market. So you can learn from books, blogs, and videos But keep in mind that only your own experiences will make you a successful forex trader.

30

i can share with you some of my critical point

1.decided not to follow any trading system ,mainly focus on the technic of stopploss.

2.after years of searching learning trying ,finally came down to dead end ,i don’t think i can ever win any money ,because this game is totally scam.

3.wander for years ,still can’t get rid of trading ,not giving up finding that one thing can 100% rely on ,instead of half ass technical ,fundamental stuff.

4.get inspiration from stock trading ,study the rules of all trading game,start to see why forex trading and stock market was designed this way.

5.finally come out with good plan ,but took time to find the right tool to trade ,slowly but surely making profit ,but the game itself ,the broker are giving me obstacles ,they knew my kind of trader exist ,not just trade and win ,but cracking the whole charting game.

not sure if anyone have similiar experience like me ,or how long would you take to achieve what i did ,i never a mainstream trader .

so the only advise i would give is , give up fundamental and technical ,this is a gamble game ,try to gamble smartly.thats one way out,its work for me.