In Forex, anyone can be a trader. Some choose it as a full-time profession and some choose it as a part timer. Knowledge and experience are only matter in here. You can be a profitable a trader even if you trade for one or two hours.
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A similar thread has been created with some useful answers
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By devising a strategy and backtesting it. You can even make use of algo trading.
How will I start please?
I would recommend you trade higher time frames use the M-W-D time-frames to do your top down analysis. Take your entry on the daily. You can hold this trade for hours/days.
Some good advice on here, as you have full time job then you really donāt want to be in short time frames as you wonāt be able to follow the action and as trading is spread across different time zones then you could find your management of trades becomes difficult.
I would devise an end of day strategy which means your trading after your work, this gives you time to analyse the markets and trade to your plan, if you get it right you can make 30/80 pips overnight or into the next day, you need to manage your stops but you can let trades run more freely, trade with the trend and only trade FX, forget commodities and indexes too as you may find these too volatile plus the stops can be quite large and can test your strength of character if the go against you.
Good luck and trade well.
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Just over 2 years ago I set out to do exactly what you want to do, part time. And I finally appear to be succeeding, so I can share with you my experience this farā¦
Start with demo! I can truly promise if you jump straight into a real account with no experience, youāll lose your money, or at least a good chunk of it. I traded demo for 6 months, getting used to how currencies move, trying different things. Losing huge chunks of demo cash on 1 trade. You learn a lot here, I didnāt move to real until I had (what I thought at the time) was a successful system. Turns out I still managed to half my account size in the first 2 weeks. For me this was because I was not prepared for the psychological change of trading real money and seeing real losses. When a trade is going good or bad I found I was behaving more emotionally or erratically compared to demo, so be prepared for adjustments when you make the switchā¦ and start small!
I would also sayā¦ for almost 2 YEARS I was losing, I would keep topping up my account every few months once it had drained to the point where I had too little money left to trade for effective profit. There were many many times I thought I couldnāt do it. I wanted to quit so many times. Sometimes a trade would be going well almost hitting profit and suddenly price would reverse and what I had in floating profits were suddenly realised losses. It gets to you. You go through the same mistakes every noob goes through, revenge trading, emotionally trading, over trading etc. What you have to have through all of this is a TRUE desire to want to make it work, the guts to keep pushing and keep learning, because you can only make the same mistakes so many times until it starts to sink in. Over the years I have put a few thousand Ā£ into trading, and only in the last few months have I made all my losses back and profit on top, now things are running smoothly.
I would say donāt complicate your screen with all these fancy instruments or devices with your strategy. A lot of them are superfluous and you can develop great winning strategies without them. Instead learn the fundamentals. Learn how to read the charts and plot S&R and learn candlestick patterns and supply/demand zones. Learn what news to keep on top of to gain insight into market bias. Over time you will develop your own way of doing things and will know where to go and what to do to make it, it will just take time to figure it out.
What I found was a breakthrough for me was just picking 1 or 2 pairs and really learning them. Focus on them, you learn what makes them move, you become familiar with its history and develop a rapport with the pair, more importantly you develop INTUITION. It helps you make rational informed decisions on when you enter a trade.
Also learn simple things like trialing stops (or move them to breakeven) if price moves far into profit, and get used to taking partials. You need to learn to secure pips and not focus on what you could of had if you just went a little further. Greed will come back to bite. It has me many times and to be honest itās something that is still a reason why some of my trades lose today. Donāt become too greedy and remember you donāt control the market and you must take what you can get. Any profit is better than loss.
Iām terms of how I managed my timeā¦ I work my usual 9-6 hours. Itās computer based work so I can trade through the day keeping certain information like news updates close by. My lunch hour is always dedicated to learning or monitoring trades and checking out trades. Yes my work has suffered a little in the beginning, however Iām willing to stay late to get my work done properly, you might want to expect the same. In the beginning all my weekends as well as most evenings would be spent learning forex, doing the babypips course. Doing tests, watching YouTube videos, there are plenty of decent educational sources out there. Thereās plenty of lessons and general decent rules to learn, such as when doing a market analysis start with a top-down approach, weekly timeframe and analyse, move to daily then analyse again then the 4 hourly etc. Plotting major S&R along the way. Donāt start with the 5 minute window because itās full of false alarms and trading ānoiseā. Candlestick and chart setups on these small windows donāt hold much weight. I mean I do less of this now but it is essential to learn the basics and best practices.
Iāll reiterate this point though: stay hungry to succeed. This mindset was the difference between me leaving it behind as āsomething I tried and give up on because I kept losingā and continuing to eventually become successful. I remember had a 2 week break after a big loss near the beginning and it was a time where I had to sit down with myself and decide what do I really want I with this whole forex business. Trade small, be prepared to lose, but as long as you keep going, your losses are just payment for lessons on how to be successful. Stay passionate and determined and youāll make it!
Best of luck!
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OTC markets
What I saw from many comments is that people suggesting general advice but not a practical way to answer the problem. A lot of people say to learn first, start on demo, money management, psychology, and blablabla, Of course, Iām not saying all of that is useless, but itās not relevant to this question. The main problem is his working hours, not just needing a motivational sentence to gain success in this industry. My solution to this problem would be to trade the Daily Chart, as you will only check the chart once a day and it wonāt disturb your working hours. Or if you want to trade the lower timeframes, I suggest scalping a fixed session every day. For example, you trade only pre new york session until the NYSE-open every day. Again it depends on your working hours and your place where do you live, you can adjust it to maybe pre London session or whatever is suitable for you. And it doesnāt matter whether you use price action or indicator-heavy on this, as long as youāve backtested it enough to understand your performance on demo and have a clear system to trade and then go live on it following all the rules.
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When I first started demo trading I was just like most newbies, gravitating toward the shorter time frames. My baby formula was the Cowabunga system, finding my trend in the 4 hour and picking my entries off the 15 minute chart. Iām sure it works for someone who can work it, but I work 8-5. I was one of those guys looking for buy signals on my phone in the bathroom at 9 AM. Finally figured out that until I have more free time I needed to slow down. Now Iām working a couple short term patterns on the daily chart at 5 PM after Iām off work. Iām still on my phone during the day browsing the charts to see what opportunities might be coming up, but all my trades are end of day. No fuss, no muss. Iām not making a killing with my monopoly money but Iām doing better with a lot less stress. And Iām learning. I know you said you work until 7 but my platform will allow me to set my daily candles to close at different times. You could maybe set your end of day to midnight or some other time that works for you. Then you could do this on your time. I know it seems like the excitement is in the faster moving charts, but if I want excitement Iāll take up base jumping. Iām here to make money.
Already many people had talked about Forex here, i only like to add that when you enter in market you should start trading with demo account, if do not have demo account you can get demo account with your broker.
Tradingview has a rewind and play function that allows you rewind at any given point in the market and replay. I find this best way to back test and practice trading.
Also I would get in some good telegram/discord groups. I donāt mean ones you have to pay for necessarily. There are groups that are free that are just like minded individuals discussing the market. Your network is your net worth. Stay consistent and dont give up.
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Trade markets that are active when you have free time.
Try the crypto markets too they are open 24/7
Has anyone ever done that? I am curious how one can maintain between both working 9-7 job and then trading forex after that. It is rather tiresome.
For me, I can try in some day where I am much more energetic to spend more time on screen, but on other time, it is hard for me to keep up.
When I used to work 5 days a week I found it was straightforward to trade off D1 charts using pre-set entry orders. Many entry patterns require confirmation by a further price move through a level indicated on the chart before you actually want to get in. It is simple therefore to set your order where the pattern will be confirmed - if price confirms the pattern you will be in the trade, if it doesnāt the order wonāt be triggered and you have lost nothing.
A good thing about full-time employment is that it prevents day-trading.
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Try lasting longer than a few months.
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I think itās only good as long as you are maintaining a small account. It aids the learning process as you get to trade on a real account but putting a large sum on the stake while you are busy on a 9-7 job is not a good decision.
@000zamani
If youāre looking to make some extra money and start trading on your own, you need to be prepared for a long and difficult road. But with the right tools and knowledge, itās possible to make it big in the world of finance. Here are three tips that will help you along the way:
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Start with a solid foundation
Before you even start trading, there are a few things you need to have in place. You need an understanding of technical analysis, charting platforms, and other financial concepts. This will help you make more informed decisions when trading, and give you a leg up on the competition. -
Donāt put all your eggs in one basket
When you first start trading
When you have a 9-to-7 job and want to get into trading. Your main issue is time management because you have insufficient time outside of work. So, first and foremost, make a strict schedule to save time for learning. Knowledge is essential for beginning your trading career.