I think you are mizing up the fact of “wanting to train enthusiatic traders” and:
These traders, whilst enthusiastic for trading don’t do things for free - the money is going towards their account for 1 reason or another…and that’d fine if you think their service is worth paying for to get an “education” but don’t kid yourselves.
I don’t know, Nial Fuller has spoken on many interviews about how teaching is more his passion. When your pulling down 75% win it becomes less necessary to minimize risk in the form of 350 dollars… personally I think it is more about keeping the forum exclusive and thus ensuring the quality of the posts made within it. I do believe he is minimizing loss, by having the users pay for the cost but that is more a perk than a reason.
To date I am a student at UMUC with an associates in computer science and I can tell you he is not funding much more than his website with the “profits” from the website. His numbers show profits in the tens of thousands. With compound interest and trade wins like his I doubt there is a huge ulterior motive.
Even teachers get paid 
I agree that some do it for free but perhaps their reward goal is different.
AN interesting read if you are into biology and psychology: The Evolution of Cooperation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I believe most of these forums like Fuller’s, BabyPips, and F4N are set up i that type of scenario…cooperation and both parties being in a win-win scenario, ie one teaches to gain money, one pays for the education to learn.
I take the point that there are costs associated with providing the service, and that teaching incurs an opportunity cost and therefore people should be compensated for their time. I also appreciate that you really dont want to be wasting your time dealing with people who cant afford a few hundred bucks, and its an effective filter to discourage the complete time wasters.
The thing is, its not 350 dollars is it, its 350 dollars multiplied by the number of students. There are vendors out there who are literally making millions a month from subscriptions, IB kick backs, system sales etc. There’s a market for this stuff, and if you can fulfill that market, good luck.
However, those vendors who actually have something of value to offer would be far better off providing teaching on a free of charge basis, but insisting that students fund a small account of say $5000 which the vendor trades under power of attorney, for 25% of profits.
I make just over 7 pips a day from each sytem I trade, which translates on a good year to to a return of around 120%. Im pretty mediocre by babypips standards where most guys claim to be making at least 30 times more than me, and most vendors claim to make 150 times more than me.
So even on the basis of my appalling returns, over a year, using this model, I’d earn 4 or 5 times more than a vendor charging $350, a decent vendor (if his claims are truthful) might make a thousand times more !, hell, the vendor could even reduce the requirement for the student to open a $50 account and still make ten times the money !
In addition to the extra money, the vendor gets an enhanced reputation, resulting in more students, or the possibility to attract students of a higher calibre, or students who can afford to fund a larger account. The student gets a decent return on his funds, plus training in a method that he know works.
There could be an agreement that the vendor continues to trade the account for 5 years, with fee’s reducing annually, or better still, the vendor trades the account until such time maontly or quarterly drawdown limits are exceeded.
If the vendor is a complete charlatan (and there are no shortage of those) students will have definitive proof thats the case, and word will spread.
There’s no excuse not to work in this way. The vendor could offer to allow the student to incrementally add funds to the account as their confidence in the vendor grows which also ensures that students dont place too much money at risk. In month 1, they are required to deposit 500 bucks, in month 2 a further 1500 bucks, in month 3 a further 3000 bucks etc. As students see the results achieved by the vendor each month this will give them additional confidence to commit to the method.
The real benefit of working in this way is that it would establish realistic expectations in new and inexperienced traders, and they’d get to see first hand how this game actually works in practice.
Rather funny. However Simba, if you’re making 7 pips a day, is this consistent? Or do you sometimes have bad days?
Its definately an Average 
For the past couple of years I’ve been trading automated systems, and typically, I have loads of bad days. Last week for example I didnt have a single profitable day !
Its rare to have an appallingly bad day as I tend to set definate loss limits, but they happen (and about as frequently as exceedingly good days !)
The reality is that 80% of the time I’m either losing money, or making back the money I lost earlier. New equity highs dont happen that frequently. 
I think a lot of the problems that traders face is due to setting unrealistic expectations, and therefore they might get to benefit from a dose of reality from a vendor who was prepared to open up actual trade records. Once someones profitable, its a case of continual improvement, but overcoming that first hurdle isnt helped by setting an expectation that a thousand pips a week are possible at negligable risk.
I’ve mentored a couple of people, and I’ve generally found it takes a minimum of 18 months to get them up to speed (then again I concede that I may well be as bad a teacher as I am a trader). Thats a minimum of 18 months that a vendor could be capitalising on his students assetts. Realistically, there’s no reason why the vendor couldnt insist on the student opening a $500 account, the vendor earns considerably more, he gets a great reputation and removes all doubts of his bona fide’s, the student gets the training for free, makes a few bucks, and everyones happy.
If your in need of amusement, try making the offer to a few vendors and watch the response !
well, at least you’re honest about what you make or don’t make, unlike all those scammers charging an arm and a leg for something that doesn’t even work…
So your making a comment on a thread that you didnt actually read ?
Against logic, there is no armour like Ignorance
It’s been proven that all the mud slinging against James16 (an attempt at associating him with Beau Diamond) was without any factual basis.
i think simba would disagree. personally i’m still not sure.
Well I’m sure you’ve done your due diligence - just like Simba has…:rolleyes:
How do you do du diligence based only on a forum name “james16”?
You need business name, business license number. A person taking money from students should be willing to have his name publicly known, his/her real trade statements published. If the teacher can’t trade successfully him/her self what business does he/she have teacher others “how to trade”?
I am not saying James16 can’t trade, I am saying James16 does hide behind a screen name, does choose to stay anonymous so people can’t do their due diligence, does refuse to publish his/her trade states.
Do I think James16 is a scammer, no, infact from everything i have read he is a great teacher. It’s a shame james16 feels that staying anonymous and not allowing potential students do their due diligence is for the best.
If he has 1,000 students at $129 a month, he has a 1.5 million dollar a year teaching site. He should come forward with his real identity and proven trading record.
In fact he is going to great lengths to hide his identity. If you do a whois search on the original domain james16group.com it is registered privately. Normal registration show who own the domain, private registration is set up so you can hide who owns the domain and it is something that costs extra every year to do.
Doing a whois search on the current james16group.us it shows Don Hirsch from Out Of Nowhere as the owner of the domain name, their site is outofnowhere.net and is a website design company. You see this all the time a small design company registers a domain name for the client and puts it in their name instead of the clients. I doubt Don Hirsch and James16 are the same person…
So James16 makes it impossible to “do due diligence”.
I think he just values his privacy. He’s not out to prove anytying to anyone or even promote his paid site. People join up and stay members for a year (after which time it becomes free) purely from word of mouth and the results from other members - and users of just the free thread (like me).
In this field with so much hype, so much rubbish and so many scams here’s a guy with a hugely popular paid site that’s thrived and grown for 5 years. All with 0 marketing, 0 affiliates (so no one marketing for him). The group have nothing to prove to anyone and do not care about people who question the quality of ther material (especially without even knowing anything about it).
It’s not for everyone and not everyone ‘get’s’ the J16 style of trading. It’s price action on higher time zones and it takes at least 6 months to get the hang of. I think some people expect some holy grail then get upset when they sign up and see that it actually takes work and time to get right. That’s why (and it says this very clearly on the paid site) you should get familiar with the material in the free thread for at least a month or 2 before even considering signing up to the PF.
That should put off anyone who doesn’t want to trade that style. I can feel myself repeating what’s been said too many times in this thread already.
James16 group don’t post up live statements or any other kind of proof, never needed to and not going to start now. They also value their privacy and that probably won’t change. If that puts you off then - they don’t care.
The proof is in the results (of the students) and you can definitely try before you by on the free thread and the guest area videos to see if it’s for you. You can even (like me) learn the whole thing purely through the free thread on FF
ddinnov, thats all fine and dandy… but he does offer a paid course, and until he is proud enough of his course material to have it associated with his name, these questions will continue to pop up. You can’t blame or discredit the people asking these questions. Here is a guy wanting more than 1,200 for a course, but is for what ever reason afraid to have his name associated with it.
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I think some people expect some holy grail then get upset when they sign up and see that it actually takes work and time to get right.
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I would agree to that statement, but that statement is true for any course, and has nothing to do with the “teacher” hiding behind some anonymous internet forum name.
At the end of the day its his or hers (is it really a him?) choice to reveal his name / info. If he does not this questioning of him / his motives is bound to pop up again and again. Lets face it, the paid site is over $1,200 (not allot of money) but you are talking serious numbers when you multiple that by 1,000 people. I don’t mind that either, a person should be paid for their time/effort, but I do mind that it appears the “teacher” is not proud enough of what he is teaching to have it associated with his real name. Seams all to strange to me.
$1200? You mean to pay for a year and become a free lifetime member?
It’s $129 a month I think, there’s no minimum membership duration as far as I know. And you should spend a few months in the free thread and check out all the guest material before paying anything - and there’s a refund if you’re still not happy with it.
I see your point about the anonymity - I thnk he’s just quite private and doesn’t want a lot of attention. I don’t think he’s trying to hide anything. However forex is a jungle and there’s a lot of snakeoil so it’s understandable that some people might need this information before parting with hard cash.
Yes it is a paid service for learning how to trade and build a serious trading business, but it’s not advertised or marketed in any way. It’s only found it’s way here and to other forums because of the word of mouth factor that’s made it what it is today.
If people are curious there’s a ton of information about the material for free, if they want proof and real identities then they won’t get that.
Yes the full year is over $1,200. He is trying to hide his identity, why is my real question.
Yes there is a ton of information available on his methods for free, also mixed with a ton of noise that comes with any free forum. Look I don’t think the guy is a scammer, but then again I am not sure if he really makes most of his money from trading. And until he decides to come out of hiding he will be faced with these types of posts coming up every now and again.
That’s fine - they’re not bothered what people think as they’re not actively soliciting members or marketing or advertising.
This thread is only here because of word of mouth, and I’m only here to make sure that certain negative associations (Beau Diamond) and other untruths are debunked.
They do care what people think, thats why they defend/report threads like this. The fact that they are “not actively soliciting members or marketing or advertising” is to a degree false, they advertise it on the FF thread. But that aside many cons are not advertised. Good ole Bernie Madoff’s scam got big from word of mouth.
There are only a few solid reasons in my mind for hiding your identity when selling something:
I can’t think of any positive reasons for staying anonymous when trying to sell something.
You’re right