Too old to trade forex?

I am aged 63, I want to trade FOREX but I fear I may not succeed at such a ripe age. Can I go ahead or quit now?

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Stay in the game, my friend. I have come across lots of members here your age and older here, leaning something new. I think there was an 80+ year old this year or last.

If you have the interest and dedication, your age doesn’t matter! Go for it, I say

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Experience at life is an advantage in trading but experience in trading can be developed in just a couple years.

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It’s never too late if you have the time and energy to learn new things. If you do decide to go for it I wish you success!

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age is just number at any section , if you are focus on any work , you can bring good something of course , keep learning and earn from trading , good luck

everyone has energy first of all when trading but difficult to maintain particularly when making losses.

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Age is not limit, it can become your hobby for a start because trading on demo is free and very similar to live. After you get a good grasp of fundamental and technical analysis ideas you can then start gradual transition to live account, starting from 100-200 bucks and setting 5-10% target monthly return

Age is is not a barrier, if you have the desire to learn then nothing should stop you.

Surround yourself with positive people and get started, its a great journey!

I would suggest you demo trade, at least use that to test your hand and see how it goes after a while. I’ll also suggest you get the Forexchief $100 no deposit bonus and see if you can make profit with it on a live account. Use a cent account and trade in micro lots so that you don’t wipe that money in one trade.

Age doesnt mean anything, if it does, it will just bring you more patience.

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I guess, perfect age! Know why? Because of your enough free times; just invest your time & efforts on learning, success is on the way.

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Whatever it is; please don’t invest your life savings money here! Only invest a little amount when you are very sure on your trading skill & don’t judge your trading skill too early.

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Age is not a big matter in forex business, one important thing in forex trading is about skill, age is only accumulation time along human life in the world, its not as gauge for succeeding or fail for every person, but indeed start forex must with carefully, this is risky business, learn demo first for new trader

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There is no age limit to start any work or to learn anything in Our life. So you can start learning Forex and trade in the market.

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The answer to this depends on what you want to get out of the trading experience.
You do not say what you want from trading. I cannot speculate - you have to tell us.

Many answers here come from people whose tax returns do NOT reflect their trading success, so you’d have to assume their income comes from somewhere else.

If you want to supplement your post-retirement income by say $100 or $200 per week, then that means you’d have to earn $5000 to $10,000 per year, pre-tax.

If you take advice from anyone who is NOT able to at least produce that kind of income, then I’d suggest you begin to look elsewhere.

Babypips has a great course which explains the jargon of trading, fundamentals and technicals related to this industry.

But I have not seen figures associated with any success in the trading area post-education. Nevertheless, it certainly is a great start and introduction which should not be over-looked. You can find it here: Learn How to Trade the Markets

I’d suggest the current approaches to success in trading is not working.
At least after 15 years of trying, my main income comes from my day job. My moments of success have not consistently moved me forward to becoming a professional or even part-time winning trader.

Recently I came across this site which may be an excellent post-babypips place to look, if you want to try a different approach: https://nononsenseforex.com/

I’d suggest completing the Babypips education first.
Given the very high (and very costly) failure rate amongst traders in this industry, I do not like my own chances of eventually breaking through.
I do not know about your capabilities, but you’d need to consider that a very high percentage of traders fail to break-even, let alone earn any money at all.

I am not trying to put you off, but I would definitely question as many others who are saying they are successful, to get their honest opinions about whether this is something to be attempting.

If I had my time over, I would not go near this industry at all.
There is a reason the brokers want you to participate, and it is not because they like you, or want you to be successful.

Your age is NOT a barrier in any respect, while you retain your full your full mental powers, so that in itself is not a turn off.

But in retirement years, surely you’d much rather be doing something else far more fulfilling that sitting at a desk, struggling to eke out $100/week, in a highly complicated industry which is notorious for separating people from their money?

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Thank you very much, Ingot54, yours is one of the most sincere analysis I have received in recent years. I am a computer engineer and I co-owned a company of about 26 years old that I head. I decided to step aside because businesses are not doing well in my part of clime due to recession. My last salary before stepping aside was about US$3,000.
I am hoping that I could do some trading in FOREX to earn some side income by investing as little as US$500 to US$1,000 and to keep my brain active while reading and trading. I leave in a 3rd world economy where there is no hope of government intervention in old age.
That is the summary of my life. I have learnt a naked truth from your advice and will only invest my time and money that I can afford to lose.
I thank you very sincerely.
God bless you.

But before that, you need to make you’re your trading skill; without enough trading skill, money earning is impossible! In that case, you can use demo or cent type live account (learning purpose).

You can go ahead. Age is just a number. Nothing to be demotivated. Keep trying. All the best!

don’t think about your age , think which learning approach is more appropriate for you , this market doesn’t know anyone , it always follow own trend , learn and earn more from here,

Your age is not an issue here at all provided you are generally healthy and capable of absorbing, understanding and applying new things. But do not be under any illusions that your chances of reaching significant earnings with a small starting capital are anything other than extremely slim.

You should be aware that over 75% of people attempting to earn from forex trading actually lose. This is a fact and can be seen on the websites of European brokers regulated by ESMA. These brokers are obliged to confirm these figures. For example, my broker currently states that:

“CFDs are complex instruments and come with a high risk of losing money rapidly due to leverage. 76.88% of retail investor accounts lose money when trading CFDs with this provider. You should consider whether you understand how CFDs work and whether you can afford to take the high risk of losing your money”

You should be totally aware of the risks involved and absolutely sure that you are only risking money that you do not need for other purposes. And even then you should be aware that in order to achieve a consistent profitability, you should not be taking huge position risks via high leverage. Whilst this helps to avoid sudden major losses it also places a limit on your earnings potential. So you will not be seeing sizeable profits whilst also maintaining moderate risk exposure.

Forex is a reasonably complex topic and its basics can easily be learnt. But success does not just depend only on one’s ability to learn. Trading is not a passive activity. You will be placing your own funds at risk in a highly volatile business where its profit/loss is highly visible at all times. This means that you also need certain personal qualities such as patience, persistence and discipline, as well as a good helping of analytical skills.

With the small equity that you are intending to commit to your trading, you are likely to be tempted towards intraday trading only in order to have small stoploss possibilities. However, such short term trading is extremely demanding and erratic. Markets can move intraday extremely fast, can oscillate back and forth rapidly - and often totally illogically since they are very much the reaction to market orders rather than any fundamental forces. This can produce serial losses very easily!

So if you are looking at forex as a source of significant income, I would say forget it. But if you are looking for something to stimulate your mind and provide a fascinating activity that keeps you in touch with current events and news - and possibly earns a moderate profit as well - then I would say, welcome, and go ahead! :slight_smile:

As you said:

Trading for some side income and as a passionate hobby will probably be fine. But if you are hoping to generate an income to significantly supplement or substitute for a pension, then the chances of success are small.

This is the good news! :smiley:

Age and life experience is a big benefit in trading, but even more so that you have run your own business and are completely aware of business principles of risk management, profit management, cost control, etc. And I am sure that being a computer engineer will be a huge help in developing your trading methods and journalling/analysing your trades.

These are, of course, only my own personal thoughts concerning your situation. I just think it is best that you have a thorough appreciation of the risk and chances involved. If you still wish to go ahead then open a demo account and treat it in two ways:

  • a means to safely explore various approaches and methods and experiment with risk issues.

  • then treat it as a simulator rather than just a play account and set it up with the same equity as you intend to use live and trade it precisely as you will do live. That is the only way to gain a realistic picture of how you will do with a live account. When you are satisfied that it is performing satisfactorily, only then go live with it.

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