What free educational sources do you use to learn trading?

Hi, guys!

I’m a new player in this challenging game named “Trading.”

So far I’ve used exclusively the information posted on BabyPips. It’s time to level up, open new locations on the map, and find more powerful weapons.

Yeah, there’re a lot of paid educational sources on the Internet. However, after checking reviews, I have concluded that most of them are useless. They were some kind of marketing fraud. I hope you understand what I mean.

So, I’m at a loss, guys. Please help me with a piece of advice.

What educational sources (preferably free) have you used? What are your impressions? What sites, blogs, software, forums, YouTube channels, webinars, training, courses, workshops, etc. would you recommend? Which ones should I never try?

Thanks in advance!

P.S. I would like to try paid courses, too. However, they must be really helpful and shouldn’t be an empty vessel.

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Hi and welcome,
Here is a link to the best one I know. Do the quizzes, and it will keep track of where you are up to.
https://www.babypips.com/learn

If you have already used this source, then you should have a pretty good idea of what time period you wish to trade in, what currency pairs, or indices, or commodities or stocks you want to trade. That is already half the battle over.

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Have you opened a demo account?

If not, open a demo account immediately. Or, start looking for a broker that suits you.

Learning is useless without application.

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I started with babypips also, and it’s my primary go-to. I’ve used a few resources also like pdfs on candlestick trading that people have shared in old threads here.

I’m actually learning the best at the moment by going through old threads here and demoing the things discussed at the same time. Some of these threads re trading strategies are thousands of posts long, so it’s slow steady going with plenty of time to become familiar with the content while practicing in demo accounts at the same time. I have four demo accounts now (started with just two), across two companies, set to different leverage. All testing the same strategies at the same time (well, apart from my first account, which I nearly blew, and that has now become my experimental zone. I try to limit all my undisciplined trading to there).

I should add, I’ve found some of the free videos helpful, like The Scruffy Trader. But I learn best reading rather than listening.

That might be a good start: do you know if you are a visual or an audio learner?? That might help you narrow the field some

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Try the interactive course built into the forex tester software. Firstly, it is free, and secondly, during training, you will learn how to use the acquired knowledge in practice.

Thanks, everyone, for the advice.
Yes, I have already passed the Pipsology school. Opened a demo account. I tried the forex tester course also - it is designed for complete newbies. Now I want to take my level higher

I had a similar situation when I began. I opted to read

  • Currency Markets for Dummies - This goes over the same content that the Babypips course contain but fleshes out certain sections and provide more context. Especially the section on fundamental analysis. Also contains a good bibliography to help transition to other really helpful books.
  • Day Trading and Swing Trading the Currency Market - Also builds on the foundations of the BP course and focuses on technicals, fundamentals & sentiment. Provides examples and basic setups as well that you can try and observe. This book helped me a ton and inspired the direction I decided to take.

The important thing is to build on foundation established by the online course so that the principles stick over time. To that end these two books worked really well.

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I started with BP too and then tried a few bits out but for me PERSONALLY (and it is a case of finding what personally resonates with you) I found the ICT YouTube channel very useful. He rabbits on a lot but the thing I found very useful was that the insights he gives don’t pertain to a certain way of trading in as much as oh this system is for scalpers or swing traders. It’s more about understanding the way the market works which can then be applied across time frames, allowing you to decide the type of trader you go on to become. As I said some hate his stuff but it works for me. :man_shrugging:

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I started with few books (not free though). If I recall correctly there were few resources on the internet then to find some trading knowledge (or I could not find such). Luckily, some of below were available at my university library.

  • Japanese Candlestick Charting Techniques - Steve Nison
  • Technical Analysis of the Financial Markets - John Murphy
  • Trading for a Living - Alexander Elder
  • The Intelligent Investor - Benjamin Graham (this is more on traditional value investing, but still worth mentioning)

I would say, that these books (especially first three) give you very solid foundation and knowledge.
BabyPips is a good place to quite fast put together these elements into fuller picture of forex trading.
Other blogs/youtube/sites will give you ideas to play with and expand your “vocabulary” - beware of paid content and carefully choose to whom trust on various forums - there are many people who write stuff to boost their ego without thinking about consequences for beginner traders :slight_smile:

Other thing - if you have already a broker account - check, if they are offering any training. I was positively surprised by educational content provided by my broker.

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Hi,
Whilst others have provided more than adequate paths to consider to move you on from the basics presented by School of Pipsology, I’d like to comment on your use of the term “preferably free”.

And for the benefit of other newer members, this may be worth contemplating.

I do some (paid) work along the lines of defining “total cost of ownership”, or TCO as it is referred to in the corporate world. Sometimes, people only give you half a story when they wish to sell their wares (products or services).

One side of that equation is the capital cost of an outright purchase. Another is the ongoing support cost after the capital purchase (maintenance, management, replacement timescale that determines the capital amortisation period). Another side of that equation is the collective time spent by all participants that could have been spent on other pursuits. That collective time is always in competition with a plethora of alternatives, and the objective of making a cost / benefit analysis presented as a “total cost of ownership” is to be able to compare apples with oranges when it comes to the benefit relative to the effort expended on following one strategy as opposed to another.

With that over-complicated explanation, it is important to remember that all participants have an internal cost of time. It stands to reason that if your chosen pursuits can result in a greater income per hour than how you currently make your living, then it would be beneficial to promote those pursuits with much time spent. On the other hand, if you knowingly spend more than your internal cost of time prevaricating over what options you should seek (free or paid), then there should be a moment in time that you make that decision, consciously or subconsciously, to spend some money instead of spending more time.

For example, somebody recommends a book to read, to get to the next level. I choose an arbitrary example here - that of Mark Douglas - Trading in the Zone. I only choose this because I have read it twice front to back, and have referred to specific sections countless times over.

Let’s say that you value your time at $20 per hour (GBP 14 per hour for the Brits). You spend an hour contemplating whether or not it is worth following the advice that you asked for. Cost £14. Then you spend 3 minutes looking at the cost of the book. Amazon £33.31. You spend another 5 minutes looking if it is cheaper elsewhere. Amazon – 5 used from £29.99. Ebay £23.85. Saving of 28% from new. Saving of £9.46 or 2/3 of an hour of your time.
You decide to go for second hand – it’s only a book. The cost of the research was 8 minutes and the cost of the book is £23.85. You estimate it will require six hours to read the book. 6 hrs x £14 = £84, so the total “cost of ownership” for the knowledge in this book is just under £100. You could have spent a lot more than six hours searching the internet for “free information” that you have learnt from a recommended source in probably one tenth of the time it could have taken to acquire that knowledge. If in doubt, just work an extra hour or two and make sure you spend that overtime earning on buying the book.

And what is its value to you? Priceless. Just understanding one tenth of this book could save you £100 in one right decision (eg about money management) or £1,000 (eg in backtesting a strategy in a demo account before losing real money).

That is why I think it is of benefit to look at the cost of acquiring knowledge in a different light – that of total cost of ownership and total benefit after acquisition, not in terms of dollars and cents headline cost.

The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.

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Anything on actual strategies or systems in those books? I wish somebody just wrote a book with endless systems in it to try.

Kathy Lien’s book has a few technical and fundamental strategies. What’s more valuable is the thought process behind those strategies. The books go into detail explaining them. These aren’t the only books that go into it. From the few books I’ve read so far these books have some strategies in them:

17 Proven Currency Trading Strategies I’ve not read completely but has quite a few strategies. Trading Systems and Methods is a book I’ve earmarked for urgent reading as soon as I finish learning some basic statistics and economics.

The strategies, while insightful and meaningful, aren’t as valuable as the rest of the content. Trading around specific times, interpreting fundamental data, showing you how to carry out your own research and trading psychology are much more important and valuable. I’m sure those strategies can be found in one variation or another if we looked hard enough in #trading-systems.

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In my opinion, YouTube is now one of the best educational platforms. There are a lot of educational channels there. You just enter a keyword in the search

Can’t agree :slight_smile: There are educational materials on youtube, but there is also ton of garbage. Similarly as on forums. If anyone can post content - you can be sure, that most of it will be of poor quality and some part even harmful.

You need to be extra critical and cautious before entrusting your learning to anyone and don’t play anything what pops up in youtube assuming this is actual knowledge.

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Here of course and other forums like Forexpeacearmy and ForexFactory.
Trading in the zone
Naked Trading
Candlesticks bible.
Demo accounts are your friend too

Certainly no need to pay when everything is online for free, just takes a little digging to find the good sources. I used this site and Investopedia quite a bit. Also became interested in forums like Forex Abode to chat with others and share ideas. Used Forex Peace Army to learn more about brokers and conditions. I also used YouTube and traded on a demo account.