Trading Forex

[FlirtLife]

Maybe but it's irrelevant. Losses will be small while gains are much larger. Everyone loses, the difference between people who make money and don't make money is that their gains far exceed their losses.

That's where risk management and stop losses come into play and waiting for proper confirmation signals. I've improved tremendously in that area, which is definitely something I have struggled with in the past.

You are talking about a random event happening versus once a decade versus something that literally happens daily.

Saying "losses will be small while gains are much larger" is based on 1 month experience as a retail investor in Forex. Consider which is more likely: the Forex market is efficient, or a retail investor has found a way to make money for free within 1 month.

Using stop loss orders is good practice. But they are not a guarantee.

Do Stop-Loss or Limit Orders Protect You Against Gaps?

If you are worried about a gap down in price, relying upon the standard stop-loss or limit order as protection likely isn't your best bet.

www.investopedia.com

 

[BackInTheGame78]

Saying "losses will be small while gains are much larger" is based on 1 month experience as a retail investor in Forex. Consider which is more likely: the Forex market is efficient, or a retail investor has found a way to make money for free within 1 month.

Using stop loss orders is good practice. But they are not a guarantee.

Do Stop-Loss or Limit Orders Protect You Against Gaps?

If you are worried about a gap down in price, relying upon the standard stop-loss or limit order as protection likely isn't your best bet.

www.investopedia.com

Charts are charts bro. Stocks, crypto, forex, commodities. They all tell you the same information on them.

Either you can read them or you can't.

 

[EyeOnThePrize]

15 days isn't long enough. You need three months of solid blotter before taking the algo live, but it certainly sounds like you're off to a good start.

I was never attracted to forex since any market operation requires crossing the spread.

 

[BaronOfHair]

Are you actively working on improving your trading skills or just gambling?

This honestly started out as me gambling. I've become more serious about trading over time

 

[BackInTheGame78]

15 days isn't long enough. You need three months of solid blotter before taking the algo live, but it certainly sounds like you're off to a good start.

I was never attracted to forex since any market operation requires crossing the spread.

Working on the algo but have been manually trading. Currently on a 37 non-losing trade streak...36 winning trades, 1 break-even. Probably should have had a few more losses in there in the beginning when I had my stops a little loose and would have been stopped out before winning the trade but whatever...

Have been working on refining this and have been improving. Usually only look for layup setups...certain setups are so easy to spot on a chart, they are no brainers to take.

Also becoming more disciplined about not over trading. Some days there are no setups and that's OK. Other days there are too many setups to trade and I can't them all.

I'm new to forex but not new to trading.

 

[EyeOnThePrize]

Working on the algo but have been manually trading. Currently on a 37 non-losing trade streak...36 winning trades, 1 break-even. Probably should have had a few more losses in there in the beginning when I had my stops a little loose and would have been stopped out before winning the trade but whatever...

Have been working on refining this and have been improving. Usually only look for layup setups...certain setups are so easy to spot on a chart, they are no brainers to take.

Also becoming more disciplined about not over trading. Some days there are no setups and that's OK. Other days there are too many setups to trade and I can't them all.

I'm new to forex but not new to trading.

If you're really confident in your consistency then you should move on to sizing up and practicing scaling. Always risking 2% or similar, and occasionally risking 5 or 10% on ideal setups, pushing the limits of your BP until the books give and you're effectively market making.

We'd need more blotter metrics to make a solid assessment. Max drawdown, SL/TP, R/R, average hold time, etc. If you can average 20% per month then you'll hit seven figures in less than two years. But with a small account you should be hitting 50%+ months since slippage is a non-issue.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

If you're really confident in your consistency then you should move on to sizing up and practicing scaling. Always risking 2% or similar, and occasionally risking 5 or 10% on ideal setups, pushing the limits of your BP until the books give and you're effectively market making.

We'd need more blotter metrics to make a solid assessment. Max drawdown, SL/TP, R/R, average hold time, etc. If you can average 20% per month then you'll hit seven figures in less than two years. But with a small account you should be hitting 50%+ months since slippage is a non-issue.

That's my whole point...I am wanting to prove to myself that I can be consistent and get funded with a bigger account and trade other people's money rather than my own but keep 80% of the profit until I build up a good nest egg, put that in a Roth IRA and then keep trading out of that Roth IRA which completely negates all capital gains taxes on future earnings. Meaning no matter how much money I make, I won't be taxed a single penny on it.

Huge gaping loophole in US Tax code not enough people know about to take advantage of.

Can even start as a Traditional IRA and do a backdoor conversion to a Roth IRA and still get into that way if you are over the income limits of 153K a year(228K of married).

 

[EyeOnThePrize]

That's my whole point...I am wanting to prove to myself that I can be consistent and get funded with a bigger account and trade other people's money rather than my own but keep 80% of the profit until I build up a good nest egg, put that in a Roth IRA and then keep trading out of that Roth IRA which completely negates all capital gains taxes on future earnings. Meaning no matter how much money I make, I won't be taxed a single penny on it.

Huge gaping loophole in US Tax code not enough people know about to take advantage of.

Can even start as a Traditional IRA and do a backdoor conversion to a Roth IRA and still get into that way if you are over the income limits of 153K a year(228K of married).

Running a prop shop has become pretty easy so it's been a race to the bottom for a lot of the smaller firms. A place like Apex Trader has plenty of affordable options for six figure buying power. Although I think they're futures only. If you run your stops tight enough you could use shops that allows insane forex leverage instead of needing more BP.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

Just started my Funded account challenge with Apex Trader Funding.

First trade +$1000 before commissions, no trailing drawdown used.

Had a chance for a great re-entry after selling at the initial point on a trend line touch but didn't pull it...went up back to the initial point, could have had another 1K win.

Race to 6K now before hitting a 3K trailing drawdown.

A little upset because I had another trade marked, actually 2, on a support trend line but didn't take either and they both bounced bigtime from there. Could have been up 3-4K on the day between those.

 

[FlirtLife]

"More than 55% of traders have blown their accounts while getting close to their profit targets."
https://www.reddit.com/r/ForexPropFirms/comments/15952m2

 

[BackInTheGame78]

"More than 55% of traders have blown their accounts while getting close to their profit targets."
https://www.reddit.com/r/ForexPropFirms/comments/15952m2

Yes that's because most of them are not disciplined, don't really have any system or rules they follow and revenge trade like MOFO's if they start losing instead of setting a daily loss limit and then walking away for the day like I do.

They also swing big and miss big instead of taking layups, using good risk management and making $200 5 times to make $1000 instead of trying to make $1000 in a single trade opening you up to a big loss as well if you get stopped out.

In addition, it's pretty amazing how many have no idea about concepts like order blocks, liquidity and even basic things like market structure, change of character and break of structure concepts. Without those they might as well be gambling.

I've worked my fvcking ass off to improve, learn, live and breathe these not only when I am studying it but also I can almost instantly see them live on charts. THAT'S where you need to be able to see it...live in action. Until you can do that, knowing the concepts won't help because you won't be able to see how it plays out after on the chart until after you have to act.

Basically, if I want to do something, I literally become obsessed with it and work exceptionally hard and am relentless in pursuit of it. I take my lumps and I learn from my mistakes and tend not to make the same ones twice. I'm probably not the person you want to bet against.

It's funny because people have been doing it my whole life telling me what I can't do or will never happen and there is nothing I take more pleasure in using that as jet fuel and lighting a match and then burying them and letting them know about it.

Just like I was told at age 40 that nobody would hire me as a software engineer with no professional experience, no computer science degree and was laughed out of multiple IT recruiter offices. Did I let that stop me? Hell no...I worked even harder, found a job myself, impressed the hell out of the entire development team and IT manager with how much I knew and learned on my own, how many college classes I took on my own thru EdX.com and how passionate I was about it. I got hired on the spot and within 4 years I tripled my salary and reached senior software engineer, switching jobs 2 times in the process.

So if you want to make damned sure that I make it and make it big, keep doubting me. I will take great pleasure in posting my PL's for you to see.

I'm almost $3800 of the way to $6000 and I've used exactly $39 of my $3000 trailing drawdown.

Meaning I am 62.5% of the way to my goal and have used 1.3% of my drawdown. I would have to really, really F up pretty bad to blow that drawdown before hitting my profit goal.

Was +500 Friday, and would have once again been up much more if not for my paper hands in trades. But it does have the nice effect of almost never triggering a trailing drawdown since I am getting out of the trade at its highest point many times.

 

[FlirtLife]

I'm impressed by your path to becoming a software engineer. That shows how willing you are to teach yourself, and your ability to learn programming (discipline and probably cognitive ability).

In the spirit of learning, consider if you are taking on more risk. What would you measure to decide if your risk is greater than a month ago?

Some time ago, you lost $140 spread over several trades - call it a loss of less than $50/trade. This past week, you lost $500, which is ten times as much. I have a theory: you are taking on greater risk, which has shown up in a larger loss. If you value learning about risk, this could be a chance to learn risk metrics and measure your level of risk.

"More than 55% of traders have blown their accounts while getting close to their profit targets."
https://www.reddit.com/r/ForexPropFirms/comments/15952m2

To clarify, I assume "close to" means $5,000 out of $6,000 in your case. I intended to forewarn you of a coin-flip risk you may face.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

I'm impressed by your path to becoming a software engineer. That shows how willing you are to teach yourself, and your ability to learn programming (discipline and probably cognitive ability).

In the spirit of learning, consider if you are taking on more risk. What would you measure to decide if your risk is greater than a month ago?

Some time ago, you lost $140 spread over several trades - call it a loss of less than $50/trade. This past week, you lost $500, which is ten times as much. I have a theory: you are taking on greater risk, which has shown up in a larger loss. If you value learning about risk, this could be a chance to learn risk metrics and measure your level of risk.



To clarify, I assume "close to" means $5,000 out of $6,000 in your case. I intended to forewarn you of a coin-flip risk you may face.

I lost $500 over 3 or 4 trades, decided I wasn't seeing the charts right that day and walked away until the next day.

Everyone is going to have red days and even red weeks and months. That's just how it goes. However, too many people in those situations turn $500 loss days into $5000 loss days because they get mad and revenge trade.

That doesn't work. It's based on emotions and your mind isn't right to be taking any trades for the rest of the day. Just walk away, go replay the trades, make notes of where your mistakes were and where you didn't follow your rules and learn from it.

Then don't make those same mistakes again. I'm never going to be happy with where I am at. I always am looking to improve on what I am doing. There is ALWAYS something I could have done better.

Even in the example of the $500 loss day, I literally should have made $8K profit on that day. My entries were abysmal, I jumped the gun on 2 entries where I had already placed limit orders at the proper price point and then canceled and entered early, and then it did exactly what I thought it was going to do.

In this case, I simply didn't follow my entry rules and have patience to wait it out. And I took some L's that I should have made big profits on.

That's on me. I will learn from it and not make that mistake again.

 

[Divorced w 3]

Charts are charts bro. Stocks, crypto, forex, commodities. They all tell you the same information on them.

Either you can read them or you can't.

Did you trade any European pairs on Wednesday last week?

 

[BackInTheGame78]

Did you trade any European pairs on Wednesday last week?

I had a nice short on AUDCHF Wednesday.

 

[Divorced w 3]

I had a nice short on AUDCHF Wednesday.

That’s exactly my point. The chart doesn’t tell the entire story. Europe was closed for Labor Day not one single major bank was making that pair, and the icing on the cake is Powell spoke. You could have gotten your balls blown off. I was trying to trade out of Euros that day. I have been putting trades together in various stocks there the last week and converting it back. If I told you how much spread I took doing it you wouldn’t believe me.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

That’s exactly my point. The chart doesn’t tell the entire story. Europe was closed for Labor Day not one single major bank was making that pair, and the icing on the cake is Powell spoke. You could have gotten your balls blown off. I was trying to trade out of Euros that day. I have been putting trades together in various stocks there the last week and converting it back. If I told you how much spread I took doing it you wouldn’t believe me.

I don't trade during news events. I have an indicator that marks them on the chart for me. I typically scalp off the 15 min chart. In and out within an hour

 

[FlirtLife]

I lost $500 over 3 or 4 trades, decided I wasn't seeing the charts right that day and walked away until the next day.

Everyone is going to have red days and even red weeks and months. That's just how it goes. However, too many people in those situations turn $500 loss days into $5000 loss days because they get mad and revenge trade.

That doesn't work. It's based on emotions and your mind isn't right to be taking any trades for the rest of the day. Just walk away, go replay the trades, make notes of where your mistakes were and where you didn't follow your rules and learn from it.

Then don't make those same mistakes again. I'm never going to be happy with where I am at. I always am looking to improve on what I am doing. There is ALWAYS something I could have done better.

Even in the example of the $500 loss day, I literally should have made $8K profit on that day. My entries were abysmal, I jumped the gun on 2 entries where I had already placed limit orders at the proper price point and then canceled and entered early, and then it did exactly what I thought it was going to do.

In this case, I simply didn't follow my entry rules and have patience to wait it out. And I took some L's that I should have made big profits on.

That's on me. I will learn from it and not make that mistake again.

I think you missed the point of my post:

In the spirit of learning, consider if you are taking on more risk. What would you measure to decide if your risk is greater than a month ago?

 

[BackInTheGame78]

I think you missed the point of my post:

I risk no more than 1% on each trade

 

[Divorced w 3]

I don't trade during news events. I have an indicator that marks them on the chart for me. I typically scalp off the 15 min chart. In and out within an hour

That’s entire day was risk, all day long. Let’s say Russia does something dumb, you don’t have a single dealer supporting that pair, it’s you and your broker and now your pair is 1000 pips wide. You’re doing good but this is crucial to think about. Don’t trade when the big boys aren’t trading.