Years Trading To Date

!BigBadBarry

Hi all

Firstly i'd like to say i'm not sure if this is the right forum for this thread, mods can move it if they wish, just want to tell my little story of this years trading.

A bit of background first......been trading on and off for 9 yrs now, went through most of the stages i think, trading the dow thinking i'll be a millionaire in 3 yrs......didn't happen, bought trading software, the bugger rewrote the past to make itself look good !
Discovered forex, nice trends ah this is it for me sorted now, add lots of indicators,take them away, add them again, try and follow other peoples systems, go to chat rooms pick other traders brains (most traders lose and in chatrooms they make up trades to make themselves look good or u have newbies telling u that trading 1 min charts is the way to go, maybe it is but it's not for me as i know now) tried trading daily, 4hr, 1hr, 8hr, 15min, 5min, 1min charts !!! no i'm still losing my bollocks trading !

so

Stopped chatrooms, looked around forums but didn't interact much, reading trading books here and there, taking a little bit of this and that system here and there and finally this year in January decided this is it, if this year doesn't end in profit no matter how big or small i'm stopping trading and gonna figure out something else to make my fortune.

so.................. drum roll........

Been looking over my excel spreadsheet of trades for the year and knew i was up 1200 pips give or take a few pips here and there between Feb and now (been working a full time shift work job in-between and looking after a family too in the meantime) but..... i wasn't sure of the actual profits because some trades i'd use the mini account that i don't really care about hence smaller trades and other trades i'd use the "good" account that i do care about hence larger trades. So tonight i looked at the percentages and low and behold the "good" account is up 165% this year and the other account i don't really care about is up 60% ! I'm so happy i can't describe it, having said that the amounts i'm trading are very small relatively speaking. BUT how much do hedge funds make over a year, +30-40% and they're superstars.......and no i'm not setting up a hedge fund....just yet....

This post is not a boast about how good i am look at me, i'm sitting here looking at the figures delighted, over the moon thinking i've got this whole trading thing sorted but i haven't, far from it and well from past experience i'm not so sure personally speaking i ever will have trading sorted. Just so happens this year for the first time in 9 yrs i've made a profit and i'm gonna do my best to make sure next year is a bigger profit. Personally i think anyone that tells you "i have trading sorted just follow me" is talking bollocks, markets move and change so much it's all about money management at the end of the day, you look at the R:R and decide is this trade worth taking, there will always be another trade.

Final point i know there are other traders out there making more than me, fair play to them i honestly wish them the best of luck, all i'm saying is i've finally found what works for me and next year i'll be better because looking back over my trades i'm thinking "jesus i made some **** trades" but .. i got away with it, next year i intend not to make them **** trades.

so

Dunno, half expect this thread to be pulled to ribbons if it is it is, just telling my story, seen a few good people over the years getting put off forums because of negative feedback (easy to be a hardman/woman behind a laptop or computer) hence why i kept my distance over the years. Very tempted to mention traders who influenced me but dunno......doubt they even look on trading forums anymore and even if they did would they notice me (i'm going back to Moneytec here). Look at the end of the day it's all good like life you take out of things what you will and you get of things what you put into them. This is just a small message to anyone out there thinking "i can't do this", because you can, sure even now i still have days/weeks where i'm thinking i can't do this and to be honest i'm sure there's a lot of hedge fund managers/proprietary traders that think the same thing.

I'm sure everyone knows the stats, 95% of traders lose because they give up after the first year, the ones that make it to yr 3 or 5 blah blah blah, know of someone that had all these stats and they are frightening.

There is light at the end it's up to you if you really want to get there and achieve all you want to achieve in life, remember this is your only chance at it, i hope you achieve all you want to. I know i'm on my way there ...... at last

neil.p.b

Great post Barry and well done. Always nice to see someone making money trading, no better feeling.

There was one point in your post that really stood out for me and i couldn't agree more with - "there will always be another trade". I think when this realisation starts to dawn on traders its when patience begins to overcome fear and greed (the two things that kill a trader) and profits begin to roll in more consistently.

I also lol'd at the newbies telling you that trading 1mins is the way to go, adrenaline junkies making up a lot of that 95%! Though we were probably all there for a moment at the start!

Just out of curiosity if you don't mind me asking after all those years what have you ended up trading? Daily Forex?

!BigBadBarry

neil.p.b wrote: »

Great post Barry and well done. Always nice to see someone making money trading, no better feeling.

There was one point in your post that really stood out for me and i couldn't agree more with - "there will always be another trade". I think when this realisation starts to dawn on traders its when patience begins to overcome fear and greed (the two things that kill a trader) and profits begin to roll in more consistently.

I also lol'd at the newbies telling you that trading 1mins is the way to go, adrenaline junkies making up a lot of that 95%! Though we were probably all there for a moment at the start!

Just out of curiosity if you don't mind me asking after all those years what have you ended up trading? Daily Forex?

Yes trading forex mostly, trades can last from a few hrs to a few days. Starting to look more at trading shares too but finding the time to do all the research is the problem at the moment.

Hope your trading is going well too ?

freeze4real

What time frame do you use, and your indicators ?

Jaggy

Great post and good to hear you're doing well. I've not been in the game for as long as you but everything you're saying rings true with me, i'm sure it does with anyone that has been trading for any sustained amount of time. My first year live (2011) was profitable and I was very happy to have achieved this. This year wasn't quite so good. (I was so sure i'd have that Lambo by the end of this year :rolleyes:)

But still, it's something I really enjoy doing so i'm looking forward to the Xmas break and tackling it again next year with some new ideas.

I'm mainly trading Forex with VSA and PnF.

How do you trade? Broker and MT4? Spreadbetting?

Cheers,

Jaggy.

neil.p.b

!BigBadBarry wrote: »

Yes trading forex mostly, trades can last from a few hrs to a few days. Starting to look more at trading shares too but finding the time to do all the research is the problem at the moment.

Hope your trading is going well too ?

Yes its been a very good year. I trade FTSE shares as well as the FTSE and DJI so the past couple of weeks have been a bit boring with the market indecision, i'm just winding down a few positions until it makes up its mind.

Just FYI, in some cases i'll know a lot about the company so my fundamental understanding of it is up to scratch but generally i know very little. I might do 10-15 mins on it and check the BBs to see if there is any RNS due but apart from that all time is spent on the chart. Fundamentals come into play about 5-10% of the year, the chart tells you everything you need to know so time is split accordingly.

Jaggy

neil.p.b wrote: »

Yes its been a very good year. I trade FTSE shares as well as the FTSE and DJI so the past couple of weeks have been a bit boring with the market indecision, i'm just winding down a few positions until it makes up its mind.

Just FYI, in some cases i'll know a lot about the company so my fundamental understanding of it is up to scratch but generally i know very little. I might do 10-15 mins on it and check the BBs to see if there is any RNS due but apart from that all time is spent on the chart. Fundamentals come into play about 5-10% of the year, the chart tells you everything you need to know so time is split accordingly.

Could never really get my head around fundamentals. There are so many examples of when a market does the complete opposite to what fundamentals may suggest. I don't claim to be a **** hot trader but like you say, the charts tell the story for the most part. Technical analysis is the place to be. If the charts aren't telling you a story then stay out!

The only time i'm paying attention to news is knowing when not to be in the market. News announcements like NFP and GDP in Forex markets. No one wants to be whipsawed / stopped out only to find the market back where it was 1 min before the news came out.

neil.p.b

Jaggy, exactly. Here's a two pictures of four different oilers charted against each. The first is RRL vs. BPC and the second XEL vs BLVN. Completely different fundamentals (albeit all oilers) yet the charts run with each other almost exactly.

bpcrrl.png

xelbv.png

Jaggy

neil.p.b wrote: »

Jaggy, exactly. Here's a two pictures of four different oilers charted against each. The first is RRL vs. BPC and the second XEL vs BLVN. Completely different fundamentals (albeit all oilers) yet the charts run with each other almost exactly.

bpcrrl.png

xelbv.png

Interesting for sure. Nice to see volume on the first chart too

I also notice you're using Pro Real Time, do they have Point and Figure charts as a charting option? I think I looked into them before but can't remember now.

!BigBadBarry

freeze4real wrote: »

What time frame do you use, and your indicators ?

Only use daily charts, sometimes use 1hr charts for entries. I use the best indicator ever invented.........price action..... all other indicators lag.

Jaggy wrote: »

Great post and good to hear you're doing well. I've not been in the game for as long as you but everything you're saying rings true with me, i'm sure it does with anyone that has been trading for any sustained amount of time. My first year live (2011) was profitable and I was very happy to have achieved this. This year wasn't quite so good. (I was so sure i'd have that Lambo by the end of this year )

But still, it's something I really enjoy doing so i'm looking forward to the Xmas break and tackling it again next year with some new ideas.

I'm mainly trading Forex with VSA and PnF.

How do you trade? Broker and MT4? Spreadbetting?

Cheers,

Jaggy.

I trade using a broker, spreadbetting and mt4 for charts. Good to hear your trading is going well, hope u keep a trading diary ?

neil.p.b wrote: »

Yes its been a very good year. I trade FTSE shares as well as the FTSE and DJI so the past couple of weeks have been a bit boring with the market indecision, i'm just winding down a few positions until it makes up its mind.

Just FYI, in some cases i'll know a lot about the company so my fundamental understanding of it is up to scratch but generally i know very little. I might do 10-15 mins on it and check the BBs to see if there is any RNS due but apart from that all time is spent on the chart. Fundamentals come into play about 5-10% of the year, the chart tells you everything you need to know so time is split accordingly.

Yes i'd agree the charts tell u a lot of what u need to know.

Jaggy

!BigBadBarry wrote: »

I trade using a broker, spreadbetting and mt4 for charts. Good to hear your trading is going well, hope u keep a trading diary ?

It's not going so well this year! But keeping at it. Yeah I keep a blog over at blogspot. Used to be very active over at ForexFactory but like you said above I cut down on a lot of forum usage.

That was before setting up another VSA forum with other traders. But it's slow enough there so it doesn't take up a lot of my time.

!BigBadBarry

Jaggy wrote: »

It's not going so well this year! But keeping at it. Yeah I keep a blog over at blogspot. Used to be very active over at ForexFactory but like you said above I cut down on a lot of forum usage.

That was before setting up another VSA forum with other traders. But it's slow enough there so it doesn't take up a lot of my time.

Oh, sorry to hear it's not going well, just keep at it and keep your trading size small till things turn around.

neil.p.b

Jaggy wrote: »

Interesting for sure. Nice to see volume on the first chart too

I also notice you're using Pro Real Time, do they have Point and Figure charts as a charting option? I think I looked into them before but can't remember now.

They do afaik, but i don't use them so i don't know how good they are.