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Hi Mike just joined your forum and also signed up for your elite membership. I have been trading full time for over a year in futures and stocks and have trained with some of the best instructors out there and vowed that I would not trade live until I could be consistently profitable and learn when I am wrong in the trade and get out with a small loss and move on to the next trade. I have developed a scalping method on using the 125 tick chart using a 4 contract atm based on pure price action and reading the bars. (Swing high lows and support and resistance) My goal on my trades to capture 20 ticks on 4 contracts and max loss of 4 ticks on 4 contracts. I don't know if it is possible to program this method of trading into a strategy but that is what I would like to explore by being a member of this forum. I am not a programmer but I am willing to learn. I would like to continue this discussion in the Elite forum and work with several seasoned programmers to develop this trading method into something we can all use to profit from the next market crash. I am attaching my trade log from 4/24/2010 . Looking forward to working with you guys.
Please, English only on the forum. You can use the private message system for your native language, but for public posts they are to be in English only.
Hi Everyone,
I have been in the game for 2 years. I have been pretty consistent for the past 9 months and have learned quite a bit about trading and myself in this time. I am now looking to move into automated trading as I see it as being the only way I can really get up to the next level. Thanks everyone for all the work you have done on this site. I look forward to finding ways I too will be able to contribute.
Cheers!
I often find myself on this forum when searching for stuff on Google, so thought it was time to join up.
I started trading just before the .com bomb ... yep bought right at the top a blew all the money I had saved for my tax bill, ouch, that scared me off for a while. Then about 3 years ago we sold our (IT) company and I had the "clever" idea that I would make a living trading(hahahahahaha .. hindsight is funny)
Unfortunately I had some fairly serious money to play with (after all I was going to make this my business). I'd met a futures brokers once and he was very rich (or appeared to be) so I thought, that's where the money is, in the futures market. I had no idea at all about what the futures market was, only that you can make lots of money from it, somehow betting on what was going to happen in the ... future.
The first night I traded, I lost enough to make myself physically sick, it was terrible, when you start to think of all the things you could have done with that hard earned money. So I put a stop to trading immediately and signed up for some pretty expensive trading rooms and courses (thousands of dollars worth). So now I was in phase 2, that is loosing money slowly rather than fast. I was actually getting pretty good at it but my psychology wasn't right. What would happen is I would make good money Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and then on Thursday, they first 2 trade of the day would go bad, and I would revenge trade the rest of the day, I just could not help myself and I'd loose a months worth. This happened time and time again. I moved from index futures to forex futures and then to forex spot, blew many accounts, but I just could not get over the psychological aspects to loosing.
At the same time other traders I was meeting in the varies trading rooms and courses all had the same story, they where all loosing money, I don't think I ever met one that was making any. Even old floor traders that use to deal in the pit couldn't make money on the screens. That hardly gave me confidence.
So now phase three, I started to try to program some of the strategies I used into trading systems. I decided that my psychology just did not suit manual trading.
Then I found the magical optimize button .. the button that promises you the world, but delivers you dust. I had strategies optimized to their eyeballs, with profit factors of 3, win % of 90% and I was sure that I had cracked it, I was going to get all my money back and be rich and donate to charity and go back to car racing blah blah blah.
Well that was the next hard lessen I had to learn. Trading systems need to stay as a simple idea, by adding things to them to increase the profitability and smooth the equity curve you are just filtering out the past (like that game 'Guess Who' I think it is called).
So I bought some of the recommended books about trading system design and optimization and learned just how hard it is to get a good consistent system running in this day and age. 20 years ago I could have got my Commodore 64 and made a mint out of MA crosses and breakout strats ... not so easy now days. Everyone is getting into it, the market is getting efficient to then and the systems stop working.
Anyway after countless hours, countless strategy tests, hundreds of long nights and sunrises, I now have good tick data, a good strategy, in the right market and I'm finally starting to claw my way back. I've learned not to get too excited about the future of my trading, so I won't.
My name is Roger Felton and I began trading in 1984 with a partner who was quite adept at trading penny stocks. I learned a lot from him. Mostly about controling risk. We made a little money but not enough to support our lavish trailer park lifestyle so we kept our day jobs. Later, I began trading on my own and doing ok but I hated doing all the research stock trading required.
Then I discovered the E-minis in about 1999 and I was hooked on trading futures electronically. After blowing up my initial account, I realized that risk control wasn't enough for this game. I had to work on emotion control. At the same time, I worked on developing a trading method that I could build confidence in. Over the next couple of years, I began speaking at most of the major tradeshows regularly and built a following.
After helping develop strategies for two major education firms, I entered the shark infested waters of trading education for myself and established Felton Trading in 2005. The days are long and comes with tremendous responsibility but I never regretted the decision. I am greatly disappointed in the way this industry is setting trader expectations. Trading is NOT a get-rich-quick scheme. It's a skill that must be developed and practiced...just like we learn anything else.
I was very pleasently surprised to find Big Mike's Forum. Mike and I have never communicated but I can tell he and I think very much alike. His members are his friends and all that he does is in the interest of their success as well as his. Thanks, Mike!
I started demo trading in 2007. After witnessing my stellar performance; eat my dust Gann, I quickly dumped $10K into a live account.
While fantasizing about which island resort I was going to live on and what brand silk underwear I'd be wearing from this point on... I was rudely awaken in the middle of the night by a loud ringing bell sound coming from my computer. Surely, this must the sound of a cash register letting me know I needed to make a withdrawal because it was getting to full.
But wait, something was not right. Maybe I'm just not fully awake yet. Maybe I'm really still asleep... WTF, where did 85% of my money go!%$!#%@#^@ And who the hell took a short position on the Swissie after it had already moved down a few thousand pips
Well, such is story of my market donation (margin call). I took the rest of the year off to lick my wounds and decide if I really wanted to do this. Reopened anther account in 2009 and ended the year with a 45% ROI. Not bad, but still consider it a failure. I accomplished it with an EA and way more risk than I comfortable with. I did learn a lot watching it do its thing and became accurately aware of retracements and cycles.
So, now it's time learn proper manual techniques: price action, sound money management (low DD's), and most importantly, self control. Glad I found this forum and look forward to contributing what little I can... and learning a lot. BTW, to this day, I still cannot trade the Swissie
--
Patrick
I would like to thank Mike, first of all, for the great job of putting this forum together, and also to you members for your insightful postings.
There is a lot to discover and understand about the trading world and the more the enlightened voices we hear, the merrier. My hope is that this forum is the platform I have been looking for in order to get worthy advice and pass on the same, so as to keep this interest of ours alive and thriving.
You should join the elite section and start a journal. that way the rest of us can benefit from your journey and success.....its always interesting to hear other peoples journey's.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
