I am determined to become a master trader focused primarily on CL (oil futures). This is a serious pursuit for me. I would prefer to hear advice from those who are experienced traders themselves and derive their primary income from trading.
Objectives I Want to Accomplish via a Career in Trading:
- Make a good living for my family
- Become debt-free
- Be able to spend time with my wife and children
- Be in control of my time and schedule
- Be able to assist our extended families, if necessary
- Be able to serve in my church and community in ways not possible when working for someone else
- Become financially independent
About Me
Previously, I was an IT Manager. My retirement was not growing as fast as I would have liked, and I did not think that it would allow me to retire securely in my old age. Also, I was always at the mercy of other people. Vacations were difficult to take as I always had to be accessible. I left my previous employment a little over 2 years ago. I bought my first stock ever in early 2009. I survived over the course of the last two years from income I derived mainly from investing in and trading penny stocks and sometimes big board stocks.
I began learning about trading intraday timeframes in December of 2009. I started practicing with ETF's (FAS/FAZ). I mostly broke even while trading those in the early part of 2010. Later in 2010, I introduced myself to a trader I was referred to by someone I knew. He and I began to work together on a nearly daily basis for a couple of months in the fall of 2010. He introduced me to futures, and I decided to pursue them due to the fact that they didn't seem any harder to trade than other things I had been working on, they required less capital, and they have tax advantages. I used NinjaTrader in simulation mode and then I tried live trading.
I started to do fairly well trading CL, and for a time in November of 2010, was averaging about $800/day. Then, on the day before Thanksgiving of 2010, I made a very bad mistake and ended up taking a $6,000 loss. I was trading more contracts than I really should have, but the worst thing of all is that I could have gotten out of that trade at break even or close to it, but did not. That has been my haunting memory over the last year. I traded a little bit more for a few days after that but stopped as I was too "gun shy" then.
Over the last year, I have continued to work on becoming a successful futures trader. For much of this year, I have practiced most every day with NinjaTrader in market replay mode and then against the live market in simulation mode. I posted my live "sim" trading results on my own board on Investors Hub. You can review them here, if you like:
I read posts that suggested one should stay on sim until one can be profitable consistently over time. I believe that, and I worked toward that result.
Last week, I started trading live again. Here are my results so far:
09/29/2011 - $503.36
09/30/2011 - did not trade as I was sick with whatever my wife and children had been sick with during the week
10/03/2011 - $2,181.20
10/04/2011 - $1,311.20
10/05/2011 - $1,006.72
I am starting this trading journal because I still do not yet have the feeling that I know that I can succeed at this, and I need and want to improve. I have read that a trading journal can be very effective at helping one to improve and so that is my expectation for myself through keeping this journal.