Member Trading JournalsAnyone can start their very own public trading journal to document their winning and losing trades, get opinions from community members, and learn from each others' trading experiences.
Actually I didnīt have big losses, but a lot of small losses, thatīs the problem and with the comission it got worse, for example I had a trade I think a month ago with a stock that costs 49 buck, it was 300 shares for 100 liquid profit, after that I had small losers of 10 to 15 cents and with the comission, that was 20 bucks per trade( 10 to buy and 10 to sell), it was 50 per loss, so with 3 losses I was already in red, and it helped a lot of times, thatīs why i decided to go to forex too, there the comission is lower when I have a smaller position. With the stocks if I took smaller positions, I would trade to pay the comission
This is definitely a problem as a commission of $10/300 shares is crazy (I pay $2.00/300 shares). Whenever possible I always suggest to active traders that they use a per share commission structure rather than per trade.
This is definitely a problem as a commission of $10/300 shares is crazy (I pay $2.00/300 shares). Whenever possible I always suggest to active traders that they use a per share commission structure rather than per trade.
Well here in Brazil the lowest commission we have is 10 per trade (5 to buy and 5 to sell) plus taxes ( 0,023%) + (0,023% if itīs a swing trade and 0,019% if itīs a day trade) and this broker that offers this 5 bucks doesnīt work with short positions and leverage
Hey excellent video! I'm taking a break to study some material then I'm going to be back in the hot seat. I funded a live account today but I'll only place a few trades on it if any before January.
About your first trade: You actually played that correctly and didn't know it, at least by my book. On the short term charts you have to be more aggressive to protect against a quick reversal. You took profits at the first s/r level but only after it scared you a little. You can try the method I'm working on right now if you want:
Basically take 1/4, 1/2, 1/3 or whatever portion of your trade you want to off the table at the first s/r level and move your stop to break even (BE). This may be too much work for the 15min charts so at the first s/r you could just move your stop to BE. At that point you are in a "free" trade so even if you get stopped out you never lost money.
You will probably get stopped out more often this way but the ones that do hit your take profit zone will be worth it.
About the small account trading.. I think it gives traders a false sense because you can lose $20 on a trade and shrug it off then next thing you know the account is gone and you say oh well it was only a small account..
Stick with a demo and treat it like a real account! Keep a very detailed log of your trades, %risk, daily balance and win/loss ratio (those are just a few things to get you started). If you can do that for a month or three then maybe look at a real account.
Just a few friendly suggestions. I wish you the best of luck and look forward to following your journey.
Hey excellent video! I'm taking a break to study some material then I'm going to be back in the hot seat. I funded a live account today but I'll only place a few trades on it if any before January.
About your first trade: You actually played that correctly and didn't know it, at least by my book. On the short term charts you have to be more aggressive to protect against a quick reversal. You took profits at the first s/r level but only after it scared you a little. You can try the method I'm working on right now if you want:
Basically take 1/4, 1/2, 1/3 or whatever portion of your trade you want to off the table at the first s/r level and move your stop to break even (BE). This may be too much work for the 15min charts so at the first s/r you could just move your stop to BE. At that point you are in a "free" trade so even if you get stopped out you never lost money.
You will probably get stopped out more often this way but the ones that do hit your take profit zone will be worth it.
About the small account trading.. I think it gives traders a false sense because you can lose $20 on a trade and shrug it off then next thing you know the account is gone and you say oh well it was only a small account..
Stick with a demo and treat it like a real account! Keep a very detailed log of your trades, %risk, daily balance and win/loss ratio (those are just a few things to get you started). If you can do that for a month or three then maybe look at a real account.
Just a few friendly suggestions. I wish you the best of luck and look forward to following your journey.
-Dr Pip
Hi Dr Pip
Thanks for the help and for the tipps, well taking half of position at the first S/R level is a good idea but i donīt know excatly how that platform works, when I want to close the position it doesnīt show anything to choose the positionīs size I want to exit, but anyway if I donīt like that platform I can change it.
Well I will put some trades here so we can learn from each other.
Hey excellent video! I'm taking a break to study some material then I'm going to be back in the hot seat. I funded a live account today but I'll only place a few trades on it if any before January.
About your first trade: You actually played that correctly and didn't know it, at least by my book. On the short term charts you have to be more aggressive to protect against a quick reversal. You took profits at the first s/r level but only after it scared you a little. You can try the method I'm working on right now if you want:
Basically take 1/4, 1/2, 1/3 or whatever portion of your trade you want to off the table at the first s/r level and move your stop to break even (BE). This may be too much work for the 15min charts so at the first s/r you could just move your stop to BE. At that point you are in a "free" trade so even if you get stopped out you never lost money.
You will probably get stopped out more often this way but the ones that do hit your take profit zone will be worth it.
About the small account trading.. I think it gives traders a false sense because you can lose $20 on a trade and shrug it off then next thing you know the account is gone and you say oh well it was only a small account..
Stick with a demo and treat it like a real account! Keep a very detailed log of your trades, %risk, daily balance and win/loss ratio (those are just a few things to get you started). If you can do that for a month or three then maybe look at a real account.
Just a few friendly suggestions. I wish you the best of luck and look forward to following your journey.
-Dr Pip
Hey guys,
I know some traders that will sell out of 1/3 of their position at each resistance zone they encounter and break through, however IMO this makes things difficult from a risk:reward standpoint. The problem with this is if you take 1/3 off your trade off the table at what we will call R1 and get stopped out at B/E with the other 2/3, you are only making 1/3 of your initial profit expectation while you are exposing yourself to the possibility of 1 whole unit of risk. So in the long run, you will likely lose money using this type of method in my opinion unless you are going to use an extremely tight stop which is something that I experimented with and didn't work too well for me. Although like I said I do know some traders who are able to trade using this so it most certainly is a method that could work, however you would certainly need to modify your risk:reward ratio so that it is able to work in the long run
As for the small accounts vs demo trading, this is another matter of opinion but in my personal experiences as well as working with other newer traders those that use the demo account for the first week or two to get a feel for things then jump into the live market tend to progress quicker and at a more advanced level. This is because no matter how you treat your demo account, the reality of it is at the end of the day it is just paper money, while a live account (even if it is small) is your real, hard earned money and brings with it the psychological and emotional part of trading (which I believe new traders need to be exposed to right away so they can begin the process of overcoming this state).
Personally I would rather blow out a small account, experience the psychological part of trading, and then open a new account once I feel I am ready than stay on demo and miss out on the psychological and emotional part of trading. Of course I am biased in this field because I jumped into the market with 1 day of demo experience and a rather large account but to me I really think the loss of funds was worth what I was able to learn
Hey guys,
I know some traders that will sell out of 1/3 of their position at each resistance zone they encounter and break through, however IMO this makes things difficult from a risk:reward standpoint. The problem with this is if you take 1/3 off your trade off the table at what we will call R1 and get stopped out at B/E with the other 2/3, you are only making 1/3 of your initial profit expectation while you are exposing yourself to the possibility of 1 whole unit of risk. So in the long run, you will likely lose money using this type of method in my opinion unless you are going to use an extremely tight stop which is something that I experimented with and didn't work too well for me. Although like I said I do know some traders who are able to trade using this so it most certainly is a method that could work, however you would certainly need to modify your risk:reward ratio so that it is able to work in the long run
As for the small accounts vs demo trading, this is another matter of opinion but in my personal experiences as well as working with other newer traders those that use the demo account for the first week or two to get a feel for things then jump into the live market tend to progress quicker and at a more advanced level. This is because no matter how you treat your demo account, the reality of it is at the end of the day it is just paper money, while a live account (even if it is small) is your real, hard earned money and brings with it the psychological and emotional part of trading (which I believe new traders need to be exposed to right away so they can begin the process of overcoming this state).
Personally I would rather blow out a small account, experience the psychological part of trading, and then open a new account once I feel I am ready than stay on demo and miss out on the psychological and emotional part of trading. Of course I am biased in this field because I jumped into the market with 1 day of demo experience and a rather large account but to me I really think the loss of funds was worth what I was able to learn
-Brendan
Yeah I agree with your points as well. I think everyone has to find what works for them. You and I are both speaking from past experience. You are clearly a better trader than I am right now too, now arguing there. Just opinion is all I can give. One thing I will say for sure is building up 2 accounts and blowing them both out was the best psychological experience for me, I didn't even know what a demo was at the time! Would I advise others to do it? No, money is money and if I could enter the market again with the two amounts I lost plus what I'm saving now I'd have a much larger account to trade with and that is an advantage in itself.
I agree scaling out of a position is hard to justify and very hard to accomplish properly. Psychologically it's easier to sit and watch a "free" trade play out. I was just thinking with the greater amount of opportunities on a 15min TF if you got stopped out a lot at BE it's easier to stomach than have a winner turn into a loser or get whipsawed into losses as the forex market tends to do. I know some of you say its slower than stocks which may be true, but S/R levels seem to be more fuzzy and the spread doesn't help.
Brendan has some valid points we could probably hash out with no real conclusion. The fact is there are many ways to trade and you have to find what works for you. Honestly my style is not very suitable for small TF. Well Jamp_one you have several potential directions to head in and I'm sure you will find what works for you. Sorry if I caused any confusion. As you can see we are all here to help.
Thanks for the help and for the tipps, well taking half of position at the first S/R level is a good idea but i donīt know excatly how that platform works, when I want to close the position it doesnīt show anything to choose the positionīs size I want to exit, but anyway if I donīt like that platform I can change it.
Well I will put some trades here so we can learn from each other.
Good luck with your trading
Which platform are you using? For starters Oanda was the easiest for me to learn on and the demo is unlimited in its length. Now I have an account with GFT and it is decent so far. If you have either of those I can help you out. One thing is some demo accounts have set variables like lot size but I have found if you call they can change settings to make things more realistic for you. (e.g., GFT has demo set at 100K lots. If you call them they will change it to 10k or 1k and adjust the amount of money in the account as well) Also I do not work for either company!
Well first of all I must thank you for sharing your opinion and it didnīt cause confusion at all.
The problem with a demo account is that I might be overtrading with it, once I donīt have to worry about protecting my capital and profits and thatīs what I donīt want to do, if hadnīt overtraded, I would have had 100% profit of my first investment but due to lack of experience, money managment and the greed to became a good trader I gave back all those profits. With a small account I would have to protect my capital and profits and thatīs something I really want to exercise. My aim with that small account is to stay alive and in the green as long as I can, it doesnīt matter if I earn 5 dollars in one month, the lesson is not to lose and protect that capital as if it was the only money I have.
As soon as I start that Iīll be taking notes everyday and Iīll post them here.
I had two losses today, here is the vídeo. Please add your comments and opinion so everyone can learn from it.
thanks.
Hey buddy,
Well my take on the trades are as follows:
Trade 1. Usd/Jpy Long position was a counter trend trade. You had a very large S/R zone just above your entry.
To have higher probability trades try to identify the major trend and only trade in the same direction. Also try to spot areas that are Free of major resistance. (e.g., look for trades that have room/potential to run into more open spaces)
Trade2. You shorted Gbp/Usd which was with the major trend.
Good you traded with the trend. You failed to notice the ascending triangle forming which worked against you.
For both trades: It is Friday which means the markets slow down a lot! Avoid trading Friday's market is a fair suggestion.
When I tried to scalp which is more or less what you are doing (although scalping is sometimes considered less than 1min trades), I could have a run of 2-3% days and then lose it all and more in one day's trading by weeks end. I am not consistent at it so I have no real suggestions other than what I had stated before:
1. Be Picky with trades bc you have plenty to choose from on 15 min
2. Get your stops to BE asap. You may not win many but you won't lose either.
other suggestion you probably don't want to hear. (I feel I must say it for my conscious so ignore it)
Suggestion 1: Look at larger time frames to trade. Why? Because a 1day candle carries a lot of weight, if you learn to read it you can slowly progress to lower TF charts. where the candles carry less and less weight.
Suggestion 2: If you lose more than 30% on the live account switch back to demo. No sense in losing it all. You will have proven you can lose money go to demo and prove you can make it next.
OK that is that I hope this helps you some. Again I am truly hoping you succeed and you have my support 100%. None of what I say is meant to be negative or I'd not say it, that is just my laid back personality and general good nature. I hope it comes across as that.
so ignore it)
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