Throwing Money Out the Window

This is going to be a real quick post.  I'll elaborate more when I have time later today.  This week, I feel like I'm driving 85 miles an hour down Route 80 in a convertible with 1000 $10 bills just thrown on the seats and on the floor.  You can imagine how quickly people would be slamming on the brakes to grab some money off the highway.

Out of total and utter frustration, I actually took the advice of 1 of you who stated that why not go Contrarian on yourself and if you are about to go long on a trade, go short instead.  Well, not having a good trading week and unable to get any upward pip profit movement, I decided this morning to do the opposite of what "conventional wisdom" from my brain was telling me.  WHAT DO YOU KNOW, a quick and easy 30 pip profit.  If I had done this over the last 2 weeks, I would have been very profitable.  I don't want to do this though and I don't even know if it could even be successful after a while.  I'm thinking that it would be hard for me to continue to study the charts looking for a setup and then at the moment of execution, go opposite of what I think.  Could doing this actually change the way I think about trading and mold my thinking to a profitable way?  Would I subconsciously look for setups that were contrarian and then go opposite of this which would really just be doing what I'm doing now?  Who knows.  

Talk to you later. 

 

Popularity: 2%

Currency Trader Expo

I wanted to mention that FXCM is hosting a Currency Trader Expo in New York on June 3rd and June 4th.  I've heard of this before but I just got something in the mail about it so I decided to take a closer look.  

It looks like there will be a lot of traders/authors that a lot of us have heard of including Rob Booker, Alexander Elder, Jack Schwager, Kathy Lein, Boris Schlossberg, Steve Nison, and more.  Most of the workshops are free (40 of them) except for a four that are under $200.   The schedule looks packed with some great stuff.  

I will certainly be attending for 3 reasons:

1. I want to see the faces behind the words of these "successful" traders
2. It may help in improving my trading
3. I am 8 miles away from it so it's convenient

If you cannot make it, I will try to be your reporter.  I'll take pictures, notes, and whatever else I can.  We still have a couple of months to go though so I'll remind everyone beforehand.

Read more about the currency trader expo

Popularity: 4%

Flogging Anyone?

I appreciate Greg's comments and agree with everything he says.  In particular, I agree with the facts that:

1. I am getting flogged.  If this was actually happening physically, I'd be a bloody pile of mess.
2. The 5% who consistently make money are taking the other 95%'s money (including mine) 

The reality is that though I have lost money, it hasn't been more than $2000 (give or take a couple hundred.)  It has cost me a lot more in time and effort.  I don't consider the loss of thousands of dollars a waste considering the 6+ months of experience I have received.  The $1000 for a mentor is also money that I feel is well spent even though the results have not been realized yet.  I was chatting with Rob during the US session today and as far as I can tell, he is trading for real during these times.  It is also no wonder that most mentors are probably failed traders that decided that they could do well teaching others a very difficult thing.  This doesn't mean that they know how to make money trading forex.  You can compare it to a professional sports coach who was never successful as a player but is as a coach.  There are many examples of this.  They aren't necessarily there to tell you what to trade but are there to prepare you for when you do decide to trade.

The goal of this site is to be truthful and honest.   I can tell all of you that though I have thought about not posting a losing trade in my trade history because of fear from criticism, I never did not post it.  I feel strongly that if you cannot be honest with others, you cannot be honest with yourself and therefore you will never learn. 

As always I appreciate all the comments that come in and hope that I can and others can learn from this.  If after 2 years, I'm still posting crap about losing, then shoot me down because I should not be doing this.  I promise that I will not enter the world of mentoring either.  I am not without faults in my trading (specifically with randomly trying things with real money, emotional trades, overtrades, and all the rest) but after 6+ months, I still have confidence I can do this for a living.  It's not going to be easy but think of all the hope it will give others if I can manage to beat the odds. 

Don't come to this site if you want trading advice (THAT'S FOR SURE… at least not yet) but if the 95% of you want to see someone going through exactly what you are going through, come on in.  Post your comments because I truly respect every one of you that has and if I am successful, I will attribute it to you.  

Enough of this Rah rah rah…  After reading this over, it sounds like I'm about to cry….

Popularity: 3%

I Signed Up For Forex 1 on 1 Training

I have felt totally lost over the last couple of months.  I have books, charting software, a blog where I receive numerous helpful comments from all of you and yet I don't really have a trading strategy.  I've dedicated a lot of my time to this and though I'm in the early stages, I feel like I need to head off any of the "giving up" feeling that may be entering my mind.  I know that going forward if I don't do something to stimulate my learning process, my blog will be yet another sitting around with stale content because I'm off working for the man again with no thoughts of being free.

So what did I do?  I signed up for 1 on 1 training with Rob Booker.  The training will officially last 5 weeks.  I trust Rob Booker and have been exposed to his recommendations and articles in the past. Here is a quick course overview.  I will keep everyone updated on the training.

Anyone interested in reading more about it can visit: https://www.robbooker.com/training.html 

Course Overview: 

1 on 1 training is exactly what
it sounds like: it's where you and I work every day, by
instant message, phone, videoconference, and email, and
we turn you into the kind of trader that your mother (or
spouse) would be proud of. We work together officially
for 5 weeks — following the course outline below — but
I will work with you for as long as it takes for you to
be a consistently profitable trader. I
guarantee it.

This is not some ridiculous
course that you buy and read and then find impossible
to profit from. It makes me sick to my stomach when
I hear that someone has spent $2,000 or $3,000 for a book-based
system. You don't need a book. You need a mentor.

During the training, I become your
mentor and your coach with one mission: to dramatically
improve your trading results.

Training officially lasts 5 weeks.
But we will not stop working until you are successful,
or we're both dead. Note: no one has ever died. Every
one I've trained has been successful.

You will have my phone number.
This is about getting personal advice from someone who
has been in the market. I can help you correct your mistakes
and speed up your path to trading success.

You will receive course materials,
30-40 assignments, and at least 80 hours of total instruction.

I worked with 41 traders in 2003.
All of them are still going strong.

You will always be able to contact
me, even after the training is complete. You will be part
of a growing network of people I've trained, all across
the world.

I have training references. You
can request them from me if you are thinking of signing
up.

Popularity: 3%

Week 15 performance

This week was my 4th straight losing week.  I lost $1220 this week which drops my overall profit over 15 weeks to $1243.  Even though my P/L isn’t looking good as of late, I really am not discouraged.  I have the confidence and determination to continue onward and I have the belief that I will be successful.  I am just going through the stages of learning and if it costs me money to learn, so be it. 

This week I used my first self designed trading system and followed through on every signal it gave me.  Unfortunately it is a range trading system and the EURO had some pretty nice gains against the dollar this week.  Therefore, my trading system did not perform well.  I will continue to use it.  I will stick by my hours upon hours of work. 

Popularity: 2%

Steve Shenker’s Trading Corner

It's actually Sam Shenker's Trading Corner and it can be found here:

http://www.forexproject.com/Blog/Investing_and_Trading/Original_Traders_Corner/

Popularity: 2%

Weekend Reading - Keeping an eye on Momentum

Keep An Eye On Momentum

http://www.investopedia.com/articles/forex/05/MomentumMACD.asp

This article states the obvious yet brings up a simple setup that I never thought about.  The basic premise is that momentum precedes price.  Any momentum indicator can be used but this article uses MACD as an example.

1.    Define a MACD segment.  Segment #1 below.

 

 

 

 

2.    Measure the highest bar of segment #1.  In the above case, the highest bar was .004.

3.    Wait until the next segment forms; segment #2 above.  If a bar from segment #2 falls below -.004, downward momentum has exceeded previous upward momentum.
Segment #2 consists of 10 bars.  The values are in order from left to right (-.001, -.004, -.006, -.007, -.008, -.008, -.008, -.006, -.002, -.0008)

The third bar from the left is -.006, showing greater momentum than during anytime in segment #1. Sell at the close of this bar (price=1.7579.)  Exit the position at your discretion but a good time to do so might be when momentum slows.  Momentum stalls 2 consecutive bars at bar #7.  MACD value is -.008.  Exit at the close of this bar (price=1.7381)

The profit is close to 200 pips.  Like every other setup, this will not always be successful and should be used in conjunction with other confirmation tools. 

What I like most about this setup is its simplicity.

Popularity: 3%