...Why?

Why do you trade what you trade?

One of the first questions newbies get asked is "What do you plan on trading? Which market/instrument?"

Thought it would be useful and helpful for newbies, and the bored and curious on a Sunday evening.

Did you wake up one morning and think "I know, I'm going to trade Nasdaq stocks for a living", or, "I met a guy down the pub who says he earns...

Personally, I started out on indicies, primarily FTSE as it was the most prominent one on the Yahoo home page and finance pages. It wasn't until I started researching further that I moved on to the DOW. At the time the thought of trading particular US Stocks or CFD's overwhelmed me and I wouldn't have known where to start. Once I realised how bad I was at the DOW , I moved on to forex. I had worked briefly as a forex broker in Asia ten years ago through an advert looking for 'no experience, training given!' but at the time I was blissfully ignorant and left for barwork quickly as I was travelling around at the time.

I finally settled on Forex, and after many painstaking hours found a way of earning a living through trading it and I was content.

I now trade forex because

• The 24 hour market allows me to revolve it around my life
• The larger movements, than say, UK stocks or the FTSE
• I've found a consistent method of making money
• And of course, I was absolutely hopeless at indicies

I'm sure theres plenty of other reasons as to why (or not) people trade different markets

• Local indicies
• Time difference
• intra-day or swing trader
• Investor

Anyhow, thought it may be useful to give people an idea on the reasons around choosing their preferred instrument of wealth (or poverty!)

Chris