Some Advice

I have spent a fair bit of time reading the literature on this forum over the last couple of days. I am looking at trading for two reasons:

- I currently have an investment ISA through a IFA and Skandia (hasn't really made much in the way of profit and is quite costly)
- Work for an audit firm who requires you declare your investments for independence reasons
- It would be nice to actually put in a bit of leg work and effort and see (7% equivalent AER) from an investment(s) and feel proud of it

I am not looking to get rich or really produce a second income, but I am looking to learn and eventually be able to have net earnings £15-£20 per hour of time spent.
So here are some questions:

• I work 35-50 hours a week already, so would not wish to spend more than 2 hours a day at this. Is it worth the time and effort for this small investment in time?
• Given that I have to declare every stock that I own (even if its for just one day), I would ideally have a time frame of a 3-5days for each trade. Would this ever work?
• I am always travelling with my job, so would ideally want to use a mobile based trading platform. Do any exist? Any recommendations?
• I don't plan to invest a penny until I have tested a methodology that returns the equivalent of 7% per year on my initial capital. Are there any platforms out there (again mobile based) that allow such testing? Amy I being too cautious?
• Finally, where on Earth do I start? I have read about trading plans on this site but would not know where to start with fundamental and technical analysis which would go in to such a plan. Its great being able to have a plan but at the same time I need something to put in such a plan

Any advice would be appreciated

visualAd said:

I have spent a fair bit of time reading the literature on this forum over the last couple of days. I am looking at trading for two reasons:

- I currently have an investment ISA through a IFA and Skandia (hasn't really made much in the way of profit and is quite costly)
- Work for an audit firm who requires you declare your investments for independence reasons
- It would be nice to actually put in a bit of leg work and effort and see (7% equivalent AER) from an investment(s) and feel proud of it

I am not looking to get rich or really produce a second income, but I am looking to learn and eventually be able to have net earnings £15-£20 per hour of time spent.
So here are some questions:

• I work 35-50 hours a week already, so would not wish to spend more than 2 hours a day at this. Is it worth the time and effort for this small investment in time?
• Given that I have to declare every stock that I own (even if its for just one day), I would ideally have a time frame of a 3-5days for each trade. Would this ever work?
• I am always travelling with my job, so would ideally want to use a mobile based trading platform. Do any exist? Any recommendations?
• I don't plan to invest a penny until I have tested a methodology that returns the equivalent of 7% per year on my initial capital. Are there any platforms out there (again mobile based) that allow such testing? Amy I being too cautious?
• Finally, where on Earth do I start? I have read about trading plans on this site but would not know where to start with fundamental and technical analysis which would go in to such a plan. Its great being able to have a plan but at the same time I need something to put in such a plan

Any advice would be appreciated

Click to expand...

Hi Visual....

Re putting only couple of hours a day on your trading looks like you are gonna need to be trading on higher TF's like Daily or even Weekly... this has nothing bad at all, it is just another way to look at trading and it can be tremendous profitable if you know what you are doing and get some time to put the famous "trading plan" together.... on daily or weekly time frame(....you can even trade another tf's like 4H for example) you would be holding some trades for many days and/or weeks as you said....

Re travelling a lot.... there is no doubt that you would need a mobile trading platform.... anyways, this is not a problem at all as most of the brokers out there have their own mobile App's nowadays....

Now, about the 7% yearly return you are aiming for, to be honest, and without sounding like "trading is easy", that it is not at all....but you can perfectly achieve it and over come it by a lot....It all comes to the same thing.... get your time to learn as much as possible (in this Forum there are a lot of great info), learn about everything since the basic price action, to psychology going through money management, risk management, market/s you are interested in trading and their individual and collective characteristics, etc, etc....a lot of stuff.... then, when you little by little have all your "plan" crystal clear, and you feel like you are ready... only then, is when you are just starting....
a little bit of a demo trading, then going live with the less risk per trade possible, and then little by little you will be in the position to go for it.....
It sounds a long way to cover, and to be honest, it is, but I think I'm being realistic here.... and of course, it is nothing that cannot be achieved...

Re where to start, you said you read a lot here lately:
this you started with the very beginning Trading FAQ?

I hope this helps you a bit....
If you have any question, just shout them

Yup, longer term imho. bridging the gap between trading and investing maybe?
In other words a pro active approach to investing.

visualAd said:

I have spent a fair bit of time reading the literature on this forum over the last couple of days. I am looking at trading for two reasons:

- I currently have an investment ISA through a IFA and Skandia (hasn't really made much in the way of profit and is quite costly)
- Work for an audit firm who requires you declare your investments for independence reasons
- It would be nice to actually put in a bit of leg work and effort and see (7% equivalent AER) from an investment(s) and feel proud of it

I am not looking to get rich or really produce a second income, but I am looking to learn and eventually be able to have net earnings £15-£20 per hour of time spent.
So here are some questions:

• I work 35-50 hours a week already, so would not wish to spend more than 2 hours a day at this. Is it worth the time and effort for this small investment in time?
• Given that I have to declare every stock that I own (even if its for just one day), I would ideally have a time frame of a 3-5days for each trade. Would this ever work?
• I am always travelling with my job, so would ideally want to use a mobile based trading platform. Do any exist? Any recommendations?
• I don't plan to invest a penny until I have tested a methodology that returns the equivalent of 7% per year on my initial capital. Are there any platforms out there (again mobile based) that allow such testing? Amy I being too cautious?
• Finally, where on Earth do I start? I have read about trading plans on this site but would not know where to start with fundamental and technical analysis which would go in to such a plan. Its great being able to have a plan but at the same time I need something to put in such a plan

Any advice would be appreciated

Click to expand...

Hi and welcome to the forum!

I hope I can help you out with a couple of the points you have mentioned.

There are such platforms that you can use that you dont have to invest all your time in. Mirrortrader is a platform where you can follow other traders. It enables automatic real-time execution, based on the trader’s individually selected strategies. You can find it for example here: Axiory MirrorTrader - Axiory, Forex Broker, But to be frank, I personally think it may be quiet confusing for the start, and still takes some time to learn and use efficiently.

However my own opinion is that in order to really do a stable and good profit on forex, you need to put quiet some time into it, studying, trying, and knowing what is going on. If the time is not there, then having someone trade for you might be a good idea. There are few such companies available, offering to automatically have trades transmitted to your account. For example: Performance | Multitrader

As for the platform then the choice for many is the Metatrader 4 (we also have it available for the Mac). This is one of the most popular platforms around and you can use it on the go as well as you mentioned. You can use it on iPhone, BlackBerry and Android. You can also use the demo account on your mobile and its easy to download, so as long as you have the internet then you can trade!

I agree with you in regards to not trading live until you have tried and tested these options.

Please let me know, if you think I was at least a bit helpful, or if I can help any more

Kind regards,

Jeff

1. How much time do you spend depend upon you.
2. I can not say anything sure about time frame.
3. Yes, mobile based trading will be right choice for you. All top brokers offer mobile trading like AVAFX, etoro, FXCM etc.
4. I am not familiar with any any platforms that allows to test a methodology.
5. You should start with fundamental and then move to technical analysis.

Patricia12 said:

1. How much time do you spend depend upon you.
2. I can not say anything sure about time frame.
3. Yes, mobile based trading will be right choice for you. All top brokers offer mobile trading like AVAFX, etoro, FXCM etc.
4. I am not familiar with any any platforms that allows to test a methodology.
5. You should start with fundamental and then move to technical analysis.

Click to expand...

With regards point 4, you can test methodologies on any demo account, and most brokers offer demo accounts. Its far safer testing here than in a live environment.