new to daytrading and making losses

spakus · Nov 24, 2008

Hi

I've just started trading less than a month ago and I find it very exciting even though I've made a net loss of about £1000 so far.
I trade FTSE100 stocks and endeavour to close all positions before the end of the day. I've been trading strictly on price and volume movements using level 2 data together with any information I can get from the news media. I understand that this is no way near enough to be successful at day trading and advice on what I really should be doing.

£10kLoser · Nov 25, 2008

Quite simple - stop trading real money and paper trade until you can show a profit.

To get hooked on the excitement when you are losing is the mentality of a gambler and disastrous for a trader. You clearly need to spend time learning and developing a strategy that wins...

There are no smart answers or shortcuts.

spakus · Nov 25, 2008

£10kLoser said:
Quite simple - stop trading real money and paper trade until you can show a profit.

To get hooked on the excitement when you are losing is the mentality of a gambler and disastrous for a trader. You clearly need to spend time learning and developing a strategy that wins...

There are no smart answers or shortcuts.

This might sound silly but, how do i paper trade?

UKtradergirl · Nov 25, 2008

spakus said:
This might sound silly but, how do i paper trade?

Open a demo account somewhere- anywhere that does one- and trade it pretending its real money.

shadowninja · Nov 25, 2008

Financial spread betting and CFDs with ETX Capital - sign up for their demo account.

shadowninja · Nov 25, 2008

I'd prefer to recommend IG but they don't have an unlimited time demo account.

spakus · Nov 25, 2008

UKtradergirl said:
Open a demo account somewhere- anywhere that does one- and trade it pretending its real money.

Thanks. I'll look for one and have a go

wouste · Nov 26, 2008

spakus said:
Thanks. I'll look for one and have a go

You'll learn lots of thing, but it still wont be the same as live trading.
because you don't hav the feeling you lost everything if a demo crashed.

caudurow3 · Nov 27, 2008

Hi spakus - I'm in pretty much the same situation and even looking at the same underlying. Are you Spread Betting? Also, what size account are you using?

spakus · Nov 27, 2008

caudurow3 said:
Hi spakus - I'm in pretty much the same situation and even looking at the same underlying. Are you Spread Betting? Also, what size account are you using?

Hi Caudurow, no i'm not spread betting yet. I use barclays stockbrokers and using their trailing stop orders to protect my loss, i try to pick FTSE 100 stocks like to rise and try to hang on for a 4-5% rise. my typical order size is £3-4k (a rubbish strategy if i must say so myself)

fakhar · Nov 27, 2008

£10kLoser said:
Quite simple - stop trading real money and paper trade until you can show a profit.

To get hooked on the excitement when you are losing is the mentality of a gambler and disastrous for a trader. You clearly need to spend time learning and developing a strategy that wins...

There are no smart answers or shortcuts.

nice piece of advice. you should consider it.

Shanghai · Nov 28, 2008

spakus said:
Hi Caudurow, no i'm not spread betting yet. I use barclays stockbrokers and using their trailing stop orders to protect my loss, i try to pick FTSE 100 stocks like to rise and try to hang on for a 4-5% rise. my typical order size is £3-4k (a rubbish strategy if i must say so myself)

Well there is one reason why you are doomed to failure. It appears that you are actually buying the shares rather than spreadbetting. If you buy UK shares you will pay 0.5% stamp duty per transaction (plus commissions). May not sound a lot but if you are fully employing your capital and making only one trade a day then you are down 2.5% a week or to put it another way you need to double your money each year just to pay your tax, before you start making money for yourself.

Basically its not possible to day trade UK shares by purchasing them directly. Spread betting is an option for swing trades of a few days (of course no stamp duty payable).

spakus · Nov 28, 2008

Shanghai said:
Well there is one reason why you are doomed to failure. It appears that you are actually buying the shares rather than spreadbetting. If you buy UK shares you will pay 0.5% stamp duty per transaction (plus commissions). May not sound a lot but if you are fully employing your capital and making only one trade a day then you are down 2.5% a week or to put it another way you need to double your money each year just to pay your tax, before you start making money for yourself.

Basically its not possible to day trade UK shares by purchasing them directly. Spread betting is an option for swing trades of a few days (of course no stamp duty payable).

Thanks Shanghai. Could someone please advise on the best broker to use for spreadbetting?

new_trader · Nov 28, 2008

spakus said:
Thanks Shanghai. Could someone please advise on the best broker to use for spreadbetting?

spakus, you will never make it as a trader if you need spoonfeeding or expect people to take you by the hand and lead you. You need to learn how to do your own research. There is a massive amount of information at your fingertips if you can be bothered to do more with them than just picking your nose.

Spread Betting - T2W Day Trading & Forex Forums

spakus · Nov 28, 2008

new_trader said:
spakus, you will never make it as a trader if you need spoonfeeding or expect people to take you by the hand and lead you. You need to learn how to do your own research. There is a massive amount of information at your fingertips if you can be bothered to do more with them than just picking your nose.

Spread Betting - T2W Day Trading & Forex Forums

Thanks for the very worthy advice new_trader. I do my own research and I'm reading a lot at the moment. but i also consider information from the experiences of other traders an essential part of my research as well. I'm determined to all it takes to be profitable as a trader and this is why I joined this forum

caudurow3 · Nov 29, 2008

I am a newbie and have used both CMC and Capital Spreads and have stuck with the latter for the meanwhile. While they provide realtime data (on their prices) they don't provide price data for the real market nor volume indicators.

WallStreetHero · Nov 29, 2008

if you are with barclays i advise you to dispose them immediatly, they are crap. i was with them and lost 2000, also like the other person said, you loose money throught stamp duty and commisions whih you dnt relize at the begining, thats when i stoped trading equities and started trading CFDs and futures, commisions are less, no taxes or stamp duty and you can go on leverage, ofcourse its risky and should practise properly before going on leverage.

you might want to try GFT, and open a demo account with them, they will give you very good software with real time quote and charts. i am doing really well with them and like it, but firstly dispose barclays immediatly they are S.hit (with a capital S)

new to daytrading and making losses

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£10kLoser

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spakus

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UKtradergirl

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shadowninja

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spakus

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wouste

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caudurow3

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spakus

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fakhar

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spakus

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spakus

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