Challenge Stage 1; £100 to £1000 using simple method

[Taylored001]

good thread, Just read it all the way through. forgotten what day it was started. Was it the first??

Next Tuesday

 

[Shervie]

So this is my post first, I don't usually post on many forums but this has grabbed my attention because it sounds like the awesome idea. However, I'm a little confused with something and this is probably because I'm quite new to trading.

My question is how can you afford the costs of commission if you only have a balance of £100? The reason I ask this is because I've been doing a lot of reading into trading and think I'm ready to make my first investment but can only really afford to risk £100 - £200 but with commission/cost of trade at IgMarkets at about £10 a trade, surely i'm going to have to make 10% a trade in order to cover costs? Are you leveraging your account in order to cover these costs?

I apologise if this is a really frustrating question for you guys and it may have been asked many times before but I would really appreciate your input as you seem to be starting with a balance with is very much like what I can afford.

So if anyone could help I would be very greatful, also good luck Taylored001 I hope it works out for ya!

 

[Phil Mibbutz]

You're really in the wrong thread, Shervie. He's spread betting, so the spread is the commission.

 

[Chaoss]

Good question, although difficult to interpret, the 4 bars of increasing price but all be negative, if the 4th is positive, we don't enter and wait for the next opportunity

Got that?

Yeah, got it Taylor, thanks

 

[Shervie]

Cheers Phil, obviously didn't read carefully enough that he was spread betting, thanks for your quick reply.

 

[Shervie]

Double post

 

[Taylored001]

So this is my post first, I don't usually post on many forums but this has grabbed my attention because it sounds like the awesome idea. However, I'm a little confused with something and this is probably because I'm quite new to trading.

My question is how can you afford the costs of commission if you only have a balance of £100? The reason I ask this is because I've been doing a lot of reading into trading and think I'm ready to make my first investment but can only really afford to risk £100 - £200 but with commission/cost of trade at IgMarkets at about £10 a trade, surely i'm going to have to make 10% a trade in order to cover costs? Are you leveraging your account in order to cover these costs?

I apologise if this is a really frustrating question for you guys and it may have been asked many times before but I would really appreciate your input as you seem to be starting with a balance with is very much like what I can afford.

So if anyone could help I would be very greatful, also good luck Taylored001 I hope it works out for ya!

I'm spreadbetting, your talking about trading CFD's on Igmarkets which include the spread and commisions - however Igmarkets has DMA which is quite good. If your from the UK and only have £100-£300, you're only option is to spreadbet.

Also, if you 'only' have £100-£200 to put into an account - Remember not to trade what you can't afford to risk. If you're new to trading expect to lose your inital investment, if you couldn't cope losing the money, you are not ready. Demo test until confident and consistant, then live trade. Don't trade until you KNOW you're going to make money. Otherwise your just gambling and its not really a business.

If you're not sure whether you're confident - Just tell me your planned trading strategy and what you've done to ensure it works and i'm sure i can tell you if you're ready to go live.

To give you an idea; When i started trading, i read a book, with a lot of impatience and too much over-confidence that day i filled my account with £600 and within days it was down to £200 - Due to impatient trading, gambling, 'chasing the dragon', uneducated trades, lack of discipline - Fortunetly i quickly realised that i was only gambling and continued to learn how to 'Trade' not gamble. The positive thing about that is i made all my mistakes in that first week, realised trading must be a business, you must have a plan of action, a strong strategy, experience through demo'ing and persistance.

Personally, i never demo'd the first strategies i came up with but i got lucky in that they worked and now when i have new ideas i demo them for 4-6 months.

 

[Phil Mibbutz]

I'm spreadbetting, your talking about trading CFD's on Igmarkets which include the spread and commisions - however Igmarkets has DMA which is quite good. If your from the UK and only have £100-£300, you're only option is to spreadbet.

Also, if you 'only' have £100-£200 to put into an account - Remember not to trade what you can't afford to risk. If you're new to trading expect to lose your inital investment, if you couldn't cope losing the money, you are not ready. Demo test until confident and consistant, then live trade. Don't trade until you KNOW you're going to make money. Otherwise your just gambling and its not really a business.

If you're not sure whether you're confident - Just tell me your planned trading strategy and what you've done to ensure it works and i'm sure i can tell you if you're ready to go live.

To give you an idea; When i started trading, i read a book, with a lot of impatience and too much over-confidence that day i filled my account with £600 and within days it was down to £200 - Due to impatient trading, gambling, 'chasing the dragon', uneducated trades, lack of discipline - Fortunetly i quickly realised that i was only gambling and continued to learn how to 'Trade' not gamble. The positive thing about that is i made all my mistakes in that first week, realised trading must be a business, you must have a plan of action, a strong strategy, experience through demo'ing and persistance.

Personally, i never demo'd the first strategies i came up with but i got lucky in that they worked and now when i have new ideas i demo them for 4-6 months.

You sound a lot wiser than I was at 18, Taylored... Come to think of it, you sound a lot wiser than I am now, which is rather more than 18, unfortunately.

 

[Taylored001]

You sound a lot wiser than I was at 18, Taylored... Come to think of it, you sound a lot wiser than I am now, which is rather more than 18, unfortunately.

I don't think of myself wise at all! But thanks Just read 'The richest man in Babylon' and you'll have an Aston Martin in no time... Thats the secret of life.

 

[bargainebuy]

If you're new to trading expect to lose your inital investment, if you couldn't cope losing the money, you are not ready. Demo test until confident and consistant, then live trade. Don't trade until you KNOW you're going to make money. Otherwise your just gambling and its not really a business.

I wish I'd realised this this time last year.I started spreadbetting last April with 1000 pounds and lost all of it within a month.I was balantly gambling not following any strategies.What you are doing here is great,you try to educate people so new traders can avoid making the mistakes I made.I really look forward to seeing how you get on with this challenge.Good luck!

 

[Taylored001]

Todays the big day;
Possible news that may affect us;
1.30 Core Retail sales and Retail Sales in US could have an effect on S&P500 and cause a ripple effect to the FTSE100 - Important to watch their relationship and its often dependable.

14th April 8.00 - 4-hour chart 5EMA is above 10EMA and therefore trending up, however stochastics have come out of the overbought zone and therefore we cannot trade. We are going to have to wait until either the EMA's crossover, or the stochastics go back into the overbought zone before we can even consider trading on the 5-minute chart.
4-hourly chart has formed a bit of a range last 10 bars or so, isn't trending up or down specifically so its good the stochastics is preventing us getting in right now.

Thoughts and Feelings; Thinking about the possibility of including the ADX in the selection criteria, only taking signals when it is above 20 on the 4-hour chart. Consider keeping a log of the variation for a month to see if this eliminates any bad trades (Sideways markets).

Notes; Noticed that actually on IGINDEX, the minimum risk we can have on a trade on the FTSE100 with a stop of 15 is £30 therefore transferring £100 to Mfglobalspreads to trade 0.33 per point allowing me to risk what i had planned.

The first hour of the FTSE100 is usually quite messy, then the general daily trend begins and ends by around 11.30 so its important to try to catch that move, then it ranges for several hours waiting for the S&P500 to open, then it will follow any sharp movements in the US. So around 2pm is the second move we are trying to catch. I always find that if your trading the first hour of the FTSE its almost pointless going for anything more than 20 pips but thats just me

 

[Taylored001]

I wish I'd realised this this time last year.I started spreadbetting last April with 1000 pounds and lost all of it within a month.I was balantly gambling not following any strategies.What you are doing here is great,you try to educate people so new traders can avoid making the mistakes I made.I really look forward to seeing how you get on with this challenge.Good luck!

How is your trading progressing now?

All traders have a price of education £1000 is reasonable.

 

[Taylored001]

Heehee already i've had thoughts of breaking my trading plan... Need patience and discipline.
The stochastics are back in the overbought zone; however because the last 4-hour bar didn't close above overbought line, we don't trade this 4-hour bar even though now it is above; because we don't know were the stochastics will close. And we don't later want to see that stochastics closed below during that trading session. So we have to wait for the close of this current bar to be overbought, then at 12.00 we can seek long trades on the 5-minute.

The reason i was earlier considering breaking my trading plan. Is because on the 1-hour chart, i have a Fibonacci retracement line of 0.618 and the FTSE100 is above 20 pips away from testing this, i don't want to enter long until that line has been broken (and i suspect a turn around to be honest) however i will stick to the plan.

 

[Taylored001]

Unbelievable, looks like we're going to be having no trades today

Oh well always tommorow. I'm stupidly short on the FTSE100, i've got lucky because of the current fall but what a stupid trade to take!

 

[ttabz]

Trading within one timeframe?
Or would you look at lower TFs for an entry once your signals are all OK?

 

[Taylored001]

Unbelievable, looks like we're going to be having no trades today

Oh well always tommorow. I'm stupidly short on the FTSE100, i've got lucky because of the current fall but what a stupid trade to take!

Ha, lucky *******. The US news and open soared us down to my target and i exited for a 4% gain.

 

[ttabz]

Ha, lucky *******. The US news and open soared us down to my target and i exited for a 4% gain.

So there was a trade today then?

You should put Current Balance in your signature

 

[Masquerade]

Ha, lucky *******. The US news and open soared us down to my target and i exited for a 4% gain.

So did you have a stop on that trade?

 

[Taylored001]

So there was a trade today then?

You should put Current Balance in your signature

No there wasn't sorry for the understanding; i was referring to a trade i had done using a different strategy, not part of this challenge

 

[bargainebuy]

How is your trading progressing now?

All traders have a price of education £1000 is reasonable.

I've stopped trading for real money now and just playing around on demo.There are some much to learn and I'm not gona pick up trading again until I'm very confident.After all,it's my own hard-earned cash I'm risking.