Education for Traders

[newfuturetrader]

Hi folks,

I want to start with trading and I am reading a lot lately. I have a science backgound , like numbers and believe in Education.

Here is the problem, most of the services on the internet are scams if you ask me and it is pretty hard to find a good one. I am still researching the net and I hope to find something that could really help me.

First of all I do not want to quit my job and becoming a trader. I earn good money and I think it will be hard to earn as much money in the markets. I want to start trading with a 50,000 USd Account part time. I do not like sitting in front of the screen all day. What kind of freedom is that?

Maybe someone can share his or her experience with some good coaches plese do not advertise services like this is the best one etc. I would need honest opinions.

I have the following filters when I am looking for education services

• Trade with real money! If the service cannot provide a track record with a real money account good bye!

• Only trade exchange listed products. No CFDS, No Forex, no strcutured products, no binary options! (Only equities, Futures, Options)
• No Scalping, I dont like to sit in front of the screen all day and make my broker happy

• A Method without coulda woulda shoulda. I want to understand the method and do not want to be dependend on the teacher. No I feel the market will go up that is the reason I am buying (no black box)

I believe in preperation and I am in no hurry. I am willing to spend money for a good service, but the service has to convince me first.

I know the above are quiet some requirements, but if someone wants my money he or she should convince me.

So if you have some hints, please tell me.

Good Trades

New Future Trader

 

[lloydbee]

a nice sensible approach for once and really good to hear you are looking at learning to reproduce trades rather than just sheep trade.

One thing you should mention is how much time and frequency you are prepared to put into your training as well as how long are you prepared to spend learning before going live.

Good luck with your search.

 

[newfuturetrader]

Thank you, I am not looking for the get rich quick sheme and I think it will take me quiet some time to find the right coach. I think it will take at least till end of the year to find the right coach

I will share my search in this thread from time to time
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Yesterday I got an email from one coach. He is saying on his website that he is a successful daytrader and coach for more than 7 years.

So I kindly asked him for a track record and I liked his reply

His performance is a private thing and he cannot show this to me

I could not help myself and replied

I am fine with that and we have a lot in common. my money is a very private thing as well and I cant pay him for the coaching. Do we have a deal? You Coach me and I pay you nothing and you do not have to show me your track record!

He rejected the offer


So my journey goes on. No track record no money!

 

[Stargunner]

I felt I established the best grounding in equities and futures by reading Alexander Elder's collection of books. It seemed like a rational approach to part time trading, and also includes good trading psychology and risk management. It's all about the trend, and money management.

 

[lloydbee]

In some instances due to country rulings people are not allowed legally to show their live trades, but they could perhaps show you current or future hypothetical or virtual trades.

 

[Inquisitor]

Trading equities is a different ball game to trading either futures or options and in many ways is easier for a longer term trader. Options would be my second choice after equities but futures can be much more volatile for long term position trading. Either way I would pick one only and learn as much about it as possible because trying to do all three will prove difficult IMHO

 

[newfuturetrader]

Thanks for the hint with the book. I researched and the trader with the nice excuse has no legal restrictions showing me the track record. In my opinion he has no track record and that is the reason he does not want to show it.

For the equity future option part I want to learn all the basics of them first and after that I will decide. At the moment it would not be possible for me to chose, because I do not have enough knowledge.

 

[drtro]

I'm still a new trader with less than a year's experience but I trade for a prop firm already, and have spoken to some very successful traders. Never sign up for anything that asks for insane amounts of money or a monthly subscription, usually $99. All they do is tell you everything you could have Googled yourself for free. For any basic question, just open up Investopedia and search for a keyword. It has everything you need to know about Finance. They even have free educational courses and study guides.

For Equities, Futures, Options, FX, or anything trading, you will find tons of online forums filled with information about different strategies, like Trade2Win. I'm not going to get into how to develop strategies and all of that. Trading is 90% psychology, 10% strategy. You can teach anybody technical analysis and all of the basic/simple strategies most common traders use within a couple months, but it takes years for most to develop psychologically. Successful traders control their emotion, manage risk, and become a consistent trader. It has little do with their strategy. Trading is mental warfare. Don't waste your time trying to develop a 100% success 100% reward system. You'll never do it. I spent months trying to. Everybody has. The best advice I can give you is to trade small and learn. Take a random bad position on purpose, and trade out of it minimizing your losses. The number one mental roadblock all beginner traders have is not wanting to take losses. They are taking profits way too soon but let a loss run 100% larger than it needed to be, because emotionally they was hoping it would turn around. This isn't easy. I still go through it sometimes. I see pro traders go through it sometimes. But you HAVE to learn how to take a loss and be emotionally okay with it, because if you can take a loss, you will already be better than most traders. That said, let me point you in some direction for finding good information.

For equities, you always want to trade stocks all of the pro traders are trading. In other words, stocks that are "in play." You can trade technicals off your AAPL, SPY, FB, or which ever high volume staple stock, but you aren't likely to make a ton of money without any large buying or selling going on. And it's impossible to to analyze any tape reading in these stocks as it's all just noise. The best stocks to trade are usually low volume stocks that for some reason, are getting a ton of attention in any particular day, like LAKE for example in yesterday's trading session. I'm still transitioning over to this, but I have a few pointers given to me about finding these stocks from professional traders I've chatted with making $50-$100K a day. The one I talked to the most, wakes up at 8AM and browses Briefing to review the market each morning. He mostly checks out the calender for any new Upgrades/Downgrades, checks the earnings calendar, and then any stock splits or IPOs. The website also has after-hour reports, story stocks, weekly wraps, etc. for digesting information after the trading day. Then within his platform, he has a few market sorters. He has a new daily hi and lo sorter, which he watches during the opening hour for any huge movement in a stock that's constantly hitting the top of the sorter. His main sorter is just simply all stocks sorted by largest range. He will become interested in stocks at the top that aren't usually there everyday. He also has the same sorter, but titled "Thin Movers" which is all stocks under $10 sorted by range. The last one is consolidation, where he looks at stocks with a <$0.10 range during the last 5-10 minutes, with at least 500 shares traded per minute. He will look at these stocks for breakouts. Then he also has a sorter listing all circuit breaker stocks. Just a tip I received from in my opinion, a very successful guy.

"You don't really need to know a ton of technical analysis besides where to spot key levels in support and resistance. Forget all of that MACD, RSI, MovingAvg crossover noise. Learn how to analyze Level II quotes and time and sales, and manage risk. Then trade in play stocks. You want to aim for 1:4-1:5 risk reward. I'd rather be 25% successful trading 1:4 than 75% successful trading 1:1. Both are profitable, but the upside is huge trading 25% because you're already profitable, yet have a ton of room to improve to 40-60%. Already trading 75%, there's little upside and the shortest drawdown can wipe days or weeks of profits. But just remember, trading is a whole bunch of it depends and what ifs."

For Options, there is nothing better than CBOE in my opinion. They have basic level, intermediate, and advanced section courses. Then an entire section explaining each type of spread with their own courses. And It's all completely free. I also like using Dough's platform to test strategies. It's very visual and designed for beginners. It tells you everything you need to know about the spread you made in terms of where it needs to go to make profit, break-even, and even tells you your max profit and loss. It's quite neat. They also have free video tutorials on Options but they aren't as good as CBOE's.

As for Futures, I haven't traded it much. But I do know TopStepTrader has a free chatroom you can join after you sign up. They are very nice people. I also like FuturesTrader71 for daily recaps of the futures market. Al Brooks is a futures trader I believe, and he has a few YouTube videos uploaded explaining price action and risk reward very well. Just search "Al Brooks Price Action" on YouTube. They are a good hour long filled with information.

I don't know much of FX at all, but they have a TON of traders. You will find many active Forex forums filled with free information.

 

[newfuturetrader]

Thank you for your detailed information. I will have a look I think that will really help me. Still I think it cant hurt to have a teacher. Like I mentioned I have very strong filter criteria so that the odds are pretty good to find a good one. Of course there is the big IF I find someone who can provide what I need before I would sign up.

May I ask do you trade profitable already can you make a living out of it? I do not want to trade full time I like my job and I think you need big amounts of money to make a decent salary something like 500,000 USD account.

Thanks again I really appreciate your thoughts and help

 

[drtro]

Thank you for your detailed information. I will have a look I think that will really help me. Still I think it cant hurt to have a teacher. Like I mentioned I have very strong filter criteria so that the odds are pretty good to find a good one. Of course there is the big IF I find someone who can provide what I need before I would sign up.

May I ask do you trade profitable already can you make a living out of it? I do not want to trade full time I like my job and I think you need big amounts of money to make a decent salary something like 500,000 USD account.

Thanks again I really appreciate your thoughts and help

It's all speculative. I have a friend who started with $140k and he's now making a good salary. He is no finance graduate. He doesn't even know what options are. All he does is play market movers staring at the bid/offer all day. He's never had a year worse than 77% return. He made $8K alone yesterday trading LAKE. I've personally been both catastrophic and successful trading my own account. I've lost $60K in one day, I've gone a month straight making >$1K/day, and I've got a month straight breaking even. Still getting over the learning curve with the prop firm however. I've been successful enough to get raises in my account limits, but they want to see me improve my risk reward before giving me any huge size to manage. I've lived off of trading since December of 2013 for the most part. I started in Cryptocurrency. I spent $100 in Dogecoin when I heard about it then sold it two weeks later for $500 and began trading Bitcoin. Moved to equities around February 2014 when I inherited $200K, then tried futures for 2-3 months after losing $60K in a day and raged quit. Now I just trade equities. I'm also a freelance developer in my spare time, so I don't solely rely on trading as a living quite yet.

 

[newfuturetrader]

Ok that sounds good. Your friends performance is impressive. He seems to trade small cap stocks?

That could be interesting, because I think you can predict them better than for example APPEL.

Did your friend receive any training or did he learn everything by himself?

 

[drtro]

Ok that sounds good. Your friends performance is impressive. He seems to trade small cap stocks?

That could be interesting, because I think you can predict them better than for example APPEL.

Did your friend receive any training or did he learn everything by himself?

He didn't pay for anything. Nobody I know that's successful paid for any "teacher"

It's a scam. Everything they teach you, you can find on your own. If you want to pay some guy who was successful 10-20 years ago $5,000 or $99/month to read you bedtime stories, then be my guest. Might as well put give your money to one of those Craigslist get rich working at home ads.

 

[newfuturetrader]

Hi,

I think that most people pay teachers that are worth nothing. I totally agree with you they just tell you everything that you can get for free on the net. I am looking for a seasoned trader, who can show me that he is successful. Only if he/she is successful I would hire him/her.

I wouldnt hire anyone who is just talking and cannot proof it. I am not interested in all the Forex binary option get rich quick shemes.

I am not in a hurry and I will try to find someone. in the meantime I will read and search the net for information.

 

[newfuturetrader]

Hi Folks,

over the weekend I got another reply from a trading coach, he only can offer me an excel file. Great an excel file that is worth nothing to me. Even better he trades with real money (that is what he said) but it is very complicated to verify his account!

Honestly wouldnt it be easier to say that you do not have a real track record. If you want to verify a track record that is one of the easiest things you could do especially when offering trading courses.

So still searching the net, but that what it is about not to give up. It is like trading you have to wait for a good trade you cannot force it. And if there is no good opportunity just do nothing. Cash is a position as well

Have a great and succesful week

 

[louistrader]

Hi folks,

I want to start with trading and I am reading a lot lately. I have a science backgound , like numbers and believe in Education.

Here is the problem, most of the services on the internet are scams if you ask me and it is pretty hard to find a good one. I am still researching the net and I hope to find something that could really help me.

First of all I do not want to quit my job and becoming a trader. I earn good money and I think it will be hard to earn as much money in the markets. I want to start trading with a 50,000 USd Account part time. I do not like sitting in front of the screen all day. What kind of freedom is that?

Maybe someone can share his or her experience with some good coaches plese do not advertise services like this is the best one etc. I would need honest opinions.

I have the following filters when I am looking for education services

• Trade with real money! If the service cannot provide a track record with a real money account good bye!

• Only trade exchange listed products. No CFDS, No Forex, no strcutured products, no binary options! (Only equities, Futures, Options)
• No Scalping, I dont like to sit in front of the screen all day and make my broker happy

• A Method without coulda woulda shoulda. I want to understand the method and do not want to be dependend on the teacher. No I feel the market will go up that is the reason I am buying (no black box)

I believe in preperation and I am in no hurry. I am willing to spend money for a good service, but the service has to convince me first.

I know the above are quiet some requirements, but if someone wants my money he or she should convince me.

So if you have some hints, please tell me.

Good Trades

New Future Trader

You have an excellent filtering system and your thinking is good. The problem is that what you're looking for doesn't exist for the masses. If you find it one day, please let me know. Even out of those that trade real money profitably, there is a lot of subjectivity and subtleties that are very difficult to interpret when trying to trade their method mechanically.

My experience with courses is that you will learn things but no one gives you everything even though they all make that claim. Everything that I have seen will teach you some form of support and resistance, some form of a moving average and some form of a risk management strategy of when to get out if you're right and when to get out if you're wrong. You seem like a smart guy; I just summed up thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours worth of courses for you in a paragraph. I hope you understand and appreciate it.

You say that you make good money so you may want to purchase a few courses and go through them at your leisure just to come to the same conclusion that I wrote about above. With that said, you probably will learn things that while available for free will make more sense to you when explained in a course format. It did for me.

My best advice: learn everything possible about the market and design your own system that fits your style. Simulate everything for a long time (at least a year) before you actually go live. I wish I did. I just saved you another few thousand here.

I'll send you an invoice.

 

[newfuturetrader]

I really appreciate that louis.

Fortunately I am not in a hurry and before anyone gets any money from me I will check it out very carefully. Maybe I do not find anyone but that is ok for me but I still think that there are some good guys out there.

I am not interested in any get rich quick shemes etc and I always ask the coaches if they can gurantee that I make money. Some said yes so they are out.

No one can gurantee that I know it is a numbers game and even if the odds are in my favour I still can lose money. All the coaches i talked so far gave the wrong answers.

I am no expert in trading but I understand how it works. It is like running an insurance company or a casino. Simple Math you need the odds on your side but still it is simple but not easy.

If I should find a coach and of course tested it I am happy to share my expierence but it is a BIG IF, because I am aware it will be pretty hard to find a decent coach
I will keep you updated

Have a wonderful day

 

[newfuturetrader]

Guys the weekend is close and I want to share some ideas why I do not want to scalp.

When you read my post one of my filter criteria was no scalping and I want to explain why. Maybe it helps some poeple who are looking for there path to trading

Why no scalping

- High Order Fees

Even when you are comparing a lot of brokers and some of them offer really good deals, still it is way too expansive to scalp. Percentage wise the commissions are huge and in my opinion you only make the broker rich. I think you have to be a floor trader that scalping is worthwhile.

- Time

I think time is the most precious commodity we have. We do not get back any time and I see no sene in sitting all day long in front of a computer screen just to scalp a few cents out of the market. my goal is to trade a bigger account in the future and I think scalping will not allow that.

- Algo Trading, HFT

Competing against machines must be almost impossible. Now human beeing is as fast as a computer. I dont want to compete against machines which can process information in nano seconds.


Bottom line

I think scalping is only popular because it is kind of exciting to see instant results and the industry is advertising it a lot. For every Broker a scalper is a very good client because of the high commissions he/she generates.

I dont htink that you can find any retail client, who is a successful scalper, because it is like going to a gun fight with a knife. The commissions are far too high.

Most people are impatient and want to trade. In my opinion you should sit down first and think what you want to achieve with trading. Furthermore do not listen to brokers, they are only interested that you trade.

Hope it helps

have a wonderful weekend

P.S. I contacted some more coaches and I hope they will reply over the weekend

 

[MajorMagnuM]

He didn't pay for anything. Nobody I know that's successful paid for any "teacher"

It's a scam. Everything they teach you, you can find on your own. If you want to pay some guy who was successful 10-20 years ago $5,000 or $99/month to read you bedtime stories, then be my guest. Might as well put give your money to one of those Craigslist get rich working at home ads.

yes. very important is finding someone who can teach also

 

[newfuturetrader]

Hi folks,

hope you all had a great weekend. So far nothing new regarding the coach, but you have to be patient it is like trading. Do not trade because you are bored and do not sign up for a coach just to have one.

One Coach told me he can show me a way how to make 10% per month guranteed, I sent him the forbes list and asked him why I cannot find him at the top?

No reply so far. No one can gurantee you money, I want someone who brings the odds into my favour, that is all a coach can teach you in my opinion.

As soon as I have news you will hear from me

 

[louistrader]

In addition to my previous post, most will teach you some technical set ups that involve chart patterns and/or indicators.

Regarding your thoughts on scalping: all strategies and approaches are valid if executed correctly. Scalping is one of them.

I am telling you that I highly doubt you will find exactly what you're looking for unless you have a personal friend or relative that does this and even then they may not be able to help you. They all give you pieces, but never the whole puzzle. You may spend money on a system and the system itself is worthless (it doesn't work), but it may give you some other insight.

Find what works for you + combine a proper risk management strategy + make sure you have a favorable risk-reward ratio and you can make anything work.