It seems to work for me

[Kevin21]

Hey,
after asking about keeping it simple using MA's and trend lines, i decided to mission out into the real world with it. Obviously i refined it a bit to suit the indices i want to trade.
I've been spread betting the FTSE 100 and DOW using my TA strat. On the first day i lost 50 pounds. However this was my own fault as i didn't stick to my rules. The first thing i messed up was not waiting untill my TA gave me the signal to trade. I was too egar to try and make some money, and as a result i just went off trying to chase the opportunity down when the market was just trading sideways. This combined with pulling in and out of the market straight away everytime i doubted myself racked up the 50 quid loss. 3 trades of losing 10 points and one 20 points loss.
Today though i had pretty good self control, stuck to my rules and only traded when i got the right signals and held it out untill i got where i wanted to be. I took 30 points out of the FTSE in the last 45mins going long (had to sit there all day waiting for the right time) then i took 10 points going short on the dow for a min or so when i first opened, i then took another 40points early lunch time (new york time). So today i've taken 80 points in total after covering the spreads, so i'm 80 pounds up

 

[Kevin21]

Just missed out on another 25points just because i didn't have bottle to hold on. Even tho my rule is that i do not trade untill the price crosses the EMA. Just goes to show differenent it is when you're trading with real money. I'm still quids in today tho, so i'm just gonna call it a day now, been sat here 12hrs now lol. If i had stuck to my rules, i would of walked with 125points profit. Still can't complain with 72points in the end.

 

[Kevin21]

i'm kicking myself now. I should of stayed on, would of taken a clean 100 points, but i went to maccys instead

 

[Kevin21]

a graph to explain...

 

[firewalker99]

Dow

hi and welcome Kevin

you might be interested in the DOW 2007 thread, where we currently have a lot of members posting live trades and their thoughts... might lead to an interesting exchange of ideas who knows

 

[timsk]

Hi Kevin,
I second Firewalker's comments in welcoming you to T2W. That said, I'm not clear about the purpose of your thread? Could you elaborate as to what it is that seems to be working for you? Additionally, the impression I get (and I hope I'm wrong here) is that whatever 'it' is, it's only been doing so for a few days or weeks at most. If this is the case, then I'm sorry to break the bad news, but a few days or even weeks of profitable trades is unlikely to amount to a long term consistently profitable strategy. On top of which, daytrading futures with a D4F at £1.00 per point is really stacking the odds against you. Not impossibly so, but boy will it be tough going. If you make your living by other means and trade purely as a hobby for entertainment and are prepared to blow a fixed amount of money that would otherwise be spent on sport, cars or travel etc. - then fine. But, please don't make it your profession until you've got at least a few of the tools of the pro's and some of the mindset which, needless to say, doesn't include a trip to 'maccys' in the middle of the trading day!

Sorry if the above sounds harsh, but as one who's started out with a carefree approach similar to yours, I've learnt the hard way by losing mucha mucha wonga. If my comments cause you to question your approach and to study the market in greater depth, then they may just help to save you from the losses that I've suffered over the years and you will too - undoubtedly - if you carry on as you are. My biggest loss came after 4 months of consistent profits when I really thought I had an edge and was well on my way towards trading glory. All it took was one trade and 24 little hours to blow 70% of my account.

Tread carefully, very carefully . . .
Best wishes,
Tim.

 

[laptop1]

My biggest loss came after 4 months of consistent profits when I really thought I had an edge and was well on my way towards trading glory. All it took was one trade and 24 little hours to blow 70% of my account.
Tread carefully, very carefully . . .
Best wishes,
Tim.

It does you good to blow your account . nearly all top pros blew their account when starting out, newbies don't want to here this though. But its so true, blowing ones account makes you a better trader.

 

[firewalker99]

It does you good to blow your account . nearly all top pros blew their account when starting out, newbies don't want to here this though. But its so true, blowing ones account makes you a better trader.

Join the club

 

[Kevin21]

Hey,
thank you for your replies. I've been trading for a few months now and at first i did take losses and my account with cmc markets got maxed out a few times. It's always game over when you get the liquidation notice e-mail from them lol.
At first looking back at it, i was pretty much just gambleing on how i thought the market was going to react to the news on yahoo finance lol. I also noticed that the dow would shoot off when it first opens most of the time. So if i read some good news on yahoo, i just went long on it at 2:30. Obviously i didn't last long.
I'm currently at uni, well i've just finished, and i graduate in july, but i'm going back to do my masters. At uni there was a lad in my finance and applied econometrics modules that was doing pretty much the same thing as me. We got talking and he pointed me down the TA road. Apparently his old man was a stock broker in birmingham, had his own firm and all that, and he showed him few things so to say. Basiclly i spent a few weeks coming up with the strategy using what this guy showed me, and i back testing it 5 years. The results seem quite promising and it's foundations are quite simple. Obviously i don't want to go into too much detail about it just yet...
My old man has done pretty well for himself by just having his fingers and thumbs in as many pies as possible, and is always up for trying something new, if he thinks there's potential. I spoke to him about what i was doing and he said to me straight away "i'll give you five grand to start trading with, but i get half the profits if you make anything off it, and if you do well at it i'll give you some more money" Obviously i was over the moon, but at first i didn't want to take it incase i lost all the money, but my old man knows the risks and just said that if i never try i'll never know, nothing ventured, nothing gained.
So far i'm a just under 200 pounds up. I accept the fact i could lose it all tomorrow, but the way i see it is that, at the momoment, i'm just some skint student with nothing to loose, so why not? I've learned a lot over the past few months, but i know i'm still green as grass, but the only way to learn is to jump on the horse in my eyes. I would love to get into the industry as a career, but the general impression that i get is that all these big investment houses in the city don't really tend to hire gradatutes from Leeds uni if you catch my drfit. So here i am....

 

[Arbu]

I would love to get into the industry as a career, but the general impression that i get is that all these big investment houses in the city don't really tend to hire gradatutes from Leeds uni if you catch my drfit. So here i am....

It's some time since you wrote this but I do hope you haven't got disheartened. After Eton, my cousin went to Newcastle University to read chemistry. He now works in the hedge fund industry, and I was reliably informed several years ago that he was being paid £500,000 per year. I think Leeds is possibly more highly regarded than Newcastle, and, if he can do it having read chemistry, I'm sure you can with economics.

Of course, I'm making an assumption. You did go to Eton, didn't you?

[No, I'm not bitter nor nuffink.]

 

[tripleogstar]

firstly, getting into investment banking - front office trading during this current situation is near impossible. Secondly, you have got to be smart to get into the role, if you go to a reasonably good university you stand a chance, but still very little. The top 5 universities are looked at first in the recruitment process, Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, UCL, LSE. The first 4 of which are top 10 in the world, and so it is very tough getting into the industy. Btw, I have experience in front office trading at JP Morgan so am aware of the recruitment process.

and arbu stop being a snob, eton lol, wot r the chances he has gone eton most people dont, u w a n k a.
At the end of the day, you can always get into the industry, its just that if you havent got the right education you have just got to hustle harder.

You would be surprised to hear this but most of the guys on the desk i was on at jp morgan did not even go to university. They entered the industry years ago, but just shows that to be a good trader you dont need a good education, just a certain type of personality and certain level of intellect