What was your biggest obstacle?

[Rambo35]

Everyone has a different story and every successful trader had to face various challenges and obstacles when they started out. Those who claim they didn’t struggle at all obviously never traded in their life. We all have a different learning curve and approached trading with a different mentality and from different angles.

What was your biggest obstacle you had to overcome before you felt you were on the right track?

I think to me it was to trust myself that I would figure it out and get to the point where I could create a strategy that works for me in order to achieve consistent trading profits. I remember when I decided to trade I had no idea what I was getting into and I did take the time to educate myself to the point I felt comfortable to open my very first account and place my first trade.

What was yours?

 

[ChattiFX]

Probably chopping and changing strategy...

I'd come up with one idea, it might work for a bit, it might not... but when it stopped working I'd switch to another plan... over and over again... I dread to think how many different strategies I've gone through in the past 10 years... there may have been some good ones in there that I disregarded to quickly for all I know!!

It wasn't until I started properly looking back over past trades and changing variables, one at a time, that I started to understand where I was going wrong and could properly evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of what I was doing.

Not that I am there yet, but at least I understand why I'm not there now!!

CFX

 

[NVP]

100% agree ...............its about finding the strategy that sits ok/nicely with you and therefore you will go through the rough and smooth for it because you believe in it 100000%

I've dabbled in Trading since the 80's .............I didnt get into the Groove until the early 2000's and only after I found something that I really liked and wanted to commit to 100%

still learning and experimenting but the core ideas/system is still there and I am happy with it

N

 

[Intel_Bvc]

For me its still a case of what IS my biggest obstacle...

Well its actually the inability to simply leave my fully automated system alone. It opens and closes trades without the need of any manual intervention. I have performed detailed analysis on the different strategies it employs and already know the "optimum" hold time for each trade. I should just need to check on it from time to time and ensure its not doing anything it shouldn't do, or ensuring that trades are not left on past their hold time due to bugs etc.

Yet, I simply can't help but meddling with it and closing off trades or disabling strategies during big data releases or announcements etc.

Some would say if I know meddling with the system is a bad thing why do I do it. There's one main reason:

Fear

Fear of losing money or not holding onto gains. This leads me to deviate from the strategies and close trades early for profit or to minimize loss. This is out of step with the analysis I've done on the system to quantify its performance because its based on holding each trade for the desired time. Introducing a random and likely inconsistent action of manually altering trades like this introduces losses instead of achievement of projected profits.

Although I know I need to simply leave the system alone, it doesn't help when changes I've made manually seem to be beneficial. Sometimes at the time of making a manual change it appears that the change was for the best, but 2 weeks on I've often looked back at the stats of the changes I made and it actually resulted in a net loss.

So considering all the above, why can't I just show more mental strength & discipline and leave the system to do what its been designed to do??

Because on the other hand you have a recent example where I statistically proved that a change that I found myself making manually actually improved the systems performance. So I'll soon be coding that and making it automatic after which I'll probably find some other reason to start manually fiddling around!

It's human nature to remember the 1 time you get it right and forget the 9 times that you got it wrong.

For me the bottom line is quite simple... maybe I'm just not cut out to be a trader. Time will tell I suppose.

 

[phoenix25140]

i think for me it was waiting for trades to build before getting in. The whole buy low sell high is an easy concept but once high markets can go higher regardless of technicals.

My key was to consider the fundamentals when selling off a high and waiting for the trend to start using simple moving averages, not massively complicated but money management is the key. As yourself when am I getting in? When am I getting out? .

As long as your winning 6/10 times your doing something right.

 

[Rambo35]

So what I am filtering out here is that patience or lack thereof was and is a very big obstacle. When it comes to fear would anyone agree, that at least partially, it is derived from lack of confidence in your strategy/ability?

 

[ChattiFX]

So what I am filtering out here is that patience or lack thereof was and is a very big obstacle. When it comes to fear would anyone agree, that at least partially, it is derived from lack of confidence in your strategy/ability?

I'd definitely agree with patience and confidence in my strategy being big factors to me personally. Both of which only came with time and experience...

It's not easy to see 5-10+% of your capital eroding away over a period of time but if you can look at the chart and understand why it's happening. Maybe it's a period of abnormal volatility or sideways movement, but you've probably seen it happen before and have the experience to know that if you continue to follow the rules you have set yourself then after a few hours, days, weeks (whichever is relevant to your system) it will build back up and back in to profit.

Unfortunately you have to have hit on a strategy that works... and I've had plenty of strategies in the past that continue to lose which is pretty disheartening... but working towards finding the right strategy is where you get the experience and therefore the confidence and patience...

CFX

 

[Rambo35]

I'd definitely agree with patience and confidence in my strategy being big factors to me personally. Both of which only came with time and experience...

It's not easy to see 5-10+% of your capital eroding away over a period of time but if you can look at the chart and understand why it's happening. Maybe it's a period of abnormal volatility or sideways movement, but you've probably seen it happen before and have the experience to know that if you continue to follow the rules you have set yourself then after a few hours, days, weeks (whichever is relevant to your system) it will build back up and back in to profit.

Unfortunately you have to have hit on a strategy that works... and I've had plenty of strategies in the past that continue to lose which is pretty disheartening... but working towards finding the right strategy is where you get the experience and therefore the confidence and patience...

CFX

I think risk management can help there as well which should be set to a level below 10% in my opinion, actually way below it. Most prefer a level between 2% and 3%.