Not looking for a secret magic pill for success; looking for steady progress.

Well, I traded demo for about three weeks, had a decent hang of it, and decided to go live.

Here are my depressing results
https://www.myfxbook.com/portfolio/forex/392342

When trading demo, I would just look at longer trends, look for a short opposition to that trend, then make my buy or sell in favor of the trend. I didn't use s/l or t/p at the time and it actually worked fairly well, though do note that I had a hard-on for data and charts and a mobile app that let me ignore life and stay actively involved.


When I went live, I was also reading more and more about keeping tight s/l and how managing losses should be prioritized over only thinking about profit. I've never been a get-rich-quick douchebag and I'm naturally pretty patient and a moderate thinker (extremes usually aren't good). I don't mind taking the longer run, so this sounded intuitive and wise to me.

I did just that.

Well, that didn't go well since it kept seeming like my s/l were doing me no good and only holding me back while my t/p weren't firing when they should; I was left with s/l that set off just a little bit too early (right before a reversal in my favor) and t/p that were set just a little bit too far out (a little bit away from the point where there was a reversal against me).

Recently went back to just actively monitoring and making decisions based on that and, well, the market bent me over and showed me who was boss.








So, since I'm sure plenty of you have blown out accounts, fought the frustration, and learned from it (and I do expect to make loss at first to a reasonable degree while I learn), what advice could you offer me? I'm grasping the general concepts. It's the technical application of them that I'm getting tripped up by.

Hey,

Things happen and happen again...

First I would recommand to all new traders to practice for at least 6 months on demo. (I haven't done it and the same story happen to me too... third times! )

Then you will have to learn about your errors... this is the only way to learn into this jungle. Having a break and try no to do the same errors again.

Getting more confidence about yourself and matury.

We all have to admit that we do not become good trader in on day... You will succeed in if you really do believe it!

It took me over 2 years... and now I'm not affraid showing my live account. (Dreams can be true)

Good luck

This Pipjet seems ok thus far for me for 3 months: batcheler.mtrocket.com , its using FX Choice broker fixed spread. There are 5 other accts Pipjet folks are running 5 accts, one is around 2 years now, see via there site pipjet.com . Of course, the 1% that is a loser trade, one hopes doesn't hit the hard stop and is similarly a controlled trade close like one -11 pip loss on some of those accts. Jerry

I've been trading for 9 months now, and in the beginning I never saw consistent profits, either. The typical pattern was that I would be profitable in over 90% of my trades gaining a few pips at a time, and then I would lose one big position and wipe out all my previous gains. This pattern continued until I realized I wasn't paying much attention to the reward-to-risk ratio.

The reward-to-risk ratio (the ratio of the pip gain from a win and the pip loss from a loss) must be at least 1:1. Mine was way below that; I used to close positions after gaining only 2 or 3 pips, and when I had a loss, it was on the order of 10 to 20 pips. No wonder I was losing money.

My problem was solved when I did the following:
1. Come up with a strategy that wins more than 50% of the time.
2. Keep the reward-to-risk ratio at 1 or greater.

the key is to adapt to the market change,being able to read the market properly and using fundamentals along with thech analysis is essential,practice for months until you are able to that properly on demo ,you must master it before going live with big money.

Hi,
Just want to tell you that i have went through this same thing with SL just a bit too close or TP a bit too far. The point is that you have to remember what you after? You are not picking the tops or the bottoms but what you are after is what is in the middle. What it means is that 20pips out of 50pips move is what I want.

Other thing I want to add is to be careful with reversal patterns. Remember that they have much more power in sync with a larger time frame setup otherwise I can not care less about them.

...and the most important....Journal Your Trades!
Check your hair burning ideas over 50trades and see what does it bring to the table by analyzing them in your journal. I know its boring but do you remember your last 100 trades? The setup and your levels? So journal...an good luck.

It's a hard business. We have all blown accounts before finding success. A positive win-lose and risk-reward ratio are essential, yes, as is a sensible stop-loss and keeping risk levels down, but by far the biggest reason we fail is because we don't follow our trading strategy! How many times have you moved a stop? How many times have you been so certain that you have risked more than you should? How many trades have you closed before the take profit is hit? They don't call it discipline because its easy!

The smaller the timeframe you use the more you will find that this happens. On larger timeframes, a small difference from price and your TP won't matter as much as on small ones.