Trading shares and fx

[rizbit]

I recently went to a seminar with learntotrade. I suppose it was informative however the woman spent half the time talking about her family life as opposed to the actual technical and detail side of things.

Now they made it look easy and tempting. I suppose they gave a slight warning saying that you can lose money if youre not careful.

Now After this i did my own research and decided NOT to pay the £2000 fee they were charging for a two day course (yes a 2 day course...) not to mention the travel and hotel cost youd have to pay to get their.

After doing some research I had the knowledge to do basic trading. I used a few well known sites for advice on who to invest in.

What have I found...Well I made money on numerous trades. I would say the profit/loss ratio overall was about 70:30. But the thing is when i made money it was small amounts and when I lost money it was bigger amounts so it terms of profit overall its probably negative.

What I want is a good forum where I can discuss issues as they arise, as I dont think this would be a good place. BUT i am sure there are others here who are into trading.

Is this just a rich man game?? Becuase im not rich (far from it) however the information i was given was that you CAN give up your day job for fx trading. But i think thats a load of BS now. Even analysts can say for sure what pairs will go up or down, you have to go by established pattern spotting but this doesnt always work.

Has anyone gone into trading as a newby and done well enough to give up your day job (if you had one) if so how did you do it, what advice would you have.

 

[Michaelr1211]

I havent ventured in fully yet, more of a 'learning the trade'. I could recommend a really good website thenakedtrader. The chap, Robbie Burns, also has a couple of books that are superb, i've just finished reading one. He also holds seminars i believe and i dont think theyre anywhere near as much as what you said there. Worth a look..

 

[Websitehandyman]

I trade on a regular basis.

I would say it's ok to use forums to learn things about trading shares but the best advice I can give you is to never take in anything anyone on a share forum says about any share. Don't trade on what you here said good or bad because those forums are full on people trying to get you to buy or sell shares. Companies pay people to post on them and the are prepared to lie, be abusive and simply swamp the discussions with rubbish to earn their £50 a day.

Try ADVFN.com & iii.co.uk for a start.

 

[spreadtrader]

Don't get sucked into big vendors selling training and trading systems. You can learn all you need to be profitable in the markets by spending a few quid on Amazon. Attend classes and seminars by all means - just not the ones that are blatant jazzy money making activities.

I highly recommend reading 'Come Into My Trading Room' by Dr A Elder. It is the book that gave me that light bulb moment where it all clicked into place and I became a consistent trader.

Robbie Burns clearly knows his stuff and is a successful trader but I found his books somewhat lacking in substance.

As a new trader I'd stay away from the on-line trading community message boards too. They are snake pits that will mess with your mind.

Trading is not a rich mans game. It is a percentage game though. Get your head around compounding profits and achieving a consistent 30%+ annual return on capital and you can quite conceivably become wealthy overtime, even if you are of modest means.

If you start with £2K capital and add £2K capital every year and compound annually at 30% with no capital extracted you could be sitting on over £1/2 mill in 15 years on a contribution of £30K. That's the killer detail that gets you to where you want to be.

You'd need some serious trading capital if you wanted to do it for a living. £100K cash and use of leverage bare bones minimum. At that rate you'd risk your capital not growing too. £300K + sensible leverage would be comfortable.

I'm personally in the get rich slow camp. I.e. I trade part time and my expenses are covered by my business.