Measurement of Success in Forex

[Mars]

Just throwing a this out there.

I have spent the last 3 years on and off with FX, Coding EA's and manual trading with little success. I think we all enter this thinking that we can find the next big thing but tend to learn the hard way that it can be subjective as to what the next big thing is.

The systems I have developed over the years have either been suited to particular market situations and tested well or been very abstract. But as we all learn in this 'business' - historical back-testing / curve-fitting can turn into an empty pipedream pretty quickly and that our stoplosses become our nightmares.

Just wondering how many of you have had any amount of success in FX? What seems to be driving you?

(I know there are people out there that have unique approaches and personally I think thats where it is.)

Mars

[MrLong]

A measurement of success from my perspective, is a system that continues to work Week in and Week out.
I would say 90% of advice being taught on forums is a fallacy, different people giving advice they don't really know to be correct.

Risk has to be measured by the success and experience of the trader, not just come to a figure of say 2% of an account balance, a trader may only want to deposit 10k with a crim, but has 100k in another bank account.

Biggest reason for failure, is to trade the same trade up to 7 times, example: AUDJPY, AUDUSD, GBPAUD.
When the trade goes wrong, the trader gets whacked, with the same trade going wrong x 3.

Then there are the trades where on one trade, they sell the USD and the on another trade, they buy the USD, in my book, that's a hedge.

No way can a trader put an EA on a chart, sit back put his feet up and watch the money come rolling in, I've recently observed, so called traders taking trades, that are no way trades and they quickly get
that confirmed to them, when their stop loss gets hit about 8 pips away.

Their mentality towards trading is completely wrong.

Hope I haven't bored you too much



Andy

[phil_trade]

Measurement of Success in Forex

A philosophic question

IMO, in this so difficult job of Forex Trader, success isn't +1500% in my last backtest from 2009-2013, either +230% in my last 9 months live trading
but
each new days, adapt itself and/or its EA to market conditions and win new trades !

Avoiding to be a "past good trader" is the most difficult job, and that's I will call "success in forex"

cheers

Philippe

[SteveHopwood]

For me, a successful trader is one who has stopped blowing accounts. That's me.

Next step: successful and consistently profitable.

[joyaxian]

I think to be successful in fx market, is to keep yourself mentally physically healthy at all time. I have been trading for over 5 years, when finally I figured out a system which works for me, I found out that I had an extremely high blood pressure (170/120) which means I either fall ill or stay away from the market. I blew a few of my accounts and really struggling to pay off my debts, having a high blood pressure isn't really helping for my recovery. I just wish some beautifully and kind coders out there can help me to create an ea or a semi automatic ea (or at least a voice alert) so I don't have to look at the screens and drive my blood pressure to sky high each single day. I must say this Christmas and forthcoming New Year is my worst of all in my entire life. I am so depressed.

Sorry to make people feel bad. I don't mean to. My spirit is still here, just a episode. Like Chinese used to say: I can loss many battles, but I will not loss the war.

Good luck and best wishes to everyone.

[phil_trade]

I think to be successful in fx market, is to keep yourself mentally physically healthy at all time. I have been trading for over 5 years, when finally I figured out a system which works for me, I found out that I had an extremely high blood pressure (170/120) which means I either fall ill or stay away from the market. I blew a few of my accounts and really struggling to pay off my debts, having a high blood pressure isn't really helping for my recovery. I just wish some beautifully and kind coders out there can help me to create an ea or a semi automatic ea (or at least a voice alert) so I don't have to look at the screens and drive my blood pressure to sky high each single day. I must say this Christmas and forthcoming New Year is my worst of all in my entire life. I am so depressed.

Sorry to make people feel bad. I don't mean to. My spirit is still here, just a episode. Like Chinese used to say: I can loss many battles, but I will not loss the war.

Good luck and best wishes to everyone.

Hi joyaxian

Just open New Post and explain your "trading system which works for you", with max detail and trades examples, and you will find some good coders to write this EA.

cheers

Philippe

[macman]

An interesting and thoughtful first post Mars.

Obviously the only true measurement of success in retail forex trading is if you can make a profit - “long term” - and “long term” is the clue here.

By their very nature, virtually all retail traders are ultra short term traders. Institutional traders may be taking a 5 year, 10 year or even longer position, so your point "The systems I have developed over the years have either been suited to particular market situations and tested well or been very abstract." may actually not be correct - “long term”. How many retail traders are going to be able to say “OK, I made a loss this year but I am sticking to my strategy?”

If you really want to be profitable “long term”, you need to take a “long term” approach to learning how to trade forex as a business and that can involve years of practice, just like starting any other type of business. Sadly, just as in any other type of business many who try are not really equipped to succeed. I am not sure what the failure rate is of new business start-ups but it is high - just like the high failure rate of forex traders. Also to compound the problem, the broker financial model is to get retail traders to trade as often as possible, not as safely as possible, as they know the vast majority won't be around very long. How many broker “competitions” are run to find the safest trader?

So, just like starting any other business type, do your research first, which in retail forex is daunting to say the least. Learn about risk profiling and understand the beast you want to tame and accept that if you are going to become a successful retail trader you will need to invest a huge amount of time. Is it maybe better to invest that time in gaining qualifications and experience in another area perhaps? You might well be able to become a qualified lawyer for instance in the same time frame!

Also, sadly there are no short cuts - no magic EA - no magic system, just hard, hard work and many disappointments along the way.

Can it be done?
Absolutely - I have a couple of past students making between 5% & 8% monthly without significant dips.

Can automated trading (EA) work?
Sure, a long as you understand that all EA's are little more than a not very smart assistant who places trades for you to help you out. The final decision has to be yours.

This is a risk/reward demonstration from my own course using an EA running a lot size 10 times higher than it should be - however notice it was started when the longest market run in recent months was under way and if you had cashed out in the 2nd or 3rd week of December, your gain would have been about 50% in just 21 days with a 44% draw-down. However, you would need a lot of experience to know when to release the EA as long term without intervention, it is suicidal!

EA_return_10x.png

I hope this is food for thought and doesn't come over as too negative.
If you have the personal mix needed to succeed as a retail trader, you will make it.

Best of luck & a happy and profitable New Year to all.
macman