My thread title sums up my dilemma...I am 28 years old and have been in the mortgage business for the past 10 years...I am looking for a career change and growing up on the North Shore of Chicago what does everybody want to be "a TRADER". The problem I am having is due to my lack of education it seems nobody wants to even talk to me. I am willing to start at the bottom in order to learn pay is not important right now but knowledge is. I was very successful in the mortgage game but new laws and guidelines have evaporated my business. I need to make a career change now before I get any older. I have been reading through these forums for the past couple of weeks and have received some good direction but to no avail. I am interested in prop, trading floor/room, trading assistant clerk anywhere that will give me contacts and experience. I now the pits will close eventually but maybe that can give me a start. I need a little direction and advice other than DONT DO IT...I want to do it !!!Any help will be greatly appreciated. P.S. Do you have any good info on trading education? and I have seen people advertising trader mentoring is this the way to go?
My business stream was primarily real estate investors and quick turns, where you purchase a distressed piece of property cheap and fix and flip. Mortgage lenders have turned their nose at these types of deals and make it impossible to get financing for these property investors. And also their are 10K mortgage brokers in the Chicagoland area fighting for the same nickle.
Hello: If you are serious about this, the choices are pretty clear. You can start to read appropriate texts, magazines, internet articles on the subject, casting a wide net at first. Then as you develop enough experience and background, you might be able to answer some of your own questions. If you want to accelerate the process, unfortunately you will have to accept exposure to risk (the risk that you spend your valuable time and money and do not obtain the tools to get where you are going). If you wish to trade equities, you should go to a reputable proprietary house and get trained. For equities trading, you might look into Don Brights business (Bright Trading). If you want to learn to trade commodities (futures) you will need a fundamental background relating to the market you choose. If for instance you want to trade metals, you need to know everything about your market from the bottom up. Then you need to learn your market (reading at first, then perhaps going to a commodities trading firm for experience). If you choose forex, again you need a fundamental background in finance or economics and then I would suggest you try to obtain an entry level position with a company known for that type of trading (Citibank for instance). Whatever choices you make, you need to know that the road ahead is long. To obtain success in this business you need to have skills, experience and discipline. I have been doing this for a dozen years, and have never seen a person just jump into it successfully. Once you understand what it is you have to do, it seems to me that it is only a question of how badly you want it. Good luck Steve