Hello Everyone, Hello. My name is Mike and I from Ireland. I have just completed my 3rd year of my business degree and I am very interested in the area of trading and especially the whole energy area. I would really like to get into this area when I have completed my studies. My college is not one of the best in Ireland (we were ranked 12th in a recent poll) and my college course is also not ideal. I am currently majoring in marketing (I know not the best area for trading). We currently have no class on the whole area of trading. We just do a little on stock markets in our fiance class. I started an interest in the area of trading about a year a go after seeing Wall Street the movie. Everything I have learnt on trading has been self thaught. Ireland is not exactly a hot bed for trading and I actually do not know of anyone working in trading in Ireland. I am interested in a career in this area but is it just a pipe dream, especially after reading some of the comments on this page about guys with phd and MBA's. Any advise would be welcome, thanks
Don't let everyone's comments get you down. You don't need to know what "forex" means if you're simply trading some stocks (although you'll learn what it means after reading people's posts enough). Also, what type of career are you envisioning? There are maybe two or three dozen career paths you could take. You could leverage your money and buy bonds, you could day trade, you could invest, you could blah blah blah blah blah From what I can tell about your situation, I would suggest getting a day job doing whatever your major is in, save money, get a broker, and then start investing in some companies you feel will do well over the next few years. While you're doing that, find your favorite financial website (finance.yahoo.com, google.com/finance, whatever), and read everything that interests you. If you read and understand it, it's pretty much like taking college classes. The only difference is you don't have a degree at the end, and it'll be hard to work for someone who does financials (but you can surely work for yourself)
hi mike, u r lucky u did not learn finance, so u do not need to unlearn it. Most directional traders in the City used to be East Enders / working class guys with no education. U need math mainly if u do arbs or derivatives. I suggest u manage to get a job that allows u to sit in front of a screen and watch the market action. Ur job can be ur alibi to study how markets behave. Currently commodities are hot so u can search in that area Find a list of brokers, hedgers, speculators go visit them and tell them what u wrote. Have no shame, get them when they go to the pub and socialise. Meet as many as u can. After u start working try to understand the market, fail, try again. Do NOT trade real money at first but do paper trade and be honest with yourself. Then start trading small. Trade bigger when u win, smaller when u lose. Read Market Wizards by J. Schwager (the first book). Read Trend Following, by Covel. When u'll realise that emotion control is everything, u'll be ready to really begin learning something. At that point u might be ready to listen to what a Van Tharp has to say. Have fun. F
How many lives have been changed by this movie? Despite being about how bad Wall Street is it has become Wall Street's best recruiting tool.