I'm going to stick to mainly facts here... I would tell my story but I'm sure it would be similar to most guys who the trading thing has "clicked" for. It's taken me around 5 years, and 2 small blown accounts. I decided at the last one that the next time I'm going live will be it. Went to drawing board, backtested for several months. Got some setups that worked. Front tested them for 1 year now. Tracked my setups in and out statistically and doing some optimization currently. I have a profitable strategy, but no capital. I am a recent graduate at 22 years old and am currently working parttime. I have the option of having parents take out loan but they are not in most solid financial situation so im looking for alternatives. I have a tradestation account with sim results, but lots of wacky stuff happens on TS sim and its very unreliable as far as a track record. Lets say we can use it though if someone has creative ideas as far as going to an investor or lender. My job allows me to trade RTH and work fulltime to acquire capital. If it comes down to the longest solution, I will simply continue to work till I have a minimum of $30,000 dollars saved up. I trade index futures and a fixed 1%. I've gone through many options in my mind and am very patient for whatever solution comes to me. If any ET members have been here before and have some nice suggestions I would appreciate it. I have only recently acquired a steady income, I would be willing to do personal or small business loans, anything else that it takes. It will take me roughly till January to earn the money myself so I am willing to do that, but I am ready for live trading as of now. Thank you everybody have a wonderful evening.
If your strategy is truly profitable, why wait for $30000 to start? Many futures firms let you trade index futures with only a few thousand dollars margin.
1) Its most likely your front tests won't be profitable, real time money placed into the market is the only test 2) Save up $5000 or $10,000, join a prop firm, and trade 20-30k. Simple. In your situation.
Just keep in mind, you still don't know if you can trade profitably until you've done so. If you have a solid strategy, then why can't you start smaller?
If your account is to small for ES cant u trade/chart the ES and execute the signals on a 3x ETF pair like UPRO/SPXU. Here in europe we have Spreadbetting (taxfree) and CFD's which allows us to trade with smaller ticksize, down to $0.5 per ES/SP point.
I know how many losers I can expect and my maximum drawdown. If I consider my maximum sim drawdown of 15% and double that we come out to a 30% drawdown. Also, I trade in multiple units so I need to have minimum that amount of leverage and I do overnight holds which is why I am not looking to ETFs. I am looking to start a business and not to blow up. I have seen many fail with good skills and low capital in hand.
Here's an idea I am considering. What if I were to post live trades for my daytrading for next 1-3 months. If someone sees me as viable I would be able to provide proof of my income and perhaps a personal loan would be possible by someone generous who would earn a small return 9-12% EOY for a very big service to a person pursuing their dreams. Sounds crazy enough to work?
This guy triples his account within ONE month from $3000 to over $9000 (If everything is true as he posted in real time). If you are that good then you can generate your capital soon enough, or you can learn from him to double/triple your account within short period of time no matter how small amount of fund you start with. http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=202034
To what risk? how many percent of the trading equity is at risk for each trade. Anyone can go all-in and double their money in a single day trading futures, that is nothing to strive for. Reckless gambling is not trading.