Hello, I need a little advice, and there seems to be a plethora knowledgable folk here who might be able to help me. Simply put, I want to trade as a HOBBY, not as a means of financial support. No way - never. I've read (here) that good way to start is with FOREX. I came across a web site, forex.com, that advertised the possibility of starting accounts as low as $250, which is about my range for where I am and what I want to do. Am I looking down the right road? I want to start out with a few hundred bucks, don't want to pay commission fees, and have zero expectations of making any money. Cheers, Thanks for any pointers, tips. I appreciate any consideration. Brad
You want to trade as a hobby, not to earn a living, and you want some good recommendations? OK, if you want to trade forex and aren't worrried about taking your profits out of the market, they come highly recommended: http://www.elitetrader.com/br/?action=view&R_FirmID=183 Good luck. Jimmy
Brism, Try Oanda....you pay fees but they are in the spread...with any Forex dealer/marketmaker... Be careful, You may like trading so much, you may get serious, regardless of your beginning... Michael B. P.S. I think you have a better chance than 75% of the posers here in ET and thanks for the refreshing post and your writing style is much appreciated.
Run, don't walk away from the forex market. Excessive leverage on the order of > 100:1 (nobody can make perfect trades with no margin of error) combined with a HIGHLY opaque OTC market stacks the odds against you... not to mention that retail FX firms are, by definition, bucket shops. If they cannot offset your position and those trying to take the same side as you - don't expect to get filled. You'd do well to prove it to yourself by trading equities on margin via a prop account while simultaneously trading forex and seeing which is best. Note that you aren't going to learn how to trade by thinking that your tuition will be a few hundred bucks. Expect to spend many thousands before coming close to forming a coherent strategy. The good news is that all of the trouble one goes through to learn to trade can never be taken away. Additionally, it's a wonderful adventure and if you enjoy solving puzzles, it's the world's greatest puzzle. Order The Logical Trader by Marc Fisher.
Yeah, and then you can trade like him, and make $0.02 for every $1,000 in margin you have, oh, OK, lets make that $0.005 for you. Very profitable, eh? Now that's what I call hobby trading!
Oh man, you don't really expect us to believe that you make solid money as a retail FX trader, do you? It doesn't happen. I worked at FXCM when I first arrived in NYC and I saw ONE retail account turn a profit. ONE. Granted, he was up huge over 4 years (close to 7 figures on a 5 figure initial account base). But only one?! To this day I really believe he was running some form of arbitrage on the technology - similar to the games people used to play when ECNs first appeared in the late 90s. But, I'm not smart enough to venture a solid guess.
FaderTrader, I am arbing, but not on temporal imbalances...and I do not care what you (us) believe...I also have another system that is not arbing and can make some consistent money. As far as FXCM and your background, you just lost a huge amount of credibility... Here is my track record that I am building
Do I really need to....Just the initials FXCM explains all...When your ready to trade, get out of those bucketshops and get into a respectable firm...