%% FREE brokerage/LOL\ not going to happen for long with bid/ask spread. Some comissions did go to free. I did get a free IBD book with my 6 month[not free] subscription to 6 month IBD newspaper...........................................................................................................WORST way to learn is with leverage, but few of us are smart enough,to lean with 1 share SPY or MSFT. But one good thing about leveraging ignorance, as many of us did\ it tends to get so exspensive /you ALWAYS remember the lesson.................................................................................
I have to place a real trade every week on my site- it helps me but I still trade my own account like a wus
I hear ya. For me, the biggest part is learning about myself. I read all these stories about the Gamestop kids and all these others over the years that hit massive home runs...turning $20 into $3M or whatever. I could never do it. When the $20 gets to $150 I sell because I can't believe I have a 7 bagger and I don't want to lose what I made. I love reading about these guys but it would never be me.
You should not expect anyone to give you their special sauce of how they are making money in the markets. You need to find your own strategy that works and meets your personality for trading. I seriously doubt you will find anyone who will tell you before the trade is made to follow through or not. You, at best. may find a mentor who will review your trades after the fact and explain where you went wrong. Very few for free. There is all kind of information on the internet and in books that can help. They will not give a system to trade, but can give you the tools to build your own.
For free you can use ET. Post your plan for a trade and then post how you made the trade. If you varied from the plan explain why. That's what you should expect a mentor to do. A mentor will ask why? You have to be prepared to explain your action.
I have a secretsauce method that makes 50%+ p.a. Do I trade it? Of course not, I'm an idiot like most people!
I'm willing to go through a risk model woth you for free. Something as simple as a risk model would probably straighten you out a bit from what I'm reading.
Intriguing post by destriero and probably aligns a lot with my philosophy / approach. For me, I have a "framework" that guides what I'm focusing on but the actual decision-making is more discretionary based on skills and "pattern recognition" (conscious and subconscious / intuition), which can include reading the traders on elitetrader. And for me, pattern recognition isn't what a lot of people think (e.g., looking for typical price patterns such as H&S, wedge, candlesticks, etc.) -- it's way more expansive than that. For instance, there are definitely some folks on this site who have pretty distinct patterns of thinking and being able to recognize those is an additional edge.