OK, well let me help you out. Everything you are proposing is already out there, it's called a prop firm. LOL. Seriously, I don't see what the difference is. I mean look, they still pay commissions right? So on top of that, you are charging them a daily nut to sit somewhere and be independent? So they still have all the same over head but none of the advantages to being prop? I doubt this will fly man.
But what if there is not a prop firm in your city?..then what?. I live in Birmingham and the closest thing to a prop would be in Atlanta, so if I had something like this here, I'd go in a heart beat. And any trader that can make 1k a day, I dont think is going to care about a small hourly fee. The whole point of all this is for a trader to be able to work with, and around other traders rather being stuck at home all day long, and like I said, if there is no prop around, I think many would give it a try. they'll be able to download their broker software on the computers, so if they're online traders, or direct access traders, it can still work.
And how many traders are there in Birmingham? LOL. Seriously man, look, talk to Don Bright. He use to have 10,000 offices around the country. LOL. Ok, a few less. But a lot. He shut almost every one of them down because outside of NY, Chicago, and apparently Las Vegas, there is no demand for it. You have to go to where the traders are. They are not coming to Birmingham!!!!! I'm sure you have a nice little town, in fact, I heard it's a fun place and cheap as well. But if you really want to take this career seriously, you might want to pack your bags and move to where the action is. Your venture will not work on a small scale. You really need to pack a place in to justify the cost. So let's say there are a couple more guys like you around Birmingham that are disenfranchised and left out and are looking for an office. That's not enough. You need a lot of guys to make it worth it. That is why Don closed shop in almost every city they had an office in.
A trading venue in Birmingham? LOL. You'll have better luck selling fur coats in the Caribbean. Ok, if you are serious about this...call a couple of the larger prop houses and see if they will work out a deal with you to open a small branch in your area. I doubt you will get any takers, but it's a better shot than opening an internet cafe and charging rent.
Wasnt this idea played out already in the late 90s? There were these firms that opened offices meant for independent traders. Each trader would either get a cubicle or an office. It looked exactly like a real work place. The idea here is that some people would trade better in a structured office environment and would be able to network in-person with other traders. When the tech stocks crashed, then these places went out of business...
If there enough potential customers, you need to do some market research for your idea. I think it sounds interesting. But I don't know if I would like to trade there. I would appreciate the comfort of my own home. You need to be able to offer a whole lot of software on your computers. Different traders use different charting software; metastock, tradestation, amibroker, wealthlab, neoticker etc. I don't think it would be very lucrative, but you never know. Maybe a regular internet café would be more lucrative.. But if your doing it for fun, as you say your going to do it when your consistantly profitable. Then it would be cool if it would just breakeven, wouldn't it.
I have an idea to make this business profitable : you have to propose this deal to your customers / traders, let's assume they trade forex : 1) find a reliable forex broker who offers an interesting introducing broker program, for example cmsfx (are they reliable maybe not....)offers 7$ per round turn per lot to the introducing broker, that means every time one of you traders buy and sell a lot you get 7 $, 70 $ if they trade 10 lots etc... 2) get a powerfull charting software that you will install on all your computers. 3) find at least 10 traders who will open their account and trade their acount with the broker you have an agreement with 4) tell them go and join my room for free (or very little money) (new computers nice flat screens free charting softwares) as long as you make at least a volume of .....x lots. That mean you offer them an office, computers and charting software , and an office atmosphere of working for nothing or nearly nothing. You get paid by the commissions you get as an introducing broker. Let's assume you are a great trader and profitable, you can charge your traders your trading coaching / system an dof course trade near them with your own account and make extra profits. I am french excuse me in advance for my poor english. It lokks better this way no?You could make money without trading and without asking money to you customers...... Good trades to all