This is true for probably 1% of all ES traders. And from this 1%, 99% will never trade with the low margins you speak about. You don't get rich from the leverage, you get rich from a good trading system that makes consistently money. Leverage is irrelevant if your trading system sucks.
You know that with a 500$ margin on the ES you only need a 10 points drawdown to wipeout your account if you use 100% of your available capital? Anyone who has traded the ES knows that this is a recipe for disaster.
Good Morning rb7, Yes sir, I agree 100%. Definitely need drawdown capital per ES contract + the margin for each contract. Losses will come.
$500/contract margin is not bad. Trading on $500/contract margin is bad. See the difference? A lot of people don't see that difference. To them if you want $500/contract margin, then you are trading on $500/contract margin.It is a misunderstanding. NO, I want $500/contract margin, but I don't trade on $500/contract margin. The low margin does nothing harm to me. It gives me some cushion when I need it. Sometimes I need to hold multiple positions, or sometimes I need to trade multiple instruments at the same time, so when I do those things, high margin will cause my problems and I will not be comfortable holding multiple positions, or trading multiple instruments . I don't choose my trade size based on how high leverage I get, I choose my trade size based on my strategy RR ratio and risk management,to ensure my account survival and at same time maximize my profit. For ES my lowest leverage in theory could be $5000/contract, but I never trade that low leverage. But I still want $500/contract margin.
The fact that you need it means that you trade at $500 margin. So your logic doesn't make sense. Without the $500 margin your position would have probably been closed by the broker. ROFLMAO.
I gave out all explanations in my post but you could not understand them. Why many forex brokers offer very high leverage because it is not uncommon that a forex trader holds like 10 or 20 pairs positions and trade 10 pairs at the same time. Each pair does not take much margin but 20 or 30 pairs need very high margin. It is not that if you have $10000 buying power and each pair needs $1000 margin, so you can trade 10 pairs. You still need some room for your positions when they go down and take more margin. So probably you will need $20000 to hold or trade 10 pairs.
The red text confirms that when you catch an open loss on some positions, you need more money, so more margin. The aim of a margin is to protect the broker against your losses. So the reserve just in case if the positions go down is called MARGIN. You use it to go under the initial $1,000 margin that you have. So in reality your margin is not $1,000, but more. If you need 20K to hold 10K margin positions, your margin is $2,000 instead of $1,000. My reaction was on the ES. Were you not speaking about the ES and $5,000 margin? Without the $500 margin you would not be able to keep all these positions, so you use the $500 margin, you need it. My conclusion is that your real margin is lower than $5,000. Take away the $500 margin and you get in trouble. I cannot see how the $500 margin can be useful if you don't use it. Useful means good for using. If you don't use it, it is not useful. But if you use it, your pretended margin is fake.