Make a living trading FOREX?

[aceholic]

To keep this brief:
Yes, there is plenty of opportunity to make money in Forex... more than enough to live on. If you could capture every pip in a single day in the 6E futures with a 1 lot, you could probably live on it for a year. The chances that you'll be able to find even a tiny fraction of that profit with any consistency is small.

It is helpful to have extremely low latency, a huge amount of information, and the best software available. Those are all advantages, but they are not completely necessary. Adjust your strategy according to your hardware/software capabilities.

Also realize that it isn't a zero sum game. Commissions are the "rake". Most people will come up with strategies that give 0 edge and lose to the rake. Some will not be able to handle it mentally and lose much more than that. A rare few will come up with strategies that can beat the rake over any significant period of time... and usually those strategies won't last for more than a month or two.

 

[cabletrader]

Quote from aceholic:

To keep this brief:
Yes, there is plenty of opportunity to make money in Forex... more than enough to live on. If you could capture every pip in a single day in the 6E futures with a 1 lot, you could probably live on it for a year. The chances that you'll be able to find even a tiny fraction of that profit with any consistency is small.

It is helpful to have extremely low latency, a huge amount of information, and the best software available. Those are all advantages, but they are not completely necessary. Adjust your strategy according to your hardware/software capabilities.

Also realize that it isn't a zero sum game. Commissions are the "rake". Most people will come up with strategies that give 0 edge and lose to the rake. Some will not be able to handle it mentally and lose much more than that. A rare few will come up with strategies that can beat the rake over any significant period of time... and usually those strategies won't last for more than a month or two.

The rest is just regurgatated stuff 1,000 people have said before but this bit is just great.....

"...A rare few will come up with strategies that can beat the rake over any significant period of time... and usually those strategies won't last for more than a month or two. "

I love it!

 

[IShopAtPublix]

Quote from cabletrader:

Can you explain please, that's a little bit too advanced for us noobs.

That is harsh cable

 

[cabletrader]

Quote from IShopAtPublix:

That is harsh cable

Sure, but he never came back to explain it!

People come out with this stuff and then slope off into the shadows when someone asks them a question or challenges their opinion, typical internet forum I guess

 

[IShopAtPublix]

Quote from cabletrader:

Sure, but he never came back to explain it!

People come out with this stuff and then slope off into the shadows when someone asks them a question or challenges their opinion, typical internet forum I guess

I know. Mods/Admins need to do something about people with 3 posts to their name coming in and claiming they make more money than warren buffett.

 

[Optionpro007]

Quote from weitau:

I can't add much here because many good people have posted valid advice.

What I can say is I have a friend who used to work at a large (300+ employee) online forex firm, and he says that nearly 100% lose their capital within 6 months.

Back to the guy with the idea that Forex trading is a zero sum game.... How does one succeed in Forex? You need access to large amounts of capital, insider knowledge, millions of $ in trading technology, and millisecond execution speed. So who has all this? They are FX traders at large banks. They see the order flow. They have the connections. They have quants programming with clusters of supercomputers. This is not the type of people I would want to play poker against.


Each market has different odds of success depending on many factors. Forex would be the last place I would think of trading.

I am only posting because the above is incorrect.

All you need to make money trading any market including forex, is learning to read and trade price. That is all you need, nothing else.

 

[AJFCapital]

Quote from Optionpro007:

I am only posting because the above is incorrect.

All you need to make money trading any market including forex, is learning to read and trade price. That is all you need, nothing else.

I totally agree!

But for FX, you would also need a good broker.

 

[cabletrader]

Quote from Optionpro007:


All you need to make money trading any market including forex, is learning to read and trade price. That is all you need, nothing else.

Absolutely!

....and like AJFCapital says, a good broker.....oh, and money management....and of course discipline.

I believe things are going to change in the next couple of months with the new rules coming into force from June, it will be interesting to see how shops handle it.

 

[AJFCapital]

Quote from cabletrader:

Absolutely!

....and like AJFCapital says, a good broker.

I believe things are going to change in the next couple of months with the new rules from June, it will be interesting to see how shops handle it.

I'm sorry.....what's going on in June?

 

[cabletrader]

Quote from AJFCapital:

I'm sorry.....what's going on in June?

This

I think it's going to be interesting to see what happens, we could be seeing a preview on Oanda right now with all the slippage, it seems 'what you see' is not necessarily 'what you get' any more!

Slippage on nearly every one of these 20 trades today, both in and out.....it must be said though that a fair proportion was in my favor!

Account1

I guess there's a lot to be said for longer term trading where the odd few pips here and there don't really matter!

Account2