What to do?

P

PipHog

A small account ($200.00) unit forex trader that is consistently profitable but not highly so (40-50 pips a month) has two choices?

1.Grind it out for a year or two until the account reaches the equity needed to make enough profit to withdraw some of it for expenses and yet still add to equity.
2.Try to find someone to fund a 20k-30k account for starters so can start the above process immediately.

Any experience out there? Recommendations?
PH
 
Won't basically your finances dictate what you should do?

I mean if you need more money to pay the rent than you're making trading, then you'll either have to get a job or find an investor so you can bring in some real money soon. The latter sounds like a long shot to me, plus the fact that it may be harder to stay profitable with the added pressures of trading someone else's money, trading larger size, and of course the ever-present threat of your edge(s) fading away. But if you can find an investor and you have faith in yourself, then go for it. Your best bet is probably a family member, realistically.

Otherwise, if you don't have bills to pay, then the best thing is probably to not put anyone else's money at risk, but keep doing what you're doing day after day, trying to improve as much as you can so you can build your account on your own.

Edit: By the way, my personal view is that trading is best as a means to manage one's portfolio, not to try and build one from scratch. But all power to you if that's what you're trying to do.
 
Thanks Tomahawk.

Yes, you are correct, in the absence of alternatives options are limited at this time. That is why I'm trying to brainstorm.

I mean yeah, I can plug along for a couple more years, but I would rather not, it has taken me several to get to where I am.

TO: Achilles28

Let's do some math. My calculator says that at 50:1 with 50 pip profit per month we're looking at a 16% per month return on account equity. That means the account would double in approximately 6 months. (6x16= 96%--almost 100) all things remaining equal of course, this is just math. :D

Now, this may not be much to some people wanting to make millions per month but I can see someone out there being ok with that in the absence of anything else.

BACK TO TOMAHAWK:

Even if a couple grand were scraped up, still, I would be plugging along for a long time on a few hundred per month profit, why leave so much potential on the table? But if that's the way that it has to be, then ok. I've stuck with it so far, and am not going to be quitting.

PH
 
Hi, I'm in quite a similar situation to yourself. I have a very small account that I'm trading and I'm targetting 100% growth per year.

Don't be disheartened about trading a small amount as even a $1,000 will turn into $1m after 10 years with 100% returns a year. Sounds like a long time, but it's not unrealistic and are there any better plans out there ?

One thing you can do, if your system is good, is sell signals through Collective2 and ZuluTrade as this costs very little and could generate revenue that you can then use to swell your capital. I do that with my system :-

http://www.collective2.com/cgi-perl/system51583707
http://www.zulutrade.com/TradeHistoryIndividual.aspx?pid=20470

Zulutrade is free to list on, C2 charges $90 per 6 months and it will take a while to build history and get paying subscribers. The successful players on there can pull in $1000's per month in fees so it's well worth considering but these are a handful and I suspect the vast majority make next to nothing.

C2 is probably the more professional of the two and it scores systems on consistency of returns so even a low returning system like yours could do well if it's consistent. Zulutrade, on the other hand, is like the wild west and many systems use outrageous techniques like never closing a losing trade or martingale to get massive returns and high win rates with catastrophic levels risk to the punter.
 
Based on the size of the account and profitability it's a good bet you've got a very short trade history.

How many trades have you made? Over what period?

You need audited returns over at least 2 years before you can expect any significant interest.

3 good months out of 4 is meaningless.
 
Quote from Pippi436:

3. get a job, and build up a real stake
More...

Agreed, but I think there's a fourth alternative......

4. Quit now. Because if the original poster were serious he wouldn't have asked this question. You have to clear the first hurdle.
 
You guys are too funny.

Makes me wonder why I need to go through the hassle of managing 9 figures for a miserable 1,5%/15% when I can just take my $1000 and double it every six months... :p

Damn, all these years lost. I would have been richer than Buffet by now.

Ninna
 
^ It's likely you don't "manage" anything.

But work for a fund in a tertiary role like analyst or systems design.

People don't flippantly chat about running 9 figure accounts on a message board. It's a gigantic liability professionals avoid.
 
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