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hdulcann58
03-10-2016,
Hi there!

I'm a complete newb to trading, but came across your forum a couple of times while investigating Emini Trading Academy and the Day Trading Academy. The comments on this site seemed really well reasoned and genuine, so I've come back to see what other gems you might have.

After poking around for a few hours I'm sorry to say I'm pretty lost on how to get started with trading.

The community here seems very skeptical of various youTube videos and training websites, but I can't figure out what the alternative is. What does futures.io (formerly BMT) recommend for an honest introduction to trading?

I guess what I'm after is a bit of a road map. I don't like to sign on for things before getting a full idea of the costs and risks. But as an outsider, I don't know who to trust and what training options actually do what they claim to do...

Can anyone recommend a course, or a series of videos, or books that can take me from zero to semi-functional trader? The more comprehensive the better, but preferably with fixed costs and clear progressive milestones.

Thanks for any and all feedback!

Howardpt
03-12-2016,
jaredmason View Post
Hi there!

I'm a complete newb to trading, but came across your forum a couple of times while investigating Emini Trading Academy and the Day Trading Academy. The comments on this site seemed really well reasoned and genuine, so I've come back to see what other gems you might have.

After poking around for a few hours I'm sorry to say I'm pretty lost on how to get started with trading.

The community here seems very skeptical of various youTube videos and training websites, but I can't figure out what the alternative is. What does futures.io (formerly BMT) recommend for an honest introduction to trading?

I guess what I'm after is a bit of a road map. I don't like to sign on for things before getting a full idea of the costs and risks. But as an outsider, I don't know who to trust and what training options actually do what they claim to do...

Can anyone recommend a course, or a series of videos, or books that can take me from zero to semi-functional trader? The more comprehensive the better, but preferably with fixed costs and clear progressive milestones.

Thanks for any and all feedback!

If I may, the first thing you need to do is decide what kind of trader you want to be.

The second is to decide what you're going to trade and when you're going to trade it.

The third is to develop your system.

It is work. There's no denying that. The good news is that it needn't cost you a dime until you're ready to open up a brokerage account and begin trading.

The attached pdf will guide you:

Attached Thumbnails
Hi! How do I get started?-developing-plan2015.pdf

idehagufais
03-12-2016,
I started by reading books I found at the book store. For inspiration I read interviews with traders. Market wizards and new market wizards. Also one of the best I read was Alexander Elders books, particularly the new trading for a living. I'd download ninjatrader and do some sim trading using end of day data. All free except the books. Find anything available free. Podcasts, webinars, iTunes vids. Avoid, for now expensive subscriptions and courses because all of that information can be found free online if you take the time to look. Eventually, after absorbing enough free info and with your experience with sim trading you'll probably want to consider coding strategies so you can backtest and have more certainty about your approach or methodology. You need to know if there is a positive statistical expectancy to your system. As a newbie I would avoid futures but consider forex because you can trade small with very small commissions. Plus you can scale up to higher leverage later as you grow. I hope that helps.


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"I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."
- Michael Jordan, 5-Time NBA Most Valuable Player, 6-Time NBA Champion

ihitewicojax
03-14-2016,
I'm going to recommend a different approach from the usual. Let's look at the steps you would take to become a professional golfer (or any performance based endeavor) and let's try to translate those steps into trading.

1. Learn and understand the rules
2. Get the appropriate equipment
3. Learn the basic mechanics
4. Practice in a controlled environment
5. Evaluate your performance
6. Apply steps 4 & 5 in real time
7. Find mentoring or education
8. Repeat previous steps for as long as it takes

In trading it would translate to:

1. Learn the terminology (margin call, short, long, risk-on, risk-off, trade management, etc)
2. Acquire a trading platform and brokerage account
3. Learn your platform (place a trade, manage your trade, close out trade, etc).
4. Practice in SIM placing some trades. Treat them as closely as possible to real-life, no 5,000 lot trades.
5. Record everything in a journal (observations, emotions, everything).
6. The reality of how difficult trading should be apparent if you followed all the steps so far. Get some skin in the game and open a small real money account and watch how different it is with actual money on the line.
7. Read books, watch the webinars in the Elite section, ask questions in the forum (everything you need to become profitable is already in this forum, no need to pay for a trading room).
8. Repeat about 1 million times the steps of failing, recording, learning, and applying until proficient.

Imibiamup
03-15-2016,
We ONLY retain learned knowledge in context.

This means to understand what a short is, get on a demo acct and see it in action, by doing it yourself.

To understand what a margin call is, get on a demo acct, and let a massive trade go against yourself, and don't close it until it margin calls. Incidentally, you'll also learn about stop-loss, money management, and what the emotional roller-coaster feels like.

To iterate, learning is best done in the context/application of what you're learning. Get in the driver's seat and smash into some walls.

What develops true skill isn't a repertoire of "how to do it correctly", but rather "how NOT to do it". So put on a helmet and wreck yourself a bit.

Also, see one, do one, teach one. Learn it, do it, then explain it to someone like they're five. Repeat the first two steps until you can do the last.

Start accepting the fact that this is going to take you a really long time, and be ok with that. For motivation and evidence, read Mastery by Robert Greene.

-Jimmy

P.S. Assume you're always wrong, then you will always be learning.

-Jimmy