ITT: ask a Forex trader anything...

>>1039958
Did you ever made more than 5% in a year?

>>1039958
Why did you fail high school?

Was it too hard or are your parents meth addicts

>>1039959

Yes, I have. Although 24% per year is my current target.

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>>1039961

I earned my GED, and then attended college for accounting. After I was done there I moved on to SEO, and discovered trading while promoting a Forex website. The rest is history.

Honestly I understand the misunderstandings/aggravations leveled towards the industry at the moment. There is a lot of deceptive information out there, and honestly I was just coming on here to offer a bit of truth.

Because for one thing, unless you're a millionaire...you need to gain access to OPM (other people's money) in order to make a living in this business. That's the truth, but there is a way to get there without working for a huge bank.

Been researching/studying forex for a while now, when i go live im planning on opening and account with 5-10k is this enough starting capital? I want to be a swing trader, how realistic is 15% return per month?

how long do we have to wait until you try to sell us some stupid "follow my strategy"-scam?

>>1039958
When you make a profit, where does that money come from?
Someone has to be losing money for you to make money right?

>>1040029
its everyday the same "look at me a im froex trade ama" implying that any serious trader is wasting time on chan

>>1039965
>but there is a way to get there without working for a huge bank

and that is?

>>1040042
well, i found the answer to my own question.
Forex has a 0 sum. Meaning that the money comes from all those that put money into it. for you to make a profit, other traders must be taking a loss. That's why 98% of people lose money while 2% get really rich with it.
you'd be better off selling forex than trading it it seems.

>>1040050

Sorry I didn't respond sooner, was in a meeting. So basically you need to take the time necessary to educate yourself, and then prove yourself in a demo account, then open a small account to further demonstrate your ability.

At that point you have a kind of 'portfolio' as a trader you can shop around to hedge funds, etc...

>>1040061

No, Forex is not a zero-sum system. Options contracts is a zero-sum game though, definitely.

>>1040061
your moms a zero sum game mate
i sell her my dick
she buys my dick

>>1040071

Thanks for your input. I'm certain that it will get you far in life, and I hope that you find your way back to /b/ soon.

>>1040074
youre welcome
good job paying interest when you could be trading individual currencies for cheaper

>>1040071
no... his mom gives you a little surprise for free...

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>>1040079

What about trading other people's money wasn't clear in my earlier statement? And no thanks about trading individual currencies, I prefer spot FX.

>>1040085
>opm is an argument against not getting a cheaper price to trade

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>>1040086

So...all the hedge funds and institutions who trade FX spot and make billions of dollars a year...they're just ignorant to your rationale.

Is that your assertion? Because if so, man...

>>1040087
>appeal to authority fallacy

>>1040087
could you name a single hedge fund that trades spot FX?

>>1040102
GSA capital

there are quite a few trading FX forwards

>>1039965
>Because for one thing, unless you're a millionaire...you need to gain access to OPM (other people's money) in order to make a living in this business.

that isn't true - completely depends on the strategy... there are still 'locals' out there at prop firms trading FX futures etc..and the amount of money (their money) they need to put down for margin can often be just a five figure sum...

obviously their returns are more like 100% a month...

>>1040106
do you work for them?
if not why not?

>>1040113
I don't work for a fund, I rent a desk at a firm in London and trade futures

>>1040117
that is the sort of firm I would try to work for if I were to work for a fund though

Winton Capital would be another

I don't have a PhD though....

>>1040117
do you have to pay to get a desk? what's the setup?
if not: how did you get there? did you just show them your record?

>>1039958

How must capital do I need to start forex trading for a living?

What platform do you use?

>>1040129
yes you have to pay.. how much you pay depends on software and data you require... there are various ISVs you can use - TT, CQG, Stella etc.. most prop firms/arcades support a bunch of them... renting a co located server obviously adds to the costs too... can vary from a couple of grand a month to say 4-5 or so... I'd rather not get too detailed here re: my specific setup as there aren't too many people out there at prop firms doing exactly what I do.

got there via a grad scheme at a different firm - you start off on a sim for 10 weeks then go live on a 50/50 split... this scales up as you make more money...

there are far fewer opportunities for this these days - if you were interested then Met Traders still offers this sort of training program, very slim chance of success though now... I don't know if they pay a salary when you're training or not... but they don't appear to charge for it (some rather dubious firms are charging for this sort of thing now - fact is it isn't viable to train up people to trade futures any more as the vast majority will lose money - if it were then I'd have been looking to back a couple of grads myself already.)

>>1040140
>fact is it isn't viable to train up people to trade futures any more as the vast majority will lose money

to put this into context back in 2004 there were people sat at some firms trading STIRS, just using simple spread trading strategies... spread moves up a bit, moves down a bit etc.. plenty of them just about broke even and made a living off the exchange rebates for providing liquidity... there were complete numpties able to earn say 15k GBP a month by breaking even or even making a slight loss and getting paid rebates from the exchange... these days these people are very much out of the game thanks to increased automation of trading, and rightly so... just as most of the old floor traders couldn't cope when trading went to the screen...

so the days of getting in a bunch of grads... sacking a few of the complete idiots after a few weeks but then letting the rest go live and seeing them make money and increase in size... those days are long gone

>>1040149
what are they (Met Traders) teaching in these courses?
I have the feeling that it is "technical analysis"

now that I have read up on it I'm pretty sure that Met Traders is a scam.
You have to pay £2000 a month for the desk and they admittedly have a very high turn over.
They are not interested in creating good traders to trader their money. All they want is to milk dreamers for their desk fee and get a new batch of recruits in when the old ones are burned.

>>1040154
yes, quite likely...

I can't comment on their specific 'course' but if it is anything like the course I did years ago at another firm then TA will form part of it. Thing is these courses (or at least the one I did) don't really teach you to trade. Not everyone uses TA, one of the biggest traders at my previous firm didn't have a chart in sight on his screens, just price ladders...

the course I did years ago involved a bit of self study initially, we were set tasks to find out certain information about different exchanges, using the Eurex, CME etc.. websites... introduced to the order book, how it works, different contract specs... we'd have visits from reps from different exchanges.. they'd give some lectures and leave promotional material (basically we were going to try different markets on the sim and then go live on a particular product or set of products)... in addition tot he catalogues I think I ended up with a CBOT baseball cap and some mapel syrup from the guy from the Montreal exchange. Other external people are the reps from different software companies and reps from technical analysis services... that is where the TA lessons came in - some bloke from futures tech gave a bunch of lessons and we had some other guy from trading central trying to pitch his service... we then had lessons in house about different basic strategies fro trading spreads, trading economic releases (or rather the aftermath of economic releases and in particular how spreads tend to vary immediately after certain figures... how certain figures give indications of other upcoming figures...)... it was useful stuff to know but the actual process of finding edges from which to make money... that is basically left to you...

>>1040164
you're not going to pay them with your own money surely?

desk fees are standard, I had to pay one as a trainee too and a salary and software costs... it is usually a deduction from your account... software costs only kick in when you go live. but yeah you have to cover the desk fee and the cost of your salary from the profits you make before you take your split...

I'm not sure that is a scam per say... if you lose a bunch of money then it is their money you're losing and you won't have paid them anything

>>1040171
the thing is: you don't get access to their money for 8 months or so (I forgot the actual number).
so that's around £16k out of the pocket to learn stuff you should already now if you are interested in trading.

>>1040102
You just went full retard..

>>1040166
let's get to the meat: how did you find your edge?
i'm not asking what your edge is but I want to know the path to get it...

>>1040181
you seem a bit confused - how are you going to be out of pocket... if they hire you they're paying you a small salary, it is their money at risk, you don't put up your own money unless you're going to be self funding at one of theses places

>>1040185
I get that. But who is to say that you will get their money to trade with.
This might just be a carrot in front of my nose.

>>1040184

I don't have a single edge - there are various things that I've observed (and later tested) that can make money. some things have come via other traders, some things have come via observation initially...

there were some exercises that were useful initially in the first few weeks - for example some index gets updated and published every 15 seconds, there is a futures market for this index, we had an exercise to construct the index ourselves to update in real time from data feeds of the individual stocks... obviously people arb between index futures and their components (if they have the infrastructure) but this was more to see if there were situations where a movement in the real time index we'd constructed could give an edge in scalping the futures... i.e. even say a movement/change in the order book allowing for good queue position etc..... this could be taken further to say monitoring the bigger components of that particular index... (it didn't really result in an edge but it was a useful exercise)

another thing to look at like I mentioned earlier was the movement of different contracts after figures... if you take a look at some spreads for example US 5yr/10 yr and bund/bobl... look at the spread between the two contracts immediately before a big figure NFP etc.. then how they behave during and then afterwards... in certain situations you'll see them trading in a certain range then in all the chaos the spread/the relationship between them moves significantly due to the mass of selling/buying... then as everything calms down it the spread/the relationship slowly returns to the range it was trading in before the figure...

>>1040202
you're not necessarily going to get their money to trade with... you might go on the sim, lose pretend money and get sacked...

doesn't cost you anything other than your time though

>>1040111

100% a month huh...show me the way to that pot o' gold.

>>1040211

Thanks for joining the thread...good to see another voice of reason on here. Yes, the road to getting AUM/OPM can be a long one. But it is possible.

>>1040211
how do you know that the patterns you find are robust?
I had a spread widening/tightening pattern last year. Then at one event the tightening did not happen and it wiped out the profits of the previous 15 times.

>>1040220

What sort of risk management are you using?! You shouldn't be losing that much money in a single trade...

>>1040220
initially I didn't... it was a very crude approach... now I'm a bit more data driven but there is still a big element of intuition. I wouldn't necessarily compare my approach to the very scientific approach carried out by say quant researchers at a hedge fund... then again there are some relationships patterns that seem to persist only temporarily so in some ways a bit of intuition isn't necessarily a bad thing... then again maybe I'm just kidding myself and have just been lucky all this time

>>1040223
kelly.
i did not go broke but still a huge loss. the bet size was bigger than the previous events because i accumulated profits from other strategies.

>>1040224

Right, because of the fact that most systems are based on current market conditions.

>>1040225

So you added to your position based on your profitability, and also added to your stop loss as a result?

This really isn't a good idea on a perpetual basis, it's better to increase your positions at specified intervals.

>>1040217
>100% a month huh...show me the way to that pot o' gold.

why? you're apparently successfully trading client funds at a healthy 24% per year...

the sort of things traders at prop firms/arcades do don;t lend themselves to constantly increasing in size or compounding returns... if you trade a 100 lot clip one month you're probably still going to trade a 100 lot clip the next regardless

>>1040231
or if we went back in time a few years maybe you'd be happy to throw around a few hundred lots or even a thousand or so... these days not so much...

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>>1040231

I was being facetious...forgive me.

>>1040224
>then again maybe I'm just kidding myself and have just been lucky all this time
doesn't this scare the shit out of you?

>>1040238
didn't really think about it initially, was more worried about making sure I was profitable, consistent etc.. didn't consider that some of my success could be a fluke/luck...

now I'm in a position where I don't need to worry too much if what I currently do stops being viable

>>1040231
>don;t lend themselves to constantly increasing in size or compounding returns
so you are saying that you won't get rich at a prop shop ...

>>1040248
depends what you mean by rich.... most firms will have had a few people who've had seven or occasionally eight figure years...

my point was in reference to compounding - if you could compound the sort of % returns we're talking about then you'd quickly become the richest person in the world...

>>1040248

Define rich. Also, one can take what they learn and go to those they know and spin off to create a hedge fund of their own. It's like the difference between waiting tables and owning a restaurant.

>>1040252
Where do you work by the way? Or are you independent?

>>1040255

I'd rather not talk about where I work. Suffice it to say that I employ a very conservative strategy with regard to risk, and I look to the long term. Hence why I started a thread, all the get rich quick schemes ala Forex do a lot of harm.

>>1040252
very few go on to hedge funds... people who are successful for a 2-3 years do seem to pop up at various banks albeit in non trading roles, some of them end up working for software companies, market data vendors, exchanges etc.. - a couple of friends who didn't make it are now basically in glorified sales roles as account managers etc..

there are people like Lawrie Inman though who ended up at a hedge fund - though it is a certain type of fund that doesn't seem to be particularly scientific and wasn't set up by the typical ex banker type either... but rather someone with a background in futures/commodities...

http://news.efinancialcareers.com/us-en/149214/high-paying-hedge-fund-hires-super-star-trader-with-taste-for-poker/

does anyone one of you two know anybody who got rich (=millions) trading FX or similar with his own money?

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>>1040262

The investment game is not here to entice people who aim to be mediocre or even nominal, it's a game for people who want to be exceptional. It's about what you want and what you can sacrifice.

The guy who wants to spend his spare time drinking beer and going to the club twice a week though...no this is not a likely outcome. Nor is it a likely outcome for someone who already has a wife and children.

But for someone in their 20s with the time/motivation necessary, it is absolutely possible to:

Learn how to trade ---> Do well in a demo account ---> open a micro account ----> trade well for six months ----> approach a prop firm.

>>1040262
>Tudor Capital’s European operation is run out of an ostentatious 25-acre specially-adapted stately home in Epsom, Surrey replete with onsite pool, bar and tennis courts. It’s known for paying its employees well, and this year its 21 members shared a compensation pot of nearly $70m (although the highest paid member received $27.6m of this).

doesn't sound like a bad place to work - though AFAIK they've now moved their offices into West London...

>>1040267

I believe I do...but I've never been one to ask a friend how much they have in the bank.

>>1040269
I'm talking about people who've already been trading at a prop firm for a few years... very few of them go on to work for hedge funds.

raising capital is a whole new ball game

>>1040274

Raising capital is indeed a whole new ball game, but if you have the connections to spin off and start a hedge...chances are you know where to start looking.

Lawrie Inman got fired last year though... most likely he was too successful ;)
http://news.efinancialcareers.com/us-en/218592/poker-star-hedge-fund-trader-leaves-tudor-capital/

>>1040267
yes

though mostly fixed income futures and oil futures

at the firm I started at there were a couple of big gilt/bund traders and a big oil trader - at one point he was one of the largest independent oil traders trading on the ICE exchange(in terms of volume at least)

I've made sufficient profits myself over the years to not have to worry too much

>>1040278

no that isn't sufficient, I've got plenty of connections right now... my current clearer provides seed capital as did the founder of my previous firm who I'm still in contact with... there are small hedge funds renting office space in the London office where I rent a desk

it is a completely different ball game - a lot of the stuff people left at prop firms do simply isn't scalable in that way...

I find trading a very lonely pursuit.
Absolutely nobody who has any success is willing to share or mentor :(

>>1040304
well there isn't much incentive to unless they've got a stake in your success... i.e. they're backing you financially - fact is that isn't so viable these days

have you tried options market making firms - optiver, IMC, liquid capital, mako etc..? They still take on graduates regularly.

>>1040312
I applied to one of them. No response.
But I don't have a PhD. So I doubt they will take me.

>>1040321
you don't need a PhD to become an options marketmaker... lack of a PhD isn't a factor

it would be useful for a quant/researcher position at one of those firms but certainly not a requirement for a trading position

>>1040328
>>1040321
I also spoke to a recruiter specialising in city jobs.
She told me that without a Math PhD from Oxbridge or being a Nobel price level academic there is no chance I will ever get a food in the door of the industry.
I gave up trying at that point.

>>1040331
>Math PhD from Oxbridge or being a Nobel price level academic

if you can't figure out that this is obviously false simply due to the number of people working in the city then you probably don't belong there

>>1040332
That was for hedge fund jobs. Seems to be true though. The majority of hedge funders have PhDs from Oxbridge.
I know I don't belong there.
Since I never got a call back after applying.

And for sell side stuff I'm not the type anyway.

>>1040342
if you want to do research into financial time series data at a hedge fund then yeah a PhD in statistics, signal processsing, econometrics would be a good start...

a PhD is a good start for any researcher role whether as an academic or in industry or in a hedge fund...

if you want to be a researcher then why haven't you done a PhD..i.e. a big exercise in research?

>>1040371
on the other hand if you just want to trade futures or options... it isn't necessarily a requirement none of those options market making firms previously mentioned require one for trading positions

>>1040071
Fucking rekt

>>1040371
I'm not good enough.
It's difficult to get into a PhD position at an Oxbridge level uni, i.e. I got rejected.

I remember talking to someone from Jane Street. He said that traders also have PhDs since it's completely automated.

That shift towards recruiting almost exclusively PhDs from top Unis seemed to have happened the last 7-8 years.
It coincides with a trend to 100% automation of trading execution and a huge oversupply of PhDs with only few research job in academia.

I think the last remaining (but still dying) area where humans execute trades are OTC derivatives.
For now...

>>1040395
>I'm not good enough.

so what is the issue, you want to be a researcher but you, by your own admission, are not good enough to do a PhD... probably a good thing you're not a researcher then. The department/supervisor is more important than the university at PhD level.

you don't need a PhD to be a trader... the vast majority of traders don't have PhDs...

there is a subset of people working in research at quant hedge funds and high frequency firms who will generally have PhDs but if you're not capable of getting a PhD which is essentially a big exercise in research then a career in research isn't for you....

>>1040461
what's the difference in skills between a quant researcher and a trader?

>>1040466

there are quant positions in sell side firms that require PhDs to create models

there are researcher positions in quant hedge funds and trading firms that require PhDs to find exploitable patters in financial times series data or look at ways of minimizing the impact of large orders etc..

>>1040476
if you're talking about systematic trading - in some cases there might be no traders only researchers and developers... in others the traders are just concerned with execution and the researchers are the ones who own the pnl...

sounds like traders don't add much value.
any model should have the parameters (volume, price range, timing, exchanges, etc.) included.

I mean the "trading" that I do is basically just pulling the plug whenever I notice that the model doesn't work anymore.

>>1040500
in systematic trading... well yeah the main value there is from the researchers... execution traders maintain relationships with brokers and need to get orders executed within certain parameters

if you're successful trading for yourself then why are you applying for work?

>>1040536
I'm not successful.
I make peanuts.

>>1040286

Get better connections. Seek out people with capital and sell them on your fund.

what's your story? can you post here? >>1040844

looking for insight thx

>>1040703
I don't have a 'fund'

I've already got connections

you don't really seem to have grasped what I've posted previously

>>1040871
he was writing to me.
and he is right.

wait no... now i'm confused too :D

>>1040065
> exchange fees don't exist

>>1040900

That message was indeed meant for you...clicked on the wrong response link. XD

>>1039962
24% is fucking ridiculous no way i can believe that kind of returns only on forex

>>1040995
i avg. 10-20%/wk and know many others that do. lol

>>1040071

savage but true! wannabe OP. No you're not a Forex trader. My friend at Barclays who trades with currency rates is a trader not you.

how bout that CAD, eh?

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Daily reminder that technical analysis is the homeopathy of finance

>>1041065
How

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>>1041093
Says the flat-earther. Hey, I didn't know you Amish guys traded equities and commodities.

>>1041117
technical analysis.

>>1041073
>My friend at Barclays who trades with currency rates is a trader not you.

erm...

does he trade rates or trade currencies...?

methinks you're talking nonsense...

even if you're not then assuming the OP is truthful then the OP is the real trader taking actual positions, proprietary risk... not your mate who's trading off customer flow

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>>1039962
>24% per year

>>1040111
>100% per fucking month

>>1041065
>10-20% per week

I wish people would stop replying to troll threads

>>1041294
Or let's say it's a professional trader starting off with something more reasonable, say, $250k.

After a year of trading he'd have more than $400,000,000. This thread is fucking retarded.

>>1041299
you're just too retarded to see the missing key

>>1041065
>>1041294
It might be true but it will crash and burn ver soon. To do those returns he has to be taking big risks.

How do I into trading durex?

>>1039958
Income for the last three years?

>>1041148

Yeah sure. OP sitting on his couch at home is the real forex trader but my friend at Barclays is not a trader. He trades with currency rates. And I also know a guy at MS a guy at GS and a girl at JPM and a guy at a hedge fund. /biz is just full of wannabes that think they're pro traders.

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>>1039958
>Forex

>>1041716

Gold and Silver Pumper.

Like Mike Maloney, full of Baloney,

A Big Fat Phoney !

>>1041713
you don't appear to be sure whether he trades rates or trades FX...

I'm not sure you're in a position to say who is the real trader here