How to Stay Busy

[charles1 10]

Hello fellow traders. As a beginner trader looking to make trading a career I am struggling on to make a fulltime job. How do you fellow traders stay busy for 40hrs per week or less or more. I've learned not to trade to many instruments at once and that its best to stick to one product for awhile. I mean how do you make an 8 hour day out one product. Chart reading is essential, but does it take that long to read charts? Let me know how your day is filled with trading work, thank you.

[Brookwood 10]

Who says it has to be an 8 hr day? I didn't get into this game so I could sit in a cubicle all day. You may even find that your trading success is inversely proportional to your trading day length. And don't forget about those commissions adding up the more you trade. For some, being at home is a difficult transition because you may feel "lazy" if you are not "doing something" but I was fortunate that I already worked from home. I start my day ~ 8: 30 or 9 EST and I'm usually flat by 11:30. Just trade when the setups occur ( for me it's the open) then turn the damn computer off and go to the gym.

BUT: if you are just starting out get as much screen-time as you possibly can. Remember though that 12-2pm or so is usually deadsville so avoid trading then.

Cheers,

BW

Edited January 31, 2011 by Brookwood
hopefully for clarity

[chipper 10]

Agree with Brookwood...quality of trades, not quantity.

[emazing 10]

I only trade until around 10:45 am. No more! After that it's lunch time and the equity markets get very illiquid to trade. It's not woth it.

 

Take it from a guy that learned his lesson. I trade very large share sizes and enter very big positions. I start around 9:40 and try to keep it for not longer than an hour. During that time I make anywhere between 4 to 8 trades. I guess you can call me more of a scalper.

 

Good luck!!

[Ingot54 13]

Hello fellow traders. As a beginner trader looking to make trading a career I am struggling on to make a fulltime job. How do you fellow traders stay busy for 40hrs per week or less or more. I've learned not to trade to many instruments at once and that its best to stick to one product for awhile. I mean how do you make an 8 hour day out one product. Chart reading is essential, but does it take that long to read charts? Let me know how your day is filled with trading work, thank you.

 

Hi Charles

 

You are in a wonderful position.

 

Here's why.

 

When many traders started out around 5 to 10 years ago, the market support systems were poorly developed, and any forums that were around were offering views and ideas that the traders of the day submitted from their personal experiences.

 

The other things that happened on forums were:

 

1) Pump and Dump posts by "experts" and their cohorts were rife, and misled and fleeced many beginning traders by this deceptive trick

 

2) There simply was not enough information available to advise traders correctly. Chat rooms and forums were actually not good places for beginner traders to inhabit if they wanted to both keep their capital and advance as traders.

 

Trading books were still being written, although many of the enduring authors already had their stuff out there, if you knew then what "good stuff" really was.

 

As well as that, we now know about things like "Analysis Paralysis", Over-trading, Money Management and Position Sizing, Risk and Reward estimates, Adequate Capitalisation, Trading and Business Planning, and now a new concept has been introduced to me in another thread, by FXGirl, which she called her "Emotional Plan" ... I like that concept.

 

So the forums of today have moved forwards, and are really beginning to be a help to the trader. It is possible to pick up in probably weeks, these same things that took many more experienced traders months and years. It remains though, that nothing surpasses screen time to deliver that vital experience, and perhaps in your trading spare time, you might consider spending more time simply following market price, and try to understand the patterns and reasons for the activity. Many traders spend a lot of time doing just this.

 

Data services have proliferated and become affordable or even free, and Trading Platforms have evolved to accommodate the best Indicators (and even whole systems) and include back-testing functions and fully customisable features. Even these things have not made much of a dent in the perception that "95% of traders fail" or leave the market within a year.

 

I find it a very good thing that you asked 'how do traders stay busy for 40 hours" and that you say that you've "... learned not to trade too many instruments at once and that its best to stick to one product (for awhile)."

 

Right there you have placed yourself in a bracket of traders with a very much higher chance of success. I say that because it seems that you are very focused. That single word - focus - is what many early traders like myself missed, and in my case, I have moved from following Equities, CFD's, Indices, Metals, Energy, to Forex. And I have tried all the whiz-bang Moving Averages, Indicators and Systems, Strategies and Time Frames. Only thing I won't try is Robots - I like to participate

 

I have not included the important aspects of the Psychology of Trade Management, the Psychology of the Trader, and Self-Improvement in general. The emotions of Fear and Greed have a profound influence on the longevity of traders, and the idea of dealing with these emotions, and placing them under control in trading, can not be over-estimated.

 

One of the things all traders should do at the beginning of their trading careers, is to do a Personality Profile Test to uncover which Instruments and Time Frames are best suited to the natural nature of the trader.

 

Then a Risk Profile should be performed to assist with guiding the best of the traits discovered in the Personality Profile. Why scalp in the 1 minute time frame, if your personality and risk profiles are pointing to trading the 4 hour or End of Day charts? These are things that consume a lot of my time - or did in the past. I have long known that I do better in the 4H and 8H time frames, and that I need to ground those trading decisions in what the Daily and Weekly trends are doing. I don't cope with the stress of scalping too well.

 

So these are all research-based things that I have spent countless hours on, and I would imagine many traders would put that in their own testimonials.

 

Today, I have come full circle, and I am now focused.

 

I use a few indicators and moving averages - yes I do - because that identifies for me what I need to be seeing before I take my slice out of the trend. That's just me. I am relaxed with that. And I do spend a bit of time with Price Action learning and Candlestick Patterns.

 

Is that knowledge going to help me move ahead?

 

I have to say yes, I believe the knowledge I am still gaining WILL be of benefit, as long as it does not cause yet another detour, and derail me from my current path

 

So I think it is truly great that you are, as a beginning trader, looking for ways to fill those hours while trading, or waiting.

 

It is very easy for an experienced trader to be patronising of beginners - I hope I am not like that ... so can I ask for a little more information please?

 

How long do you look at the market you trade before deciding to take your entry?

How long are you in your trades?

Do you have profit targets, or do you take what is available during one session and leave it at that for the day?

 

I am interested in these things for a reason - to find out how it is that a new trader is not stuck to the screen all day trying to cram his head full of information and ideas to scrape that last dollar from the market. I find that very refreshing and interesting, that a beginner is not drawn into the analysis whirlpool like many of us were in our own early days.

 

It is refreshing and something of a breakthrough for me to see that is it possible for someone to enter the world of trading, and already have discovered one of the single most important qualities that many of us lacked in the early part of our own trading learning.

 

Thank you for your question.

 

Now - just to help you with how my own day is filled:

 

I have my wife and one of my sons at home, and we work together on other projects, apart from my trading. I sleep in a little late (10am sometimes) because I am frequently watching currency screens until 2am, without actually taking trades.

 

I read newsletters and contribute to a forum or two, though lately I don't wander far from TL unless for research purposes (eg Forex Factory). And I am doing as much self-reconstruction as I can, mentally, emotionally and physically. In the evenings I walk for 30 minutes, and every second afternoon I jog/walk/jog/walk with my son for about 90 minutes as a form of recreation and outlet from everything else.

 

You have sparked an interesting point, Charles - why is it that we spend so much time at the computer participating in "trading activities" when we actually only trade for a short time?

 

It is ironic that the reason many of us became interested in trading to begin with, was to give ourselves a better quality of life, or better chance at financial independence.

 

Yet the whole process has become, for many, a form of slavery, that denies us our physical health, our relationships and enjoyment of the many other things that life offers us outside of the house/office.

 

The passion can become an obsession, and the difference is subtle.

[joshdance 10]

Remember though that 12-2pm or so is usually deadsville so avoid trading then.

Cheers,

BW

 

Agree completely with your post, but for some instruments 12-2 is an okay time!

[SIUYA 11]

 

The passion can become an obsession, and the difference is subtle.

 

I am obsessively passionate about trading (or maybe the business of trading).

its a curse and a blessing.

 

Recently I went from trading by myself in a room (4years) going to the beach before the open, and after, and in a long round about way via a sidetrack tour to the UK during the GFC - what a bleak place, made even bleaker .....I am back.

 

Now I have moved back into a room with a bunch of different guys who all trade various styles and instruments. Its fun, we go to the pub for lunch, we chat, we swap ideas and stories and help each other out with administrative stuff - what a nightmare this has become lately....and that is what takes up most of the day - admin.

Now once this is done, the aim is to automate more things....as I take a different approach to others and trade more instruments.....currently learning some C++ to help in this.

I treat this as a business - not a lifestyle choice, or a freedom choice etc; So the mentality maybe different to others, but I am always busy, will always be busy and I like it like that.

I switch off when I need to. I may hold positions for months, but I sleep at night and dont sit in front of a computer.

I know I will work until I drop as I like it, but I also know how to enjoy myself when not trading - and that is important.

[friva 10]

hi Charles,

 

in my view if u chose to trade only one instrument and want to make a committment working-hours-wise you will soon get too bored not to act.

 

That way I bet u'll often anticipate entries, ie u buy or sell too early, often hit your stops, too often lose money and then, u know what ? u'll sit there watching the market do what u anticipated it'll do but u'll miss the move.

 

U'll get to feel bad as time goes by without action.

In fact u probably hold the view that u have to work/make-an-effort to earn ur living, that making an effort/give-it-a-try is good and ethical. You either change that belief or you better find a solution that fits with it.

 

As a possible solution you could chose to trade TWO instruments. The very action of alternating their charts on your screen, say every 5 minutes or so, and update and adjust ur charting setup if necessary will equate to "work" and partially satisfy ur urge to be active.

Do not want to tarde two ? Then trade one live and paper trade the second. What's the important is the "working action" as opposed to sit watching a screen endlessly.

 

Alternatively u could chose to update and adjust ur charting setup at fixed time intervals (5 min or so), and do something else that is useful but easy in between updates. Must be useful but must be uncomplicated.

 

Try and see if this is good for you.

 

Best

Franco

[Mysticforex 13]

That is a Great Post by Ingot54. I also think Brookwood had some great advice.

screentime, screentime, screentime,

 

I this point in your development when you are not trading, you should be Backtesting.