I’m a trader in St. Petersburg, Russia (Julia).
This article mainly wants to talk about their 3 years of transaction summary from the perspective of failure, and success.
Three years ago, I made the bold decision to quit a well-paying job and start doing what I really love — investing and trading.
I had a foundation in economics, I was tired of working full time, I had spare cash, I was willing to take risks, and above all I wanted financial freedom.
I choose to trade on an exchange.
In Russia, you have to have a certificate to freely buy any tools from Moscow or the United States.
So I spent half a year to take the exam. The process was so painful that I even think about it now.
But it all paid off. I got my qualification and finally started trading.
And then…
There was failure.
1. The execution of the broker contract was wrong. It took time to select the broker.
I looked at trading platforms, fees, and cash methods, but forgot that there are a lot of extra fees involved in executing a trade.
This is a problem that novices tend to have. Due to lack of experience, they open an account without adequate preparation at the beginning. They want to try everything.
I spent a lot of money to enter NYSE, LSE and other markets. Besides, I also did foreign exchange. The account threshold and the commission fee of each transaction added up, which made my account very ugly in the first year.
How to avoid this failure?
— Even if the contract terms are long and boring, read them carefully.
– Online contract execution, which makes psychological pressure less;
– Compare the terms and fee details of different broker platforms;
Before you start trading, be sure to do your research and know your market and direction.
Failure 2. Lack of knowledge and system to start trading with real account and made a lot of ridiculous mistakes in the beginning. I had no idea how orders were executed or what the buying and selling prices were.
Gold, crude oil, index futures, foreign exchange futures and so on.
Soon the account was down 20%.
On the good days, there were a few pockets of profit, like 15,000 rubles in 2018 and almost once in 2019.
But don’t think I’ve done any technical or fundamental analysis. It’s all about “feel” and “might.”
Without systematic trading, I made many mistakes, such as trading too boring, trading too much position, trading different markets and tools at the same time, not having any plan, and so on.
Now, of course, I don’t pay attention to why the price is changing, but how it is changing.
How to avoid this failure?
– To read the charts deeply, understand the market buyers and sellers;
– If you do day trading, be sure to pay attention to market momentum.
In my short trading career, I’ve tried at least 40 techniques and metrics, none of which lasted more than a month.
I was always disappointed, always looking for something new.
Top traders consider this to be the biggest rookie mistake.
How to avoid this failure?
— The trading system should be simple, you should try out all the features of a system for at least 4-8 weeks and collect some data before making a decision.
Losses are part of every trading system, but not a reason to change it.
Neglecting Money Management Not establishing my own trading rules I began to learn some of the trader’s rules, such as not losing more than 2% of your money on any one trade and not losing more than 6% of your money in a month.
But I don’t have a limit on how many trades I can lose in a day, and it’s hard to stop even when I’m running out of money in a month.
How to avoid this failure?
– Set the number of trades allowed to lose money in a day;
— Setting an acceptable daily/weekly/monthly loss;
— Don’t go against your money management principles.
Failure 5. Holding a losing position The loss caused me serious psychological discomfort and trauma. My mood was already very negative, and I always stayed away from my family.
Every time I needed to increase my investment, I felt that I could no longer accept the stress of losing money.
On 90% of loss-making trades, I tend to wait for the break-even point, sometimes for days or even weeks.
I spent my waiting time relying on imaginary scenarios of anticipation.
I learned later that this was one of the biggest problems in trading, and it took a long time to change that mindset.
My biggest losing trade, which I held for nearly a week, was closed automatically due to a contract change.
Maybe, I was broken at the time, maybe a biggest loss will change me a little bit.
How to avoid this failure?
— Stick to stop-losses.
Instead of having a bottom in mind, you have to set a stop loss.
A stop loss is triggered, and your loss is minimal.
5 Lessons from failure to Move on!
The first year I lost 30% of my money and was Mired in self-doubt. After a lot of soul-searching, I decided I needed to make a change, so I followed these 5 directions:
I decided to find a more suitable platform that would allow me to trade the futures market on the Moscow Exchange. This platform should also have a reasonable fee, offer a lot of unique indicators, and allow a long period of free testing.
2. Learning cluster analysis and order flow I think it is necessary to learn how prices change.
I found a trading platform that provides relatively good order flow data.
Cluster analysis charts are also more useful to me than candle charts. In the case of the RTS index in Russia, there is no time factor and new bars are formed when +1000 or -1000 contracts are reached.
In this chart, I can see the change in the volume data.
I couldn’t get that information with a regular candle chart.
Success 3. Write trading log, test trading strategy, principled trading I started to write trading log, every detail of the detailed analysis, after reflection to seriously test.
I can’t say that my current trading method is perfect, but I can feel that the trading strategy is improving step by step.
I pay more attention to the market information, which is hidden in the order flow, in the chart and in each candle.
Perfecting a trading strategy is an ongoing process.
My previous trading log My current trading log success 4. Improve my English and expand my horizons I read English information.
The financial trading market is an international market and most traders communicate in English.
Therefore, this language skill becomes a necessity for me to search for important knowledge and information.
In the past three years, I have read more than 45 books on trading skills and mindset in English.
5. Develop Your Own Trading Style. Trading is a natural place to experience a variety of emotional ups and downs, but developing your own trading style can help stabilize your emotions.
I learned order flow analysis and trading on my favorite platform, and gradually reversed my previous feeling of powerlessness in the face of trading, gradually understood the market, and kept records and introspection.
I trade index futures contracts on the Moscow exchange for only a few hours a day, leaving the rest of the time for family, sports and life instead of staring at a screen as I used to.
My English is improving, so it is more convenient for me to learn trading explanation and training.
As a Chinese saying goes, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
I’m not a trading wizard. I just learn and grow in trading.
I hadn’t made a million dollars or embarked on my own round-the-world journey.
I sincerely hope that I can have such a day, facing the southern spring breeze, taking brisk steps, to look at and capture the global scenery.
