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The risk to profit is the same for both the $50k and the $100k, both are twice, from five to ten lots, from $3k to $6k profit, from $1k to $2k unrealized loss limit, except the max drawdown, only from $2k to $3k, but that's not a big concern for me. The evaluation cost is also twice and I don't think you get the whole paid amount if you pass the $100k. The only advantage to passing this one is the max daily unrealized loss, its twice at $2k, and so trading two or three lots is much more realistic and of higher success in my opinion, but only for keeping the account and maybe some peace of mind, not for improving performance. A big consideration is that the daily loss limit does not go up as more trading lots are available, so even if you make profits that would qualify you to get 10 lots, you still have a $2k loss limit.
With the $50k you are pretty much stuck with trading two or three lots forever, but with the $100k you might be able to trade four lots if you get really good and build that profit equity in the first hours of the trading day, could even trade six lots at noon if you already made $1-2k in the morning. So that is a future possibility for some traders, not saying that I necessarily would qualify to do that. My goal is to approach this slow and steady, only two lots for a few months, consistent gains, I don't need a whole lot of income, but certainly cannot afford to lose this opportunity, so my goal is to prepare well before starting.
Can you recommend a momentum indicator that would help me view the market trends with some structure? I saw one that I liked before but cannot remember the name, its a single line that trends well with price action. Or maybe you have something else in mind that works for you. I am in a discovery process with these things.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
A year on sim, trading 50 turns before lunch. Wanting to open a $1000 broker account. I'm not a religious person, but you should pray for help.
Your playing a video game. What you are doing has no bearing in reality. If anything, you've conditioned an enormous amount of bad behaviors over the last year that will be virtually impossible to overcome, especially if you don't have extremely deep pockets.
Video games are more reality based than paper trading. if you bad at it, than at least there is "Game Over"
Matt
Trading futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. You may lose more than your initial investment. All posts are opinions and do not claim to be facts. Please conduct your own due diligence. Use only Risk capital when trading Futures.
1 800 771 6748 local 561 367 8686 email [email protected]
But on a more serious note, only when traders care about the outcome and it has a true impact on them in one way or another, only then they start improving or wanting to improve. Until then, it's all trading decoration.
Matt
Optimus Futures
There is a risk of loss in futures trading. Past performance is not indicative of future results.
Trading futures and options involves substantial risk of loss and is not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. You may lose more than your initial investment. All posts are opinions and do not claim to be facts. Please conduct your own due diligence. Use only Risk capital when trading Futures.
1 800 771 6748 local 561 367 8686 email [email protected]
No, its not a $1,000 account, its the topsteptrader $100k with a $2k loss limit I aim for. I do ok on sim, been shedding bad behaviors already, not scalping, holding longer, having some discipline. What I think I need is some more education on psychology and market profiles, then make a better trading plan, pass the combine, and start slow. I think I might do ok for a good while if not longer term. I aim to stick with this for years.
Thanks for being tough on new wanna be traders, its needed, but in my case I don't think I am far gone lost with bad behaviors. I only trade one or two lots and hold them for seven to ten minutes, avoid scalping, have price targets, only trade with the trend, usually make good profits, know when to avoid the market, and am learning when to close and reverse positions if the trend changes while I hold, but am careful with those situations. So if anything, I am trying to avoid bad behaviors and to reinforce good ones on the sim while I can, or at least I believe so, and I know real trading is very different, it requires even more discipline, but I believe in myself and I believe I can do this in time with the right education and account risk parameters, like topstep provides.
What can I do now? What are the usually terrible bad behaviors I could have developed? I think I need help with this. Did you read my previous response? I don't think I am entirely lost, that I could have a good chance still. I don't want to bother you but can you help? Also, what books do you recommend?
Books will not really help. But I always enjoy stuff from Mark Douglas. Trading in the Zone is a great read.
Usually the bad habits you form are different biases.
Now you can't really break these sim trading. Because without skin in the game you will never really force yourself to change. Also a lot of these are embedded with us since birth and we pick the rest up along the way.
I will try to think hard on those and do my best, but I think Mike thinks I am too lost and that I will not make it. Thou he thought I was thinking about trading with a $1,000 account, which is not the case, and I would have thought that the person is insane too.
There are many other great book around. It all depends on the info your are chasing to learn. Then its up to you to see if that style fits you mentality and trading style. Most of them are not free or cheap. If you get stuck, do a search for any online linked libraries in your state/country. There might be some resources around that you can reserve and get sent for pick up from your local library if they offer such a service.
I don't necessarily think anyone is saying your lost yet. Just trying to point out there are a lot of other things to take into consideration on the way to achieving your goals. Its great to have confidence in yourself but this is one life choice where if you can't back that up with real action in real time, it comes back and bites you hard. This financial path is littered with many many people who fell by the side because they didn't understand or respect the risks enough. Its easy to say you have good money management in sim but when your in a hole at the end of the week going through funded trader with the stress of missing out, that is where your real life discipline will pay off. By not having capital yourself, you are essentially in the hole from the beginning with your head on the chopping block at the mercy of the risk management team of the funded trader program once you make it through. I would guess that the funded trader program is not free each time. There might come a time where instead of repeatedly trying to get funded it might be better to put those funds to a more productive use for books or getting your own small account up and going. I don't imagine that these programs are put in place to take losses while the trader learns from their mistakes but are based of repetitive performance bench marks.
The other thing to keep in mind is that most funded trader programs require you to prove yourself for XX weeks prior to you getting funded. It then takes one bad week and you can be kicked back to the proving ground all over again.
You would be well served to listen closely to the advice some of the more seasoned traders on this forum are willing to give you (For free). Just reading through their previous posts on this forum has helped me heaps since I joined.
As for getting some practice with some real money on the line to train your trader psychology, (This is not ideal) but if you are under capitalized and not able to open a futures account, you could look into executing trades on a micro S&P contract through a FX broker but use your futures platform and real time data to make the trade decisions from. I have no idea what the spreads or fills would be like and the quote is out it looks like by about 10.25 points but seems to be consistently out (??).
The other option is to find a futures broker who will let you open with a reasonable min balance and trade E-micro futures. You would want to check out liquidity for any of these micro contracts you trade and maybe trade accordingly.