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I don't want to presume I have this all figured out, because I do not by any means, but am finally starting to feel it is making sense and I can actually do this. I have been reading about the micro e-minis though and maybe that is a better place for me to start as I believe it will be a tenth of the size of the ES contracts.
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
TOS simulator if they give you a 100k paper account and you trade 2 contracts you are only using 3:1ish leverage.
To make it the same as a $3k account with 2 ES you need to be trading 34 or 35 contracts with a $100k account.
It has nothing to do with emotions. It is that trades that would be winners with being properly capitalized get called or liquidated when over leveraged and turn into losers.
IMO paper trader is a total waste of time anyway. People just try stuff until something works so just end up using an over fit system to what happened in the sim.
Check out Tradovate. They allow a small account size and have good rates and margins. Plus their data feed is low cost. I haven't personally tried them but am considering opening an account with them. They have a free two week trial.
Take a look at Generic Trade. They have no account minimum to open and very generous intraday margins and commissions are 59 cent per contract. They do have a $59.00 monthly platform fee. It's worth checking out especially for a small account. Good luck.
LDCapital
who just turned 19, trades his own money on a thing called Robinhood. When he was describing it to me I though it must be a fraud...commission free, very small trades etc. BUT I looked at their clearing agreement and talked to an old fried that actually knows their "risk guy".
In Chicago there are some brilliant hard working people developing Tasty Trade and Tasty Works. I give them my full endorsement...but I do not know margin minimums or how they are applied at either place.
Do NOT be insulted by this...it is meant as perspective, not indictment: If the lowest margin requirements and transaction fees are your focus rather than interest rate spread and firm wide risk policies you might not be suited to futures markets. My UNSOLICITED advice: Build a 100 share position...or even a 50 share position in SPY and learn to trade your speculative directional strategy from the short side against that long position. Even if you execute terribly and are clueless you will discover that "the worst thing that could happen" will be instructive and it wont hurt your balance too badly or your ability to stay in the game.
Not insulted at all, I'm grateful for the advice! I think I need to be more patient and build my starter capital before I invest $ again. I played with a small amount on Robinhood when I was first learning but it was with stocks and options. I am leaning towards micro e-mini which is rolling out in a couple of weeks and will be 1/10th the size of ES. It will help to minimize my risk until I can prove myself with a cash account. Your idea sounds like a great step two in my plan before moving on to the full ES contracts. For now, I'll keep saving, studying and will watch how MES plays out in the first few months as far as volume. Thanks!
My first post, since I joined today. While I'm getting the lay of the land on this site, I can tell you that TDAmeritrade did discount my futures trading from their stated amount. They were going to discount them even more once I did over 100 contracts per month, which was pretty easy to do.
However, I dropped them yesterday for full disclosure.