Life before trading

D

Dowser

I'm interested in what people did before they became traders and how they made the transition.

I worked on a Chemical plant for nearly 20 years. Luckily the shift pattern gave me time off in the week and I started watching the charts. I demo'd for a bit then started with very small stakes. I was a couple of years down this path when a new management team took over at work. Streamlining and cost cutting were the new watch-words. Ultimately, they stopped us working weekends. So, with my time off midweek curtailed and a big hit on my salary - I decided it was time to leave and try trading full time.

That was six months ago - I've never regretted the decision to leave, but I can't say I've made it yet either. I'm going to review my progress every 6 months. As long as I can pay the bills and I'm still keen, I'm going to carry on.
 
Hi

Before i started trading i was working as a sub contract driver for the likes of DHL and was a postman for 14 years previously. Always been interested in shares due to my father having shares in all sorts of companies,so i started trying to build a little portfolio and learn how it all worked,have traded part time during working the last 3 years, i also bought and sold a few properties over the last ten years which has enabled me to build up a nice trading pot. I am now 36 and comfortable enough not to have to worry about work for a good 3 years, so i took the plunge into fulltime trading i built an office in my garden and have been trading properly since March. Its going ok so far, finding it different being at a desk all day looking at screens , but great to b working from home and being able to see my kids more.

Im the same as you i will review my progress at xmas and see if its still working financialy and lifestyle wise.
 
I hav'nt full time transitioned to trading ........been Gambling and later on Trading since my early teens so 40+ years on I cant remember a time when it wasn't in my life

I will trade F/T next year if my consulting business falls off.........but in truth trading is as boring to me as other jobs after 40 years at it so will still have to have other things going on to stay fresh !

N
 
Well..I started trading from 2005 (aged 21, had to get the calculator out there for a second).

I started doing clerical office role before started trading and then went full-day into trading around 2011 up until my emotions took over with those wild market swings and blown my account heavily by end of last year, 2015...

Now am back within a day job but haven't quitted trading yet.

Its a hard nut to break...but having hooped in to so many trading methods/approach, my final hurdle is now using supply and demand......and my word, I should have stuck with this supply and demand more seriously few years ago.....because having re-started this approach.....It feels nice to instantly go into 'profit' when entering trades.....still fine-tuning....

Conclusion - I am still trying to break ever since day 1......
 
10pips said:
Well..I started trading from 2005 (aged 21, had to get the calculator out there for a second).

I started doing clerical office role before started trading and then went full-day into trading around 2011 up until my emotions took over with those wild market swings and blown my account heavily by end of last year, 2015...

Now am back within a day job but haven't quitted trading yet.

Its a hard nut to break...but having hooped in to so many trading methods/approach, my final hurdle is now using supply and demand......and my word, I should have stuck with this supply and demand more seriously few years ago.....because having re-started this approach.....It feels nice to instantly go into 'profit' when entering trades.....still fine-tuning....

Conclusion - I am still trying to break ever since day 1......
Click to expand...

That's interesting, have you any good links that expand on the Supply/Demand methodology
 
can't do it part-time. takes 10's of 1000's hours of screen time

before you can say i have arrived
 
I used to work on motors. But now I run my my own full time gig cleaning toilets at the Coach & Horses. I am tardings in between turdings.
 
20 years at Chemical establishments - it's impressive.
I am a businessman. I started to work with the parents, the family business. I am currently working in building business and trades in his spare time. Forex interested me when my friends started to get involved in this. They dragged me into the ocean and I'm grateful to them!
 
After Uni I have done many jobs from sweating on the NSW railways to opal prospecting and back in the UK office work and treasure hunting before getting into trading. It all looked so easy. Just up or down. So I spent countless hours in front of the PC trying this and then that but really not cracking the profitability problem.
So now I am getting the PC to do the leg work using EAs and gardening. Much less stressful.
 
Pat494 said:
After Uni I have done many jobs from sweating on the NSW railways to opal prospecting and back in the UK office work and treasure hunting before getting into trading. It all looked so easy. Just up or down. So I spent countless hours in front of the PC trying this and then that but really not cracking the profitability problem.
So now I am getting the PC to do the leg work using EAs and gardening. Much less stressful.
Click to expand...

Is there any general advice you can pass on to us gardeners about developing EA's? How did you find your edge if you didn't really crack it as a discretionary trader? Hope you don't mind me asking(y)
 
cbrads said:
Is there any general advice you can pass on to us gardeners about developing EA's? How did you find your edge if you didn't really crack it as a discretionary trader? Hope you don't mind me asking(y)
Click to expand...

Steer clear of Martingale and averaging down systems like the plague.

Currently watching a prog about the extraordinary power of prediction of the the swarm.
 
There's two parts to this in my opinion..the life before trading and then life after trading. Here's how it goes..
the life before trading: An accountant, mild mannered respectful, average education, safe to medium risk taker. becomes a consultant (because I talk more, but I'll still call myself a consultant), even more respectful (your clients are your future business even though noone is listening to you), leaning a little towards the medium to high risk as income increases. Education still exactly the same but for some reason your title of consultant makes you seem more educated the next, whereas your education has not changed in the slightest, only your net worth and net income. disposable income increases and therefore your expectations..the car is bigger, the house bigger, your ego bigger..this is where the trader comes into the picture

life after trading:
you were never an accountant, you in fact managed funds for high net worth individuals, you mixed with the rich and famous, even if the rich and famous was the financial director of M&S who lets face it, still gets the train into work from Maidenhead..but that doesn't matter as you are no longer an accountant. You are a trader, even worse, you are a trader on a public forurm
your education has gone from grammar school "a" level tops to having several degrees in maths, quantum physics and psychology (because lets face it, if you cant read the minds of every market participant then there is no possible way you can make a living trading!). No, gone is my "a" level...i now used to work for the top financial institutions in the country (whereas really all i did was go to a nationwide cash machine) but im a trader now and those old days are gone

I trade price action, no indicators for me! that simple moving average i have on my screen is not an indicator, no, its a barometer i use to determine the trend. I dont need indicators or any technicals, even though i'll throw in elliot waves and support and resistance..nope, no technicals for me.
My respectful levels have dropped to zero. I will spout so much BS it wouldn't be allowed past 9pm. I will dismiss anyones opinion simply because it is not my own. My extra degrees that I have makes me more intelligent than you, as i dont need indicators. I just use price action and volume..oh right thats technical but that doesn't count as its the funcamentals that drive the market..have i contradicted myself? yes I might have, but i cant remember for all the BS I'm spewing

how about my net worth? well now as a trader I trade, up down sideways any angle you can think of, I MAKE MONEY!! I make loads of money because I'm from a financial institution background (extracted cash from a cash machine), i have a degree in psychology (how else can you determine the thought of every single market participant) i have left behind my only 2 a levels in maths and english
I make thousands, every single day. I day trade (what happened to my job as a consultant, f*** that sh1t I'm a day trader now.. its as easy as playing golf, because i dont use indicators anymore..in fact i dont use any common sense whatsoever
because now I'm a trader

and the best bit about trading, i trade every single day of the week...yesterday!
yep, every single day I'll tell you what happened yesterday. not whats going to happen today, not tomorrow, yesterday.
all using my price action skills, volume analysis and support and resistance ( no technical analysis like indicators for me, as i am in tune with the thoughts and minds of every random person who ever owned a share in his lifetime..because of my psychology degree). I am an expert on what happened yesterday. can you see how yesterdays' price action correlates to the move in volume on that day (yesterday) precisely. can you not see how it was obvious that had you chosen my one chart, extrapolated over a few hours (that have happened in the past) I was able to (cherry) pick the best place to enter, to take advantage of every single random price movement..

yes folks, i have made countless millions analysing, and regaling yesterdays price movements all because i started trading and joined an internet forum

Oh my, how my life before trading has changed so much..tomorrow i'm that consultant again, but tomorrow i'll be yesterday's god, a person i never was before, a person who can read price action without price itself, a person who can read the minds of every market participant but struggles to read the financial times..
I am yesterday's trader!!! I am still an accountant who calls himself a consultant and will post a chart of yesterday's price action

next time you come across a thread, think what this person really is, who he really is, if it wasn't for yesterday
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Life before trading: a career, social life, pay and travel
Life after trading: Uncertainty, introspection, obsession, you pay (for your mistakes).

Cracking the nut is proving much harder than anticipated.... can be done though, through incremental improvement from experience.
 
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