Hello brutusdog,
lol I'm staying with my sister during the week as she lives much closer to work than I do. It only takes me about 30 minutes to drive there from hers. I'm supposed to be there for 7am but invariably I find myself getting in around forty five minutes later than that...
Training is very limited. We get brief talks on fundamental and technical analysis and are set exercises to do on both. It's more about proving that we can be profitable. Each day we post our P&L and when we feel we are ready to go live they examine our P&L and let us know what they think. We've only been posting for about 2 weeks. I expect it to be at least another 4-6 before we can demonstrate enough consistency to get real money.
Not well. I'm just not happy on the lower TFs. I also feel a little stubborn: it's taken me a long time to become profitable and I've only found consistency on the longer TFs. While I can see the advantages and the appeal of scalping the lower TFs I am of the opinion that if you find something works then you shouldn't go messing with it.
I'm not sure I can do that but I can tell you what its like:
We have 3 X 15" monitors.
Far left one has CQG (for charts on). We share this among 3 of us. That means that when you are using your charts no one else can control theirs. This is not actually as bad as it sounds. It's just a matter of getting used to it.
Middle monitor has TT (the trading platform) on it. It displays the ladders for the different markets, your order book and information on all taken trades plus your P&L.
Just incase anyone is confused as to what a ladder is here is a picture of a similar setup that I found on the web:
http://www.vankartrading.com/images/tt.png
Ladders are on the left. Each tick is a "rung" on the ladder. The current price is in the middle. So if the GBP/USD is at 1.9950 then the next rung down is 1.9949 as that is the next tick lower and the rung above would be 1.9951. To get filled long or short, you just click next to the price.
On the far right monitor we have internet. We can have whatever we want on that screen. Some of us stream CNBC or Sky News. Some of us have the Bloomberg website or Market Watch or perhaps even their email. I personally have MT4 open with about 8 charts on it.
To the right of these 3 monitors I have my laptop. I usually run MT4 on that too so that I can look at even more charts.
Finally between myself and the person next to me is a Reuters screen with real time news.
We are supposed to choose an instrument and focus on it. This is very hard for me as the setups I take work on all markets and limiting myself to one will severely limit my setups. If forced too, I will probably choose the Bund as price action seems to work well on that market and I have had the most experience trading it. It's also the one market I managed to scalp successfully.