Just before I go can I just share a post I wrote over on the Vince Stanzione thread. I simply make the point that people promising outrageous returns if you purchase their trading scheme should be treated with great suspicion; but this shouldn't make you cynical towards people who give it to you straight. Captain Currency falls into the second category. (Disclosure for the benefit of the cynics: I don't know him and I haven't spoken since March 2010, when I did the course)
Hahaha, very true.
I don't think paying for education should be rejected outright per se. The problem is that the marketing techniques and advertising that accompany a lot of these "systems" is criminally overhyped with the obvious objective of increasing sales. The potential trader wants to believe the hype, purchases whatever it is, and then is disappointed when they realise that you can't really be a billionaire by giving this smooth talker €99.99 and then spending 10 minutes a day sitting at your computer in your underpants.
That's not to say that the material they are selling doesn't "work". From what I know Vince Stanzione's approach relies on basic technical entries and riding a trend. In the right hands that obviously can be a very robust strategy. But there is more to it than forking out the purchase price and waiting for the cash to roll in.
If a trader purchases one of these systems, for example one that relies on moving averages, and it doesn't work out for him, he cannot proclaim that moving averages don't work. Likewise he can't really proclaim that the system doesn't "work". What he can say however is that in all likelihood he has been misled by outrageous promotional claims which raised his expectations to vastly unrealistic levels and thus he was disappointed. Therein lies the scam.
To sum up, if someone comes to you and says they can turn your PC into an ATM machine and you can withdraw whatever you want (underpants optional of course), all you have to do is paypal him a few sponds, run for the hills. If someone comes to you and says that they will teach you to trade, but that it will likely require blood, sweat, money and tears from you and probably a few years of your life, and you still might give up after that anyway, I would consider him possibly to be serious. There aren't very many courses like that around though, because they don't sell very well.
I spent a lot of time and money going through university and post graduate qualifications to qualify into a particular profession. When I eventually started to work in this profession I found that I didn't really enjoy it, found it tedious and consequently I wasn't very good at it. Was the university a big scam?
There are a lot of variables that come together to make someone successful in their field, be it work, sport, whatever. Regular components in this mix are usually dedication, aptitude, persistence, possibly talent, time, luck, enjoying what they are doing, etc. The profession of market trading is no different and no amount of €99.99 "systems" will change that.
Good trading in 2012