Winning Forex: the 100k Challenge

It wasn't easy but we did it, $1k to $100k on both demo and live accounts. Let's take a moment to celebrate and then get down to business. There, was that long enough? Ok.

Why did some people make it and other give up or just painfully failed? I have narrowed it down to several reasons. Hopefully you will be able to take these lessons away from this article and impliment them into your own trading.

1. Trading more then 1% a trade.

Seems a little weird that the people who eventually made the $100k only risked a max of 1% of their capital in any given trade? Well thats what everyone who made it did. Trading this amount of capital keeps you in the game if you eventually run into a losing streak on the market. This is a vital piece of information to remember. Even though your profits will be lower then a person who risks, say, 10% a trade, your long term ability to stay in the game is far greater then the 10% trader.

2. Trading more then 3 major currency pairs at a time.

There is no way getting around it, Forex can sometimes be a risky and volitile market. Information saturates the internet about every major currency pair. Keeping track of more then 3 currency pairs will often leave the trader in paralysis of analysis. Personally i only trade 2 majors and keep up to date on those. Being a master of 2 currency pairs is far better then being a jack of all pairs and a master of none.

3. Being lazy and not constantly learning.

People change, and markets based on people change with them. Forex changes all the time, what is a favoured currency, what isn't favoured can change week to week. My point here is not to only trade the news, my point is that the people who succceeded in making the $100k were always shaprpening their skills. This market can make you filthy rich so why wouldnt you spend the time learning all you can about it? I can never understand new traders who read a few books on Forex and think that their learning is finished. If you want to make money off Forex remember this, the cost of trading forex is Capital and Learning.

4. Only focusing on one time frame.

Last but not least here is something we probably all did as new traders. But the sooner you kick this habit the better off you will be. Let me give you an example. If a daily chart is showing an upward trend reversal, but on a 1 minute chart it is showing a strong start to an upward trend, if you are only focusing on the 1 minute chart you are going to lose a lot of chedder. My point here is simple, keep an eye on the overall picture at all times. Use 2 -3 different time period charts for a big picture and then use 1 to make your trading decision.

Remember the Forex market does not play favorites. Learn to trade smarter and the profits will follow.