Hi All

Looking to gain a small following for an experiment, gonna spreadbet 1,000 of my own hard earned with a view not to stop until I hit 25,000 or lose the lot!!

It'll be across a range of Index, equity & FX trades starting small and building the pot (or lose the lot) will be using flat stops and running profits with trailing stops.

If you want to follow every trade and watch the spiral up or down feel free to follow me on www.twitter.com/eyetrader - where I'll be simply be posting each trade as I click the mouse

BTW this is not spam, I'm not selling anything, I dont want any donations, more of a personal challenge that I'm going to conduct in public!!!! I'm hoping to see a few tips on here as well as my own strategies and ideas.

Lastly I'll be donating 5,000 of the profit (if/when I make it) to charity

May the slaughter commence :)

Eyetrader

Dont look a thicko to me tab, looks like you know what your doing well done.

Must say I have both a short term and long term portfolios and my investing methods are far different to my spreadbet metholodgy.

Now trading full time rather than investing part time after retiring at 50 a couple of years back.

Keep up the good work.

cheers.

Post from across the road at scrazie from sister thread re- to 14 grand trading account.

GF, I don't think 14k is enough to live off. Would be too much pressure for me to "get it right", to much pressure to over trade, I can't bring consistent returns throughout the year.

For me it would depend largely on other factors: does he have other income sources to cover food and living expenses, is he single, accommodation sorted, if so, then yes, I think 15k is plenty.

Personally I would want to own my own home and be running some other business on the side before going full time.


I would add to GFs list:

- Don't blindly follow tips, DYOR

- Tight spreads are crucial, esp when spread betting

- Get comfortable with charts

- Get comfortable with cash flow, reading general accounts etc (you might as well if this is going to be your job).


Possibly controversial and counter to GF:

- don't worry about beta, lots of money to be made on certain oilers, miners etc, esp when markets fall through support

- always use guaranteed stop losses for spread bets

- always use price alarms for stock positions, never trust the stop loss in your account

- always have a mobile device that can trade, use price alarms(!)

- never be 100% long

- if your fully leveraged and invested, stay very close to the screen and start taking profits

- don't invest everything in stocks

- set your entry, stop loss and profit targets before trade entry, make sure minimum 1:2 risk/profit ratio, use trailing stop loss

- don't overtrade, if you like a trade, use price alert to only buy at support and sell at resistance

- if the profit on your account looks too good to be true, it's probably time to take it, immediately!

- keep a record of trades, reasons opened, give the trade a rating betweem 1 and 10 how sure you are, give reason for closing, evaluate your trades some days later

- make sure the majority of your trades are with the market (trend is your friend)

- don't read individual stock threads,

- do read international press- int herald tribune or my preferred is FT

- use sentiment indicators to help spot turning points and qualify what you read and where you interpret the general market going

- never bet more than 2% of your account: except when the no brainers come along

- bet big on the no brainers (but remember they will not come around more than once maybe twice a year, it will likely be due to a macro trigger)

- don't be scared to get out of the market for weeks or months at a time

- another opportunity will always come, so don't worry if this one doesn't happen

Why does it need to be so complicated with loads of fancy rules? Whatever happened to kiss?

Well it is Spread betting with more risks than your normal broker account hilary.

My experience, Goldfinger, is that the risks are normally self-inflicted by punters who over-leverage small accounts and run stops which are unnecessarily tight and easily gunned.

You don't need a list of 100 rules to avoid those mistakes imo.

A relative of mine is a great investor, makes heaps of money, but is a hopeless spreadbetter, and has never made any money at it - he reckons the mindset is different with s/b'ing, and it seems to be to do with timescale, and as Hilary says, over leverage of accounts, no matter what the size.

FWIW I don't think the instruments you trade matter much, whether it's indices, Fx or stocks, as long as you get the leverage right. It's taken a long time for me to realise this!

Lots of similarities in your rules and mine, goldfinger.

I avoid exploration stocks (oils, mines) and risky biotechs. I usually bank profits on the eve of Results (as even if Results are good, they can be accompanied by some unpredicted corporate action). I keep stakes small in relation to overall pot. I occasionally cash in everything and start again - or reduce stakes take a few days break and close out entitre portfolio every now and again. I use trailing stops. I use charts but in a very simplistic way - the fewer indicators the better.


Too early to report progress on my 12 month mission - three days is nothing. But by last night's close (Day 3) my 14,000 was 15,384 which is nearly 10% up (9.89%). The portfolio now has 43 stocks in it, and is 45% cash.

fully agree with Hilary too - it's about capital management and not being over-exposed ie thoughtful risk-management. That means fully understanding the risk rather than just recognising that there is one. I'm very much a kiss man too. My own S/b experience began very slowly with too much caution I suppose, but it did mean that by trading very small positions, I learnt a technique with which I was comfortable and that was profitable overall. I spend far less time p*ssing about with the markets these days as I'm very busy in my profession, but I took 5 years to turn in a 2,500% profit after an original aim of beating the bank's interest rate. I have to say though, that it was easier to do a few years ago, what with less sophisticated trading software and lax rules from the s/b companies. Level 2 was rather easier to read too which made for easier bot-prediction!

and



equals



It's all that the likes of JP Morgan and Rothschild, etc ever had before they invented those computer thingies. They somehow managed to do OK.

I used to draw my own charts on graph paper updated manually every day. Didn't have a computer when I first traded shares - just teletext prices and a dial-up automated sharepricing service. Then got a computer and joined ESI (which some here will remember)

i just use a chequebook!

I've forgotten how those work.

mine don't :-(

this is a nice thread that i enjoy reading.
h
now this is just by eyeballing but i particularly like thsoe three angels represented by the rule, the pencil and it's shadow.
regards
jkd

Good work Juzzle :-)

Nothing much happening in my small portfolio of three stocks, AFR / SBT and the gold dog, ANGM, although the latter is now at b/e despite the rather stupid (but anticipated) large spread!

50% in cash at the moment, so scouting around for a sure fire winner - Lol

Some good stuff posted on here (none of it mine!).

This 'cheque stuff'....

It's 'insurance time' for the tenants of some of my commercial properties - so we send them an invoice for the premium. We give them all the bank details for a bank transfer or online payment, for them to do the remittance.

However, they ALL send a cheque.

OK it gives them a bit of time and a bit of extra cash flow. I'm pleased they ALL pay promptly, which tells me they sensibly give this kind of thing some priority. It also tells me their cash flow isn't too crap.

But they are ALL a bit 'living in the past' with the making of their payments. I feel it's quicker to do it online. I would guess cheques give them at least 6 days in time benefit but the interest they earn is quite minimal.

Does anyone disagree?

PS. Watching a few things make higher highs, I'm pretty much a 'commodities man' at present, myself.

And the fact your tenants pay by c/q has got exactly what to do with the thread subject?

pth: post 51 et seq is the context, I guess.

Binned SBT today at a loss of approx 275, which on reflection is a bit more than I should have tolerated, also indicates to me that the initial bet was too large. rationale for opening the trade was a chart breakout and adjacent results, unfortunately, the results seemed not to inspire and the SP now appears to be trying to fill a gap. Broker downgrade today probably didn't help very much.

Taken a smaller position in AGLD, which seems to have slipped under the 'gold rush radar.' Initially a nice rise of 8% but fell back during the afternoon to +4%, in any event not far from b/e.

My big hope for a really nice return, AFR, has slipped a little today and may test support at 110p; if it bounces from there may well add.

BRK, SLS and WEIR have been my most consistent upbets so far. And ZEN the best downbet. I got stopped out of WEIR today, but it remains on my list for possible reopening (I had temporarily tightened my stops while away).