And that is precisely the problem. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Anyone with an account size / risk capital of less than $10,000 - $20,000 has no business attempting to learn the trading business by trading CME currency futures. Three words: forced excessive leverage. Enough said. Unfortunately, that description covers 95%+ of newcomers, and probably the majority of not-so newcomers. There are far better options at the small capitalization stage. Including at least one reputable firm in the cash forex market, offering arbitrarily small, unit trade sizing.
I would say the contrary, you would be better off using less leverage if you are trying to learn to trade FX.
sure. however some brokers will allow you to trade with a $5k account. this would allow you to trade 4 eurofx contracts intraday, or about 8 (??) bp contracts. to be honest, we should ask ourselves if anyone should be trading with less than $5k. being undercapitalized is the reason for most failures in business - trading or otherwise. a $5k account will still let you trade a number of contracts remember on an intraday basis. more contracts means you can manage the trade and use leverage more effectively thus reducing risk. due to the higher liquidity and deeper market, there are no liquidity gaps, so little slippage. this allows you to set a tight stop etc - more flexibility than you could do with a bucket shop. i wouldnt have thought position trading (overnight) would be advisable with a $5k account. if you want to do this, then i would probably say paper trading is the best option until the person has enough money to do the job properly. so, imo, anyone trading with an account less than $5k is just being greedy. they dont have the patience to wait until they can do the job properly. they are filled with the pie in the sky bullshit that fx bucket shops pump out with their silly fx trading competitions, mini accounts, and other golden carrots dangling out on the end of a stick for the greedy sheep off to the slaughter. most good brokers remember ask for a $10k account. i dont think trading is a career for dreamers. it certainly shouldnt be considered a hobby unless one likes throwing money down the drain.
Huh? Where is the contrary part? This is in complete agreement with my post, above yours. Unless you are referring to another post.
welll thats all v.nice thank you but i for one happen to trade at interbank market size level and have been monitoring CME eFX liquidity on majors for quite a while now and i am just not convinced... at all...
Spoken like a true elitist. First of all, screw daytrading. Not everybody wants or needs to trade that way. Second, who are you to decide what's being "too greedy"? Doing the job properly means having a good strategy/money-management set, not just having some arbitrary >$XK account. Of course if you're the typical, semi-skilled, untalented trader, you need a BIG account to make up for lack of knowhow and inevitable losses during the learning curve. That's not the case for everybody. The more trading ability a person has, the less $$$ he can start out with and succeed, compared to another with more bucks and less ability.
youre kidding. ok then - tell me who the biggest platforms are then, and their daily amounts of business that gets done on each one for eur/usd. THEN we will look at globex. like i say, it will probably be the 3rd largest - if not the 2nd by now. YOU SHOW ME YOURS AND I WILL SHOW YOU MINE euro/usd is the biggest pair traded in the world. oddly enough, more $ business is done in es than any single fx pair. fx has a lot of $ business done for every currency cross in the world aggregate, but when you look at each pair, you start to understand that fx isnt as liquid as they want you to think - guess they were right - the crowd is usually wrong when it comes to the markets! can we also talk about execution speed as well? i know than globex beats ANY fx platform like ebs HANDS DOWN for execution speed. this is why the pros trade there for prop, and retail numbnutts go to bucket shops. the otc market is mostly used by people who have genuine need to do business there for what ever reason. futures also carry less risk than the otc market. buscket shops are really the bottom of the stack - slow fills, massive counterparty risk (refco fx anyone), blah blah blah. anyway - its still all a load of bullshit. these things dont really concern the average trader on et.
i am not, but i am not trying to convince you either mate... more another day perhaps since its 1:30am in tokyo and i want to trade the fomc stuff later tonite... need to get some sleep... ciao ciao ;-)
No, not enough said. What force? Somebody in FX got a gun pointed at your head, forcing you to take 100:1 leverage? Intelligent Kelly sizing never gets anywhere the ridiculous leverage offered by FX brokers, including OandA's smaller limit of 50:1. Trade smartly, not greedily.