But what I did manage to develop was a smaller bank account. Forget about the months and years I wasted. It was all of no use; the books, seminars, programs, and indicators – none of them helped too much. Not one of them trades before the market movement.

What You Can Expect From A Good Commodity Trading System:

In the end, what is important is being able to predict the price of the commodity you speculate in. The truly successful traders accurately predict prices constantly, without the benefit of studies or pointers, normally achieving ten point trades, if not more. They call trades in real time and most entries are called well in advance of the market movement.

Make sure that the online system you rely on functions in all market conditions. In addition, it must be applicable for any future, commodity, or stock trading, including e-mini day trading.

The Future You Should Trade:

I would advise you to trade in futures that allow day trades regardless of the fact that as a mere individual, as opposed to a big company, you may not have much money.

Any future will give you sufficient leverage, in terms of the diversity of stocks it’s possible for you to trade, and the options are many – the same futures traded by large institutions. Simultaneously, it should not prove very costly for a contract. Most importantly, it should not involve investing hundreds of hours in research, or using stock screeners and analyzing charts in each and every time frame.

It should be possible for you to complete the contracts immediately and the market should usually move favorably.

The Advantages Of A Good Trading System:

A commodity trading system that works well should get you to predict commodity prices correctly and easily. After you come across such a system and figure out how it works, you will wonder how you could have missed it; of course, it is not easily discernable until someone else points it out to you. And when it is, your scope for trading improves greatly.

Day trading may seem to be very complex but it can be very easy. It can be very enjoyable earning a lot in futures trading, without the tension and anxiety that usually is linked with day trading. The trick is to figure out how to forecast correctly and if you learn enough, success is yours for as long as you want.

To repeat what I said, in the beginning, my initial trading plans merely resulted in my squandering money. This program changed all that. I don’t claim it’s a magic wand, but it is the closest thing to it I have found.

The Steps You Need To Take To Be Sure Your System Delivers:

There are a number of advisors for commodity trading who maintain that their commodity trading software never fails. Always remember that these claims have to be proven first. The next time you hear about a wonderful online future trading system, tell the vendors you want to look at their trading record.

How much have they grossed while trading futures, over a reasonably long time-span? Do the people who use their system average ten points a day? Would they allow you to watch them call the market in real time before the market movement, with some precision? Is there a free trial period?

If you start day trading before resolving these points first, you may end up going bankrupt, as almost happened to me.

1. Lets assume a stock opens two cents higher than it closed yesterday. It later closes three cents higher than that. Should we get in? Not necessarily. Because as the candlestick showed us, even though it had a five cent swing from the day before, a long wick was created. This meant that it went even higher then it eventually settled on. That tells us that the pressure to go higher wasn’t strong enough. We will put it on our watch list, and keep a keen eye on it.2.A few days pass with similar results. Suddenly there is a break in the resistance. The stock has formed a candlestick with a long tail. What does this convey? We might put a buy signal for a couple of cents  higher, because the long tail tells us that the bulls are ready to take over.3. Ideally you want to wait for clusters to form. Of course the greatest indicator is a long candle. One that opens and closes with hardly any wick or tail.This synopsis could have very easily taken place over a few hours rather than days, if you were day trading, for example. There are many “characters” in candlestick charting, and those who master reading them become successful.

If you can acquire software that gives you even the slightest edge in your favor, it is well worth the Investment. I don’t profess to being an expert, but I do know of some. I obviously don’t have the time to go into all the details now, but at my site Market Mentalist you will find all you need to know about investing online. There is access to some of the top trading systems available including software, books, newsletters, and Forums. Whether you are an inquisitive novice or a seasoned pro Market Mentalist offers the online investment resource you just might be seeking.

Make no mistake however, in both strategies as with anything connected with investments, you had better be knowledgeable. Always have an exit plan or stop loss in place and it is essential that you have an excellent technical charting platform.   Knowledge and Training Lead to ConfidenceConfidence Leads to ProfitLet us assume that you have some knowledge or you wouldn’t be researching the market. Any training you receive should be for technical analysis, or you are just wasting time and money. As far as software platforms, the following suggestions I strongly feel are necessary for any software to be useful.1. It must be able to offer live streaming technical data.    (Otherwise the program is merely educational)   2. The platform should defiantly include candlestick charting.3. Visually it has to be large enough for all the data to be seen easily. (Many of the online brokerage’s technical data are too small to be useful) 4. It must be cost effective. (Most good systems can be purchased for between one and two hundred dollars)Let the Candles Light Your WayInclude Candlestick Charting for Even Greater ProfitsFor those of you not yet familiar with candlestick charting, I will try to give a brief but accurate explanation.  The Chinese invented the market concept, and the Japanese perfected charting techniques with the use of the candlesticks. It is easy to understand this complex system, if we simply break it down to the ticks on the chart you follow every day. We know that the lower tick is where the stock opened and the higher is where it closed. Now if we made the two lines parallel and connected them, what would we have? A candle. However, during that movement, the stock might have gone lower or higher then where it opened or closed, So our candle has formed a tail and a wick. Is it starting to make a little sense to you? Can you see the advantage of knowing this information, for getting in and out, and setting a stop loss?I don’t profess to being an expert, but I do know of some. I obviously don’t have the time to go into all the details now, but at my site  Market Mentalist you will find all you need to know about investing online. There is access to some of the top trading systems available including software, books, newsletters, and Forums. Whether you are an inquisitive novice or a seasoned pro Market Mentalist offers the online investment resource you just might be seeking.

Once a trading account has been designated as a day trader account, you must calculate the day trading power of that account. That formula is fairly complex, and I highly recommend that, as with all online investing, you seek professional guidance. There are many ways to get help with this information, with a minimal cash outlay.For those of you math wizards that love formulas, here it is.4X Maintenance Excess = DTBP. For those of you currently scratching your head, you must also figure what maintenance excess as well. That calculation is: Total Positions + Total Cash = Total EquityTotal Equity-Non-Margin Positions= Margin EquityMargin Equity-Maintenance Requirement= Maintenance ExcessThese figures are based on the previous day’s closing prices. Along with figuring DTBP and knowing what makes a trade account a day trader account, you must understand the minimum equity requirements for such an account. Most brokerages require a fairly substantial amount of twenty to thirty thousand to set up your account. If your day trading account goes below that minimum equity requirement, you will be issued a “call” to bring it up too minimum, if not, your trades left in the account can be liquidated. Your day trading power can only remain operational if you maintain your minimum equity requirement and your trading activity remains within the set limits. I don’t profess to being an expert, but I do know of some. I obviously don’t have the time to go into all the details now, but at my site  Market Mentalist you will find all you need to know about investing online. There is access to some of the top trading systems available including software, books, newsletters, and Forums. Whether you are an inquisitive novice or a seasoned pro Market Mentalist offers the online investment resource you just might be seeking.

There are any number of reasons why a trader hesitates before a trade.  The main one is lack of planning.  Without a plan, there is no degree of confidence a trade will be successful, it’s all wishful thinking. Unless they are outright gamblers, traders usually have a strong need to protect their assets and avoid risk. This is especially true for beginning traders. It can take a long time to build up sufficient capital for serious trading. By that I mean sufficient capital to be able to trade for a living. It is quite understandable to fear losing all or part of your initial capital. Beginners tend to seek absolute certainty before taking a risk, and gaining true confidence in you ability to trade successfully can take time. Unscrupulous marketers of mechanical trading systems and methods take advantage of the beginners fears and lack of confidence by advertising “sure-fire” “magic” ways to trade, instead of revealing the truth about the difficulties in becoming a consistently successful trader.

When it comes to short term trading, there isn’t very much time for long deliberations. Market conditions are in continuous flux. Decisions need to be made relatively quickly, and if one waits too long to execute a trade, he or she may miss a significant opportunity. The reasons for hesitation are everywhere, and traders must be aware of them, and create a plan to prevent them.  Let’s look at a few of the things that cause traders to hesitate:

The complex charting software available these days tends to increase hesitation.  Traders think that the more confirmation they can get from indicators, the more certain they can be that a trade will be successful.  However, all indicators lag the market. The notion that an indicator can somehow predict what will happen once a trade is entered is nothing more than wishful thinking. An indicator may give some degree of confidence about entering a trade, but the indicator cannot trade the trade, only the trader can do that. Once a trade is entered, it becomes entirely a process of management. It’s tempting to look at as many indicators and signals as possible. Doing so, however, can be very time consuming. That’s why seasoned traders advise looking at only a few if any key indicators.

Hesitation is often related to a lack of confidence in the trader’s trading strategy or trading ability. There are numerous reasons for such lack of confidence. Some of the reasons are shallow and mostly on the surface, like being distracted by watching financial TV while trading.  Other reasons are more deep-seated, and actually reflect psychological problems dating all the way back to early childhood.  A trader may not believe that his or her trading plan is adequately developed.  Nevertheless, they are determined to trade, so they muster up their courage and finally jump into a trade almost guaranteeing that the outcome will be a matter of pure chance.  Some traders may question their trading plan because they know that they did not spend enough time preparing it. Sometimes hesitation is intuitive, warning the trader to avoid the trade. All too often, traders are not tuned into their own intuitive feelings.  In the case of intuition, hesitation can act as a motivator. If the trader feels the hesitation is because of lack of adequate preparation, then that trader must learn to spend more time preparing for trades. By studying the markets a trader can come to see new higher probability setups, thereby reducing doubt and indecision, and in turn stop the hesitation because of more adequate preparation.

Hesitation sometimes reflects a deep desire to be right and a fear of being wrong. It has been our experience that many of the people who are attracted to trading fit into this category.  Great care must be taken by physicians, engineers, scientific types, and mathematicians, who seem to be the most prone to this type of hesitation. They are often perfectionists afraid to face their inadequacies. By putting off a decision, they don’t have to face their limitations, and can pretend they are better traders than they really are. If I had the time and space, I could give you dozens of examples of this kind of hesitation.  The perfectionist’s reality states that everything must be in order and follow rules.  They think strictly inside the box.  They want everything to be perfect, so they continually second guess and doubt themselves and what they are doing. They believe that they cannot cope with being wrong. This occurs in trading decisions as well as other life decisions. Extreme perfectionists often think that once they make a bad trade, it will be the start of a downward spiral and a complete blowout of their trading account.

Hesitation very often relates to low self-esteem or other deep-rooted psychological issues. We see these more times than we would like to.  Traders with low self-esteem usually lack confidence, not only in trading, but other areas of life. Beneath it all, they doubt their ability to trade, and hesitate making a trade until they the guilt of not doing so overcomes their fear.  At that point in time, they enter a trade out of pure compulsion driven by guilt.  This exposes them to a trade with no real plan to support it.  They become victims of pure chance.  We also find that traders who hesitate may have a conflict regarding their success. They can actually fear success.  They have been told by parents or others that they were no good, that they would never amount to anything, that they were “bad.” These people strive for success at one level of their consciousness, but at a deeper level, they secretly believe they cannot attain it, or do not deserve it.

Identifying, directly facing, and eventually eliminating a problem of hesitation is the only way to truly deal with it. Chronic hesitation will eventually destroy the confidence a trader needs for success. If the problem is not dealt with and the traders continues to hesitate, miss important market moves, and see his or her equity begin to dwindle, that trader runs the risk of becoming a phantom trader, a pretender, becoming convinced that the imaginary trades being made are real. If you are prone to hesitation, it’s vital that you deal with this problem early in your trading endeavors. Identify the reasons for it, confront the problem, and make changes as soon as possible. These are changes you have to make within yourself.  If you will truly engage in self-examination with the object of eliminating hesitation, you can trade become consistent and successful in trading profitably.