Futures Trading

March 3 1995, I started to study commodities and trading futures contracts with an introductory course called The Worlds Most Powerful Money Manual and Course by the Ken Roberts Company.

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  • I made a deal with my neighbour, Dave, where I paid part of his subscription to the Toronto Globe and Mail and he saved the commodities quotes page for me each day. I photocopied blank chart grids and set pencil to paper.
     
  • For six months I called dozens of brokers for information while charting by hand before I opened an account with real money. Each and every trade was a loser and soon I was ‘taking a break’.
     
  • While I saved up funds for my next failing plunge, I phoned several exchanges and systematically requested every free brochure and flier they offered. It was amazing! They sent boxes of information and much of it was great to read. I received far more information from the each of the exchanges than was included in my first commodities course. But, the research idea was Ken Roberts… hummm.

Winter of 95, my Folks brought me their old IMB XT computer with Lotus 1-2-3 version 2.0!
 I was able to do ten-fold the analysis, and much faster than charting by hand! I entered daily data from the newspaper and it plotted moving averages, and even had an Accumulation/Distribution formula from an issue of Stocks and Commodities magazine!I put more money in my account in the spring of 96 and lost it just as quickly. My interest faded. I felt that I couldnt trade until I had the information that my Broker had… I needed a Pentuim computer system.

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By the fall of 96, Read more of my short story…

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How can it be, with so much information available,
that almost 90% of speculators lose money?

Strong historical evidence and practical current examples prove the validity of many Technical Analysis Methods, and yet, very few Commodity Traders are truely profitable.

Given that placing your trades and managing your money only takes 20% of all your time - then 80% of your time is taken up *thinking* about your trades. Is there a common thought pattern that makes so many speculators fail at trading? More importantly, is there a common way of thinking shared by the profitable traders?

Explore these questions and others here, at Futures Trading Primer.

Prime your trading - BEFORE you hit the markets.

Futures-Trading-Primer pulls together a unique and useful Mashup of Commodities Trading Information and trading psychology resources.
The First Core of the Membership Area is exclusively devoted to Trading Psychology.

The Second Core covers the various Commodities Markets, Trading Stragegies and Market News, and will grow in stages.

To begin with, Futures Trading Primer will focus on Seasonal Trading Strategies in the Agriculturals, all range of Technical Analysis Strategies and current market news on the Fundamental Supply and Demand data behind the Ag Markets.