Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!
Time really flies in that we are approaching the final week of 2008. As most hedge fund managers have already gone for holidays, I do expect there isn't much to do with the forex market until next year. As a result, I have officially closed shop in my forex business for 2008.
Looking back what I have done during the first year of running this new (forex) business, I have learnt a couple of things:
1. Believe in yourself and you will find ways to achieve certain goals - my limiting belief of not being able to stomach the volatility in the forex market over the last decade, has been thrown away. Now that I am able to trade forex simply means that limiting belief is just limiting belief. If I give myself a complete stretch, I have progressed to the next step.
2. Successful trading is all but psychology - I could have the so-called "best and powerful" trading strategies and also the "best" forex guru in town to teach me, and yet the progress could not be achieved until I have got the trader's attutide right in this business. That's how the psychology comes about. Have an attitude that is deemed correct in my own circumstances. Follow the rules, and keep myself discplined. Further, remember the importance of continious improvement - Kaizan. I followed faithfully what I called "7 Essential Credentials of a Successful Trader" to work on this new business. I am glad to see significant progress in the first year and trust that I will be able to deal with the challenges in 2009.
3. Always have a back-up plan - this forex business was the result of my contingency plan in 2008. By anticipating the challenges in the equity and index markets, I started equipping myself with additional knowledge in another area of practice and I was glad that this anticipation resulted in a successful launch of my forex business. The fact that I could start the real operation within a couple of months means that I could make a difference from my old days as an options trader. So, what's my back-up plan for 2009? I am going to look at the next level of challenges - i.e. futures market. This means that I will be essentially one day able to trade anything under the sun. Having said that, I do anticipate a come-back to the index options market in 2009 as I expect that the trend will likely be a side-way for 2009 and perhaps 2010. I did quite well in 2005 in the sideways market by deploying sideways strategies - something which I am very good at. So, I am ready to play sideways strategies again in 2009 at least.
Finally, this will be my last post for 2008. I wish all of my readers a Merry Christmas and look forward to the upcoming challenges in 2009.
Believe in yourself and you will make a difference! This is our Patterns of Excellence!!
2008-12-26
2008-12-16
Am I a marketer?
First and foremost, I am grateful that there are many readers in my Discussion Board , and I realize that not everyone has been actively participating in my board, which is fine with me. I am not in the board selling you any information or courses. However, as and when I think there are some interesting products, I do post a link or two to keep my readers aware. Of course, if my readers are interested, they have the choice of buying the products directly by clicking the link in my board.
Having said that, I am recently quite perturbed with a few participants who registered in my board and made a lot of unresourceful remarks. You know as much as I do that every aspiring trader wants to succeed in trading and yet, no one is going to spoon feed us. Thus, we all have to devote our time to learn and better equip ourselves in this business. Put simply, there is no short cut or miracle. If I don't give me 100%, I won't see the result I have today. Is it a fair statement?
Now, here is the deal. I am happy to share with my readers knowledge I have provided that it does not infringe any proprietary rights. A particular reader recently has demanded me to release certain details of a proprietary system and insisted that it is no harm to share just as little information as possible. When I replied politely that this trading system is proprietary, I got remark that I am the best marketer in promoting my course and stuff like that.
What a joke, isn't it? Sharing information is fine to the extent that the source originates from public domain. If the information is proprietary, it cannot be given out free. That's the real life in business. Obviously, we all wanted to get this kind of information free of charge. Doing so is however not respecting intellectual property law, and is also unfair to people out there who are willing to pay for such information.
So, blaming me as a marketer for courses because I don't give out such proprietary information does not help that person at all. Well, there are also many sites that provide free forex trading system information. Why doesn't this person go to read for himself? Well, I don't have a clue!
First and foremost, I am grateful that there are many readers in my Discussion Board , and I realize that not everyone has been actively participating in my board, which is fine with me. I am not in the board selling you any information or courses. However, as and when I think there are some interesting products, I do post a link or two to keep my readers aware. Of course, if my readers are interested, they have the choice of buying the products directly by clicking the link in my board.
Having said that, I am recently quite perturbed with a few participants who registered in my board and made a lot of unresourceful remarks. You know as much as I do that every aspiring trader wants to succeed in trading and yet, no one is going to spoon feed us. Thus, we all have to devote our time to learn and better equip ourselves in this business. Put simply, there is no short cut or miracle. If I don't give me 100%, I won't see the result I have today. Is it a fair statement?
Now, here is the deal. I am happy to share with my readers knowledge I have provided that it does not infringe any proprietary rights. A particular reader recently has demanded me to release certain details of a proprietary system and insisted that it is no harm to share just as little information as possible. When I replied politely that this trading system is proprietary, I got remark that I am the best marketer in promoting my course and stuff like that.
What a joke, isn't it? Sharing information is fine to the extent that the source originates from public domain. If the information is proprietary, it cannot be given out free. That's the real life in business. Obviously, we all wanted to get this kind of information free of charge. Doing so is however not respecting intellectual property law, and is also unfair to people out there who are willing to pay for such information.
So, blaming me as a marketer for courses because I don't give out such proprietary information does not help that person at all. Well, there are also many sites that provide free forex trading system information. Why doesn't this person go to read for himself? Well, I don't have a clue!
2008-12-11
Practice Defensive Forex Trading
“In trading, Risk is Pre-Determined but Reward is Un-Predictable. Your Stop determined your risk. The Market decides your reward. Success in trading is supported by your discipline, diligence and decided by your Money Management and Psychology.,” - Henry Aw Young, Singapore
Henry is a good friend of mine with whom I met in Adam Khoo's Wealth Academy Program in 2008. He is also a professional trader and a trading coach.
As you can see, people who have been proper trading education will say something like the above. Always determine the risk before looking for the reward. Establish the pain threshold with informed decision right before placing the trade and know how much we will lose in a particular if we are wrong first before asking how much money we can make if we are right.
Amateur traders could find it hard to accept. They tend to ask "if trading is for money, why should they not take about how much they can make in a trade?" Well, the answer is fairly simple. If we are in a trade without knowing the maximum pain threshold, and if we are wrong in that trade, emotion will drive us crazy, and we will start giving excuses so that we can delay our pain until such time as we cannot. By that time it will be too late to get out of the losing position, and the traders might as well not exit the trade. The probable outcome s that the traders have their accounts wipe out and curse and swear that they shall not trade anymore because the market is unfair to them.
Does this sound familiar to you? You should have heard in the recent bear market where many people lost tons of money because they approached this business in a completely incorrect manner.
So, who in the market right now are still making money? I guess people who have been educated properly and practice defensive trading. And what do I mean by defensive trading? Let's draw some indications below:
1. Always find a reason not to trade, and if you find one, then, you are out of the market. This helps us to focus on quality set-up / pattern and at the same time, kick away emotional trading.
2. Always address stop loss first before looking at the profit. Yes, it is completely reversed. The advantage of this is by ascertaining the stop loss, you will be able to determine the proper position sizing, and risk allocation. If you find that the stop loss is something you are not comfortable, you have found another reason to stay out of the market.
3. Trade based on your trading personality. I know this is a challenge. Some of us tend to trade in a shorter time frame. I am one of them. When I talk about shorter time frame, I mean it is short in my own definition. For example, I trade forex by using at least a 5-min chart and at the same time. 1 min-chart is too short in my definition.
4. Do take into account of bid/ask spread. Very often, we tend to look at the upside of an individual trade and when taking into account the spread, the result can look very different. So, remember to incorporate bid/ask spread in your trading result so that it becomes more realistic.
5. Do your research and development. I would like to answer Chris' (JMOT's) questions here. I am a system trader because it is something I learnt from Tom Gentile, the co-found of Optionetics. I took Tom's traits in my trading business and very often, I blend a few systems which may give me better results. For example, if I take FAST2 to trade on USD/JPY, the accruacy may be somewhere between 65% and 75%. Knowing that the win/loss ratio and the risk/reward ratio, most FX1 students may find it hard to make money on FAST2. Some of the students may start blaming FX1 and whoever on the planet saying that this course sucks.
In my case, I focus on how to better the system with a view to increasing the win/loss ratio. In my own R&D, I asked myself the following questions:
- Can I use some signals to filter out the less probable side of the trade? Put simply, if USD/JPY is on a short-term downtrend, and there is a long signal, should I take this trade blindly? This is why I incorporate Kathy Line's BB Band in my modified FAST2. So, if the pair is in the sell zone, I will concentrate on the short trades.
- Can I take into account support and resistance? Put simply, if USD/JPY gives me a sell signal, and at the same time, the profit target will face a strong support somehow in between, should I take this signal? Peter Bain and John Person are the gurus in pivot point analysis. There are also free MT4 code for daily pivot points. How about putting pivot points in the pair and filter out less probable trades? For example, this afternoon there was potentially a short USD/JPY trade and I decided not to trade. My PT was 92.20 and S1 is 92.24. So, I did not place the trade which eventually was proven to be a right decision becuase it really bounced back nicely at S1and moved all way to my SL and I would have registered a max loss on this signal.
So, these are some of my ideas to fine-tune the trading systems based on what I know. You may ask how the hell I know all of these. I can share with you that it is based on my hunger and desire to become the best forex trader in Singapore. That means I constantly look into my existing trading systems (and till now, I have at least 20 systems) and decide which of these are suitable in the given market condition. Unlike many amateur traders, instead of focusing the word "why?", I look at "how". With this little weeak of the question marker, I see a hell lot of oppotunities in forex market.
Another reader asked why I posted my daily forex record in my discussion board. I am not showing off of course. The sole purpose of doing this is to keep track which systems I use on a particular day, and how they performed. Of course, some of these systems are proprietary and thus I am not allowed to post the detail entry and exit rules. I need to respect the intellectual property of the inventor of the systems. At the same time, I have recently spent hell lot of time to forexfactory.com and singaporeforexforum.com as there are tons of free traidng systems and some of them provide MT4 codes. So, if you are committed to be the best of the best, you must decide for yourself what you should do.
Have fun in your forex venture!
“In trading, Risk is Pre-Determined but Reward is Un-Predictable. Your Stop determined your risk. The Market decides your reward. Success in trading is supported by your discipline, diligence and decided by your Money Management and Psychology.,” - Henry Aw Young, Singapore
Henry is a good friend of mine with whom I met in Adam Khoo's Wealth Academy Program in 2008. He is also a professional trader and a trading coach.
As you can see, people who have been proper trading education will say something like the above. Always determine the risk before looking for the reward. Establish the pain threshold with informed decision right before placing the trade and know how much we will lose in a particular if we are wrong first before asking how much money we can make if we are right.
Amateur traders could find it hard to accept. They tend to ask "if trading is for money, why should they not take about how much they can make in a trade?" Well, the answer is fairly simple. If we are in a trade without knowing the maximum pain threshold, and if we are wrong in that trade, emotion will drive us crazy, and we will start giving excuses so that we can delay our pain until such time as we cannot. By that time it will be too late to get out of the losing position, and the traders might as well not exit the trade. The probable outcome s that the traders have their accounts wipe out and curse and swear that they shall not trade anymore because the market is unfair to them.
Does this sound familiar to you? You should have heard in the recent bear market where many people lost tons of money because they approached this business in a completely incorrect manner.
So, who in the market right now are still making money? I guess people who have been educated properly and practice defensive trading. And what do I mean by defensive trading? Let's draw some indications below:
1. Always find a reason not to trade, and if you find one, then, you are out of the market. This helps us to focus on quality set-up / pattern and at the same time, kick away emotional trading.
2. Always address stop loss first before looking at the profit. Yes, it is completely reversed. The advantage of this is by ascertaining the stop loss, you will be able to determine the proper position sizing, and risk allocation. If you find that the stop loss is something you are not comfortable, you have found another reason to stay out of the market.
3. Trade based on your trading personality. I know this is a challenge. Some of us tend to trade in a shorter time frame. I am one of them. When I talk about shorter time frame, I mean it is short in my own definition. For example, I trade forex by using at least a 5-min chart and at the same time. 1 min-chart is too short in my definition.
4. Do take into account of bid/ask spread. Very often, we tend to look at the upside of an individual trade and when taking into account the spread, the result can look very different. So, remember to incorporate bid/ask spread in your trading result so that it becomes more realistic.
5. Do your research and development. I would like to answer Chris' (JMOT's) questions here. I am a system trader because it is something I learnt from Tom Gentile, the co-found of Optionetics. I took Tom's traits in my trading business and very often, I blend a few systems which may give me better results. For example, if I take FAST2 to trade on USD/JPY, the accruacy may be somewhere between 65% and 75%. Knowing that the win/loss ratio and the risk/reward ratio, most FX1 students may find it hard to make money on FAST2. Some of the students may start blaming FX1 and whoever on the planet saying that this course sucks.
In my case, I focus on how to better the system with a view to increasing the win/loss ratio. In my own R&D, I asked myself the following questions:
- Can I use some signals to filter out the less probable side of the trade? Put simply, if USD/JPY is on a short-term downtrend, and there is a long signal, should I take this trade blindly? This is why I incorporate Kathy Line's BB Band in my modified FAST2. So, if the pair is in the sell zone, I will concentrate on the short trades.
- Can I take into account support and resistance? Put simply, if USD/JPY gives me a sell signal, and at the same time, the profit target will face a strong support somehow in between, should I take this signal? Peter Bain and John Person are the gurus in pivot point analysis. There are also free MT4 code for daily pivot points. How about putting pivot points in the pair and filter out less probable trades? For example, this afternoon there was potentially a short USD/JPY trade and I decided not to trade. My PT was 92.20 and S1 is 92.24. So, I did not place the trade which eventually was proven to be a right decision becuase it really bounced back nicely at S1and moved all way to my SL and I would have registered a max loss on this signal.
So, these are some of my ideas to fine-tune the trading systems based on what I know. You may ask how the hell I know all of these. I can share with you that it is based on my hunger and desire to become the best forex trader in Singapore. That means I constantly look into my existing trading systems (and till now, I have at least 20 systems) and decide which of these are suitable in the given market condition. Unlike many amateur traders, instead of focusing the word "why?", I look at "how". With this little weeak of the question marker, I see a hell lot of oppotunities in forex market.
Another reader asked why I posted my daily forex record in my discussion board. I am not showing off of course. The sole purpose of doing this is to keep track which systems I use on a particular day, and how they performed. Of course, some of these systems are proprietary and thus I am not allowed to post the detail entry and exit rules. I need to respect the intellectual property of the inventor of the systems. At the same time, I have recently spent hell lot of time to forexfactory.com and singaporeforexforum.com as there are tons of free traidng systems and some of them provide MT4 codes. So, if you are committed to be the best of the best, you must decide for yourself what you should do.
Have fun in your forex venture!
2008-11-22
Getting addicted to Forex Trading
My wife and I went to a parent workshop this morning about internet security at home for concerned parents. The presenter mentioned that online gaming is very popular among the kids and it is very easy for them to be addicted. I was thinking whether it is just the problem for the kids because I have a similar challenge too.
Over the last four weeks, I only placed 3 options trades, all of which were simple quickie on directional bets. For the rest of the time, I focused 100% on forex trades. Yeah, I had two business trips in the month of November and honestly did not really trade. However, the fact that I am now back to the normal schedule allows me to focus again on forex trading.
As I explained to some of my readers, forex trading is tough if one hasn't got the proper education. In addition, under the influence of Boris and Kathy from GFT Forex, I honestly do not trade forex by looking at the technicals alone. I read into a lot of fundamentals and use fundamentals to confirm my directional bias, and use technicals (if I have to) to confirm my bias. So, in this sense, I have fulfilled with Boris mentioned on the first M and the second M.
Imagine in a down day where you see a bullish signal on the carry trade pairs, are you seriously going to long? Well, a pure technical trader may go for this trade and probably it will be either a small winner or luckily best, no loss. However, by understanding the fundamentals, one will more likely than not filter out this long signal and hence, places no trade.
My forex trading hours are primarily in the afternoon, Singapore time. To me, this is the best time to trade because there is no US news that could swing the market easily. In addition, Europe markets have the tendency to follow the US market of the previous days. It's therefore easier to gauge the direction.
Having said that, I know and am aware that there are students who still prefer to trade during US cash market hours. It's fine because it boils down to one's trading preference - in this case, the operating hours. Now that I have traded forex for a while, I must say that I have an upper hand on the news around Asia and Europe, and even Canada, Kiwi and Aussie. There are many opportunities a day so a forex trader should not worry about having nothing to trade. Of course, we filter the better ones in order to ensure a higher win/loss ratio.
I have many trading systems in forex - which I acquired from many mentors and gurus. However, I screened out the best of five which have been working consistently:
Asia High Low System - AHLS
This is a system that requires one to place a trade at 3pm Singapore time on EUR/USD. The idea is to look for breakout of the range, and aim at a quick bite of the breakout and pocket the profits. This system has a track record of about 60% correct over the last few years. A few of us are working on a semi-automatic system and probably will launch in the near future.
London Momentum
This is a system that requires one to place a trade at 3pm Singapore time on GBP/JPY, at which time the London market is open. There is a set of formula to use to calculate the EP, SL and PT and is largely based on Jimmy Young's original version with mutiple lots to go in and scale out. The system however suffers an inconsistency at the beginning of this year and thus, I have researched and introduced a filter that provides a better result. Yesterday, I have further refined the system in such a way that I chalked up 185 pips per 3 lots in a mere two hours. So, London Momentum (Beta 2) will be what I am concentrating on for the next month to see if it can give me a better result. There isn't a trade everyday but for the time I traded so far in November, I recalled there was only a losing trade.
5 min 60 SMA
For Jimmy Young's trading tactics coaching class students, and also the TradeCast Publication subscriber, you know this is the main daily trading system Jimmy and his students use. The challenging part of this system is the execution, and I am still working on how to get a better execution. In addition, I have introduced a new set of stop loss rule which largely follows Kathy's multiple lot scaling out method. So, as Boris said, forex traders are risk managers. I would therefore be more than happy to lock in the profits and make the trade risk free first before looking for the final lot to make a home run.
1 min 60 SMA
This is the newly inented trading system introduced by Jimmy not long ago. It's purely based on the news each day, and can be referred to in the NewsTrader Publication. I have tested this system since last week, and it's 50/50 so far. Let me test it further before I give you my insights.
FAST2
When USD/JPY is trading in a tight range, FX104 did not really work. So, as an alternative, let's go back to the first forex trading system introduced by FX1 Academy. Using Kathy's BB filters and my own parameters, I have managed to screen out many bad qualty set-up. I am glad to say that I have not made a single loss this week on FAST2 based on my parameters. So, who said FX1 Academy's $4,500 course not working? I bet to differ.
For further information about Jimmy Young's trading course, please go to http://www.fxte.com for further details. I know the full-package costs US$7,999 (consisting of the basic course, intermediate online course, trading tactics coaching class, and the advanced online seminar) and it is quite expensive in view of the current economic climate. And at the same time, it is expensive because it gives you the entire trading package which enables you to start, rather than putting one in a half-past-six position. Jimmy shares with his students the game plan each day and this is the cream of the crop. He also does post-mortem everyday to explain what works and what does not work. I have certainly benefited so much from Jimmy's insight.
My wife and I went to a parent workshop this morning about internet security at home for concerned parents. The presenter mentioned that online gaming is very popular among the kids and it is very easy for them to be addicted. I was thinking whether it is just the problem for the kids because I have a similar challenge too.
Over the last four weeks, I only placed 3 options trades, all of which were simple quickie on directional bets. For the rest of the time, I focused 100% on forex trades. Yeah, I had two business trips in the month of November and honestly did not really trade. However, the fact that I am now back to the normal schedule allows me to focus again on forex trading.
As I explained to some of my readers, forex trading is tough if one hasn't got the proper education. In addition, under the influence of Boris and Kathy from GFT Forex, I honestly do not trade forex by looking at the technicals alone. I read into a lot of fundamentals and use fundamentals to confirm my directional bias, and use technicals (if I have to) to confirm my bias. So, in this sense, I have fulfilled with Boris mentioned on the first M and the second M.
Imagine in a down day where you see a bullish signal on the carry trade pairs, are you seriously going to long? Well, a pure technical trader may go for this trade and probably it will be either a small winner or luckily best, no loss. However, by understanding the fundamentals, one will more likely than not filter out this long signal and hence, places no trade.
My forex trading hours are primarily in the afternoon, Singapore time. To me, this is the best time to trade because there is no US news that could swing the market easily. In addition, Europe markets have the tendency to follow the US market of the previous days. It's therefore easier to gauge the direction.
Having said that, I know and am aware that there are students who still prefer to trade during US cash market hours. It's fine because it boils down to one's trading preference - in this case, the operating hours. Now that I have traded forex for a while, I must say that I have an upper hand on the news around Asia and Europe, and even Canada, Kiwi and Aussie. There are many opportunities a day so a forex trader should not worry about having nothing to trade. Of course, we filter the better ones in order to ensure a higher win/loss ratio.
I have many trading systems in forex - which I acquired from many mentors and gurus. However, I screened out the best of five which have been working consistently:
Asia High Low System - AHLS
This is a system that requires one to place a trade at 3pm Singapore time on EUR/USD. The idea is to look for breakout of the range, and aim at a quick bite of the breakout and pocket the profits. This system has a track record of about 60% correct over the last few years. A few of us are working on a semi-automatic system and probably will launch in the near future.
London Momentum
This is a system that requires one to place a trade at 3pm Singapore time on GBP/JPY, at which time the London market is open. There is a set of formula to use to calculate the EP, SL and PT and is largely based on Jimmy Young's original version with mutiple lots to go in and scale out. The system however suffers an inconsistency at the beginning of this year and thus, I have researched and introduced a filter that provides a better result. Yesterday, I have further refined the system in such a way that I chalked up 185 pips per 3 lots in a mere two hours. So, London Momentum (Beta 2) will be what I am concentrating on for the next month to see if it can give me a better result. There isn't a trade everyday but for the time I traded so far in November, I recalled there was only a losing trade.
5 min 60 SMA
For Jimmy Young's trading tactics coaching class students, and also the TradeCast Publication subscriber, you know this is the main daily trading system Jimmy and his students use. The challenging part of this system is the execution, and I am still working on how to get a better execution. In addition, I have introduced a new set of stop loss rule which largely follows Kathy's multiple lot scaling out method. So, as Boris said, forex traders are risk managers. I would therefore be more than happy to lock in the profits and make the trade risk free first before looking for the final lot to make a home run.
1 min 60 SMA
This is the newly inented trading system introduced by Jimmy not long ago. It's purely based on the news each day, and can be referred to in the NewsTrader Publication. I have tested this system since last week, and it's 50/50 so far. Let me test it further before I give you my insights.
FAST2
When USD/JPY is trading in a tight range, FX104 did not really work. So, as an alternative, let's go back to the first forex trading system introduced by FX1 Academy. Using Kathy's BB filters and my own parameters, I have managed to screen out many bad qualty set-up. I am glad to say that I have not made a single loss this week on FAST2 based on my parameters. So, who said FX1 Academy's $4,500 course not working? I bet to differ.
For further information about Jimmy Young's trading course, please go to http://www.fxte.com for further details. I know the full-package costs US$7,999 (consisting of the basic course, intermediate online course, trading tactics coaching class, and the advanced online seminar) and it is quite expensive in view of the current economic climate. And at the same time, it is expensive because it gives you the entire trading package which enables you to start, rather than putting one in a half-past-six position. Jimmy shares with his students the game plan each day and this is the cream of the crop. He also does post-mortem everyday to explain what works and what does not work. I have certainly benefited so much from Jimmy's insight.
3 Simple Rules of Winning Forex Traders (from Kathy Lien and Boris Schlossberg of GFT Forex)
About two weeks I went on CNBC and predicted that range will rule the currency markets for the foreseeable future. The price of EUR/USD at the time of broadcast? 1.2630. The price of EUR/USD at close of trade today? 1.2590. So range reigns in the currency market as every rally fails and every decline proves false breaking the hearts of both bulls and bears and that dynamic will probably last for the rest of this year. Thus with little new to say and holiday shortened week ahead of us I thought we'd change the format this week and skips the price action review concentrating instead understanding the basic building blocks of successful trading.
This past week in Kuwait I gave a presentation titled "3 M's that Drive the Currency Market". It showcased a simple analytical framework created by Kathy and I to explain most of the price movement in currencies. The 3 M's stand for Macro - broad economic and political themes, Micro - day to day economic releases and Monetary - for monetary policy of the G-10 nations. The 3M's model, though relatively straightforward, does a very good job of encapsulating virtually all of the catalysts in the FX market.
As I was flying back to US, my thoughts drifted to the 3M idea and I realized that trading itself can also be summarized in a 3 variable model - a model I call the Three Simple Rules Of Winning Traders.
Rule 1 - Develop an opinion
Whenever I hear traders tell me, "I don't have any opinion, I just trade price action." I always smile ruefully and think to myself that the trader is both an idiot and a liar. The fact of the matter is that every time you enter the market you are implicitly rendering an opinion on the future movement of price. The difference between those traders who do so implicitly versus those who put forth an explicit reason for their trade is that the former have no clue of what they are doing while the later at least try to figure out the story behind the trade.
It goes without saying that I have little respect for traders who mechanically follow price action like mindless robots. In trading you get paid not for what is happening now, but for what will happen in the future and if you cannot figure out what is likely to drive price towards your target you are just a lemming in the market. Right or wrong, developing an opinion is the cornerstone of a winning strategy.
Rule 2 - Let Price Confirm Your Thesis
To politely paraphrase a very crude Wall Street saying, opinions are like faces - everyone has one. Developing an opinion even one that is ultimately correct is utterly worthless if the market happens to disagree with your assessment. The history if trading is littered with brilliant analysts who were absolutely correct on their calls and yet were bankrupted by the vagaries of price action before they were ever proven right. Your opinion may be dead on, but as traders it is price movement, not opinion that we are trading. Until and unless price corroborates your opinion you have no entry signal for your trade.
Rule 3 - Manage Your Trade
More than anything else great traders are good money managers. I've always believed that you can put two great traders on the opposite side of a position and often both of them will wind up making money. On the other hand put two novices in the same spot and they will more than likely both lose. Trading above all the art of managing the unknown. Let's say you own a sandwich shop in some strip mall in Nebraska. Most likely you would know to within 10 or 20 sandwiches how many customers you will have every single day of the year. Now imagine that sandwich shop was the FX market. The day to day variance would drive most sandwich shop owners insane. Some days you may sell 500 sandwiches, other days you may have to dump all your food supplies into the garbage as no business came through your door. That's why trading at its core is always about managing risk. Every time you trade the operating principle is - Hope for the Best Prepare for the Worst.
The only way we've been able to control risk and at the same time participate in the market is by always cutting our position in half once a short profit target is met. No matter what anyone tell you, there is simply no way to know a priori if any given trade will be successful. At BKT we really believe that half a loaf is better than none. Success in trading is contingent not only on your analysis but on your ability to properly manage your position. That is why the game is hard. To be a winning trader you must be both - a good analyst and an an excellent risk manager.
2008-11-06
AN ARTICLE TO SHARE
Dear Readers,
I would like to dedicate this article to all of you.
Lesson Learnt From My Grandmother
It brought me a lot of fond memories when I first wrote it, and the more I read, the happier I will be. The fact that life is full of challenges means that we can become stronger and stronger. You know as much as I do that we should love our family, relatives and close friends, and treasure them before it is too late to do so.
So, if you haven't talked to your parents for a while, go ahead and make that phone call and say "I love you". Treasure yourself too because who is the most important person in this world. After going through Module 2 of Patterns of Excellence, I know the answer pretty well. So, take charge of your life and become 120% responsibility for what you are doing.
Dear Readers,
I would like to dedicate this article to all of you.
Lesson Learnt From My Grandmother
It brought me a lot of fond memories when I first wrote it, and the more I read, the happier I will be. The fact that life is full of challenges means that we can become stronger and stronger. You know as much as I do that we should love our family, relatives and close friends, and treasure them before it is too late to do so.
So, if you haven't talked to your parents for a while, go ahead and make that phone call and say "I love you". Treasure yourself too because who is the most important person in this world. After going through Module 2 of Patterns of Excellence, I know the answer pretty well. So, take charge of your life and become 120% responsibility for what you are doing.
2008-10-28
Ok you guys win. I can't beat you guys!!
In a local forum, someone said,
"I buy, the price go down. I sell, the price go up."
"I give up. Lost $20k in one month. "
"No more."
We need many of these people in the market to fund our profits. Retail investors and traders who are so penny wise and pound foolish will never appreciate the importance of getting education. They approach investment and trading in the wrong ways.
Everyone knows that in order to profit, he has to buy low and sell high. But many times, he does not seem to be able to figure out that in order to profit, he can actually sell high and buy low (well, I am not talking about naked short position, and don't get me wrong on this). And interestingly, he may be buying high and selling low. Why does this happen? This has something to do with fear and greed.
Fear - afraid to take losses and as a result, losses keep piling up until that person cannot tolerate anymore.
Greed - take profit as fast as possible because it may be gone. So, the person will take profit and later will discover that he could have made more and started screaming and shouting.
Having said that, by getting proper education, this person could have saved $20k. Of course, when every smarter Alec is telling you that "cash is king and thus you should wait", he is also not getting proper education. Please don't listen to these people because they never tell you that you can profit from a bear market first before it reverts. So, instead of waiting for the bull market to come back, why waste time to stay sideline? We have traders who continue to make money in the bear market, me included. It's the result of us getting proper education, and trading with a plan. Don't under-estimate the power of education and don't be afraid of getting involved in the bear market.
Well, who knows when we are seeing this situation in future. But if we are educated, I am sure we know how to deal with this next time.
In a local forum, someone said,
"I buy, the price go down. I sell, the price go up."
"I give up. Lost $20k in one month. "
"No more."
We need many of these people in the market to fund our profits. Retail investors and traders who are so penny wise and pound foolish will never appreciate the importance of getting education. They approach investment and trading in the wrong ways.
Everyone knows that in order to profit, he has to buy low and sell high. But many times, he does not seem to be able to figure out that in order to profit, he can actually sell high and buy low (well, I am not talking about naked short position, and don't get me wrong on this). And interestingly, he may be buying high and selling low. Why does this happen? This has something to do with fear and greed.
Fear - afraid to take losses and as a result, losses keep piling up until that person cannot tolerate anymore.
Greed - take profit as fast as possible because it may be gone. So, the person will take profit and later will discover that he could have made more and started screaming and shouting.
Having said that, by getting proper education, this person could have saved $20k. Of course, when every smarter Alec is telling you that "cash is king and thus you should wait", he is also not getting proper education. Please don't listen to these people because they never tell you that you can profit from a bear market first before it reverts. So, instead of waiting for the bull market to come back, why waste time to stay sideline? We have traders who continue to make money in the bear market, me included. It's the result of us getting proper education, and trading with a plan. Don't under-estimate the power of education and don't be afraid of getting involved in the bear market.
Well, who knows when we are seeing this situation in future. But if we are educated, I am sure we know how to deal with this next time.
2008-10-17
My Dearest Grandmother
I will always remember you, my grandmum, the one who brought my up and took good care of me when I was young. I know you suffered a lot over the last few months, especially whenever I heard from Flora that you were admitted to hospital again.
I admired you for being tough and determined. I admired your perseverance even though at times you suffered tremendous pain. Having said that, you remained positive and had faith on the doctors' diagnosis. You faced the tough test the God put on you this month - for doing an operation which a normal person would not even dare to receive. You were doing well to be honest. We, all members of Wong's family, are proud of you.
Will the God take care of you, and you will enjoy a new page of life.
Your dearest Grandson!
Jack
I will always remember you, my grandmum, the one who brought my up and took good care of me when I was young. I know you suffered a lot over the last few months, especially whenever I heard from Flora that you were admitted to hospital again.
I admired you for being tough and determined. I admired your perseverance even though at times you suffered tremendous pain. Having said that, you remained positive and had faith on the doctors' diagnosis. You faced the tough test the God put on you this month - for doing an operation which a normal person would not even dare to receive. You were doing well to be honest. We, all members of Wong's family, are proud of you.
Will the God take care of you, and you will enjoy a new page of life.
Your dearest Grandson!
Jack
2008-10-09
Whoosh 26 Module 1
Oct 2008 marks a milestone for me in terms of stretching my goals. I was part of the coaching team for Whoosh 26 - Patterns of Excellence (POE) Module 1.
Thank you for the guidance from the various senior coaches, and of course Pete Tan, our POE Head coach.
If you think coaching in Wealth Academy is the same as coaching in POE, please re-think. POE Coaching is 100,000 times more challenging than WA coaching. First of all, Pete expects all coaches to attend the pre-course coaching workshops (all together there are four sessions). I missed two of them and was a bit embarassed when I showed up on the third session. These sessions started from 7pm to 4am next morning. No kidding. Also, I am new to Pete and was not comfortable in front of him on the first night. But ... I am now used to Pete. He is a very tough guy and at the same time, is willing to share his knowledge with the group.
In terms of the actual POE, we had some 40 participants and for the first time as a coach, I understand the rationale of two key activities - WHY MUST YOU CHANGE? and WHY AM I IMPORTANT? Regrettably, I missed the STEEL ROD on the third night otherwise this coaching experience will be more fulfiling I must say.
Overall, it is a definitely a stretch to me, and I look forward to Mod 2 at the end of this month. I am grateful to all the senior coaches from POE for accepting me as part of the Whoosh coaching family. I learnt a lot, and I trusts that we will share our joy and happiness in future Whoosh batches.
What to do with your money now?
I commend the effort by my best pal, Conrad who wrote this short article in his blog ( http://www.conradalvinlim.com/?p=270). I am doing my readers a big favor by presenting Conrad's thoughts to you.
Ironically, I received a few calls recently from my readers and buddies who asked me what they should do in this economic crisis (or should it be named 'opportunity instead?). If you flip newspaper and watch Channel News Asia, CNN and CNBC, you may have heard this phrase very often - CASH IS KING!
When I reviewed the arguments presented by the speakers and journalists, I could not help but to think that some of these arguments are too naive. Why? This is the best time and it is never too late to improve your financial literacy, thereby offering yourself a valuable opportunity to learn how to manage your money. Instead of asking around what to invest and how to invest, it is now your time (yes, your time) to look for these answers.
As nicely put by Conrad, you know your bank deposit isn't that safe because the safe zone is only S$20,000 per account. Cash in milo tins may be safer in that regard. But instead of keeping the money and doing nothing, why do you not offer yourself an opportunity to get education?
When so many people are screaming and shouting about the downfall of the equity market, when so many people are losing money in this market, only a few have equipped the skill to make money. I happened to be one of the few people who had the ability to do so.
Today is 9 Oct, 2008 and over the last 6 trading days, my forex portfolio was up by 17%, and there are still three weeks to go before the end of Oct. When my buddies who hold off to trade options because they are scared of the high implied volatility and wide slippage, forex is my logical choice because it is the largest market and no matter what happens in the equity market, the liqudity and the tight spread the forex market continues to offer make me wonder whether I have made to right decision to move to play and defend in the forex market.
Well, my story is that I started forex education formally only in this March. However, with the proper trading psychology and well-founded business plan, I was able to start my forex business in a few months and am now reaping the fruits of my earlier effort. So, while many people who took up courses and still lost money in forex, and while many people continue to say that forex trading is risky, here is an example - see for yourself how to delay gratification and get yourself some education will help you to survive in this market.
While my friends told me that they have bought nice cars and houses, I always think how to invest in myself first - delayed gratification is painful because one can be easily influenced by the peers. However, instant gratification can be painful when something suddenly happens and you have no time to respond.
If you are seriously in getting some forex education, you can consider the following:
http://www.babypips.com
http://www.theforexbooks.com
http://www.singaporeforexforum.com/forum.php
http://www.gftforex.com/
http://www.dailyfx.com
http://www.netvibes.com/BKTraderFX#FXDashBoard
and many more ...
If you are ready to start your forex education, let me know. I have tons to share with you too.
I commend the effort by my best pal, Conrad who wrote this short article in his blog ( http://www.conradalvinlim.com/?p=270). I am doing my readers a big favor by presenting Conrad's thoughts to you.
Ironically, I received a few calls recently from my readers and buddies who asked me what they should do in this economic crisis (or should it be named 'opportunity instead?). If you flip newspaper and watch Channel News Asia, CNN and CNBC, you may have heard this phrase very often - CASH IS KING!
When I reviewed the arguments presented by the speakers and journalists, I could not help but to think that some of these arguments are too naive. Why? This is the best time and it is never too late to improve your financial literacy, thereby offering yourself a valuable opportunity to learn how to manage your money. Instead of asking around what to invest and how to invest, it is now your time (yes, your time) to look for these answers.
As nicely put by Conrad, you know your bank deposit isn't that safe because the safe zone is only S$20,000 per account. Cash in milo tins may be safer in that regard. But instead of keeping the money and doing nothing, why do you not offer yourself an opportunity to get education?
When so many people are screaming and shouting about the downfall of the equity market, when so many people are losing money in this market, only a few have equipped the skill to make money. I happened to be one of the few people who had the ability to do so.
Today is 9 Oct, 2008 and over the last 6 trading days, my forex portfolio was up by 17%, and there are still three weeks to go before the end of Oct. When my buddies who hold off to trade options because they are scared of the high implied volatility and wide slippage, forex is my logical choice because it is the largest market and no matter what happens in the equity market, the liqudity and the tight spread the forex market continues to offer make me wonder whether I have made to right decision to move to play and defend in the forex market.
Well, my story is that I started forex education formally only in this March. However, with the proper trading psychology and well-founded business plan, I was able to start my forex business in a few months and am now reaping the fruits of my earlier effort. So, while many people who took up courses and still lost money in forex, and while many people continue to say that forex trading is risky, here is an example - see for yourself how to delay gratification and get yourself some education will help you to survive in this market.
While my friends told me that they have bought nice cars and houses, I always think how to invest in myself first - delayed gratification is painful because one can be easily influenced by the peers. However, instant gratification can be painful when something suddenly happens and you have no time to respond.
If you are seriously in getting some forex education, you can consider the following:
http://www.babypips.com
http://www.theforexbooks.com
http://www.singaporeforexforum.com/forum.php
http://www.gftforex.com/
http://www.dailyfx.com
http://www.netvibes.com/BKTraderFX#FXDashBoard
and many more ...
If you are ready to start your forex education, let me know. I have tons to share with you too.
2008-09-28
Big Mouth Iron Condor (BMIC) SystemTM
A lot of traders around the world were comparing my BMIC SystemTM with Dan Sheridan's High Probability Condors. First, let me clarify that BMIC System is a system created by me and it is not based on Dan's system alone. In fact, BMIC System is generated by mixing and playing with at least three iron condor systems that are available currently in the internet and of course, the system works because I have done sufficient backtesting before I put this system on live trading.
Now, some of you may find that my Beta 1 Guidelines are too much to handle. Remember that this system is a rule-based system and therefore I have a lot of rules to capture different scenarios. For example, the hard close rule is to deal with the overnight RLS settlement. Buy back cheap rule is to make sure that a trader can remove his obligation as early as possible. So, they are all there for reasons. You cannot get these rules in a complete sense by reading other iron condor systems because most of them tell you vaguely how to get in but none of them is really able to address the "How to get out", or at best, you may consider this or that ... blah blah blah.
Why do I not talk about volatility? In the first place, iron condor consists of two vertical spreads. Therefore, the volatility is hedged in that you buy high IV option and sell high IV option at the same time. Or you buy low IV option and sell low IV option. Indeed, RVX can help to determine how big the mouth is. It helps in certain sense but that's all you can use. So, not mentioning volatility is not fatal because it does not matter at all, unlike time spread or diagonals.
If RVX is at all time low, chances of getting burnt WOULD NOT GO UP because you are going to use some rules to get out of the position. For example in Beta 1, I talked about what if you lose 1.5 times of your original credit received, you should consider getting out. So, those who said they may be burnt did not consider faithfully all the potential exit rules, and I am daring to say that - they did not.
All in all, no matter which iron condor system you are trading, make sure that you have done sufficient backtesting and forward testing before putting money at risk. Taking someone's system without testing it can be fatal and when you get burnt, don't blame the system developer but yourself - why? It's because you haven't done enough practice to drive F1. How can you drive like Lewis Hamilton when you just get your license?
Go figure.
Com'on - Listen to the so-called guru's advice
Read the following in a local forum with interest of how silly and naive aspiring traders can be:
"I am a newbie and just started trading few weeks ago. I thought I got some good information from this forum and won some money initially. One particular forummer caught my eyes as he was very articulate and claimed he was right of the market movement for the past few months..2 weeks ago on a friday, when the market turned, I listen to his advice and go long, becos he sound to firm and sure abt the position..never did I expect he flip his position so fast on the coming monday..Now i suffered for a lost of $10450..very sad now I never lost such a huge amount in my life..and the above was my entire saving..I am keeping this away from my wife over the weekend and now feel very depress and lost"
Hey, in the first place, a few lessons we can learn from this poor chap's mistake:
1. Treat someone's opinion as a fact is fatal because a trader can turn his opinion in a split second. Since he is not giving you any advice, he owes no fiduciary duty to you. If you are wrong, it is your own mistake and you have no legal recourse against this guy. So, don't even think of suing that trader? No way, you are wasting your money and your lawyer will happily pocket the legal fee.
2. Never trade with the amount you cannot afford to lose. So, if you hear like this guy say "I suffered a loss {sic} of $10,450 ... I never lost such huge amount in my life", probably he is trading too big and thinking that this trade would be a home run. Once you are in the mindset of gambling, chances are you are asking how much this trade can make, and not how much you will lose if you are wrong in the first place. That's why gamblers can sometimes make money but in the long run, gamblers can't last. Probability is not on their sides anyway.
3. This is really a joke but is so common. So many people are not willing to pay a few K to get proper education because they say the instructors suck, the course sucks, the materials suck, the strategy does not work. Ironically, they are happy to pay so much money to let Mr. Market teach them a good lesson. You can call this moral hazard, or the law of adversity. Isn't it better to pay $10k for proper education and learn how to trade well and last longer, instead of paying $10k to Mr. Market and now the money is gone. This poor guy literally has less than $10k to start his trading business. He felt sad and probably he wouldn't trade anymore because humans are scared due to "once bitten, twice shy" syndromes.
Another victim ....
Read the following in a local forum with interest of how silly and naive aspiring traders can be:
"I am a newbie and just started trading few weeks ago. I thought I got some good information from this forum and won some money initially. One particular forummer caught my eyes as he was very articulate and claimed he was right of the market movement for the past few months..2 weeks ago on a friday, when the market turned, I listen to his advice and go long, becos he sound to firm and sure abt the position..never did I expect he flip his position so fast on the coming monday..Now i suffered for a lost of $10450..very sad now I never lost such a huge amount in my life..and the above was my entire saving..I am keeping this away from my wife over the weekend and now feel very depress and lost"
Hey, in the first place, a few lessons we can learn from this poor chap's mistake:
1. Treat someone's opinion as a fact is fatal because a trader can turn his opinion in a split second. Since he is not giving you any advice, he owes no fiduciary duty to you. If you are wrong, it is your own mistake and you have no legal recourse against this guy. So, don't even think of suing that trader? No way, you are wasting your money and your lawyer will happily pocket the legal fee.
2. Never trade with the amount you cannot afford to lose. So, if you hear like this guy say "I suffered a loss {sic} of $10,450 ... I never lost such huge amount in my life", probably he is trading too big and thinking that this trade would be a home run. Once you are in the mindset of gambling, chances are you are asking how much this trade can make, and not how much you will lose if you are wrong in the first place. That's why gamblers can sometimes make money but in the long run, gamblers can't last. Probability is not on their sides anyway.
3. This is really a joke but is so common. So many people are not willing to pay a few K to get proper education because they say the instructors suck, the course sucks, the materials suck, the strategy does not work. Ironically, they are happy to pay so much money to let Mr. Market teach them a good lesson. You can call this moral hazard, or the law of adversity. Isn't it better to pay $10k for proper education and learn how to trade well and last longer, instead of paying $10k to Mr. Market and now the money is gone. This poor guy literally has less than $10k to start his trading business. He felt sad and probably he wouldn't trade anymore because humans are scared due to "once bitten, twice shy" syndromes.
Another victim ....
2008-09-25
Thanks, Conrad
My best trading pal, Conrad Alvin Lim mentioned me in his blog, and guess what? I received two friends request in my Facebook. Not a bad way to attract traffic and increase my profile (do I really need a high profile? I don't actually).
Without sharing too much the stories of my two new friends, I would just like to highlight the difference between Wealth Academy Trader ("WAT") and Optionetics two-day intermediate seminar. I consistently receive questions, specifically asking me to compare and contrast these two courses. It's like "Greeksman, I am considering either WAT or Optionetics. What's your take?"
I see the comparison as that of an apple with an orange. I am not in the best position to comment on WAT since I am never Conrad's student myself. However, from the conversation I have with Conrad and his students, and since I have the honour of being a special guest in his WAT forum, I understand that WAT provides basic training on trading matters.
In my opinion, whether a person decides to trade stocks, indices, options, futures or forex, because he chooses to be a trader, he has to acquire the basic skill. I believe therefore WAT is a good course to help aspiring traders to build their foundation. I don't any get commission from Conrad though to say this. I do find that had Conrad taught WAT earlier, I would have had become one of his students so that I can brush up my technical analysis and candlesticks.
In the world of Optionetics, however, apart from having a basic technical training, one will add on the foundation of options. So, one can start trading options assuming that he has already had trading skill. I sincerely believe that this should be the case. If one starts immediately to trade options, it's like "Hmm ... you are driving a F1 race car without having a driving license". I am not saying that it is not possible but you know the risk involved.
In the end, whatever one decides to do, he must understand why he is doing what he wants to do, and do whatever it takes to achieve the goal he set for himself. So, if you are interested in knowing more on Optionetics, do drop me a note or come to one of our previews by registering at http://www.optionetics.como.sg. The previews for the upcoming seminars will be 7-9 October in Singapore, and 11-13 October in Hong Kong.
If you are physically in Hong Kong, please come to Langham Place, Mongkok on 11 Oct at 1:00pm. Why? It is because for the first time in Optionetics' history, I will be doing the preview in 100% Cantonese. The slides will all be in Chinese too. So, if you are interested in hearing Optionetics talk options in Cantonese, I shall see you in Hong Kong. I am sincerely looking forward to it.
My best trading pal, Conrad Alvin Lim mentioned me in his blog, and guess what? I received two friends request in my Facebook. Not a bad way to attract traffic and increase my profile (do I really need a high profile? I don't actually).
Without sharing too much the stories of my two new friends, I would just like to highlight the difference between Wealth Academy Trader ("WAT") and Optionetics two-day intermediate seminar. I consistently receive questions, specifically asking me to compare and contrast these two courses. It's like "Greeksman, I am considering either WAT or Optionetics. What's your take?"
I see the comparison as that of an apple with an orange. I am not in the best position to comment on WAT since I am never Conrad's student myself. However, from the conversation I have with Conrad and his students, and since I have the honour of being a special guest in his WAT forum, I understand that WAT provides basic training on trading matters.
In my opinion, whether a person decides to trade stocks, indices, options, futures or forex, because he chooses to be a trader, he has to acquire the basic skill. I believe therefore WAT is a good course to help aspiring traders to build their foundation. I don't any get commission from Conrad though to say this. I do find that had Conrad taught WAT earlier, I would have had become one of his students so that I can brush up my technical analysis and candlesticks.
In the world of Optionetics, however, apart from having a basic technical training, one will add on the foundation of options. So, one can start trading options assuming that he has already had trading skill. I sincerely believe that this should be the case. If one starts immediately to trade options, it's like "Hmm ... you are driving a F1 race car without having a driving license". I am not saying that it is not possible but you know the risk involved.
In the end, whatever one decides to do, he must understand why he is doing what he wants to do, and do whatever it takes to achieve the goal he set for himself. So, if you are interested in knowing more on Optionetics, do drop me a note or come to one of our previews by registering at http://www.optionetics.como.sg. The previews for the upcoming seminars will be 7-9 October in Singapore, and 11-13 October in Hong Kong.
If you are physically in Hong Kong, please come to Langham Place, Mongkok on 11 Oct at 1:00pm. Why? It is because for the first time in Optionetics' history, I will be doing the preview in 100% Cantonese. The slides will all be in Chinese too. So, if you are interested in hearing Optionetics talk options in Cantonese, I shall see you in Hong Kong. I am sincerely looking forward to it.
2008-09-23
Those who attended the course should sue these people for misrepresentation - the course promises easy profits, which is clearly untrue
Very often in the local forum, you will see someone stand up to be a referee or an umpire to tell the world that it is unfair for someone to make money and for the rest to lose money. I can never understand the mindset of these people. Most likely, they could be victims of these seminars, and perhaps lost a lot of money by learning how to trade or invest.
Instead of blaming themselves for being ignorant and perhaps not giving 100% to learn how to trade/ invest well, they choose to blame the seminar organisers, the instructors, the founders of the courses, the people involved in the seminars, their academic qualification (which has no relevance in trading/ investing whatsover).
The sad thing is that if you subscribe to this logic, chances are you will never be able to be successful in investing and trading. It goes by this simple logic - trading and investment is a skill and it is not possible to be acquired overnight. Most of the participants I came across carried what I called a "quick-to-get-rich" mindset. Worst still, if they also have the mindset of equating setbacks as failure, they will never achieve anything from trading and investing. The seminar fee will simply go down to the sink. It is as simple as that.
Now, if you are serious in learning how to trade / invest well, then ask yourself this question. Are you able to commit to yourself (not to the others) that you will do whatever it takes to achieve it? Are you able to design a plan to enable you to learn the process and the requisite mechanics? Don't say that you have a day job and you don't have time to do this. Maybe you have to sacrifice your sleeping time. Maybe you have to sacrifice your Friday night's drinks. Maybe you have to let go a hobby like golf over the weekend. To respect trading and investing as a business, you must put in time and effort to realise the dream. How do you expect someone to teach you how to ride a bicycle without you practising how to do it?
To think what these folks do is naive and obviously, don't say that I haven't told you so - they will fail and I guarantee that! The saving grace of course is that we need these people to participate in the market, so that we can grab money from them.
Very often in the local forum, you will see someone stand up to be a referee or an umpire to tell the world that it is unfair for someone to make money and for the rest to lose money. I can never understand the mindset of these people. Most likely, they could be victims of these seminars, and perhaps lost a lot of money by learning how to trade or invest.
Instead of blaming themselves for being ignorant and perhaps not giving 100% to learn how to trade/ invest well, they choose to blame the seminar organisers, the instructors, the founders of the courses, the people involved in the seminars, their academic qualification (which has no relevance in trading/ investing whatsover).
The sad thing is that if you subscribe to this logic, chances are you will never be able to be successful in investing and trading. It goes by this simple logic - trading and investment is a skill and it is not possible to be acquired overnight. Most of the participants I came across carried what I called a "quick-to-get-rich" mindset. Worst still, if they also have the mindset of equating setbacks as failure, they will never achieve anything from trading and investing. The seminar fee will simply go down to the sink. It is as simple as that.
Now, if you are serious in learning how to trade / invest well, then ask yourself this question. Are you able to commit to yourself (not to the others) that you will do whatever it takes to achieve it? Are you able to design a plan to enable you to learn the process and the requisite mechanics? Don't say that you have a day job and you don't have time to do this. Maybe you have to sacrifice your sleeping time. Maybe you have to sacrifice your Friday night's drinks. Maybe you have to let go a hobby like golf over the weekend. To respect trading and investing as a business, you must put in time and effort to realise the dream. How do you expect someone to teach you how to ride a bicycle without you practising how to do it?
To think what these folks do is naive and obviously, don't say that I haven't told you so - they will fail and I guarantee that! The saving grace of course is that we need these people to participate in the market, so that we can grab money from them.
2008-09-22
WEALTH ACADEMY - CONGRATULATIONS ON BATCH 13
Congratulations to the folks on the right of the photo who completed Batch 13 of Wealth Academy on 18 - 21 Sep 2008.
As I told my fellow coaches, there is always a reason for everything. I am not going to AKLTG to coach for money. In fact, I came out with my own money to be a coach. But why did I spend my weekend there at the expense of many things which I could otherwise do? I sincerely believe that as I meet people from different walks of life, it will inspire me and sometimes I do learn something from the others by understanding their questions, and talking to them. So, there are values I found in engaging conversation with different people.
Thanks Adam for his thoughtful remark at the closing ceremony by framing me as the "Best Options Trader in Singapore". This is despite the fact that my readers jolly well know that AKLTG offers an options trading program and there is a perceived competition between AKLTG's options trading program and the options trading program along which I tag. He does not mind doing the introduction. To me, Adam has inspired my life since I joined Wealth Academy in May this year. I learned so much from him in terms of how to be empowered by doing just simple things every single day.
Conrad? Well, there is nothing more than I can say. This guy rocks and he is what I call one of the best day-traders in the world. Who can compare with him on his knowledge in candlestick patterns? I can't because I am a beginner in candlestick analysis. Actually, I don't need to use candlesticks so much in my options trading as I am primarily a premium collector. However, I found the knowledge in candlesticks a must in my forex trading because there is no premium collection strategy but purely directional play. So, it becomes a MUST for me to learn it.
Thanks Terry for doing a fantastic job as the Program Director. He is an amazing chap with a lot of energy, and he led the team to provide the participants, Adam and Conrad with tremendous support. Of course, to my fellow coaches, you guys are great because I learned something from you too - Kavin, Michelle, Serene, Joshua, Vincent, Bernard, Vivian, Allan, Ruben, Cheryl, Melvyn, Lawrence, Justin, Alicia, Mark (I hope I did not miss out anyone ...)
That's why I keep going back to AKLTG, a place to allow me to be energized and empowered.
Finally, I would like to thank Arthur, one of the participants for providing the picture so that my blog can now be updated with a graduation photo!
So, if you wanna come back to be a coach in WA 14, it's going to be fun.
Congratulations to the folks on the right of the photo who completed Batch 13 of Wealth Academy on 18 - 21 Sep 2008. As I told my fellow coaches, there is always a reason for everything. I am not going to AKLTG to coach for money. In fact, I came out with my own money to be a coach. But why did I spend my weekend there at the expense of many things which I could otherwise do? I sincerely believe that as I meet people from different walks of life, it will inspire me and sometimes I do learn something from the others by understanding their questions, and talking to them. So, there are values I found in engaging conversation with different people.
Thanks Adam for his thoughtful remark at the closing ceremony by framing me as the "Best Options Trader in Singapore". This is despite the fact that my readers jolly well know that AKLTG offers an options trading program and there is a perceived competition between AKLTG's options trading program and the options trading program along which I tag. He does not mind doing the introduction. To me, Adam has inspired my life since I joined Wealth Academy in May this year. I learned so much from him in terms of how to be empowered by doing just simple things every single day.
Conrad? Well, there is nothing more than I can say. This guy rocks and he is what I call one of the best day-traders in the world. Who can compare with him on his knowledge in candlestick patterns? I can't because I am a beginner in candlestick analysis. Actually, I don't need to use candlesticks so much in my options trading as I am primarily a premium collector. However, I found the knowledge in candlesticks a must in my forex trading because there is no premium collection strategy but purely directional play. So, it becomes a MUST for me to learn it.
Thanks Terry for doing a fantastic job as the Program Director. He is an amazing chap with a lot of energy, and he led the team to provide the participants, Adam and Conrad with tremendous support. Of course, to my fellow coaches, you guys are great because I learned something from you too - Kavin, Michelle, Serene, Joshua, Vincent, Bernard, Vivian, Allan, Ruben, Cheryl, Melvyn, Lawrence, Justin, Alicia, Mark (I hope I did not miss out anyone ...)
That's why I keep going back to AKLTG, a place to allow me to be energized and empowered.
Finally, I would like to thank Arthur, one of the participants for providing the picture so that my blog can now be updated with a graduation photo!
So, if you wanna come back to be a coach in WA 14, it's going to be fun.
2008-08-23
Getting Half the Juice - from Boris Schlossberg and Kathy Lien of GFT Forex
The longer you trade the markets the more you realize that the only absolute in the game exists on the downside. What I mean, is that the only factor that we can control with any degree of consistency is our losses. Most people of course believe they can control profits and that is perhaps the most naive belief of all. I'll never forget one time sharing a cab downtown with well known colleague who opined in no uncertain terms that he never takes trades with less than 3 to 1 risk reward ratio. I remember feeling uncomfortable at the time with his utter conviction that this was the only way to trade and only much later realized that this man must have never put his own money on the line because his premise was laughably unrealistic.
In real trading there is no such thing as 2 to 1 trades or 3 to 1 trades because you never know ahead of time how much money the market will give you. It is an utter act of hubris to think that just because you want to make 100 points of reward for every 30 points of risk you will actually achieve it. The 2 to 1 or 3 to 1 risk/reward trades are what they teach you trading books, and of course as so often the case what looks great in theory is actually remarkably dumb in practice. As the greatest philosopher since Plato once noted "In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is."
Last week I spoke about the need to set minimum targets and stick to them. However when it comes to maximum gains - the game is always open ended. Sometimes you hit a home run, sometimes a double and sometimes you just have to satisfied with a dribbling bunt. (For all our non North American readers I apologize for the profusion of baseball metaphors) but I think everyone gets the general idea - YOU CANNOT CONTROL YOUR PROFITS, YOU CAN ONLY CONTROL YOUR POSITIONS.
Sometimes when you squeeze a lemon you only get half the juice, and trading can be very much the same way. In practice, most traders scale out of their trades, taking some profit as it comes. In fact when you read our Millionaire Traders book the one unifying theme amongst most of our interview subjects be they trend followers or trend faders, long term or short term traders was that they always scaled out of their winners. Certainty and arrogance is for amateurs. Professionals play the probabilities and always remain flexible and open to the markets.
The longer you trade the markets the more you realize that the only absolute in the game exists on the downside. What I mean, is that the only factor that we can control with any degree of consistency is our losses. Most people of course believe they can control profits and that is perhaps the most naive belief of all. I'll never forget one time sharing a cab downtown with well known colleague who opined in no uncertain terms that he never takes trades with less than 3 to 1 risk reward ratio. I remember feeling uncomfortable at the time with his utter conviction that this was the only way to trade and only much later realized that this man must have never put his own money on the line because his premise was laughably unrealistic.
In real trading there is no such thing as 2 to 1 trades or 3 to 1 trades because you never know ahead of time how much money the market will give you. It is an utter act of hubris to think that just because you want to make 100 points of reward for every 30 points of risk you will actually achieve it. The 2 to 1 or 3 to 1 risk/reward trades are what they teach you trading books, and of course as so often the case what looks great in theory is actually remarkably dumb in practice. As the greatest philosopher since Plato once noted "In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is."
Last week I spoke about the need to set minimum targets and stick to them. However when it comes to maximum gains - the game is always open ended. Sometimes you hit a home run, sometimes a double and sometimes you just have to satisfied with a dribbling bunt. (For all our non North American readers I apologize for the profusion of baseball metaphors) but I think everyone gets the general idea - YOU CANNOT CONTROL YOUR PROFITS, YOU CAN ONLY CONTROL YOUR POSITIONS.
Sometimes when you squeeze a lemon you only get half the juice, and trading can be very much the same way. In practice, most traders scale out of their trades, taking some profit as it comes. In fact when you read our Millionaire Traders book the one unifying theme amongst most of our interview subjects be they trend followers or trend faders, long term or short term traders was that they always scaled out of their winners. Certainty and arrogance is for amateurs. Professionals play the probabilities and always remain flexible and open to the markets.
Finally, I got wiped out today after several days struggle
I read this note from one forex forum with sorrows. This student just picked up a forex trading class. He said in the forum that he could not control himself. He could not remove any emotion. He could not follow all the strategies and rules. He knew the danger but yet he continued to do it. He told himself he needed to stop not following the rules but he could not do it.
He shared in the forum about what happened a few nights ago. All the indicators were showing the strong uptrend. Yet, he was going for short position. When his trade was stopped, he went to short position again when there was signs of retracement. Worst still, he placed an order without profit target and stop loss. He admitted that he is gambling. So, in the end, his account was wiped out within merely 2 days.
He is in depression mode. He is remorseful and embarassed. An now he is asking others for help, in particular how to control his emotion.
As far as I am conerned, this is a classic example of why an aspiring trader can easily fail after paying for a seminar. A retail trader has a high tendency to approach trading in the wrong way. He trades without a plan. He trades with emotion, greed and fear. A seminar in itself is not in the position to put a newbie in the position of a professional trader. Instead, the newbie has to take control and makes a decision to follow the rules, and trade with a plan. If he fails, he cannot blame the seminar, the course provider, and the instructor. From this newbie's note, he did not blame anyone. So, it is indeed a good sign. He knows his weakness. He just does not know how to do it. In my mind, there is still hope on this newbie. He had a painful lesson and he will learn from his mistakes.
So, how can we help him? Actually, no one except him can help himself. Why? It is because like I said above, he has to take charge of the outcome. Maybe he should stop trading for a while. Maybe he should start again by paper trading in a demo account. Prove to himself that he can make consistent money before funding a new account. It's very obvious that instructors keep telling newbies not to put real money to trade but practise in demo account first. Not many people I know will follow the rules. In my case, I never trade a system unless I have backtested it and paper trade for a while. Only when I see consistent returns I will put my first $ at risk.. Some people call me nuts and some people disagree with me. Honestly, I don't give a damn. Why? At the end of the day, I am accountable to myself, not to the others. So, why am I concerned with what other people said?
I wish this newbie a successful trading career. Don't give up and take massive action to deal with the psychology part. Like what Conrad and I said to our respective students, it is trading psychology that brings success to a professional trader.
I read this note from one forex forum with sorrows. This student just picked up a forex trading class. He said in the forum that he could not control himself. He could not remove any emotion. He could not follow all the strategies and rules. He knew the danger but yet he continued to do it. He told himself he needed to stop not following the rules but he could not do it.
He shared in the forum about what happened a few nights ago. All the indicators were showing the strong uptrend. Yet, he was going for short position. When his trade was stopped, he went to short position again when there was signs of retracement. Worst still, he placed an order without profit target and stop loss. He admitted that he is gambling. So, in the end, his account was wiped out within merely 2 days.
He is in depression mode. He is remorseful and embarassed. An now he is asking others for help, in particular how to control his emotion.
As far as I am conerned, this is a classic example of why an aspiring trader can easily fail after paying for a seminar. A retail trader has a high tendency to approach trading in the wrong way. He trades without a plan. He trades with emotion, greed and fear. A seminar in itself is not in the position to put a newbie in the position of a professional trader. Instead, the newbie has to take control and makes a decision to follow the rules, and trade with a plan. If he fails, he cannot blame the seminar, the course provider, and the instructor. From this newbie's note, he did not blame anyone. So, it is indeed a good sign. He knows his weakness. He just does not know how to do it. In my mind, there is still hope on this newbie. He had a painful lesson and he will learn from his mistakes.
So, how can we help him? Actually, no one except him can help himself. Why? It is because like I said above, he has to take charge of the outcome. Maybe he should stop trading for a while. Maybe he should start again by paper trading in a demo account. Prove to himself that he can make consistent money before funding a new account. It's very obvious that instructors keep telling newbies not to put real money to trade but practise in demo account first. Not many people I know will follow the rules. In my case, I never trade a system unless I have backtested it and paper trade for a while. Only when I see consistent returns I will put my first $ at risk.. Some people call me nuts and some people disagree with me. Honestly, I don't give a damn. Why? At the end of the day, I am accountable to myself, not to the others. So, why am I concerned with what other people said?
I wish this newbie a successful trading career. Don't give up and take massive action to deal with the psychology part. Like what Conrad and I said to our respective students, it is trading psychology that brings success to a professional trader.
2008-08-22
Increase our edge in directional trading - sector analysis
Kudos to Mike Wade and the technical support team of Hubb Corporation in Sydney, 2-day seminar students in Singapore and Hong Kong have the knowledge of sector analysis, and for those folks who purchased Profitsource (http://www.profitsource.com), they can even enjoy the new Sector Scan which is currently available to students elsewhere at ICT and ITT levels.
Have you ever heard a complaint like Wave Theory does not work or Profitsource sucks?
"i have hat lot of failed trades with my profit source for the last 2months, i would like to know what i did wrong. eg i bought lots of wave4 trade that went the exact opposite and i have lot quite some money in the process, what should i do as am starting to doubt the process"
In the past, as this student politely said, I will reply this way:
"Profitsource W4 setups are just that: SETUPS. There is no guarantee they will turn into great profits. It is of most importance that you have a trade plan before you open position. Having exit points when things go wrong saves you money. Adjustment points when things go your way will save you a lot of frustration. If you are up $7K and end up loosing $4k is highly irritable, you need to take care of your winners so you can win more but limit your losses.
Once you are in a trade, it doesn’t matter what EW formation you see on PS. By then you have predefined exit/adjustment points.
There is always a chance that if you can be right about what the underlying is going to do and loose money on options. Learning more about how options work should eliminate that danger."
Here is what I would have said in the past:
"I strongly suggest taking advanced seminars. I was struggling for two years, then after ICT, ITT and POMM I was able to become a full time trader in 14 months. Yes I had to do homework as well as sacrifice vacation time to attend seminars and OASIS; however, telling my employer that my last day on a job will be 9/12/08…priceless."
However, as an instructor now, I know I should not reply with emotion and insist others to follow what I am doing. At the same time, I know very well that if something is not working, I may not be convinced to get additional education as a means to change my strategy. There are more costs involved and not everyone is ready to do so. Grateful to Mike because he studied sector analysis and found that it works well to increase his hit in directional trading.
In this respect, the 2-day Singapore and Hong Kong seminars in July 2008 incorporated sector analysis as part of the agenda. This agenda is exclusive to only Singapore and Hong Kong students as far as I know. The sector analysis discussion is only available to other students who are at ICT and ITT levels (which means they have to pay to get such knowledge).
So, what should a student do? He should start looking at the sector analysis to understand how smart money flows from one sector to another sector. He should understand how different sectors react at a prevailing time or at a particular market condition. This is the starting point.
As part of the identification of trading opportunities, 2-day seminar students may considerfocusing on
1. Strong stocks in the strongest sectors that display a Wave 4 Buy set-up, or a bullish break-out set-up
2. Weak stocks in the weakest sectors that disaply a Wave 4 Sell set-up or a bearish break-out set-up
The amount of trades obviously will be reduced but the hit rate increases, and this is something I discovered over my backtesting. My hit rate in July on sector directional trading is 80% correct, and suddenly a non-directional trader like myself finds the niche and confidence to come back to directional trading. Do I need to take additional courses to do that? Not really. At the end of the day, additional education is useful in helping us to improve our skill. But nothing comes with building confidence based on the basic stuff that still works well. A 2-day student does not need to any advanced courses to gain this experience. Just come to any of our 2-day seminars either in Singapore and Hong Kong, which is free re-attendance to them. So, why paid $4,000 to get something that may potential be free.
Our next 2-day class is scheduled to be in Singapore on 23/24 Oct and in Hong Kong on 28/29 Oct. If you are an existing Optionetics 2-day student living in Asia, you may consider taking action to see us.
Kudos to Mike Wade and the technical support team of Hubb Corporation in Sydney, 2-day seminar students in Singapore and Hong Kong have the knowledge of sector analysis, and for those folks who purchased Profitsource (http://www.profitsource.com), they can even enjoy the new Sector Scan which is currently available to students elsewhere at ICT and ITT levels.
Have you ever heard a complaint like Wave Theory does not work or Profitsource sucks?
"i have hat lot of failed trades with my profit source for the last 2months, i would like to know what i did wrong. eg i bought lots of wave4 trade that went the exact opposite and i have lot quite some money in the process, what should i do as am starting to doubt the process"
In the past, as this student politely said, I will reply this way:
"Profitsource W4 setups are just that: SETUPS. There is no guarantee they will turn into great profits. It is of most importance that you have a trade plan before you open position. Having exit points when things go wrong saves you money. Adjustment points when things go your way will save you a lot of frustration. If you are up $7K and end up loosing $4k is highly irritable, you need to take care of your winners so you can win more but limit your losses.
Once you are in a trade, it doesn’t matter what EW formation you see on PS. By then you have predefined exit/adjustment points.
There is always a chance that if you can be right about what the underlying is going to do and loose money on options. Learning more about how options work should eliminate that danger."
Here is what I would have said in the past:
"I strongly suggest taking advanced seminars. I was struggling for two years, then after ICT, ITT and POMM I was able to become a full time trader in 14 months. Yes I had to do homework as well as sacrifice vacation time to attend seminars and OASIS; however, telling my employer that my last day on a job will be 9/12/08…priceless."
However, as an instructor now, I know I should not reply with emotion and insist others to follow what I am doing. At the same time, I know very well that if something is not working, I may not be convinced to get additional education as a means to change my strategy. There are more costs involved and not everyone is ready to do so. Grateful to Mike because he studied sector analysis and found that it works well to increase his hit in directional trading.
In this respect, the 2-day Singapore and Hong Kong seminars in July 2008 incorporated sector analysis as part of the agenda. This agenda is exclusive to only Singapore and Hong Kong students as far as I know. The sector analysis discussion is only available to other students who are at ICT and ITT levels (which means they have to pay to get such knowledge).
So, what should a student do? He should start looking at the sector analysis to understand how smart money flows from one sector to another sector. He should understand how different sectors react at a prevailing time or at a particular market condition. This is the starting point.
As part of the identification of trading opportunities, 2-day seminar students may considerfocusing on
1. Strong stocks in the strongest sectors that display a Wave 4 Buy set-up, or a bullish break-out set-up
2. Weak stocks in the weakest sectors that disaply a Wave 4 Sell set-up or a bearish break-out set-up
The amount of trades obviously will be reduced but the hit rate increases, and this is something I discovered over my backtesting. My hit rate in July on sector directional trading is 80% correct, and suddenly a non-directional trader like myself finds the niche and confidence to come back to directional trading. Do I need to take additional courses to do that? Not really. At the end of the day, additional education is useful in helping us to improve our skill. But nothing comes with building confidence based on the basic stuff that still works well. A 2-day student does not need to any advanced courses to gain this experience. Just come to any of our 2-day seminars either in Singapore and Hong Kong, which is free re-attendance to them. So, why paid $4,000 to get something that may potential be free.
Our next 2-day class is scheduled to be in Singapore on 23/24 Oct and in Hong Kong on 28/29 Oct. If you are an existing Optionetics 2-day student living in Asia, you may consider taking action to see us.
2008-08-21
I am not defending for Optionetics. I am only talking about business and commercial sense
I was engaged in a dialogue in my discussion board with an Optionetics student from the US. She wrote to me a long post:
*************************************
I was engaged in a dialogue in my discussion board with an Optionetics student from the US. She wrote to me a long post:
*************************************
I am happy for you to be part of the Optionetics, being its official teacher. I’m not so happy for the newbie’s out there. When you were just a regular “student” you were more open, more helpful. When I was studying your BMIC, seeing you post your live trades or even trades that just closed, it was very helpful. Now your response to most questions is that you cannot do it anymore, because you are Optionetics teacher. How that suppose to help the new student? Just another student (you 2 years ago) could do it, and now you, the official teacher cannot help as much as you were able to do short time ago? For the sake of new students, please, quit being a teacher, and become just another student again. It will benefit them more, like it did me.
My original education on the Iron Condor started with Don Fishback. That’s where I learned the formula to compute the Expected Move, that I believe is the most accurate, since it comes straight from the Black-Scholes options pricing model. Any time some student asks about the EM formula, he is being told “it’s a big secret, unless you pay another 3-4 grand and come to a POMM class”.
How about just pointing the curious student to some books? You just said in your previous post that you cannot say anything about non Optionetics books. My question then is “Is Optionetics also in the books sale business, not only in seminar business?” What about books by Charles Cottle, his older one CWS or the newer one OTTHR? Would pointing them to students prevent them from going and paying for POMM class? Or maybe these books would motivate them even more to go to that class?
After studying Don Fishback’s Iron Condors, I also was studying from Keith Fitz-Gerald, before running into Dan Sheridan and you. At the same time, because lucky me I live around
That’s another beef that I have with yours and all the other teachers answers when somebody asks “Which is the best broker to use?” I was invited to attend Expert class in
While I can understand that at least you guys, the official Optionetics teachers should not discuss the other teaching companies, like Pristine.com or Randomwalktrading.com how about just saying that RWT has good books (and I have written proof that some of the Optionetics teachers were/are contributing writers to their monthly articles). While I’m not impressed with Pristine’s options side education, their technical analysis is very good, as pointed already about a year ago on discussion boards by another Optionetics student (who luckily for us did not become a teacher ;>)
Most of the students are honest, hard working at their option education and not looking only for freebies (like our friend Bok, the CPA ;>) Sometimes just the seminar is not enough; I for example had read at least 100 books on TA, options, psychology of trading etc… I attended some other options seminars, besides the ones by TOS. I’m on the mailing/seminar list of Nison, Bigalow, OptionsUniversity, etc… Point them to those materials, so they can study in the confines of their homes, have different point of view, some questions explained different way. I believe that no wrong will come Optionetics way doing this. They will appreciate more the company who REALLY has the students best on its mind, not only its account receivable.
I will end it there for tonight. I hope you and all others will look at my series of posts as not me complaining, but trying to see the real Optionetics – Empowering Investors company, that I believed it to be over 5 years ago during my 2 hours free introductory seminar.
******************************
I thanked this student who provided me with the honest feedback. There are lots of restrictions or business ethics as to why Optionetics is not in the position to fulfil the wishes of newbies. Whatever it does, it will never please everyone on the planet. So, may I have the permission to explain:
1. As a company that provides educational services (and not a charitable organization), the employees and contractors have to be paid. No one does charity work in this business anyway. Accordingly, Optionetics has to be run as a business, i.e. a profitable venture. Having said that, it has strong business ethics. It has its students/customers to be concerned. Students' success brings into Optionetics the intangibles, and its reputation. Therefore, from a business perspective, I don't understand why there are still people who lack the business mindset and insist that a company such as Optionetics is morally wrong in selling educational services. It is the corporate objective to be in this business and it is a business proposition.
2. While Thinkorswim is a licensed broker based in the US, it does not have a license to operate in Singapore. On record, only Optionsxpress and E-trade have license to operate in Singapore as brokers. In this respect, it is not possible to recommend Thinkorswim as a broker in an event held in Singapore. To do so will put the company in trouble as the Monetary Authority of Singapore will be after the company. Moreover, as far as I know, Thinkorswim or any other unlicensed brokers are unable to provide any form of solicitation and demonstration of their platform in an event held in Singapore. If so, the Monetary Authority of Singapore will also be after them.
3. From a business perspective, other service providers are actually the company's competitors. So, like Warren Buffett looking for a valued stock, the third criterion is that a company must display a strong economic moat. So, how can a company running a business mention other competitors' products or services in its own event. It simply does not make any business sense.
While I appreciated that student's effort in bringing up many points, what is missing is a sound business proposition, and commercial sense. As I am running my own business, these things are very obvious to me.
2008-08-19
It takes all sorts of traders to make this world
I am still in the process of recovering from the two full days of invovlement in Invest Fair 2008. I was at my Optionetics' booth, with the aim of meeting prospective students (or appropriately put, options traders wannabies). I shared with my teammates in Skilled Builders Group meeting last night on two interesting stories I had in this event.
Story 1: Meeting a student who had previously signed up for the 2-day seminar but eventually gave up
I met with this student who previously signed up for the 2-day intermediate seminar (i.e. the package that includes our Home Study Course and free life-time reattendance). He was one of the members of the 95% Club. In other words, he failed to continue with the program. When I asked him why he failed, the response was as follows:
"I am not as smart as you"
"I am not a lawyer"
"I am not a university gradutate"
"Options is too difficult for me. I don't understand the concept"
Do you think the response is fair? You may be able to understand why there are so many people in the end who decide to give up. The response was far too negative. It is precisely why these people will fail because they constantly put their mind into unresourceful state. One major challenge for professional traders is to avoid negativity (or stay in the resourceful and positive state). That is the mindset of professional traders. So, good luck with this fellow student and hope he will do something he likes.
Story 2: Seniority in trading - does it matter?
This may be a good one laugh after all. One participant in the Fair came to our booth and asked whether our program (Profitsource) has any proprietary indicator. I explained that Profitsource does not have any propreitary information because it is just a software to allow the users to do technical analysis. I then explained to him that I trade forex without even using any technical indicators at all. He was a bit shocked and asked me how many years of experience I had in trading. When I mentioned that I had a few years of experience, he said that the fact that I enjoyed my success for a short period of time does not mean anything. I was a bit surprised to hear that because if this gentleman has been in this business for 25 years, why is he still looking for propreitary indicator? Does it matter if one has been in this business for many years? Does seniority mean success? Go figure out. I was laughing behind his back because I could not believe that a trader with 25 years of trading experience is still searching for the Holy Grail.
More to come!
I am still in the process of recovering from the two full days of invovlement in Invest Fair 2008. I was at my Optionetics' booth, with the aim of meeting prospective students (or appropriately put, options traders wannabies). I shared with my teammates in Skilled Builders Group meeting last night on two interesting stories I had in this event.
Story 1: Meeting a student who had previously signed up for the 2-day seminar but eventually gave up
I met with this student who previously signed up for the 2-day intermediate seminar (i.e. the package that includes our Home Study Course and free life-time reattendance). He was one of the members of the 95% Club. In other words, he failed to continue with the program. When I asked him why he failed, the response was as follows:
"I am not as smart as you"
"I am not a lawyer"
"I am not a university gradutate"
"Options is too difficult for me. I don't understand the concept"
Do you think the response is fair? You may be able to understand why there are so many people in the end who decide to give up. The response was far too negative. It is precisely why these people will fail because they constantly put their mind into unresourceful state. One major challenge for professional traders is to avoid negativity (or stay in the resourceful and positive state). That is the mindset of professional traders. So, good luck with this fellow student and hope he will do something he likes.
Story 2: Seniority in trading - does it matter?
This may be a good one laugh after all. One participant in the Fair came to our booth and asked whether our program (Profitsource) has any proprietary indicator. I explained that Profitsource does not have any propreitary information because it is just a software to allow the users to do technical analysis. I then explained to him that I trade forex without even using any technical indicators at all. He was a bit shocked and asked me how many years of experience I had in trading. When I mentioned that I had a few years of experience, he said that the fact that I enjoyed my success for a short period of time does not mean anything. I was a bit surprised to hear that because if this gentleman has been in this business for 25 years, why is he still looking for propreitary indicator? Does it matter if one has been in this business for many years? Does seniority mean success? Go figure out. I was laughing behind his back because I could not believe that a trader with 25 years of trading experience is still searching for the Holy Grail.
More to come!
2008-08-15
Full-time Trader? Does a full-time trader need to trade full time?
Come across the following questions from Conrad's Board which was raised by an aspiring forex trader. This guy asked
"I have some doubts whether to be a full-time Forex trader after 1 year.
i) My friends told me that it takes as much as S$100k to trade in Forex market.
ii) There is no guarantee to make money in Forex. Otherwise, people will have quitted and traded full-time at home.
iii) Is it a must to work a trading firm to gain experience?
Kindly advise a lost soul like me.
Thank you."
How will you respond if you were asked to answer these questions?
Ans: Yes, your friends are correct in that you need to take as much as $100k to trade in forex market. But where is the leverage? Do you understand the concept of leverage which can be a double-edged sword. It can work for you and against you. So, go figure out what leverage means in forex market and how you should apply leverage correctly.
There is no crystal ball out there. I don't even know what to eat tonight. Let alone what I am doing tomorrow. However, does a full-time trader really need to trade full-time? It has always been a FAQ and a $64K question. I won't sacrifice a 9-5 job because I will trade from 10-4 at night. It is simply switching the work clock. It does not make sense. While a lot of folks have painted a 24x5 feature in forex market, do understand that there are certain hours where the market moves fast for you to make money. I place my forex trades only at 8AM when Tokyo is open, 2PM when Frankfurt is open and 3PM when London is open. So, I don't need to trade forex full time as I have better things to fill my non-forex trading hours. Attend Wealth Academy to understand the concept of primary source income and multiple stream of income. It will blow your mind.
The last question is whether it is a must to work in a trading firm to gain experience. Straight answer is "no". One can gain experience by doing the following:
1. Learn the skill by making mistakes in the martket.
2. Get education to learn the skill, paper trade to gain experience and increase confidence level.
At the end of the day, there are too many folks out there who want to take advantage of the quick-to-be-rich scheme. Here is another classic example!
Come across the following questions from Conrad's Board which was raised by an aspiring forex trader. This guy asked
"I have some doubts whether to be a full-time Forex trader after 1 year.
i) My friends told me that it takes as much as S$100k to trade in Forex market.
ii) There is no guarantee to make money in Forex. Otherwise, people will have quitted and traded full-time at home.
iii) Is it a must to work a trading firm to gain experience?
Kindly advise a lost soul like me.
Thank you."
How will you respond if you were asked to answer these questions?
Ans: Yes, your friends are correct in that you need to take as much as $100k to trade in forex market. But where is the leverage? Do you understand the concept of leverage which can be a double-edged sword. It can work for you and against you. So, go figure out what leverage means in forex market and how you should apply leverage correctly.
There is no crystal ball out there. I don't even know what to eat tonight. Let alone what I am doing tomorrow. However, does a full-time trader really need to trade full-time? It has always been a FAQ and a $64K question. I won't sacrifice a 9-5 job because I will trade from 10-4 at night. It is simply switching the work clock. It does not make sense. While a lot of folks have painted a 24x5 feature in forex market, do understand that there are certain hours where the market moves fast for you to make money. I place my forex trades only at 8AM when Tokyo is open, 2PM when Frankfurt is open and 3PM when London is open. So, I don't need to trade forex full time as I have better things to fill my non-forex trading hours. Attend Wealth Academy to understand the concept of primary source income and multiple stream of income. It will blow your mind.
The last question is whether it is a must to work in a trading firm to gain experience. Straight answer is "no". One can gain experience by doing the following:
1. Learn the skill by making mistakes in the martket.
2. Get education to learn the skill, paper trade to gain experience and increase confidence level.
At the end of the day, there are too many folks out there who want to take advantage of the quick-to-be-rich scheme. Here is another classic example!
2008-08-14
The $4K Forex Course in Singapore
"The worst fx training ever given by a local company. You trade in order to earn 2 - 3pips per trade! Don't ever join them! You will be cheated 3.5k. I happened"
"I attended XXX and my take on them is they teach retracement. A course in retracement is not worth $400 not to mention $4000!"
"Recently i attended a seminar by XXX too... sounds interesting... but when it comes to the course fees for 2 days... its almost $5k! (round up) Is that too expensive? Or, is there value for it (for anyone who has attended before)."
Many folks in Singapore must be confronted with rising cost of living. Hence, some daring folks are looking around for quick to be rich scheme. There is a variety of schemes available in Singapore - stocks, options, futures, forex etc. You name it, Singapore has it.
Out of curiosity, one of my trading buddies asked me for websites on forex education. It prompted me to one and I saw some folks discuss the forex courses that are conducted in Singapore. In fact, my trading buddies overseas asked me how I got my forex trading education. What I told them was that Singapore ranks Number 2 in the world int terms of the number of forex traders. So, we are spoilt by choice.
I am a firm believer of education before putting money at risk. So, I was one of those who paid a few thousand dollars for these courses. I did not do only one but a few courses over the period of three months. I also plan to do a popular forex course next month, after I postponed it for three times because of my overseas assignments in options teaching. I also have plan to do an advanced forex course in the first half of 2009.
So, does it work for me after paying a few thousand dollars on forex education? The real answer is that these courses work. Why are they not working for some people? To be frank, I believe it is people that make these courses not work. Why? Let me ask your these questions. Why do you trade? If your answer is "money", then please run. Don't walk away. As my mentor, Tom Gentile, said, money is the result of successful traders and should never be a goal.
Money itself does not motivate us to do something. It's the emotion we attach to the money that drives us. Something I learnt in Patterns of Excellence @ AKLTG. So, if you haven't figured out the answer to "why trade?, perhaps you should not spend that kind of money to get education. You are not even ready to start a trading business.
As far as I am concerned, that course which a lot of folks have negative feedback works for me extremely well. To be frank, Dr. Lim has given me a lot of inspiration simply because he is a believer of looking at the price chart without using any technical indicators. When I was asked by others how I trade forex, my response is I don't use any technical indicators at all. One guy questioned me and sought confirmation. I re-confirmed that I don't even use an indicator such as moving average. How amazing it is to trade forex this way.
The FAST2 is a beginner strategy. It laid down the important concept of having a Profit Target and a Stop Loss in forex. Having a PT and a SL in forex is a must because of the volatility of the forex market, especially during the European and US trading hours. However, newbies tend to focus on the outcome of a trade and not the process of practising to make the skill perfect. Worst still, some newbies can't wait to recoup their course fees and start trading with real money. Guess what will happen? Losing money? Most likely. It is not the strategy that does not work. Newbies simply do not have the requisite skill set yet to trade live. That's the whole point.
Have you ever wondered trading FAST2 in certain hours only? Have you ever wondered not to trade FAST 2 in certain time? Have you done a basic fundamental analysis of what is going on in the global economy? Have you studied the inter-relationship between the stock market, bond market, commodity market and the currency market? So, if you have no clue what I am asking above, you are not ready yet. The above questions are important as far as FAST2's performance is concerned.
A lot of folks do not discuss FX104, which is a daily trading system given by Dr. Lim in the supplementary course which costs us only $20. Yes, I did FX104 under the old regime. FX102, 103 and 104 are blended in a one-day course already but it is still $20. It's amazing how FX104 performed since I started trading it on 28 May 2008. In my case, I started paper trading this system for two months before I go live. I proved to myself that the system can generate consistent paper money for two months (which was 1,400 pips out of 14 trades) before I put the system on live. So far, in my real account for FX104, I have done 4 trades already , and profited around 200 pips. As I am writing this post, a FX104 short trade is in the process and it is already broken even.
So, you may ask why FAST2 and FX104 work for me but there are so many folks who complain about them. Like I said, before you go trade anything, you must do your due diligence. Having a trader's attitude and approach trading as a business.
In my recent Seven Essential Credentials of Successful Traders series written for Optionetics, I said that all successful traders have the following things in common:
1. A Strong Self-Belief that trading is a viable business
2. Have good traders habits
3. Have S.M.A.R.T Goals
4. Have a Master Plan for this trading business
5. Have Winning Strategies
6. Willing to "Kaizen" - continous improvement
7. Know how to protect this business
So, aspriing traders - have you got what it takes to be a trader by having all the above credentials? If not, you are not in the 5% Club yet I must say. You still need to work hard in order to leave the 95% Club.
Take care!
"The worst fx training ever given by a local company. You trade in order to earn 2 - 3pips per trade! Don't ever join them! You will be cheated 3.5k. I happened"
"I attended XXX and my take on them is they teach retracement. A course in retracement is not worth $400 not to mention $4000!"
"Recently i attended a seminar by XXX too... sounds interesting... but when it comes to the course fees for 2 days... its almost $5k! (round up) Is that too expensive? Or, is there value for it (for anyone who has attended before)."
Many folks in Singapore must be confronted with rising cost of living. Hence, some daring folks are looking around for quick to be rich scheme. There is a variety of schemes available in Singapore - stocks, options, futures, forex etc. You name it, Singapore has it.
Out of curiosity, one of my trading buddies asked me for websites on forex education. It prompted me to one and I saw some folks discuss the forex courses that are conducted in Singapore. In fact, my trading buddies overseas asked me how I got my forex trading education. What I told them was that Singapore ranks Number 2 in the world int terms of the number of forex traders. So, we are spoilt by choice.
I am a firm believer of education before putting money at risk. So, I was one of those who paid a few thousand dollars for these courses. I did not do only one but a few courses over the period of three months. I also plan to do a popular forex course next month, after I postponed it for three times because of my overseas assignments in options teaching. I also have plan to do an advanced forex course in the first half of 2009.
So, does it work for me after paying a few thousand dollars on forex education? The real answer is that these courses work. Why are they not working for some people? To be frank, I believe it is people that make these courses not work. Why? Let me ask your these questions. Why do you trade? If your answer is "money", then please run. Don't walk away. As my mentor, Tom Gentile, said, money is the result of successful traders and should never be a goal.
Money itself does not motivate us to do something. It's the emotion we attach to the money that drives us. Something I learnt in Patterns of Excellence @ AKLTG. So, if you haven't figured out the answer to "why trade?, perhaps you should not spend that kind of money to get education. You are not even ready to start a trading business.
As far as I am concerned, that course which a lot of folks have negative feedback works for me extremely well. To be frank, Dr. Lim has given me a lot of inspiration simply because he is a believer of looking at the price chart without using any technical indicators. When I was asked by others how I trade forex, my response is I don't use any technical indicators at all. One guy questioned me and sought confirmation. I re-confirmed that I don't even use an indicator such as moving average. How amazing it is to trade forex this way.
The FAST2 is a beginner strategy. It laid down the important concept of having a Profit Target and a Stop Loss in forex. Having a PT and a SL in forex is a must because of the volatility of the forex market, especially during the European and US trading hours. However, newbies tend to focus on the outcome of a trade and not the process of practising to make the skill perfect. Worst still, some newbies can't wait to recoup their course fees and start trading with real money. Guess what will happen? Losing money? Most likely. It is not the strategy that does not work. Newbies simply do not have the requisite skill set yet to trade live. That's the whole point.
Have you ever wondered trading FAST2 in certain hours only? Have you ever wondered not to trade FAST 2 in certain time? Have you done a basic fundamental analysis of what is going on in the global economy? Have you studied the inter-relationship between the stock market, bond market, commodity market and the currency market? So, if you have no clue what I am asking above, you are not ready yet. The above questions are important as far as FAST2's performance is concerned.
A lot of folks do not discuss FX104, which is a daily trading system given by Dr. Lim in the supplementary course which costs us only $20. Yes, I did FX104 under the old regime. FX102, 103 and 104 are blended in a one-day course already but it is still $20. It's amazing how FX104 performed since I started trading it on 28 May 2008. In my case, I started paper trading this system for two months before I go live. I proved to myself that the system can generate consistent paper money for two months (which was 1,400 pips out of 14 trades) before I put the system on live. So far, in my real account for FX104, I have done 4 trades already , and profited around 200 pips. As I am writing this post, a FX104 short trade is in the process and it is already broken even.
So, you may ask why FAST2 and FX104 work for me but there are so many folks who complain about them. Like I said, before you go trade anything, you must do your due diligence. Having a trader's attitude and approach trading as a business.
In my recent Seven Essential Credentials of Successful Traders series written for Optionetics, I said that all successful traders have the following things in common:
1. A Strong Self-Belief that trading is a viable business
2. Have good traders habits
3. Have S.M.A.R.T Goals
4. Have a Master Plan for this trading business
5. Have Winning Strategies
6. Willing to "Kaizen" - continous improvement
7. Know how to protect this business
So, aspriing traders - have you got what it takes to be a trader by having all the above credentials? If not, you are not in the 5% Club yet I must say. You still need to work hard in order to leave the 95% Club.
Take care!
2008-07-21
WEALTH ACADEMY - 
CONGRATULATIONS ON BATCH 12
After completing WA Batch 11 in May 2008, I returned to WA 12 as a coach on a part-time basis. What I learnt as a coach is the team spirit. The coaches aren't paid for spending time in AKLTG. However, it is the passion that drove every coach to do more than 100% to make sure that the participants benefit from the program.
For those who are WA graduates, I encourage you to seriously consider to come back as a coach. You may not realise the fun in the coach room. There were lots of happenings and with Adam and Conrad in the room, there was fun and laugh I can say.
I always believe a project cannot be accomplished if the team members don't have chemistry. However, this was not the case for this team. Some of us were already friends from POE and some of us were from Conrad's Wealth Academy Trader - like Justin, Sean and Kavin.
The only regret I have is that I missed the happening on Friday and Saturday whereby from word of mouth, our Mr. Terry Seah did a pretty good job in the game we play in WA. As by popularity, Mr. Terry Seah (our Ah XXXX) will be the next Program Director for WA 13, who will be assisted by Kavin Chia - the Assistant PD.
Enjoy!
CONGRATULATIONS ON BATCH 12After completing WA Batch 11 in May 2008, I returned to WA 12 as a coach on a part-time basis. What I learnt as a coach is the team spirit. The coaches aren't paid for spending time in AKLTG. However, it is the passion that drove every coach to do more than 100% to make sure that the participants benefit from the program.
For those who are WA graduates, I encourage you to seriously consider to come back as a coach. You may not realise the fun in the coach room. There were lots of happenings and with Adam and Conrad in the room, there was fun and laugh I can say.
I always believe a project cannot be accomplished if the team members don't have chemistry. However, this was not the case for this team. Some of us were already friends from POE and some of us were from Conrad's Wealth Academy Trader - like Justin, Sean and Kavin.The only regret I have is that I missed the happening on Friday and Saturday whereby from word of mouth, our Mr. Terry Seah did a pretty good job in the game we play in WA. As by popularity, Mr. Terry Seah (our Ah XXXX) will be the next Program Director for WA 13, who will be assisted by Kavin Chia - the Assistant PD.
Enjoy!
2008-07-14
Patterns of Excellence (Module 1) - 10 to 13 July 2008
Another milestone was achieved over the weekend when I completed my Module 1 of Patterns of Excellence (POE) at AKLTG.
Module 1 is about how we can use POE to transform the quality of OUR own lives. We learn:
Ultimate Success Formula
Mental-Recording: Master Your Mind
Create Empowering Beliefs
Re-programming patterns of behaviour
Design Your Destiny
Reframing - transform problems into opportunities
Anchoring: activate powerful states
Values: discover your driving force
Peak states for peak performance
Build instant rapport with the others
After completing the course over 3.5 days, I graduated from this class and became a member of Whoosh Batch 25.
So, I moved towards my goals a little bit further. One of my goals was to complete POE in 2008 and I am glad to say that I have made it.
This course is not a trading or investment course. It's about how one gets to know himself better. Isn't it true that as a professional trader, it is important to know your trading personality. So, this course gave me an opportunity to reveal my emotional self.
Although the course started at 9AM, it ended at 2AM the next day. Interestingly, despite the jam-packed schedules and the fact that I only slept 12 hours over the last 4 days, I was not fatigue at all. In fact, when I am preparing this post, I am full of energy because I can say "hmm ... ENERGIZED!, YES!!". I am also playing Rocky Music in my brain to wake me up. This course has completely removed my limiting belief on many things.
I take this opportunity to thank Adam because he continuously inspired me (and sometimes makes me feel agitated). Realizing that Adam and I have many areas common, can I model his excellence and excel myself? Why not? In fact, I have incorporated a lot of his speaking styles in my training too. I am also good at "copying" or "replicating" someone if you don't realize.
Apart from Adam and the co-trainer (Stuart), I must also thank Nicolas and Jun De who were our coaches for Group 9, and Peter, Chiew Ling, Kia Huey, Hidah and Lawrenece for being supportive when we performed certain group activities in class.
I also would like to commend the courage and confidence Kia Huey and Hidah gained during the course. At the beginning, they shared with the group that they did not have any confidence in speaking in front of the entire group of audience. Guess what they did eventually (see below):
See Kia Huey who was speaking confidently and with emotion next to Adam and her thank-you note to all the participants (see right)
See Left - Kia Huey spoke with emotion when she was on the main stage. This is the power of empowered belief - if you believe you can speak in front of the public, just one trigger is good enough to make you do what you believe you can do.
After Kia Huey gave her speech, guess what happened on Hidah?
She put herself on the line because she committed to the group that one of the stretch goals is to come up to the front and speak to the group. And with Kia Huey's speech, it fired up Hidah's emotion and she made it!!
Before the end of the course, each of us was required to write our name, our fear and limiting beliefs on wooden boards. Ladies needed to break 1 and Men needed to break at least 2 boards.
Our Mr. Atakalawoo (Lawrence) told us that it would be easy to break 2 boards. So, he opted to break 3 and guess what? He made it. Since Mr. Atakalawoo broke 3 pieces, I asked myself this question - can I be better than him? So, I asked for 4 pieces. Although it took me about 10 attempts (not the three-letter word huh!), I also made it. The goup's record was evidenced by the picture above.
I believe I came for one of the best courses I ever did in my life and I have committed to take up POE Module 2 during Oct 29 to 2 Nov at AKLTG to learn the advanced NLP techniques. In the meantime, SBG25 Group has started operating, and we must work hard to achieve our goals!
Another milestone was achieved over the weekend when I completed my Module 1 of Patterns of Excellence (POE) at AKLTG.Module 1 is about how we can use POE to transform the quality of OUR own lives. We learn:
Ultimate Success Formula
Mental-Recording: Master Your Mind
Create Empowering Beliefs
Re-programming patterns of behaviour
Design Your Destiny
Reframing - transform problems into opportunities
Anchoring: activate powerful states
Values: discover your driving force
Peak states for peak performance
Build instant rapport with the others
After completing the course over 3.5 days, I graduated from this class and became a member of Whoosh Batch 25.
So, I moved towards my goals a little bit further. One of my goals was to complete POE in 2008 and I am glad to say that I have made it.This course is not a trading or investment course. It's about how one gets to know himself better. Isn't it true that as a professional trader, it is important to know your trading personality. So, this course gave me an opportunity to reveal my emotional self.
Although the course started at 9AM, it ended at 2AM the next day. Interestingly, despite the jam-packed schedules and the fact that I only slept 12 hours over the last 4 days, I was not fatigue at all. In fact, when I am preparing this post, I am full of energy because I can say "hmm ... ENERGIZED!, YES!!". I am also playing Rocky Music in my brain to wake me up. This course has completely removed my limiting belief on many things.
IF WE BELIEVE IT CAN, IT CAN!
I take this opportunity to thank Adam because he continuously inspired me (and sometimes makes me feel agitated). Realizing that Adam and I have many areas common, can I model his excellence and excel myself? Why not? In fact, I have incorporated a lot of his speaking styles in my training too. I am also good at "copying" or "replicating" someone if you don't realize.
Apart from Adam and the co-trainer (Stuart), I must also thank Nicolas and Jun De who were our coaches for Group 9, and Peter, Chiew Ling, Kia Huey, Hidah and Lawrenece for being supportive when we performed certain group activities in class.
I also would like to commend the courage and confidence Kia Huey and Hidah gained during the course. At the beginning, they shared with the group that they did not have any confidence in speaking in front of the entire group of audience. Guess what they did eventually (see below):
See Kia Huey who was speaking confidently and with emotion next to Adam and her thank-you note to all the participants (see right)
See Left - Kia Huey spoke with emotion when she was on the main stage. This is the power of empowered belief - if you believe you can speak in front of the public, just one trigger is good enough to make you do what you believe you can do.
After Kia Huey gave her speech, guess what happened on Hidah?
She put herself on the line because she committed to the group that one of the stretch goals is to come up to the front and speak to the group. And with Kia Huey's speech, it fired up Hidah's emotion and she made it!!Before the end of the course, each of us was required to write our name, our fear and limiting beliefs on wooden boards. Ladies needed to break 1 and Men needed to break at least 2 boards.
Our Mr. Atakalawoo (Lawrence) told us that it would be easy to break 2 boards. So, he opted to break 3 and guess what? He made it. Since Mr. Atakalawoo broke 3 pieces, I asked myself this question - can I be better than him? So, I asked for 4 pieces. Although it took me about 10 attempts (not the three-letter word huh!), I also made it. The goup's record was evidenced by the picture above.
I believe I came for one of the best courses I ever did in my life and I have committed to take up POE Module 2 during Oct 29 to 2 Nov at AKLTG to learn the advanced NLP techniques. In the meantime, SBG25 Group has started operating, and we must work hard to achieve our goals!
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