TRADETHINK ARTICLES : A Traders Commitment

FutureSource.com: Fast Break for Traders

January 4, 2008

Education Edition

Today's Featured Article

A Traders Commitment

By Chris Morse

Commitment: To devote oneself to a pursuit or endeavor.

Trading involves many types of commitments and various sacrifices. To attain trading at the top of one’s game can indeed be a big commitment. A few of the important commitments essential to success in trading are investments of one’s time and their emotional dedication to trading successfully. Having financial strength is important though in and of itself is not enough without your personal time and dedication.

It can take hundreds or thousands of hours, years and even decades to find the summit of one’s trading ability.

Not all of us have the time available to be self directed career traders. It is important to be able to distinguish whether or not you have what it takes to be a successful trader completely on your own merit. Being a successful trader does not necessarily mean that you have to call all the shots correctly. Many if not most successful traders are actually successful investors.

One of the first stories I learned at a very young age early in my career. There are two types of people in the markets. There are people with the ideas (analyst) and there are the people that execute (traders) the ideas or trades. Rarely comes along that very special individual that possesses both qualities. What is important is not necessary to posses both qualities as an investor. Rather and more important is to distinguish which one you are. You can be a great shot caller. But, without the ability to pull the trigger you will go nowhere. There are some that love to gun sling. However a lack of discipline will keep them from the essential follow through to stick with the important trades when required.

How to tell which type of trader you are is not always easy. It can take years to follow your ideas and realize that while you are often in sync with the markets your ability to execute is not there. Or you may be one who strategizes and invest many times of money and effort only to find your strategies are not successful in the markets.

Many traders or investors need to come to a point of self awareness. To realize it is time to look for help in trading is not a defeat. A saying I will always remember “If you are not good at investing your money find someone who is”. Most successful traders are indeed successful investors.

There are many trading or investment vehicles available. There CTA’s (commodity trading advisors), CPO’s (commodity pool operators) and system developers all available to assist an investor. To be successful you will need to be able to distinguish who can provide you with the best trading assistance for your individual financial situation.

There are many ranking systems offered to the investing public such as Barclay’s or Autumn Gold. These services will rank CTA’s and CPO’s. There are system developers that will let you evaluate their trading system performance such as Trade Think. What is most important is to find real time trading results and experience of the advisor or system developer. It is good to get as much free and informational content before investing. CTA’s and CPO’s will be able to show you disclosure documents. A trading system developer needs to show you system results. Trade Think is a well established system that has a real track record showing over a 100% return for 2007 by one of their auto-trade brokers.

It is important to know which financial category of investors you fit into. CTA’s will typically require $50,000 to $100,000 or more of investment capital. A CPO will often require up to $1,000,000 or more for the best of the best and you may need to also be an accredited investor (you have a high net worth).

Most investors do not have the financial requirements to start with a CPO. However you may get lucky and find a CPO who is also a CTA and system developer. This way you can grow into being a larger investor. One such system developer is Chris Morse of Trade Think. Trade Think offers for free an evaluation of their trading systems to help educate investors and traders. You can work with a portfolio system from a system developer for as little as $30,000 or more. A system developer will request much less money than a CPO or CTA. If you are trading with only a few thousand dollars or anything less than $20,000 it is highly recommended to keep learning and to wait until you have the right amount of money to invest wisely.

You will spend a great deal of time and effort to become a successful trader or investor. Many of you have already made a considerable investment of you time, dedication and finances. It is important that you continue you commitment in your search for excellence. Do not be afraid to do whatever is necessary to become successful. Most of you will realize the importance of getting experienced help when required.


Disclosure: Commodity trading has large potential rewards, but also large potential risks. You must be aware of the risks and be willing to accept them in order to invest in the futures markets. Don't trade with money you can't afford to lose. This is neither a solicitation nor an offer to buy/sell commodity interests. Users of the software are solely responsible for the operation of the software and trade postings to this website are either only as examples of how the software works or the results of operation of the software after the market closes provided to licensees of the software only to help validate their operation of the software. Trade Think does not manage any money or provide trade or investment recommendations.

Notice: Returns are hypothetical. Hypothetical or simulated performance returns have certain limitations. Unlike an actual performance record, simulated results do not represent actual trading. Also, since trades have not actually been executed, the results may have under or over compensated for the impact, if any, of certain market factors, such as lack of liquidity. Simulated trading programs in general are also subject to the fact that they are designed with the benefit of hindsight, no representation is being made that any account will or is likely to achieve profits or losses similar to those shown.

TRADETHINK SHOWS YOU AUTOMATICALLY:

• when to enter the trade ... • where to enter the trade... • trend direction ... • when to exit the trade ... • where to exit the trade ...

PAST PERFORMANCE IS NOT NECESSARILY INDICATIVE OF FUTURE RESULTS. INVESTMENTS IN FUTURES INVOLVES HIGH RISKS AND YOU CAN LOSE A LOT OF MONEY.

FUTURES TRADING HAS LARGE RISKS. YOU MUST BE AWARE OF THE RISKS AND BE WILLING TO ACCEPT THEM IN ORDER TO INVEST IN THE FUTURES MARKETS. DON'T TRADE WITH MONEY YOU CAN'T AFFORD TO LOSE. YOU SHOULD CAREFULLY CONSIDER WHETHER YOUR FINANCIAL CONDITION PERMITS YOU TO PARTICIPATE IN THE FUTURES INDUSTRY. IN SO DOING, YOU SHOULD BE AWARE THAT TRADING FUTURES AND OPTIONS ON FUTURES CAN QUICKLY LEAD TO LARGE LOSSES AS WELL AS GAINS. SUCH TRADING LOSSES CAN SHARPLY REDUCE THE VALUE OF YOUR ACCOUNT. THIS IS NEITHER A SOLICITATION NOR AN OFFER TO BUY OR SELL FUTURES INTERESTS.

USERS OF THE SOFTWARE ARE SOLELY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE OPERATION OF THE SOFTWARE. TRADE POSTINGS TO THIS WEBSITE ARE EITHER ONLY EXAMPLES OF HOW THE SOFTWARE WORKS OR THE RESULTS OF OPERATION OF THE SOFTWARE AFTER THE MARKET CLOSES. THIS IS PROVIDED TO LICENSEES OF THE SOFTWARE ONLY TO HELP VALIDATE THEIR OPERATION OF THE SOFTWARE. TRADE THINK DOES NOT MANAGE ANY MONEY OR PROVIDE TRADE OR INVESTMENT RECOMMENDATIONS. PROSPECTIVE TRADE THINK CUSTOMERS ARE ADVISED TO MAKE DECISIONS BASED UPON THEIR SPECIFIC CIRCUMSTANCES AND NOT MERELY ON THE INFORMATION CONTAINED ON THIS WEBSITE. THIS BRIEF RISK DISCLOSURE STATEMENT CANNOT DISCLOSE ALL THE RISKS AND OTHER FACTORS NECESSARY TO EVALUATE YOUR PARTICIPATION IN THE FUTURES INDUSTRY, WHICH SHOULD BE CONDUCTED INDEPENDENTLY BY YOU WITH THE EXPERTS OF YOUR CHOICE.

ALL TRADING INVOLVES HIGH RISK. THERE HAVE BEEN NO PROMISES, GUARANTEES OR WARRANTIES SUGGESTING THAT ANY TRADING BY TRADE THINK USERS WILL RESULT IN A PROFIT OR WILL NOT RESULT IN A LOSS.

ALL RETURNS PRESENTED ON THIS SITE ARE HYPOTHETICAL. HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS HAVE MANY INHERENT LIMITATIONS, SOME OF WHICH ARE DESCRIBED BELOW. NO REPRESENTATION IS BEING MADE THAT ANY ACCOUNT WILL OR IS LIKELY TO ACHIEVE PROFITS OR LOSSES SIMILAR TO THOSE SHOWN. IN FACT, THERE ARE FREQUENTLY SHARP DIFFERENCES BETWEEN HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND THE ACTUAL RESULTS ACHIEVED BY ANY PARTICULAR TRADING PROGRAM.

ONE OF THE LIMITATIONS OF HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS IS THAT THEY ARE GENERALLY PREPARED WITH THE BENEFIT OF HINDSIGHT. IN ADDITION, HYPOTHETICAL TRADING DOES NOT INVOLVE FINANCIAL RISK, AND NO HYPOTHETICAL TRADING RECORD CAN COMPLETELY ACCOUNT FOR THE IMPACT OF FINANCIAL RISK IN ACTUAL TRADING. FOR EXAMPLE, THE ABILITY TO WITHSTAND LOSSES OR TO ADHERE TO A PARTICULAR TRADING PROGRAM IN SPITE OF TRADING LOSSES ARE MATERIAL POINTS WHICH CAN ALSO ADVERSELY AFFECT ACTUAL TRADING RESULTS. THERE ARE NUMEROUS OTHER FACTORS RELATED TO THE MARKETS IN GENERAL OR TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF ANY SPECIFIC TRADING PROGRAM WHICH CANNOT BE FULLY ACCOUNTED FOR IN THE PREPARATION OF HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS AND ALL OF WHICH CAN ADVERSELY AFFECT ACTUAL TRADING RESULTS.

TRADE THINK AND ITS CURRENT EMPLOYEES HAVE HAD LITTLE OR NO RECENT EXPERIENCE IN TRADING ACTUAL ACCOUNTS FOR ITSELF OR FOR CUSTOMERS. BECAUSE THERE ARE NO ACTUAL TRADING RESULTS TO COMPARE TO THE HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS, CUSTOMERS SHOULD BE PARTICULARLY WARY OF PLACING UNDUE RELIANCE ON THESE HYPOTHETICAL PERFORMANCE RESULTS.