Why Forex Trading

I have chanced upon this form of investment from a long long time ago, unfortunately back then I was told to deposit in thousands of USD into the account to start trading. Since then, I have not revisited it nor even gave it a second look. I have gone pretty aggressive into the stock market, hoping that with the knowledge I have, there could be an avenue for extra income to supplement my meagre take home pay... however, as fate has it, I have terrible luck in it and economic doom seems to follow me in each and every foray I make into the stock market.

So, I cool off stock market for a while and while I was seeking out investment opportunities, many came and I came off unimpressed. For the past few years though, we were bombarded by some high flying forex traders that claim to have the "secrets" of making money in forex trading... I was like.. WOW! All the while I thought most will get burnt beyond recognition in this risky market and some enquiries made to them made me realize that, "ITS FUCKING EXPENSIVE" to attend your talk and training! I never bothered to attend.. after all I thought I would never have enough money to even start investing in Forex Trade.

Time pass and I was introduced to a chap who explained that I can start forex trade with only USD1... I was like yeah.... then he showed me a copy of his profit statement of 20% returns per day of trade bla bla bla.... the rest being imcomprehensible load of gibberish statements... and I go again like... oh yeah.... what about the losses? Then just one statement from him that makes it clear and that really caught my imagination.... "Trade only 30% of your margin"

Now, how that became the mantra, we shall talk about it later. That had me all caught up... I did the financial projection and calculation and hours of research to clear the rust off my head on forex trading. I Googled for hours and I came up with this thought that I MUST at least give it a try despite all the negative perception that I have on Forex Trading... which could be just myths and some unfounded scare which I have been hearing all these while.

Then I approached this friend again and clarified with him further on how the mechanics of transfers, deposits and withdrawals.. well, an accountant by profession like me are always bothered by how much money leaves my pocket and how it travels and most importantly, how do I get the money that I supposedly own back to my own pocket again! After getting all those sorted out, I thought, well, time to try trading..... DEMO MONEY... well, not yet my own la... try try first ma... so I signed up with IKO Fx. I know, I know there are many platforms in the market.. I so happen to choose one that this friend of mine trades on.. so at least I can confer with him ma.. should I need more information or clarification.

So, my adventure or misadventure into Forex Trading starts! Date stamp: 19th August 2011. I shall note down my experiences and feelings on every trading day so that it can act as a repository of knowledge as well as experience that could be shared and be reminded regularly.

Ok.. ok.. back to the "trade 30% of your margin". Well, forex trade gives you this leverage of 1:500, so for every dollar that you trade you get a leverage of 500. Eg, if you put in USD100, you will have USD50,000 to trade. And trading goes from as small as 0.01lot. 1 lot in this case is USD10,000, so 0.01 lot merely indicate that you trade USD100. For every 0.01 lot it is USD0.10 of your margin. Hence, if you deposit USD100 into your trading account, by rule of thumb you can invest up to USD30 of your margin... (ie 3 standard lots).. so there you go... Forex Trading for Dummies. Lets TRADE!