# Looking for a mentor



## Purepriceactiom (30 September 2016)

Hey guys
 I'm currently living in Canberra, Australia. I've been trading stocks and forex for 2 years now. I have a sound understanding of technical analysis in many aspects.
I'm really searching for someone who's truly mastered the art of trading and turns over big profits, who might be willing to show me the ins and outs of what they do. I would be willing to travel and take care of everything else. I'm really relying on the empathy of the potential bigger players out there to think back when they were struggling and help a newcomer out.
I believe it is really essential to be properly mentored by someone who has greater experience.
I've tried several online programs that teach technical analysis where discussions can be had, but I have found that doing things online simply doesn't cut it.
Basically, I'm seeking for someone to take me onboard and let me sit in the passenger seat to observe and learn while they trade.


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## SirRumpole (30 September 2016)

Have you written to Warren Buffett ?


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## Purepriceactiom (30 September 2016)

yeah mate, hes not answering my dms


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## garrettjones (2 October 2016)

I am not a big player in $ terms but I manage trading accounts for 7 people at this point with ~$170k in the market. I combine technical analysis and fundamental, but I'm more a fundamentals guys. I bought in big in retail in Feb, before the big run up (think SUL,RFG, etc). I'm always happy to shoot through ideas to each other.

The wiser the fool gets, the more money he makes


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## Rypieee (5 October 2016)

Hey guys,

I am 23 and fairly new to the stock market (5 months in the market) and have done extensive reading on TA and FA prior to starting (6-8 months) my quest in the share market. As the same poster above, I use a combination of technical and fundamental analysis (equally balance, not bias towards one or another) .

If Garretjones starts a group, would be happy to join up since our ideas are similar 

Started my trading account on the first day of the financial year and am up 16% as we speak, breaking my method down in the most simplest way, fundamental analysis on stable/strong companies and technical analysis after to determine entry/exit points. Using only trend trading and breakout trading strategies, I would say that I have been pretty lucky so far

Worst loss - TPM when it fell 20%+ in a day but in hindsight a sell signal was there (just too busy with work at the time)
Best gain (currently holding) - BGL / CCP (both from breakout trading) & WEB (trend trading)

Please to meet you


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## CanOz (5 October 2016)

Hmm, bull market?


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## Quant (5 October 2016)

CanOz said:


> Hmm, bull market?





yes reminds me of the old cliche " Dont confuse genius will a Bullmarket " the fact 1st day FY was after brexit dump likely to pad any short term returns , just saying no offence intended


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## Rypieee (5 October 2016)

Hey guys, 

Portfolio was in play since April/May (started off by riding up the end bits of the lithium excitement if you would call it) and I did go through the Brexit day when my total portfolio was down 4% in that one day 
Maybe it is beginner's luck but who knows, don't mean to come off as a show-off, just wanted to share what i had.

Some started at the start of the tech boom, others started at the top of the GFC, i started in a very confusing world where one moment its good news and the next day is SELL EVERYTHING 

Still got a long way to go from here on no doubt about it but happy to hear what you have to teach CanOz you did mention that you trade EU hours on a different post about mentoring?

Regards,
Rypieee


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## CanOz (6 October 2016)

Rypieee said:


> Hey guys,
> 
> Portfolio was in play since April/May (started off by riding up the end bits of the lithium excitement if you would call it) and I did go through the Brexit day when my total portfolio was down 4% in that one day
> Maybe it is beginner's luck but who knows, don't mean to come off as a show-off, just wanted to share what i had.
> ...




Yes, at the moment I'm back to afternoon shift..


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## Airflix (23 January 2017)

Looking for a mentor I can spend time with and learn strategies to trade.  I'll have some seed money and would provide 5% commission on profits.   I'm in Geelong and I'm available days to learn with someone hands on.


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## Quant (23 January 2017)

Airflix said:


> Looking for a mentor I can spend time with and learn strategies to trade.  I'll have some seed money and would provide 5% commission on profits.   I'm in Geelong and I'm available days to learn with someone hands on.



You want a mentor to teach you the ways to profitability and your offering 5% of profits , hope you got a 7 figure account because i beleive as good education to become a consistent quant trader is worth 6 figures minimum  , with that offer you will get a numpty but certainly not a pro trader  ..   good luck


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## Quant (23 January 2017)

Quant said:


> You want a mentor to teach you the ways to profitability and your offering 5% of profits , hope you got a 7 figure account because i beleive as good education to become a consistent quant trader is worth 6 figures minimum  , with that offer you will get a numpty but certainly not a pro trader  ..   good luck



Hell any decent outperforming hedge funds wants 20%   , maybe you want to revise your offer  ... that offer is insulting tbh


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## Airflix (24 January 2017)

Quant said:


> Hell any decent outperforming hedge funds wants 20%   , maybe you want to revise your offer  ... that offer is insulting tbh




I'm starting out with $2000 and I'm sorry if my offer was low, I don't know the going rate for mentoring or teaching. I'm hoping there are other's that are more welcoming. I'm offering 20% commission on learning.


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

$40.
That's about 30 min for a plumber.
You have a long road and to become proficient probably 5-10000 hrs
of learning and at time very costly.
People wont and don't mentor because its just not worth the time and effort.
They can make far more trading or coaching en mass on line or both.

As I say to people
If you were to buy a business that returned $200K a year on investment
a good one would cost you approx. $600K.
How much do you think it will cost to start your business?

It is a business ----- even with $2K.


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## pixel (24 January 2017)

Many years ago, I gave in and allowed a family friend to sit with me for 2 weeks. Worst decision I ever made! By the time I had answered questions and explained the reason for the next order, the conditions had often shifted, causing yet another missed trade.
Part of the reason may be that you can't put "intuition" or "discretion" into brief words. Take yesterday's FGR trade: I snatched a profit in spite of what looked like a solid breakout. And I didn't buy any FGROB either. It just didn't "feel right" to stay long overnight. Check this morning's announcement and watch where she'll go when the Trading Halt is lifted.


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

You know what Id do.

Pick a stock between $1 and $2 and trade in and out of it
learning all the way.
Attempt to make clear of fees 10-20%.

If you put it up hear while you do it we could all pass an opinion
and confuse the bejesus out of you!


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## Airflix (24 January 2017)

My goal is to make $100 per day profit starting out, minimum by the end of the day I'm up $100 gp.  I'm using Commsec so the commission fees are $30 per trade.


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## Airflix (24 January 2017)

tech/a said:


> You know what Id do.
> 
> Pick a stock between $1 and $2 and trade in and out of it
> learning all the way.
> ...




I'm totally up for this as a journal or study for other members.  Is there a "pick of the day" thread or leads thread?


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

Ill have a look tonight
Ill suggest say 3-5 depends what comes up.
Leave it to you from there.

Perhaps the fundi guys can chip in or make their own suggestions, either from scratch or from others posted up by the duck or anyone else.
You can then learn how to pick a prospect by asking the right and wrong questions.


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## Habakkuk (24 January 2017)

Airflix said:


> My goal is to make $100 per day profit starting out, minimum by the end of the day I'm up $100 gp.  I'm using Commsec so the commission fees are $30 per trade.




I'm not sure why I'm responding to this. Maybe just to find out what "gp" refers to in your first line

" by the end of the day I'm up $100 gp."

although it's not vitally important for me to know.

But do you have even the faintest idea what you are trying to do?

Commsec brokerage is $19.95 up to $10,000. You have apparently $2,000. I would assume you're going to put all of it in one trade. To clear $100 by the end of the day you really have to make $140. O.K., $139.90, that's a little easier.

Do you know what that is in percent?

Now I have no clear idea what tech/a means by this

"Ill have a look tonight
 Ill suggest say 3-5 depends what comes up.
 Leave it to you from there."

Presumably 3-5 stocks to trade/invest in. Surely not for diversification purposes. That would be sheer lunacy, but I don't know. This is sheer lunacy already.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to what tech does come up with tonight that will produce a 5% average return per day. Seriously, can hardly wait ...


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

Ha ha
Didn't see his aim
That won't happen
My suggestion was 10-20% Pa

I await the OPs reply before
Wasting any more time


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## Airflix (24 January 2017)

I currently have $1500 in AQQ.  I don't have the $2000 right now but when I do I'll put it all on one stock and trade it a few times.  I might have another $3000 to play with to start.  My other investments are, 1 apartment in Melbourne CBD, $10k in Gold and Silver so now it's time to work on shares.  I'm home all day as I was laid off a year a half ago, started my own Drone business and I have downtime at home to trade.


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

Airflix said:


> My goal is to make $100 per day profit starting out, minimum by the end of the day I'm up $100 gp.  I'm using Commsec so the commission fees are $30 per trade.




Are you trying to get someone to mentor you to make $100 a day with a $2000 capital base?


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## Airflix (24 January 2017)

tech/a said:


> Are you trying to get someone to mentor you to make $100 a day with a $2000 capital base?




To get started with the basics, the in's and out's.  A month's worth of hey buy this now, now sell it...why did we make that trade?


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

Ok 
Can't help you


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## Airflix (24 January 2017)

tech/a said:


> Ok
> Can't help you




Can you post your picks and the OP and I can research them and post our findings and possibilities.


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## Habakkuk (24 January 2017)

There was a thread in the Beginner's Lounge a few months ago called "$100 a day".

The OP had a lot of spare time during the day and wanted to know what sort of capital would be required to daytrade for $100.

The answer was $730,000 or maybe $100,000 but then only if you are really good at it. Before I got around to make a comment, the thread had been tragically hi-jacked to discuss the ins and outs of Queensland real estate. But I did think about it for a while and wrote up a possible and quite detailed strategy using just $10,000. Since I didn't get another chance to respond and didn't have a use for $100 a day, I deleted it.

In a nutshell, you open a DMA CFD account and daytrade ASX stocks on margin.
You will need an edge - this won't work without it.
You will need to know what your edge is and you need to know the size of it.
Then you can use the margin to turn over several times your own capital every day, e.g. trading the banks on 5 or 10% margin, you could theoretically turn over $100,000 or more. That's a little risky, so it might be better to go for $40 - 50,000 and try to clear 0.25% on turnover. Considering that the blue chips have an average intra-day range of 1 - 1.5% that's not particularly ambitious.

I'm not saying that I could do it but Trembling Hand could - with one (trembling) hand tied behind his back. Then again, who would want to work maybe all day to average 500 bucks a week?

There were a lot of extra details about money management in that exercise and other ways to do it without having to be in front of a screen. All deleted now - perhaps just as well - I'm sure I would have copped a lot of flak over it as it was all theory.

What if you have only $2,000 though? There is a possibility as well. CMC have a contra account where you can daytrade without any margin, i.e. if you buy $30,000 of ANZ, you don't need to put up $3,000 or even $1,500. As long as you have at least $200 in your account apparently, you can place your order. Again, I haven't done that and I'm not going to either, but that's what they say. There are a few ifs and buts as you might expect.

Nevertheless, the basic idea is to *use the margin*. You don't pay any interest at all as you're daytrading. It's kind of 'quantity rather than quality', meaning that there will not be much T/A involved, just execution skill, very considerable execution skill. The broker will be very happy too paying 0.15 bps to 0.06 bps brokerage to the ASX or Chi-X and charging you 8 bps.

Finally, just to clarify, this is definitely NOT advice for Airflix. It's just an excuse for me to post this.


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

Do not trade margin unless you know how to trade with it
Using it to multiply you merge starting capital is a fast track to disaster.

The stock market isn't a get rich quick opportunity.

Airfix
Post a trading plan using a single stock strategy and I may look at some possible prospects


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## Habakkuk (24 January 2017)

tech/a said:


> Do not trade margin unless you know how to trade with it
> Using it to multiply you merge starting capital is a fast track to disaster.
> 
> The stock market isn't a get rich quick opportunity.
> ...





Are you giving me advice now, tech? Or was that an order?

FYI, I have started early last year trading DMA CFDs. Not quite as aggressively as in my post. I know exactly what I'm doing although I don't intend to tell anyone. You will no doubt demand to see my brokerage statements as you usually do.


As for your last line to Airflix, tech, surely you jest!


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## OmegaTrader (24 January 2017)

I can teach you how to lose $100 a week if you want 


Far out $100 on $2000. That would require a lot of trading time or a really fast computer trading system.
Or a lot of volatility..


60% without compounding!!
Compounding 5% per month 79.58%..


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

> As for your last line to Airflix, tech, surely you jest!




First place to start is a plan.
Best start at step 1
So no it wasn't in jest.


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## tech/a (24 January 2017)

Habakkuk

Perhaps you'd like to post up a trade from start to finish
demonstrating your use/undertanding of Margin.


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## skc (24 January 2017)

Habakkuk said:


> In a nutshell, you open a DMA CFD account and daytrade ASX stocks on margin.
> You will need an edge - this won't work without it.
> You will need to know what your edge is and you need to know the size of it.
> Then you can use the margin to turn over several times your own capital every day, e.g. trading the banks on 5 or 10% margin, you could theoretically turn over $100,000 or more. That's a little risky, so it might be better to go for $40 - 50,000 and try to clear 0.25% on turnover. Considering that the blue chips have an average intra-day range of 1 - 1.5% that's not particularly ambitious.




To trade CFDs on ASX stocks on margin focusing on volume and small gains sounds feasible in theory, but in practice it would be extremely difficult.

- To clear 0.25% on turnover = catch a clean 0.5% move. Then you got to pay 8bps each way so really you need to catch a clean 0.66% move *on average for each trade*.
- How much can you risk each trade on a $10k capital? Let's say you are super aggressive risking $300 a trade (3% of capital which is massive for day trading). If you are trading $50k a hand, brokerage @ 8bps is $40 each way. So you can only afford $220 adverse movement, which is 0.44%.
- With such tight targets and stops, what win ratio can you realistically achieve? Let's say you are super skillful and you win 3/4 of the time.
- To achieve average trade result of 0.66%, you'd need every win to be 1.03% using a 75% win ratio.
- If you are looking at blue chips, then the target is starting to look a lot more ambitious.
- The outcome will be very much based on chance even with exceptional skill. 4 bad trades to start or an unlucky trading halt that gaps 2.5% (which is nothing in terms of movement except it is 5R because of the leverage) or something like that would quickly make it impossible. 

To make $100 a day is only $25k a year, which is definitely achievable with $10k and lots of skill. However, I wouldn't do it in the way you suggested.


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## Habakkuk (24 January 2017)

skc, it looks like I'm going to have to say more than I intended. My original post was prompted by the similarity between the two OPs several months apart who both wanted to make $100 a day, and neither of them had the slightest clue about it. Nor did they get any kind of 'advice' from anyone (except to invest in Queensland real estate).

Like I said, I thought about it some months ago. Overall it's unrealistic to have a daily or even a weekly target. There will be losing days and very likely losing weeks. What I'm suggesting is to daytrade with 'notional capital'. That's what I'm doing. I haven't gone over your numbers because I made a little chart myself several months ago calculating the required percentages for different win rates and some of it did look a tad ambitious. As I see it, to clear 0.25% I need to get a clean 0.41% swing with 8 bps brokerage, not 0.66%. A trading halt would be very inconvenient indeed - I've had one of those.

I'm daytrading ASX stocks (DMA CFDs on IRESS) but not blue chips. It's a mechanical system for entries and I often override it for the exit before the close. The system enters on open and exits at close. It has been working fine for 10 months. My discretionary exits tend to make the returns worse but with much lower drawdowns.
The most important thing for me is to never keep a position open over night. Never. I did that when I started trading shares with Westpac almost 2 years ago, March 2015. I found it very hard to exit losing trades as you would expect from a beginner.

That problem has gone away pretty much now that I must exit at the close or before. That's why I can use margin with reasonable confidence.

Today's exchange has prompted me to re-visit the idea of daytrading the banks. I know that it's boring as batsh!t but now I want to know if it's really that difficult. Nobody will hear about the result, that's for sure - I have learnt my lesson this time.


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## skc (25 January 2017)

Habakkuk said:


> As I see it, to clear 0.25% I need to get a clean 0.41% swing with 8 bps brokerage, not 0.66%. A trading halt would be very inconvenient indeed - I've had one of those.




You said clear 0.25% on turnover. Turnover is usually measured on the sum of entries and exits (that's how your commission is charged). So if you buy $50k and sell $50k, you turnover is $100k. So if you clear 0.25% on $100k that's $250. $250 on a $50k position is 0.5% movement. Add 8bps each way for commission and you get 0.66%.



Habakkuk said:


> I'm daytrading ASX stocks (DMA CFDs on IRESS) but not blue chips. It's a mechanical system for entries and I often override it for the exit before the close. The system enters on open and exits at close. It has been working fine for 10 months. My discretionary exits tend to make the returns worse but with much lower drawdowns.
> The most important thing for me is to never keep a position open over night. Never. I did that when I started trading shares with Westpac almost 2 years ago, March 2015. I found it very hard to exit losing trades as you would expect from a beginner.
> 
> That problem has gone away pretty much now that I must exit at the close or before. That's why I can use margin with reasonable confidence.




Good to see you finding something that works. 



Habakkuk said:


> Today's exchange has prompted me to re-visit the idea of daytrading the banks. I know that it's boring as batsh!t but now I want to know if it's really that difficult. Nobody will hear about the result, that's for sure - I have learnt my lesson this time.




I see lots of traders generally ignore banks during the trading day, but there are good days when banks are awesome to trade (like in the past few days). Personally I don't find them boring at all. But if you want a better chance of success I'd say commission has to come down a lot lower than 8bps.


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## Habakkuk (25 January 2017)

skc said:


> You said clear 0.25% on turnover. Turnover is usually measured on the sum of entries and exits (that's how your commission is charged). So if you buy $50k and sell $50k, you turnover is $100k. So if you clear 0.25% on $100k that's $250. $250 on a $50k position is 0.5% movement. Add 8bps each way for commission and you get 0.66%.




I understand what you're saying. You're talking about brokerage turnover. I don't know the term to use for *my* turnover. Maybe there isn't one. To make $100 with an edge of 0.25% net I would need to turn over $40k of *my* money. That's the turnover I'm interested in. The broker gets 8 bps on $80k. He will be happy too.
It's just a difference in terminology. However, I don't know why I need to make $250 all of a sudden or why I have to risk $300 to make $100.

But don't worry about it, skc, no need to answer this.

Here is my example: ANZ opened today at $29.36 , easy enough to get 1000 shares (but I didn't), brokerage $23.49
28 minutes later it traded at $29.61 , exiting with perfect hindsight, of course, brokerage 23.69, clearing $201.82 profit.

Now let's do the percentages:
the move was 0.85% minus 2 lots of brokerage = 16 bps, leaving us with 0.69% net
*My* turnover was $29,360 of my money. 0.69% of that is ... $202.58

I have a pretty good understanding of the numbers. This is the little chart I made months ago using 6 bps brokerage. That's what I'm paying now, 6 bps, not 8 any more.

It's not formatting as I would like

win-rate, win, loss, net profit

40% 1.5% 0.38% 0.25%
50% 1.0% 0.25% 0.25%
60% 0.8% 0.30% 0.24%
70% 0.7% 0.40% 0.25%
75% 0.6% 0.30% 0.25%

50% 1.50% 0.25% 0.50%
60% 1.25% 0.30% 0.51%
70% 1.00% 0.27% 0.50%

I said it was ambitious. They're very tight stops indeed. No idea if I could achieve that, probably not. But I want to find out.

Thanks for your response, skc. I completely agree with your main points, the riskyness, the difficulty and the sillyness of working a high-skill full-time job for 500 bucks a week while taking financial risks. There are better ways.

It was never my intention to 'prove' anything. I couldn't. That first post, #27, was all I was going to say and I foolishly expected it to be quietly ignored.

I'm hoping that we can leave it at that, but the last word can certainly be yours.


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## skc (25 January 2017)

Habakkuk said:


> I understand what you're saying. You're talking about brokerage turnover. I don't know the term to use for *my* turnover. Maybe there isn't one. To make $100 with an edge of 0.25% net I would need to turn over $40k of *my* money. That's the turnover I'm interested in. The broker gets 8 bps on $80k. He will be happy too.




Clearly we defined "turnover" differently and that led to the confusion...but I'd say your definition is incorrect. There's no such thing as "my turnover"... turnover is simply totally value trade, be they long, short, entry or exit. Your turnover = broker turnover.

So you are really trying to clear 0.25% on roughly half your value traded... or 12.5bps of total value traded. If your brokerage is 6bps then you are looking at ~25 bps gross profit on total turnover.

FWIW in my own trading, grossing 20bps would be a very solid month. Throw in some average months, 6-8bps commission each way would basically make this unprofitable. I don't doubt some traders can do better than that, but it wouldn't be the sort of scalping/high volume approach discussed here.



Habakkuk said:


> I said it was ambitious. They're very tight stops indeed. No idea if I could achieve that, probably not. But I want to find out.
> 
> Thanks for your response, skc. I completely agree with your main points, the riskyness, the difficulty and the sillyness of working a high-skill full-time job for 500 bucks a week while taking financial risks. There are better ways.




Indeed if you can achieve that then you can always go prop. Yes the shop takes a cut of your profit but you pretty much make it back on lower brokerage costs. If you are trading blue chips the approach should be scalable to some extent. Imagine grossing 20bps on $10m turnover a month... or $40m, or $100m.


Habakkuk said:


> I'm hoping that we can leave it at that, but the last word can certainly be yours.



Yes I am sure we've gone off topic enough.


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## ThingyMajiggy (25 January 2017)

Just a quick question skc, are you trading actual shares or CFDs in prop?


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## skc (25 January 2017)

ThingyMajiggy said:


> Just a quick question skc, are you trading actual shares or CFDs in prop?




Shares. I don't know any prop shop trading CFDs - could be just me being ignorant though.


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## skyQuake (25 January 2017)

skc said:


> Shares. I don't know any prop shop trading CFDs - could be just me being ignorant though.




You'd get access to hard to borrow stocks that retail likes to buy (eg BAL, BKY) and hard to access commodities (eg iron ore, china futs)

On the flip side you'd get counterparty risk, platform risk, client money risk, **** fills risk etc...


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## skyQuake (25 January 2017)

Should also note that a good mentor wont charge you (they wont need the cash) but a crappy one will (gotta pay the bills somehow).


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## tech/a (25 January 2017)

Love it.

Good luck with that.
If you've put in 10000 + hrs plying your trade---any trade
why would you be seen as a crappy mentor if you wanted to be paid for your time.


Show me a university that doesn't pay its lecturers.
Or a company that doesn't pay its staff for training Apprentices

Truth is you wont get a mentor and if you do they wont be worth the money you pay them ---ZERO.


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## Klogg (25 January 2017)

tech/a said:


> Love it.
> 
> Good luck with that.
> If you've put in 10000 + hrs plying your trade---any trade
> ...




Because there are rewards that are greater than money for some.

You may not classify them as 'mentors' in the traditional sense, but I can count a group of about 5 people that I could go to for help if I needed an opinion, got stuck or am outright lost. They're successful as investors and don't need my crappy sums of money for their help - they're just nice enough to do it.
I pay them nothing, but am grateful every time they provide assistance/guidance.

So long as one shows initiative, an expert willing to prod you in the right direction is available. You just can't expect to sit back and be spoon-fed.


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## tech/a (25 January 2017)

Vast difference to a mentor
And a vast difference in expectation between you and the OP


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