This podcast is brought to you by the award-winning prop firm, Fidel Cret.
So what I realized was I was using a standard on one lot.
So I was making a hundred bucks during New York and a hundred bucks during
agent, like, oh, I'm at $200 a day. That's great. Then I noticed, you know,
as the weeks and the months went on, I was doing it rather consistently,
and even on my losses, my losses were,
were relatively small because I was only taking 5, 6, 7 pip losses.
Sometimes I would let it hit the 10 pip loss,
but for the most part I was taking relatively small losses. So I'm like, man,
you know, I can do this consistently.
What if I open up another position with that one position I already have opened,
still catch the same move, just add another position trying to maximize on it.
So then I tested it out. So I would have a one position,
I'd have my main position open. Then I would open up a smaller one,
like a point 50 or a point 30,
and I would catch 10 pips on both of those positions.
So I was doing like 130 bucks a day, or $150 a day. So once I saw that,
I was consistently doing that. I did the same thing for agent session.
So now my $100 days we're turning into $300 days because I was,
I was adding positions catching the same 10 pips,
but just adding an extra position. So once I saw that I could do that,
and as I started raising my lot size where I would go to two lots, 2.5 lots,
three lots. Then I went to 5, 6, 8, and 10, and I said, okay,
now I can, instead of having a $300 day or $500 day,
I can have a thousand dollars day because it's obvious people are making money
doing it. I just need to figure out how.
So it was actually through a friend of mine that I found out that you did not
need IML to actually trade. And when I found that out, that friend of mine,
who was actually friends with Qbank,
who actually put me in touch with Wall Street Academy and said, Hey,
this is the top guy in the industry. This is the person you wanna learn from,
and that's all I needed to hear. I'm like, that's the top guy.
That's where I'm going. I had my little aha moments here and there,
but when everything clicked for me was when I discovered scalping.
Because when I learned my first started learning how to trade and did not know
what scalping was, I never heard of it. I thought when you were trading,
you had to catch an entire move. Wait,
in reality you can catch this much of a move and still make money.
One day I messaged him and I said, Hey Raja, you know, I'm really struggling.
I'm on the verge of giving up. I, I, I can't seem to understand this.
I can't seem to get anywhere with it. I don't know what to do.
And he messaged me back and said, Hey, let's do a one-on-one. And it,
and it blew my mind cuz I'm like a one-on-one, like just you ,
like just us like nobody else. Like, he's like, yeah, like what?
You're available now. Let's do it now. And I was like, oh my God.
I started and I'm freaking out because I'm like, I did not expect that.
I expected him to say, okay, it's okay.
You just keep studying and keep your head up, you know, typical stuff.
But he took a special interest in me actually getting
the help that I needed. So I said, you know what?
This guy knows what he's doing. He's teaching,
he's taking the time out of his day to help me.
The least I could do is just do what he says to do. And I did that. I did that.
I sent him my charts every day, every day that I traded,
every recession that I traded, I sent him my charts. He would give me feedback,
he, he would help me with this and that. But when I got in my trades,
I took 10 pips and I got out. I would close out at a certain, if I took a loss,
it was a small loss. I was managing my losses the way he taught me to.
And ever since then, I've been profitable ever since.
Episode 214 folks,
we got Charlene f x here up on the show that's coming up in a second. Now,
before we jump in there,
just wanna remind you of the Fidel Crest 50 K challenge. That's up for grabs.
In fact, there's five of them up for grabs.
There's a link in the YouTube description or the podcast description.
Go on there, have a look how it works.
I've got a little video there for you to watch. Uh,
I'd love to see a few more of you entering that so that we can get this
underway. It's gotta be awesome. Now the other thing going on here,
we've got the Robot Builders Club where I teach you how to automate virtually
anything you can dream up.
We use a software called FX Dreamer and we've got some amazing things happening
over there.
So this February we have the boot camp that you can get access to along with the
build that we did for the boot camp.
And we're also building out the something in the Robot Lab live,
which is a live build. You can jump on and get access to that.
And it's based on Smart Money Concepts. Folks,
I'd love to see you on board there.
Links below the video and in podcast description. Last but not least,
let's hear from my sponsor and get on with the show.
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Alright folks, here we are on Trading Up.
We've got Charlene FX in the house all the way over there in Miami, Florida.
Ex uh, police officer, uh,
been trading for five years in the four X market.
So we are gonna hear her story today. Welcome to the show Charlene.
Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. .
Hey, look. Um, to start off with, I mean, how on earth did you get into trading?
Oh man. So I think, I think my journey is similar to a lot of people's journey.
Like Im l , right? IML exposed, I gotta give,
give it to 'em. Their marketing is excellent because if anything, um,
I I have to thank them because they are the ones who exposed me to what four X
is. And you know, I pretty much took it, took it from there. But yeah,
I got it started with, uh, I M L in 20, actually 2017.
But I didn't actually take it seriously until 2018 when I was approached with
it, uh, again by, uh,
two different friends of mine who happened to know each other and they were both
trading. Um, and I ended up getting into it,
but I was only with I M L for like about four months,
four or five months because I kind of realized that I wasn't really learning
much from them. They were more about, you know,
recruiting and signing people up. And I just wanted to learn how to trade,
wanted to learn how to read a chart and be able to make money from it. You know,
I didn't wanna take signals, I didn't want to copy and paste.
I didn't wanna do any, any of that. So, um, so yeah,
I got started in 2018 in May, I'm sorry, March of 2018.
And, um, I've been trading now, uh, ever since. And now I'm profitable. And, um,
it's been a great journey. It's been a great journey.
And so, so I mean, it's funny,
like quite a few of the guests say that they started off with I M L. Uh,
how did, how did that progress from there in terms of, you know, you had a,
I suppose a unique angle of, I just wanna learn it.
I don't necessarily wanna take any any sort of quick and easy way. I mean,
what was the, the journey from there to get to the point where you are now?
What it was is I was losing a lot of money.
I was losing money and I didn't know why.
I did not know why because they were just giving signals. They were telling you,
sign up for this app, sign up for that app. Um, you know, I barely knew how to,
even when the signal came,
I barely knew how to even put it into me because that's how much they don't
teach. You know, they just sign you up until you go get people ,
you know? Right. Money, we'll send you a signal. What's a signal ?
You know, you don't even know what it is, right? So, um,
but so when I realized every month I was paying, cuz I hadn't recruited anybody,
I never recruited a single person and the entire time I was in it,
and it was because I wasn't making money,
so I didn't wanna recruit people into something that I was doing,
and I didn't even have results doing it.
So I didn't feel comfortable sharing the idea with someone without actually
having something that tangible to show them and say, Hey,
this is why you should sign up with them, you know?
So when I realized I was losing money hand or fist,
I had loaded my live account with $500 and that's how I knew it was nonsense
because I didn't even start with demo.
They started you right off with live and they were like, Hey, get,
get your live account,
put money in there and then you'll start making money today. And I'm like,
when you hear that, you don't know any better. So you're like, okay,
is everybody else around you making money? So you're like, all right,
not realizing it's all demo , you know, it wasn't real.
I didn't know what demo was. I thought it was real. So, um, so I went ahead,
I put, I put 500 bucks in my account at the time, and at the time,
that was a lot of money to me. That was a lot of money to me. So I put a lot,
uh, 500 in there.
I signed up with I M l I think I paid like 300 something bucks to sign up
altogether.
And every month they were taking like 200 something bucks outta my account. And,
and then, and then I blew the, uh,
the $500 account they were sending like at the month.
I remember the first trade signal that I took that was sent to my phone was a US
30 trade, and it was, uh, during London session that they sent the trade,
which is odd now, but they sent it during London session. And, um,
I remember being in profit, I was up like a hundred bucks on the trade,
I was like, oh wow. And I really am making money with it,
but I didn't know how to close, I didn't know nothing. So I just left it there.
And when I came back to my account, I was negative, like 300 bucks.
So the trade had to retrace and, and I got kicked outta the trade. So, um.
So yeah. And it was, and it sounds like it was a, a high risk trade if,
if you were risking more than half, half your account.
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. No idea what the lot size is, nothing.
So when I realized I just kept losing money and I wasn't making money,
every time time I went to the meeting, every time I would talk to my,
the person that signed me up, it was always, okay, come do this, come do that.
You know, it was never like, Hey, sit down and let's go over charts.
Let me show you what support and resistance is. Let me show you how to do this.
It was just, um, just a lot of salesy stuff and I just wasn't interested.
So after I had lost a good amount of money, I was like, I'm out ,
I'm outta there.
. After the show, I realized there was a question I forgot to ask,
so I'm gonna ask it now and love it into the show here.
So what I was intrigued on finding out was like how you went from that $500
account to being able to trade like these much larger sizes on a larger,
larger account size. Um, what, what was the,
how did I earth did that happen?
Okay, so, uh,
I used to be a police officer and I was a cop for about six years,
and I'm a cop in Miami, downtown Miami, which is a huge, huge tourist area.
And downtown Miami is big on events.
There is literally always events going on when Covid hit,
it literally like shook the entire, uh,
city because there was always something going on. So as a police officer,
there is tons and tons of,
and tons of what's called off-duty jobs and off-duty jobs.
There are like kind of overtime jobs where you're working, um,
as security basically for concerts, um, restaurant openings, um,
art basil events, um, sports games, you know, you have the Marlins,
you have the Miami Heat, you have the Dolphins,
so there's always something going on in Miami. So those jobs,
they are in abundance and those jobs don't pay no less than three,
$400 per job. And they're paying you, um, 50, 60, 70,
sometimes a hundred dollars an hour minimum for three hours.
So you're at minimum I'm gonna get paid three hours. Even if you work an hour,
you're gonna get paid for the whole three hours.
So I had my regular income from my regular, um,
40 hour a week paycheck, and then I would work overtime,
which is off-duty jobs. So I was pulling in sometimes two, 3000 a week,
sometimes in those off-duty checks.
So that's how I was actually able to fund my account. I was just working,
working, working as much overtime as I could, which was a,
a good and a bad thing because it was good because I had the funds to be able to
fund my account,
but it was bad because the money came so quickly and so easily at times that
it caused me to over-leverage and to try to be greedy with it because I had
2, 3, 4, 5, sometimes $10,000 in my account and I could just go crazy with it,
not really understanding what I was doing trading.
So once I got tired of losing as much as I did,
cuz I had lost well over $60,000 in my first year,
I kind of got tired of it and I also got burnt out from working so much as well.
So I kind of had to slow down. So then I said, okay,
I'm gonna slow down just a little bit,
take the money that I I make and I'm going to just fund my account with it and
just grow that account as much as I could.
But I was still gonna practice really good risk management.
So there was a time where I had 20, 30,000 in my account,
but I was still using one lots and two lots just trying to slowly build up my
confidence, slowly build up my skill, and later on I could, you know,
grow my lot sizes as I wanted to,
but I still had the funds available for me to continue growing my account.
So that's actually how I was able to actually grow my account very quickly and
be able to have a larger trading account to be able to take higher risk.
Awesome. Well look, uh, we'll skip back on to the rest of the interview. Uh,
hopefully you guys got a bit more insight in there. Okay. So,
so where did you get to after that? Like, so you, you,
you didn't know how to do anything.
It's funny when you think back to the beginning and people probably listening to
this, this show are gonna be like,
some of these episodes are gonna go way over their head. So it's quite a good,
good thing for the newbies to listen to this so they can go, okay,
well I didn't know what a signal was either. Um, yeah, . So how did you,
how did you, how on earth did you sort of get yourself,
what were the educational steps you took the path, that path of education?
Okay, so I, um, I was under the impression,
and this is something else that I m l does, is they, uh,
put you under the impression that you need them to trade.
Like you need them to actually have access to the markets.
And I had no idea that you didn't,
I thought you had to be with the company to have access to Medi Trader to,
you know, put money in your account and trade and whatnot.
So when I found out that you did not need them,
which I found out through another friend of mine, I was like, what?
And they're like, no, I you can, you don't need them. You can trade by yourself,
you know, and I was, my mind was just,
that information alone blew my mind because it just went on to tell me how much
I didn't know. So the fact that I saw that,
that little bit of information that was now insignificant,
but back then it was huge to me. I said,
maybe I should do a little more research in this and see maybe there's other
things that I wasn't aware of as well that I need to learn to see because it's
obvious people are making money doing it. I just need to figure out how.
So it was actually through a friend of mine, um,
that I found out that you did not need IML to actually, uh, trade.
And when I found that out, um, it was that,
that friend of mine who was actually friends with Qbank,
who actually put me in touch with Wall Street Academy and said, Hey,
this is the top guy in the industry. This is the person you wanna learn from,
and that's all I needed to hear. I'm like, that's the top guy.
That's where I'm going. You know,
it's like learning how to play basketball and someone says, Hey,
this is Michael Jordan's chorus, this is the top guy.
That's who I need to learn from . You know what I mean? So, uh,
and after that, um, I, he course was the first course I ever bought and it's,
it was game over from there at that point. I, I dove in and I never looked back.
And so you,
I suppose that's quite lucky that you had a friend that was friends with Qbank.
Yeah. Um, who's been on the show for a few folks haven't, haven't, uh,
seen his episode. Uh, and um,
because are you living quite close in that area or something?
Or is it just Yeah.
Uh, I have no idea. I, I feel like it was, it was, uh, almost like, uh,
I don't know, a divine intervention or serendipity.
I don't know what they call it, but, uh, I, i I, I don't know,
I can't even say it's this. I, I think it was meant, meant to be. I'm a big,
big believer in the law of attraction and, you know, the universe, you know,
bringing you the things you're supposed to have in your life. Yeah. So, uh, it,
it just so happens, you know, I, I knew him and he knew q and he is,
and he was a traitor. Q was a traitor. And then she like,
you wanna learn how to trade? Okay, this is who you need to go to. Yeah. So it,
it just so happens, and this friend of mine, um, I had,
I didn't even know him that well. We were like friends, but not friend friends.
Like, we didn't talk every day. We didn't hang out every day.
We were kind of more Instagram friends if, if anything,
and he was actually posting profits one day on his Instagram.
And when I saw him post profits,
which is the same stuff you would see through IML people,
I messaged him immediately and I'm like, Hey, what are you doing? You know,
get away from that company. They're a scam. They're gonna take your money.
It's not real, you know? And he messes me back and he's like,
what are you talking about? Like, , like, what do you mean ?
And I said, I said, no, no, you're a part of that company, right,
that IML company. He's like, no. And I said, what do you mean? He's like, no,
this is me. I'm, these are my, I'm, I'm this by myself.
I'm not with that company. And I'm like, what?
And literally the next day I, I, I, we call, I called him, I said,
I gotta meet you. We gotta talk. And I met up with him and after that,
that was it. That was it. And I said, oh, no, I, I gotta.
It's hilarious. That's hilarious. Oh,
I find it funny because you were so, oh, like, I mean,
I suppose blinkered to the fact that the whole markets are not just iml.
You've got, you know, anyone could try, you know,
there's millions or thousands and thousands of brokers out there . Um,
that's just, that's hilarious. Uh, so, so, okay. So you,
you learn from q uh, have you taken that stuff and, and, uh,
evolved it to, to suit your style?
Or d just literally I'm just copy and pasting exactly what I learned and
replicating it?
No, no. Um, cuz here's the thing about trading.
I think you can learn trading from, you know, certain people,
but you're always gonna add your own little twist.
You're always gonna add your own little touch to it to where it's understandable
for you. So, uh,
I don't trade exactly like what I was taught in Wall Street Academy because
I did buy other courses as well, because I'm a big believer in like,
diversifying, right? You don't wanna put all your eggs in one basket.
You never know who, who's gonna teach you. You know,
that one thing that makes everything click for you. So I did buy, uh, uh,
a numerous courses along the way. Uh,
wall Street Academy was just the first course that I, I bought.
I studied that for right around nine or 10 months before I actually looked into
other courses. Um, but I would say, uh,
that course and one other course were the only ones that like, really,
really did it for me. And then I kind of took,
took the material that I learned from, you know, a little bit from everybody.
But the most stuff that I learned from the more important information that I got
from those courses, I was able to kind of put it in my own, my own strategy.
You, you should, can't say, I don't really like say strategy,
but I put it in my own way and to a way that would make sense for me.
And I kind of took all the complexities out of trading cuz trading can be
a very, um, what's the word I'm looking for? Convoluted,
uh, subject . Cause there's so many different angles,
so many different variables, so many different ways you can look at things. Um,
and I like to keep things as simplistic as possible. So I decided to, okay,
this is what I'm being taught here. This is what I'm being taught here.
How can I take these two things and simplify them to something that makes
complete sense for me and makes the the road a little bit more smoother to
navigating how to execute on a high probability trade. So that's when I decided,
that's when I decided to take all the information that I learned,
take as much fluff out of it as possible,
bring it down to the bare bones, and then I created my own platform with my own,
um, course or strategy you can say. And here we are today, you know,
where it's simple.
And my course is called Simple FX because I keep it as simple as
possible as I possibly can to where I should have named it four X for Dummies,
.
Right? Yeah.
Yeah. That's how simple and bare bones it is, you know,
to where a 10 year old can learn how to trade, um, from my strategy. So, um,
so yeah, I,
I I feel like you have to kind of get out there and expose yourself to as much
knowledge from as many things as you can,
because that's the only way you're gonna know what works for you and what
doesn't.
And so how did you,
I'm interested to hear how you sort of validated what you came up with. I mean,
you know, hearing from other people is great and then, then applying, it's okay.
But I suppose getting the confidence that it's gonna work needs mm-hmm.
some kind of back testing, et cetera.
And also trying to fit it within your lifestyle as, you know,
being a police officer and having mm-hmm. shift work, probably,
you know, sometimes in the evening, sometimes days.
How did that all play out for you to, you know, squeeze it in there? Um.
It wasn't as hard for me, um, because I, you know, I didn't have any kids.
I was still very young at the time. I mean, I'm still young,
but I was younger back then,
so I had a lot of energy and I could stay up all night and study.
I could wake up early in the morning and study,
and my job wasn't as demanding as people think. I had a set schedule,
I had a lot of control over my schedule as well. Uh,
and I had a lot of flexibility in my schedule also. So where, you know,
when I wanted to trade London session, I would just, uh, work the, um,
afternoons and then I would get up early in the morning and trade London session
and then I would, I wouldn't have to go to work till that afternoon.
So in the first,
I would say half hour of the day from like nine to about 11, 12,
I could sleep and then I wouldn't,
I would get up around one 30 and get ready to go to work and be at work by two.
So, um, and then when I wanted to train New York session,
that's when I would work, um, the nights. So I would work afternoons.
So I had a lot of flexibility in my schedule, so it wasn't hard for me. Um,
and on top of that, um,
I pretty much based trading around my job and every free
ounce of time that I had, I dedicated to learning how to trade.
I was always on the chart, even while I was at work. Uh, as a police officer,
you have a lot of downtime. Most of the time when it's busy, it's busy,
but when it's not busy, it's boring. It is boring. So, uh,
when I used to work the night shift, um, I studied a lot during,
during night because you have to be awake.
You can't really be sleeping because you have to, you know,
be aware of what's going on around you and things like that.
You never know when something's gonna happen. So you kind of have to be alert.
So to keep myself up at night, I was, I was studying,
I was either studying a course, I was on YouTube, I was, um,
back testing charts. I was, um, paper trading at times. Uh,
so any ounce of time that I had, I wanted to, um,
dedicated to trading because not only did I really wanna learn trading,
but I saw it as a way to get out of my job.
Because at the time I was really struggling with what I was doing at my job.
I was struggling with the people I was working with. It was a,
a very high stress environment. Mm-hmm. .
And I didn't see myself being there for a very long time.
And I needed a plan B, I had needed a plan B. So I said, okay, uh, you know,
I don't have a college degree. I don't really have anything to fall back on.
This has to be it. This something has to be it. And this was, it wasn't easy.
I wouldn't, I don't like to use the word easy when I talk about trading,
but at the time it was one of the easiest things.
It wasn't like I had to take a bunch of money and go start a restaurant or
something, you know, something like that. Uh,
it was just me studying and putting in the time and I had an ample amount of
time. So, um,
I really credit having that job because it gave me the motivation that I needed
to stick with it and to not quit because it wasn't easy at all. It was not easy,
um, at all. But.
Um, and when, when you were doing your,
like say for example your back testing and paper trading, I mean were,
was there something in there that like,
was an aha moment for you where you thought, ah, man, this is, this is,
this is the one.
And did you have to go through various iterations to find what you do now?
Yes. Um, I had to go through various different, different strategies. Um,
I had to, cuz the thing is with strategies,
you can't test it out for one or two days.
You gotta give it enough time to actually tell you that the strategy does work
or it doesn't work. So I, and that's why my,
the learning curve with me was,
was a little bit bigger than for most people because I gave things months.
You know,
I studied Wall Street Academy for nine months before I even looked into another
course. And even when I did look into another course, um,
I was still studying that course along with Wall Street Academy.
So I was kind of putting things together.
So I had my little aha moments here and there. Um,
but when everything clicked for me was when I discovered scalping.
Because when I learned,
I first started learning how to trade and did not know what scalping was.
I never heard of it.
I thought when you were trading you had to catch an entire move,
but in reality you can catch this much of a move and still make money.
So when I discovered scalping, it changed the game for me, uh, on its head,
literally upside down. And I never looked back.
In. Once you discover it, what was the, what was the key thing for you?
It was through, um, Raja Banks. It was through him.
I stumbled across his, uh, YouTube, uh,
live when he was doing the live sessions on YouTube.
I don't know how I found him. I, I,
I think he just popped up on my explore page or something and I,
I started watching and I, at the time,
I didn't even know if people did live trade sessions.
There weren't that many people doing live trade sessions at the time mm-hmm.
. So when I found him, that was a new thing for me. I was like, oh,
people are actually doing it, like live and, you know, in front of people.
And at the time I think he had like two, 300 people watching. Um, not that many.
But, uh, I, I watched him for like three days.
Three days I watched him and it just so happens once again
that he was having an in-person course in Miami and at the time he was
living in Canada. So I said, wait a minute.
He's coming to Miami and he's gonna be showing us how to do this.
I gotta meet this guy. I gotta go, I gotta go. And at the time I was struggling.
I was really struggling because, um, I was still swinging, trading, you know,
trying to hold positions, trying to, you know, uh, I was overleveraging a lot,
you know, trying to make back losses. I had a lot of bad habits. Um,
my risk management was out the window. Uh, it was tough. It was tough. Uh,
but when I found him, what took me with him was that he was scalping.
And not only was he scalping, but he wasn't using any indicators.
And I had probably maybe six or seven courses at the
time that I had bought at that time.
And every single one of those courses was centered around indicators.
Oh. And indicators was a very hard topic for me.
And when I saw that this guy was trading literally with nothing but looking at
the candles, I said, this is, this is it, this is it for me.
And I used my last $1,200 that I had like to my name
and I didn't even have it. I bought it on a credit card and I was just hoping,
praying, please let this card go through . Cause I didn't have the money,
you know, and I was able to, to get the class to get in.
And I actually called out sick because he has,
he has his in persons over the weekend. And I used to work over the weekends.
I never had weekends off. So it was three days. It was a Friday, Saturday,
Sunday. And uh, I called out sick all three days.
Right?
All three days. I didn't care. I was like, I want this . And, um,
ever since then, uh, three,
I would say three months after that I took that in-person class was when I
actually started seeing a lot more upside to my trading. Right.
I would say after that. So that was.
So, okay, cool. So, so what was, what was the sort of,
I mean obviously candlesticks, what were the,
what were the other key things around the,
so there was purely a scalping approach? Yes. On what timeframes were you,
were you looking to get in on?
Um, I would say mostly the daily,
the four hour and then 30 minute entries was it for me now I've
graduated to looking at the five minute to take my entries to get better entries
now, cuz obviously it takes time to get better with your entries. But, um,
understanding how to analyze my daily, my weekly,
my four hour timeframes, you know,
the higher timeframe correlations is everything with trader.
It doesn't matter what kind of trader you are. If you're a scalper,
intraday swing trader,
you still have to know how to break down your high timeframes. Uh,
I'm of that belief. And once I was able to master that, then I said, okay,
now I can, I can look at other things. I can understand market structure,
I can understand understanding volume in the market.
I can understand how timeframe, how to correlate timeframe,
correlation and put that with market structure and how do I use that to get
myself better with entries. Uh, how do I know when to get in, when to get out,
you know, what are, what are the best stop losses?
What are the best take profits? Um, and then working on my psychology as well,
being content with just taking, you know,
a small amount of pimps and leaving the rest on the table because most people,
they want as much as they can get,
but it takes a different type of discipline to say,
I'm only catching this many pimps and once I hit that I am out,
I don't care how many more it goes after I'm getting out. That discipline I had,
I had to grow into that. I had to build that within me. And once I did that,
I mean, it was game over at that point.
Mm-hmm. . And now I remember like Raja from memory,
he has been on the show, sort of would look to take maybe 20 pip profit.
What he, what did he like a fixed tape profit kind.
Of approach? He was, he was a 10 pip, God, it was 10 pip, it was 10 pips.
And he, and he, this is the thing with him that did it for me was,
uh, after I became his student, I took the in-person class. You know, you were,
you're in the, the student group and whatnot. And he was always active in there,
always talking, always accessible,
which I liked because in many other courses that I had bought, uh,
good luck getting ahold of the person that made the course, you know,
you're talking to other students that have the course,
but the main person wasn't very active in there.
So when I saw that he was active and I was like, oh,
I can message him and he's messaging me right back and I could ask him questions
and I could send him chart work and stuff. So I thought that was really cool.
That was very different. And um, one day I messaged him and I said,
Hey Raja, you know, I'm really struggling. Uh, I'm on the verge of giving up. I,
I, I can't seem to understand this, I can't seem to get anywhere with it.
I don't know what to do. And he messaged me back and said, Hey,
let's do a one-on-one. And it, and it blew my mind cuz I'm like a one-on-one,
like just you , like just us like nobody else. Like,
he's like, yeah, like what are you available now? Let's do it now.
And I was like, oh my God,
I started and I'm freaking out because I'm like, I did not expect that.
I expected him to say, okay, it's okay, you keep studying and keep your head up,
you know, typical stuff.
But he took a special interest in me actually getting the
help that I needed and that really, really resonated with me. Mm-hmm.
And after that, it was like, we were on for about maybe two hours,
two and a half hours, almost three hours. And um,
the only reason why he got off was cuz he had to go spend time with his kids and
stuff. But, uh, he took that much time with me and after that he said, Charlene,
after go what we went over today and every day I want you to send me your charts
every day, every single day. Send me your charts on every trade you take,
do this, this, and this. Go for 10 pips, get your 10 pips and get out,
be done for the day. And that's it. Do that only, and I promise you,
you will see a difference in your trading. And I did that.
He could have told me, wake up in the morning, do three back flips,
touch my nose and sing like a bird before I traded. And I would've done,
I would've done that.
.
So, so I said, you know what, this guy knows what he's doing. He's teaching,
he's taking the time out of his day to help me.
The least I could do is just do what he says to do. And I did that, I did that.
I sent him my charts every day, every day that I traded,
every recession that I traded, I sent him my charts. He would give me feedback,
he would help me with this and that. When I got in my trades,
I took 10 pips and I got out. I would close out at a certain, if I took a loss,
it was a small loss. I was managing my losses the way he taught me to.
And ever since then, I've been profitable ever since. Ever.
Since. Wow. Wow.
And so are you still taking 10 pit profits or have you sort of changed that?
Well, I've, I've caught, I'm, I'm catching more now,
but I still have that mentality. I still have that right. You know, like, okay,
I'm okay with 10 because obviously I'm using bigger life sizes now. So my,
my being content with a certain amount of profit is at a level where I'm okay
with it. So I really don't mind just taking 10 pips,
but I've kind of pushed myself to catching a little bit more.
So I'm p I'm even trading a little bit more volatile pairs now that I know will
push at least 20, 30, 40 pips in a,
in a move that normally I would only get 10 pips in.
So now I'm not typically just getting 10 pips. I'm trying to get more,
but I, I'll never like, leave that mentality to where I'm,
I'm too good to catch only 10 pips now I will never be too good to only catch 10
because it's a blessing to even be able to do that.
Some people can't get a win at all, you know?
So to be able to do that consistently, um, is, is definitely a positive.
And so with the style of trading, I mean, do do you have, I mean,
are you able to sort of adequately sort of relay
a, an what's the risk to reward ratio kind of thing? Mm-hmm. . So,
because I know that from what memory, like Raja will, you know,
if it goes into 50% drawdown,
you might take off half the position and then get out with half the, you know,
and get us a break even trade or something like that.
So there's a ways to manage it, which makes it a little bit harder to go, oh,
it's a fixed, you know, three, three r kind of trade. What, what's,
how do you do, how do you, how does it typically look for you?
Well, I actually stack my positions now, um,
most likely because I'm trying to maximize my profit potential on the same
amount of, uh, I guess risk you could say. Because like for instance,
if I'm, let's say I'm looking for 15 pips on a move, which isn't very much,
but if I'm catching 15 pips on let's say three positions,
I've now now maximized my profit potential on the same move that I would've
caught for that one position.
So I'm already exposing myself to a certain amount of risk. But, um,
I typically do not close partials. Um, I don't even use the magic keys much,
much anymore. I do trade, uh, everything manually, but, um,
I'm, so, what's the word I'm looking for?
I'm very confident in my strategy to the point where I'm
okay opening those positions and taking that level of risk because I know
exactly where I'm gonna get out if the trade goes against me and I know where
I'm gonna get out once it goes into a certain amount of profit.
And I've done it, I've done it like that now for like the last three years.
So I don't see myself changing it anytime soon. I'm okay with the, with the,
the level of risk that I've taken on my account,
it's shown me that I'm pretty profitable doing it. Uh, so no, I, I don't,
I don't typically trade like him when it comes to, you know,
closing parcels and whatnot because, um, I don't even know if he stacks.
I don't think he stacks. But, um,
I'm seeing that becoming more of a thing now with stacking positions. Um,
a lot more traders are doing it. I know I do it. Raul does it, Q does it. Um,
a lot more traders are coming out with stacking positions and it's,
it's just a benefit to me because if you're already in a trade for one,
you know, for, for catching that same position for one, I mean,
it doesn't have to be the same lot size. It can be a smaller lot size,
it can be a half of a lot, you know, whatever it is. Um,
but why not make more if, if you're already in the move,
why not maximize the profit potential? You know what I mean?
So that's just kind of my ideology behind that. Um, but it doesn't,
it's, it's not to knock closing parcels at all.
You should still do that if you are someone who wants to really, you know,
keep discipline to a t most definitely the trade is going against you,
but you still have confidence in the setup.
More than likely you could take a little bit of risk off of your trade, um,
until the trade tells you, Hey, it's not going your way.
Maybe you should get out a hundred percent. Hmm. So I mean it's,
it's all of the preference to me. It's about preference and,
and everyone's different level of risk.
Yeah. Yeah. Now, now what about, um, winning rates and, uh,
we'll go through some of the stats, like what's your win rate look like?
You know, I'm not big on percentages, to be honest with you. I, I,
I suck at math, so I know I'm profitable.
If I had to put a number on my win rate, it would probably be like
in the high seventies, low eighties, I.
Would say. Right. So you don't lose very often.
Yeah. Yeah. I would say, like for instance, this past January, um,
I traded live on YouTube for the entire month from January 3rd all the way to
the end of January. And in that entire month we traded every day.
We only took three losses that entire month.
So to me that, I mean, that was great. That was a great start to the year,
I gotta say. Yeah, and to do it live was amazing. You know,
everybody would, people were, were killing it like crazy, which was awesome. Um,
is it like that all the time? No, not only that, but the thing is,
I don't trade every day anymore.
I was only doing it every day because I was doing the live sessions.
But if I wasn't doing the live sessions, I wouldn't be trading every day.
Cause if, if I have a good day, like if I have a good day or even a good week,
if I'm doing, like, let's say if I have a, a 10 K day or let's say a, uh,
I don't know, a 20 k a week,
a lot of times I'm not trading all the time after that anymore because I'm,
I'm okay with that profit.
I don't really like to put it at risk after I've already made it.
And then on top of that,
I have other businesses that I do outside of trading that take up some my time.
So I don't dedicate too much time to trading anymore because I have other
endeavors and other things that, you know, require my time.
So it's kind of hard to put a percentage on my win rate because I'm not trading
every day anymore. And when I do trade, yes, I win more than I lose,
but what's the percentage I would've to break it down week by week or something
like that, one by month to really give you a solid number. Yeah.
Well it sounds, it sounds like it's, it's pretty high. I mean, what,
how many instrument instruments are you trading?
I'm trading yours 30 now, which I'm still kind of getting the hang of.
But my main pair is gold and my backup pair is au So that's,
those are the main instruments I trade now. Yeah. Okay. I love, I love gold.
. And, and how, how many trades in a week would you take?
I typically take one trade a day or, or maybe two.
Maybe two. Cuz now I'm trading us 30,
so I'm taking positions potentially on gold or au and now, uh, US 30,
like for instance, I'm in a, in a trade now on US 30 where I'm holding bars,
so that would count as another position because I took gold this morning as
well. So that's typically two trades. So on average,
I'm taking really only one setup a day. So if I'm trading every day,
I'm only taking one trade. So on average I'm only taking five trades a week.
So it's, it's not very much at all, at all. My keep my, my, it's,
it's qu quality over quantity for me.
And so, so what is your typical trading day?
And I'm guessing you have days where you, you'll trade and then, you know,
if you make the profit then you'll stop. But what would that day be like?
So I get up every day around 6, 6 15, 6 30, the latest,
and I'm on the computer by like 7, 7 15 ish. Um, I would get up and, uh,
the first thing I would do is I would check the news.
I would check for exactly for news to see if there's news out there. Um,
I don't look at any other pairs except the ones I trade.
I don't look at any other pairs. So I only look at gold. I mostly, uh,
au for my backup. And then I have us study that. I'm still studying,
still learning. I don't rush into US study.
I'm still taking my time with it because I trade it very differently than I do
gold or uh, au. And then, um, on top of that, uh,
in my experience with us 30,
it doesn't move until like 8, 8 30, 9 o'clock anyway,
so I'm on the choice by seven. So I have a good amount of time to, uh,
to chill with gold or au until I look at a u s 30. But for the most part,
I usually find my setups by like,
I would say eight o'clock to about 9 45.
In that window of time is usually when I find a setup,
because I'm usually off the charts by like 10 30, 10 30, 11, that's the latest.
So my trading time is between seven and 11 in the morning.
If I don't find a setup in that time,
I'm off the charts and I'm going about my day.
So that's my schedule every day I wake up.
At that time I traded from seven to about 11, and then I'm off.
Usually once I get my setup, if I get my set,
sometimes I'll get it at like 7 30, 8 o'clock. If I, once I grab my, my, um,
you know, 10, 20 pips I'm usually done. So I'm off, I'm gone and I'm,
you know, leaving my doings during my day.
So sometimes I'm not even on the charge that long.
I grab a quick setup and I'm out.
So interesting. You say I use your backup. I mean,
what was the thinking around au?
Well, with gold, um, it doesn't always gimme the setups that I'm looking for.
And it typically moves similarly to gold, however,
it's not as volatile as gold is. So, uh, I love the way it moves,
it correlates well with gold as well. So usually it's like back and forth.
If goal doesn't gimme the setup,
I most likely will find something on au and if AU doesn't gimme a setup,
I'm probably not trading for the day. So that'll be a no trade day for me.
But for the most part, if I don't find a setup on one,
I'll find a setup on another. And now I have us 30 that I'm learning,
and pretty soon, I would say in the next,
like by this summer or maybe the end of the year latest,
I want to only be trading us 30 and gold.
Righty ho. Now, uh, so you, you uh, I suppose over the course of what,
2018 to now, the whole prop firm thing has just exploded.
Did you ever dive into prop firms and try the challenges and, and how'd you go?
I did, uh, I did try F T M O. I've tried top tier.
Those are the only ones I've ever tried. I know of other companies. Um,
I'm not a big fan of prop firms because I, I do think they work,
I think they're great for traders who don't,
who just don't have the funds available to them to risk, uh,
in the live markets. But, um,
I also feel like it kind of hinders certain type of trader because it, it,
it changes your trading style. Uh, I'm a very risky trader. I like to take risk.
Um, I don't mind taking risk, you know, no risk, no reward,
you know what I mean?
So you can't really be a trader if you're not willing to risk something,
you know, to make big money, you have to risk big money. So with prop firms,
I feel like the rules are so tight sometimes that it's very hard to color
within the lines with them. And that's why they're so hard to,
to pass because the, the parameters,
the risk parameters that they give you are just so minimal and it's easy to kind
of, to kind of, you know, dip your foot in that, in that, in that pool.
So it's tough. But the flip side of it is,
I feel like the risk management that they teach you to abide by is
great. I think it's great. I think if more people Im,
I implemented those risk parameters on their live account,
they would probably see a lot more consistency as well.
But it all depends on the kind of trader you are,
the type of risk you're willing to take on your setups and your knowledge as
well. Because at, at the end of the day, it's not about your account size,
it's not about anything. It's about your psychology and your skill,
because those are the two things that are gonna help you become a,
a consistent trader. And without those, doesn't matter how much money you have,
you can have a million dollar account, you're,
you're gonna blow it just as much as you would a hundred dollars account because
you don't have the skill required to be able to manage, um, to manage, uh,
your trading.
And, and in terms of like, I mean it sounds like,
like you've got a unique approach to risk, uh, and risk management. I mean, how,
how do you, how do you sort of determine how much you're gonna put at risk on a,
on a one particular trade?
It, so it depends on the setup that I'm looking at. Like for instance,
if I'm seeing, let's say a high probability setup where I'm looking for, I'm,
I'm typically a break and retest volume trader. So if I see, you know,
I plan my trade way ahead before I take the trade, um, on my live sessions,
I show my students and the people that are watching how I actually plan the
trade before I'm even in the trade. So before I'm in the trade,
I know where I want to get in, I know where I want to get out,
if the trade goes against me, and I know,
you know where I'm willing to hold my trade if it goes into a certain amount of
profit. So I'm big on that.
I'm big on trading plans and I'm big on knowing exactly
what you wanna see happen before you ever hit the buyer sell button.
You have to know what you wanna see happen and that's gonna give you the
confidence to get in. Okay? I look at it like this. If I say to myself,
I wanna see a bullish in golfing, I wanna see a break of this level.
I wanna see, you know, support being held over here. If I see a, B, C,
I'm executing because I already said these are the things I wanna see happen
that are giving me the confirmations that I need to back up my bias.
So what's the point of doing an analysis? It's is if,
if you see what you wanted to see happen and you don't execute.
So if you plan your trade and you see your plan literally playing
out in front of you,
you need to execute because that's what you wanted to see happen. Now,
before you get in, you made a plan. The plan was, I'm gonna look,
I'm gonna see this, this, and this, and if this, this, and this happens,
then I'm getting in. But before you do that, if this, this,
and this happens after this, is it going my way or is it not?
Because if it's not going my way, I gotta know where I'm getting out.
And if it is going my way, I also need to know where I'm getting out.
Cuz they may not go your way forever. Where are you gonna be okay with coming,
with grabbing your profits, taking profits?
Are you gonna be leaving some runners? Are you gonna be done for the day? Um,
are you gonna be looking for a second opportunity if it's a loss?
These are all things, it's,
it's constant like q and a that's going on in my head when I'm looking at the
markets and when I'm looking to take a trade,
because I feel like these are things you have to actually be experiencing when
you're in a trade.
You cannot just take a trade and say whatever happens happens. It,
the markets are too volatile for that. Okay. It's, it's like,
I like to correlate the markets with a casino, the house always wins, you know,
so how can you give yourself an extra edge so you can have a little bit of an
advantage for you to win?
Because statistics say 90, 95 people typically lose at trading.
So how can you be part of that five, 10% to where you can get out on top? Well,
the more you take profit,
the higher your win percentage is gonna be because you're not in the markets
anymore. Exposing yourself to potential risk.
So it's all about the setup for me.
And it's about planning your trade from beginning to end.
Absolutely. And, and so just like on the, on like percentage of your account,
I mean, how much would you be taking from a risk percent?
Like you down percent? Or do you just use fixed lots and, and just.
Yeah. I, I like to use fixed lots and I'm, uh, I don't,
I'm not big on flipping accounts. I like to put a certain amount of, of,
of money into my account and I like to have a principal amount. So if,
let's say I load up an account with, let's say 50 K, if I was to get the,
the account to let's say 60 K or 65 K,
more than likely I'm pulling that profit out and I'm just doing it all over
again. I'm just doing it all over again.
So I like to keep a certain principal amount. So when I start my date,
I already have a number in mind of how much I'm willing to lose.
So I don't know the setup. I'm gonna see it,
the setup is gonna dictate what I'm gonna risk. So I don't know the setup,
but I already have my mind, okay, am I up on the week? Am I down on the week?
Can I play with house money? Can I risk a little bit more? You know?
Cuz when you have a little cushion,
let's say I have 50 K in my account and let's say I had a,
a 15 k day or something. So now I'm up, you know, 65, $70,000 in the account.
My principal amount was 50. I'm already up on the week,
the week has just started. I still have time.
So maybe I wanna risk a little bit more to kind of build a little more on the
account,
or do I wanna risk a little bit less because I don't wanna burn up all that,
all that equity or all that, uh, profit that I just built up.
All that cushion that I just built for myself. So I'm looking at the setup.
If the setup is one of,
is a high probability setup that I've taken several times before,
and I know that it usually plays out, more than likely,
I may wanna risk a little bit more. But if I'm not sure about the setup,
I'm gonna take my foot off the gas a little bit and say, Hmm,
do I wanna take this setup? And if I'm not so sure about it,
maybe I will reduce my risk, I'll reduce my oxides.
Maybe instead of taking more propositions, I'll take one position. You know?
So I am,
I do use risk management when it comes to that because I don't just want to just
blow money. I'm, I'm not in the market of losing money like that.
So I don't care how much I'm up, I still don't like to lose . Yeah.
You know what I mean? So it all depends on the setup.
And once I see the type of setup that I wanna take, then I'm like, okay,
that's gonna dictate how much I'm gonna risk. But like I said,
every morning when I come to the computer, I already know I'm going to win.
I start my day off always positive, always. Okay,
today's gonna be a winning day. And even if it's not,
I already know how much I'm gonna lose because you have to resign yourself to
being okay with a certain amount of loss because you never know how much you're
gonna make, but you control how much you're gonna lose.
So what, what about if you were like, so say it was a 50 k, you know,
account you started off with, what would be the figure in your,
your mind saying, okay,
well I'm happy to lose this amount and what would that figure be.
In a day or a month.
Or, or in a day? I say, I suppose a day.
In the day I would be okay losing maybe 2000, 3000.
Anything over like 4,000 would be a lot. Right. That would be a lot to me. Yeah.
Um, but that's, that's it. That's it. If I'm losing that,
I'm good for the day and either that I'm looking for another setup or hey,
wasn't my day, so I'm just gonna sit on my hands for the rest of the day.
Yeah. And do, do you have any sort of rules around like, you,
and you won't take any more than say, two setups or if you have a win,
you're gonna just gonna stop? Is it anything like that?
Typically when I have a win, I kind of stop. I, I don't like to, um,
I don't like to be gritty. I, I just, I feel like, uh,
I was blessed with this win. If the win was a tough win, like, you know,
I was in drawdown for a little bit or it gave me a hard time kidding my profit,
most likely I'm gonna be done for the day. Cuz I'm gonna be like,
the markets kind of weren't on my side today. Yes, I ended the day with a win,
but you know what, I need to, I need to call it a day here. Uh, oth other times,
let's say I'm up a lot on the week and I, I want,
I risk a lot on the trade then in, in some cases I might look and say, Hmm,
is there another setup here? But, uh, for the most part, I'm not very greedy.
That's why my runway rate is so high, because I take profit quickly. Mm-hmm.
I take profit fast. When I did my live session,
some people were mad cuz they were like, Hey, why did you close? And if, if,
you know, gold flew another 30 pips, I don't care. I I'm good with what I got,
you know? Yeah. So I take, I'm not, I'm not shy to take profit at all.
. So, so you might even like, say for example on this 50,
let's say this 50 K account example, you know, happy to lose three grand,
but you might also be happy to take what, 500 bucks and go,
I'm gonna walk away cuz it's just not playing out and or would or is that too
too low?
Yes, A bit too low . Right. Um, I wouldn't, I wouldn't, I mean, it, it,
well it depend right?
Because let's say I was in drawdown for majority of the setup and I got into
profit and it's lingering right at breakeven, you know, right around one pip,
two pip profit. And it's just, there's no volume. It's not pushing.
Cuz mind you, again, this is in, in tone with my plan for the trade.
When I'm as a scalper, you're a, a momentum volume trader.
So when you get in a trade,
you don't have time to wait 2, 3, 4 hours for it to take off.
We're looking for it to move right then and there.
So a lot of times I'm not in trades very long. I'm in trades at the most,
maybe 30, maybe 45 minutes, depending on the volume.
But there have been times I've caught five minute candles. I've caught 15,
30 minute candles. I'm in and out, in and out. So 500, no, that's,
that's nothing almost . So I wouldn't look to be,
look catching 500 on a 50 K account. I'd be looking to, if,
if I'm willing to lose maybe max three or four K,
I better make 7, 8, 9 on the trade. Right. Okay. So that's typically what,
what I'm looking to make. And when I say that it's,
I have two or three positions open. So if I have two or three positions open,
let's say I'll have, I'm up, I don't know, 10 pips, 15, 20 pips.
That's on the lot size of that I use, that's typically two, three,
$3,000 per position.
So I'm already hitting my goal once I'm up 10, 12, 15 pips.
So at that point I'm okay with closing out because I've made a good amount of
money for that day mm-hmm. cause of that, that risk.
You know what I mean? It it is,
it is compared to a lot of the guests that I have on the show,
it is high risk trading. So there's a, an art form. And how did you,
how did you get into that, um, mindset of,
of taking that kind of risk approach?
Um, I noticed it when I was only catching 10 pips and I was catching it so
consistently. I was doing it so consistently. So there was a point where I was,
um, catching 10 pips.
I was training New York session and I was training agent session and I was
training DJ at the time I was training dj, that was my only pair.
And DJ moves all day and moves all three, all the main sessions.
So I was able to catch 10 pips during New York and 10 pips during, uh,
agent session. So what I realized was I was using a standard of one lot.
So I was making a hundred bucks during New York and a hundred bucks during
agent. Like, oh, I'm at $200 a day. That's great. Then I noticed, you know,
as the weeks and the months went on, I was doing it rather consistently.
And even on my losses, my losses were,
were relatively small because I was only taking 5, 6, 7 pip losses.
Sometimes I would let a hit the 10 pip loss,
but for the most part I was taking relatively small losses. So I'm like, man,
you know, I can do this consistently.
What if I open up another position with that one position I already have opened,
still catch the same move, just add another position trying to maximize on it.
So then I tested it out. So I would have a one position,
I'd have my main position open, then I would open up a smaller one,
like a point 50 or a point 30,
and I would catch 10 pips on both of those positions.
So I was doing like 130 bucks a day or $150 a day. So once I saw that,
I was consistently doing that. I did the same thing for Asian session.
So now my $100 days were turning into $300 days because I was,
I was adding positions catching the same 10 pips,
but just adding an extra position. So once I saw that I could do that,
and as I started raising my lot size where I would go to two lots, 2.5 lots,
three lots. Then I went to 5, 6, 8, and 10 and I said, okay,
now I can, instead of having a $300 day or $500 day,
I can have a thousand dollars day on the same level of risk.
But now my stop loss has to be a little bit more tighter because now I have two
positions open instead of one. So instead of being in the five pip drawdown,
I'm in literally 10 pips drawdown because I have two positions open.
So now my entries had to be much tighter, you know, a little bit much better.
So I kind of tested it out for months because I was scared of, you know,
doing that because it was still a lot of risk. But once I saw, I said, Charlene,
you are consistently catching 10 pips.
If you have the confidence to do that with one position,
you should be able to do it. It's the same thing,
it's the same thing that you're doing. You're not doing anything different,
it's just you're adding another position.
So I kind of took that and now it just has a life.
It's just a part of my trading now. I'm just, I stack, I stack on my positions.
I love it. And I win way more than I lose way, way more than I lose.
If I was losing a lot with it, trust me, I wouldn't be doing it. Trust me,
I wouldn't be doing.
It. Yeah. , it's, yeah cuz it's that,
that's actually really interesting to hear how you got to that point because I
think that's gonna help a lot of people who are sort of thinking about, I mean,
it's a high stakes approach, uh,
to trading and how do they get there is the difficulty. It's like, I mean,
whereas most people would think, oh, you know, you just went from, oh,
I'm trading one lots now I'm gonna bump it up to three and then the way we go
and it's now,
now I'm gonna do tens and and that on a mindset point of view is gonna screw you
over straight away. Right? Oh yeah. Whereas, yeah, I like that.
Multiple positions. Um, what about like, talking about mindset?
Like have you got any sort of special things you do to try and get your mind in
tune before you start trading, that kind of thing?
Well, um, I don't trade. When I'm going through personal things in my life,
I feel like, uh, if you're not able to give the charts a hundred percent, uh,
your undivided attention, you're,
you're already in the negative because it requires that type
of respect where you have to be locked in. You have to be focused,
you have to know what you're looking at. You have to stick to your rules,
stick to your discipline, stick to your trading plan.
And if you're looking for a setup, you know,
you might be thinking about what's happening over here,
what's going on with this, you know,
family member with your relationship with work or whatever is going on with your
kids, whatever could be going on, then you're not a hundred percent focused.
And that can, um, that can fog your,
your, the clarity that you need to have when you're trading.
It may make you see something that's not there. It may uh,
cause you to have a lack of patience because you're anxious,
you're ready to go do whatever,
go take care of this and you wanna just get this trade over with and it'll cause
you to prematurely enter a setup before you pro you should and cause you to
take unnecessary losses. So I'm big on, um,
making sure your head is completely clear before you come on the charts and,
you know, expose your, your account and your psychology to a beating.
A beating is what it is. You know, being patient, um, being patient,
waiting on setups, um, sometimes missing your setup. You know,
sometimes I sit here and I'm watching,
waiting for my setup to happen and it won't happen the way I want it to happen.
And when it does happen, I'm missing it. You know?
So I just sat here for three hours and missed my setup and now I gotta go about
my day and, you know, had I not been trading if I didn't, you know,
have this going on, you know, that wouldn't have happened. Yeah. So, yeah, I,
um, I'm a I'm, I'm very spiritual, so I'm, I meditate a lot.
Um, I'm very big on prayer, very, very big on self-talk, self-help,
things like that. So I truly feel like you,
you gotta have your head on wrapped straight, you know, to be a traitor,
to sustain being a traitor to, you know, withstand the mental pressure,
the mental stress that we all go through, you know,
putting our money on the line every day and having to deal with the, you know,
you know, the things that we have to deal with. So you, you have to have,
you know, all your ducks in a row for you to be profitable because if not you,
it's, it's, it's too hard, it's too hard and I'd rather you not do it .
So.
Well, next question is what, what about, um,
if you had to recommend somebody go away and study or spend the next month
mastering something, what would it be?
Um, you know, I'm, I'm a big believer in back testing. Big,
big believer in back testing because nothing is going to help you master the
charts more than being on the charts. Cuz you could say, Hey,
read this book on psychology or, you know,
go watch this video on this or do that or talk about risk management.
All those things are very, very important. However,
none of them are gonna matter if you don't get your butt on those charts and
back to us the heck out of those charts.
You have to learn how to market moves. You have to, uh,
become familiar with sessions and become familiar with market structure.
All these things are what is going to help you really dive
into the D N A and the genetics of the four X markets
because it's a very highly volatile market space.
You have to have a certain level of knowledge and experience for you to even
think that you're gonna be profitable in these markets. So everything,
all those other things, they, they come great,
but I wouldn't be where I am if I did not dedicate as much time to back testing
as I did. I was on the charts every day, sometimes all day. And I loved it.
I loved it. Trading to me learning and studying, it wasn't, uh, daunting.
It wasn't boring, it wasn't, I enjoyed it. I, I literally enjoyed it.
I enjoyed every minute, even the things I didn't understand.
I enjoyed researching and trying to find, you know,
under and understanding of it. So you have to find the joy in it too.
Find happiness in doing it because if it's something you really don't want to
do, you are not gonna be a hundred percent focused. Mm-hmm ,
you're gonna think that I have to do this, let me just get this over with.
And when you get to the charts,
you're gonna be as lost as you were when you first started because you're you.
It's not fun. It has to be fun. You gotta find a passion for it.
You gotta find a joy in it because if you don't get a rush from it,
it's not for you.
Yeah. , I'm sorry, it's gonna be too hard. It's gonna be too hard.
Now we're gonna, we're gonna wrap up here with some quickfire questions.
So first one, how long,
how long did it take you to go from newbie two consistently profitable?
It took me two and a half years. Two and a half.
Years. What's your favorite entry set up?
Uh, break and retest for sure. Definitely break and retest.
What strategies do you use to X or, or manage your trades?
Um, the 10 pip stop is usually what it is. One-to-one,
one to two risk parameters. Um,
but that's a hard one cuz it depends on this setup because my,
my trading has definitely evolved, um, now than it was back then.
So that's typically hard for me. But for the most part,
because I'm looking to only catch 10 or 20 pips, um,
just know that I'm not risking any more than that on, on my stop loss, so.
Okay. And what about, uh, recommended trading book or resource?
You know, I did not,
I read one ebook when I started trading and that was the Candlestick Bible.
That's the only book I've ever read.
I've heard of other books that some other people have mentioned.
I've never read them though. Um, so I,
I can't really recommend any books cause I've never read any.
The only one is the Candlestick Bible, so that's the only one I can recommend.
. Okay. What about a preferred broker and trading platform?
Oh, uh, HECO trade for sure, for sure. Uh, I've been with them since,
not since I started trading, but very early on in my trading career.
I've started with them. Uh, and I haven't had issue, I haven't had issues,
withdrawals, the spreads, you know, how your pair, your,
your setup freezes or you can't get out of a trade or whatnot.
I haven't had that issue with them. The customer service is amazing. The,
when I deposit money with them, it's fast. And when I take out money with them,
it's fast as well. So that's the most important thing, right?
You wanna be able to get your money in and out.
So if you don't have issues there, you're good.
And they do deposit bonus as well, which is huge in the industry.
So I definitely recommend HaCo Trade for.
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You can learn more@hancotrade.com or just click the link of putting the
description. Okay, and let's have an ad from them right now. Um, what,
can you walk us through your worst ever trade?
Oh, wow. Yes. Yes, I can. I'll never forget it. Uh, I had, uh,
a th I had deposited $30,000 into my account once,
and I was, at the time I was trading G B P A U D,
um, which is a, at the time it was a good pair.
Now I don't like it too much,
but I was trading it and it had been ranging for weeks, for weeks.
It was stuck in this giant, like hundred pip range. It would not break.
And it was at a high and it was failing to make a new high.
And I was looking for it to just dump, to just dump. And at the time, um,
I was happy cuz I, that was the biggest account that I'd ever been trading with.
So I would, of course I over leveraged like it, like I shouldn't have.
And I threw in three 10 lot positions in the trade.
And I was looking for the, uh, I'm sorry, not the sell.
I was looking for the buy because price was already bullish.
It was holding support and resistance, but overall timeframe was bullish. So,
hey, I'm looking for price two continue bullish. So I took, um,
I took buy the support and I opened up three 10 law positions on the trade.
And I'm scalping, right? So I'm not, I don't really trade with a stop laws.
I close manually when I'm in my trace.
And I had no idea that news was coming out.
Some sort of news came out and I'm in buys
three, three positions through in buys.
And it literally just melted. It melted on me.
And in the time it took me to hit those X buttons to X out of the trade,
I was down 15 K.
So I had lost literally half my account on that one trade,
and I was the worst loss I ever took at the time. It was the worst loss. And,
um,
it was around the holidays and I literally like stopped trading for the rest of
the month. It was like towards the middle of December.
I didn't trade again till like the middle of January. After that,
I just stopped. I was like, oh, no. So yeah, that was definitely the worst.
I never did that again. , I don't even trade ranges anymore. .
Yeah. But, um, that was definitely the worst, the worst I, I would say thing.
Okay. .
Right. Well, look, final question.
If you could leave our listeners with one piece of advice, what would it be?
One piece of advice would be, uh, if, if you really want it,
and this is for you, just don't give up, keep studying. Um,
keep testing yourself, keep challenging yourself, keep pushing your limits. Uh,
don't doubt yourself. Don't, don't, uh, project negative things over your life,
over your training. If one person can do it, anybody can do it. Uh,
so if you just put in the time and the effort and the dedication, um,
you will re reap the benefits. So just don't give up,
do whatever it takes and do not give up because this will be the best
opportunity, uh, that you've ever, that you've ever seen.
Brilliant. Well, before we wrap up,
what's the best way for traders to get a hold of you?
Oh, wow. I'm huge on Instagram. I'm, I'm, I'm a big deal on Instagram. I,
I message back everybody. I look at all my dms, Charlene fx, uh,
a lot of fake pages out there guys. So just, uh,
don't look at the fakes out there, please. It's Charlene fx,
just how it's spelled. No underscores, no dots, no extra letters,
nothing like that. I will never message you first. All right.
But I'm big on Instagram. I, I, like I said, I I'm always on there. I, I'm big,
I'm a huge presence on there. I love it on there.
I enjoy connecting with my followers on there. So if you ever need anything,
any question, things like that, feel free to message me. Um, and let's,
let's connect. Let's all connect. This is what it's all about.
Brilliant. Well look a big thank you to Charlene for sharing with us today.
Everything we've discussed here, along with, uh,
links to our Instagram are all in the show notes. Uh, to find them,
simply search for Charlene in the search box on trading nut.com.
And until next time, I wish all my traders and listeners happiness and success.
Alright folks, interview done and dust with Charlene.
Now do remember we shot a video after the show where she, uh,
went through a bar replay challenge on a U D U S D, try and find some trades,
get in, get out.
You're gonna find out really how she broke down the Qbanks Raja Bank's
strategies into her own simple, simple strategy. So go and check that out,
uh, on the YouTube channel. Other things going on here,
remember there's the Fidel Crest 50 K challenge that links under the video.
Go and check that out if you're interested. Enter the competition.
And also we've got the Robot Builders Club offer this February, 2023,
where you can get access to the bootcamp and the bot that we built with that.
Uh, this February also,
do remember we're doing another build in there that you'll get access to,
which is based on Smart Money concepts,
sort of part of the Smart Money Concepts concept. Okay? All right,
enough for me.
Thanks you for watching and listening and we'll see you in the next one.