Why 99% Of Traders Are Unsuccessful

If I may ask you, what is the most important part of a building? Is it the roofing, plumbing, foundation, walls or floors?
If you said that the foundation is the most important part of the building, you are correct.
If the foundation of the building is not deep or strong enough, no matter how beautiful the buiding may look on the outside, it would eventually collapse someday.

Faulty foundation is the major reason why 99% of forex traders are unsuccessful. Most traders build their trading careers on the wrong mentality.

The singular most common faulty foundation that traders build their trading career on is the mind set to get rich quick. Hidden in most traders minds, is the desire to get rich quick. You are in a haste to quit your day job and get into full time trading all because you think you can become financially independent overnight and probably just to feel among and show off the rich lifestyle all over social media. You do not need to deny this fact because it is evident in how you trade.

These are some signs to know if you are among the traders trading with a get rich quick mentality;

1. You use poor risk management technique; Because you are desperate to make money off the market quickly, you over leverage and try to flip your $100 to $100,000 in one week. When you eventually blow the account, you feel frustrated and angry at the market. You come back to revenge the market but you end up losing again.

2. You are quick to want to get funded; I see new traders who have little to no knowledge about trading come to ask me about getting funded with a prop firm so that they first trade, then when they withdraw profits from their accounts, they would go and pay for the course. Majority of them do not even get to the 2nd phase of the challenge. Some are so desperate that they can sell off their laptops, phones, cars, even landed properties in a bid to get funded. That’s a typical example of a baby trying to run when he has not learned how to crawl. It will eventually spell doom for them. If you are in this category, trust me, you will most likely give up on trading sooner than later.

3.You are always switching strategies; You are busy looking for the holy grail of trading. Once you see traders post their profits, you are quick to start asking questions like, what timeframe do you use, what confluences do you look out for, what pairs do you trade, is retail better than SMC and bla bla bla. There’s nothing wrong in asking questions but the truth is, the underlying reason you are asking these questions is because you think that technical analysis is all there is to trading and getting to know all these trading concepts will save you from losses, lol. You gotta be joking.

4 .You enter and force trades randomly;   You may start to feel like something is wrong with you when you do not see a trading opportunity in a day or 2 days. Because of fear of missing out, you start to force trades and enter the market without any clear set up that fits into your trading plan. The reason you do this is because you are desparately in need of money. You do not have the patience to wait for the right trading opportunity. If you continue like this, you may likely be among the list of traders who in the long run will quit trading.

5. You jump from one signal group to the other; Instead of paying attention to learning, you keep hopping into one signal group to the other where they promise you 99% win rate. You keep jumping around because you are looking for quick fixes, abi no be so? That’s a get rich quick mentality you’re working with and you are gradually towing the path of unsuccessful traders whether you realize it or not.

6. You feel entitled; I hear some traders say things like, ”I’ve been in this market for 5 years, yet nothing. The market is supposed to be paying me by now”. When you talk like this, it is a sign that you have probably been engaging in some of the things I mentioned above and you expect the market to reward you for that? No way! The market does not owe you a dime.

7.You pay less attention to education; Because you are in need of quick money, you think getting good forex education is expensive and will slow down the process. So you would rather go on youtube to watch forex videos for free than pay a profitable and professional trader to teach and mentor you on how to trade.

Now who says you cannot be among the successful traders out there? If you are tired of going round in circles in your trading career, then it is in your own best interest to set things straight. Your mentor can only guide you but you are the one to take the bull by the horn and make the necessary amendments. Until you fix that faulty foundation of wanting to get rich quick, every other thing you do in this Forex space won’t make sense. Your Forex trading building(career) will eventually collapse in the long run if you keep building on this weak foundation of wanting to get rich quick and seeing forex as an easy way out. You are responsible for the result you get out of this career. You cannot blame anybody for your lack of success.

To get out of the cycle of unprofitability, you need to start to do the following;

1. Work on your mindset; Accept the fact that trading is not a quick way to get rich. Be ready to be patient and focus on the process rather than the money you stand to lose or gain. Treat your trading career like a business and give it time to grow.

2. Get good Forex education; Stop running away from investing in yourself. The money you are looking for is in the education you do not want to get. Sign up to learn how to trade and get mentored by profitable and professional traders.

3. Get a day job and trade partime; Instead of sitting in front of your screen all day long, looking for trade opportunities, get a job or a side hustle that can pay your bills in the mean time until your forex trading profits can really start to take care of you and your family. Read this article to find out how to trade while working a full time job.

4. Quit comparing yourself to other traders; Your personality is completely different from the next traders personality. So why play the comparison game? If trader A trades the SMC, even if they share all their trading plans with you, it does not mean that you will become profitable with their style because their pattern and personality may not suit you in anyway. And if you try to force it, you will only be doing more damage to yourself. All trading methodologies work, whether retail, SMC, day trading, swing trading, scalping, position trading, news trading etc Your job as a trader is to stick with the trading system that works for you.

5.Have a postive mental attitude towards your trading and keep saying to yourself that you will persist in doing the right thing until you succeed. If you are really passionate about trading, you would not mind going through the rigours of being patient, persistent and constantly showing up. This will eventually result in long lasting profits.

I trust that you have learned a thing or two from this post. I wish you the best as you progress. Please share your thoughts with me in the comments below.