Forex Trading Systems - Do You Expect Too Much?  

By: James Woolley
People who have just discovered forex trading for the first time often believe that there are lots of profitable trading strategies out there, after all there are lots of them being sold online and they all look fantastic. However the reality is often somewhat different.The fact is that despite all the thousands of forex trading products being sold online, only a tiny percentage of these methods will actually be profitable in the long run. Sure you will get lots of strategies that will maybe generate some profits to start off with, but over several months and years they rarely remain profitable.This is indeed borne out by the much-quoted statistic that around 95% of people who trade currencies end up losing money. So why do so many of these trading strategies ultimately fail?Well there are many reasons. The first reason is simply because a trading method may not have been very solid in the first place. You will often find that people try out a particular method over a few months, for example, make decent profits, and suddenly believe they have found the holy grail of trading. They will then either share their system on one of the trading forums or sell the product to other traders. However very often these short-term profits turn out to be an exception and the method actually ends up losing money in the long run.Similarly another problem is that market conditions change. Sometimes you can test out a system and see some excellent results, but then markets change and the pair you are trading either becomes more volatile or significantly less volatile, and you are no longer able to generate decent returns. This is a common problem and you can either give up on the system or adapt it so in can cope with, and profit from the new market conditions. The point is that you have to be realistic about what you can expect from a forex trading system. Most will unfortunately ultimately fail but that's not to say they don't have any value because they do. I rarely ask for a refund for any forex products that I buy, even if they don't make me any money, because I will nearly always learn a few useful tips and strategies in terms of how the strategy was created and the reasoning behind the trading method.The trick is to apply this information and use it to form your own profitable system. Indeed this is how many of my most profitable trading methods were originally formed. If you can do this then you won't be disappointed when a forex system you come across doesn't turn out to be as profitable as expected. There are a few excellent products out there but you have to remember that most of them will probably end up losing money, and a lot of them will be nowhere near as profitable as they claim to be on their sales pages so don't set your sights too high