The E-mini Trading Professor

Archive for August, 2010

People are always curious, especially non-traders, about how much money you can actually make day trading e-mini contracts. This is not an easy question to answer. Every potential e-mini day trader has a given skill set, with strengths and deficiencies that will contribute to his or her success. So I will compose this article directed at an average individual who is considering learning to trade the e-mini contracts.

An extraordinarily large number of potential traders try to trade without sound training and mentorship programs and find themselves in trouble from the onset. Even seasoned traders have deplorable days trading the market, but a lack of experience and training is the recipe for financial catastrophe. Anyone who is pondering learning to trade the e-mini contracts should either find a great mentor or enroll in a quality training course and practice extensively on a demo account. I would point out that trading the e-mini contracts is no simple task and entails a considerable amount of learning and time.

But the rewards can be very lucrative…

In order to prosper in the day trading business, every trader needs to learn a quality money management practices in addition to trading. There is a tendency for new traders to over trade or trade more contracts than is advisable for their account size. E-mini money management is the key to sustaining a career in trading. I suggest that a trader never risk more than 7% of his account balance on a given trade, and even less if possible. If the novice trader is taking more than 10 trades in a given day, he or she is probably over trading their futures trading account. There simply are not that many good trades on a daily basis. I generally make 3 to 5 trades on an average day, although those numbers could be higher or lower depending upon the market action during the course of a given trading session.

Since I try not to trade a large number of contracts, my daily earnings may be lower than others who trade large numbers of contracts. First of all, let me say that any day I am profitable I am happy. On an average day, a good trader should be able to make between $300 and $700, and on a bad day should be able to limit his losses to significantly less than those target profit numbers. If you are not trading well during a trading session, the best idea is to simply stop and wait for a day that is better suited to your trading style or a day when your emotional state is in better shape to trade. There are days when everything goes perfectly, and there are days when nothing goes right. I can’t explain these phenomena, but have certainly experienced it.

In summary, with practice and mentorship you can earn a great living trading the e-mini contracts on the Chicago Mercantile exchange. It’s something I think many people would enjoy and profit greatly from learning. We think you can learn all of these techniques right here at the E-mini Professor Trading System.