How To Become A Profitable Trader With A

9 To 5 Job 11 steps
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1. Find a trading style that fits you and your daily life
2. Dont ride the learning curve
3. The most important day for a part time trader with a job is
4. Active improvement as a trader
5. Get your priorities straight
6. Dont focus on the when and the how much. Asking the wrong questions at the wrong time
7. Spending vs. Income
8. The dangers of demo trading
9. 4 tips for growing a trading account

If you still have a 9 to 5 job, becoming a professional trader in your spare time can be quite a
challenge. Pursuing the goal of quitting your day job and trading full time often seems like an
unrealistic task for most people, but there are certain steps that can help you improve your trading
while working 9-5 and finding time for hobbies and your family at the same time.

Here are our top 13 steps and tips that will help you improve your trading while still working in your
regular 9 to 5 job:

1. Find a trading style that fits you and your

daily life
Its so important to have a trading style that fits your personality AND your schedule. The two broad
categories and trading styles traders have to choose from are swing-trading vs. day-trading.
Usually, swing-trading is better suited for traders who have limited time and restricted access to
charts throughout the day. As a swing-trader, you do your chart analyses during the weekends and
before/after work and you manage and execute your trades when you get back from work. Swing
traders also dont need to observe the markets all day long which can free up even more time. The
downside, swing traders often have fewer trades and more patience is necessary.
However, if you are a Forex trader, you could easily fit in a few hours of real day-trading in the
evenings since youll usually always find some active currency markets at any given time but make
sure that you can remain focused after an 8 hours working day. Or, depending on your time zone,
even stock traders may be able to day trade a few hours in their evenings if an exchange is open at
that time.

ForexFactory offers a great tool that helps you understand which markets are active during different
times and it also shows how liquidity changes during the day so that you can find the best currency
pairs based on your schedule:

Tip 1: Decide whether you want to be a swing trader or a day trader. Audit your weekly schedule and
your personality to see which style suits you best. Then, choose the markets and instruments
accordingly.

source:
Forexfactory.com

2. Dont ride the learning curve

This is the cardinal sin of trading; system-hopping refers to traders who frequently change their
trading method every few weeks or months. Those traders usually never see any real improvements
in their trading and profitable trading is impossible if you dont fully commit to making one thing work.
 The truth is, plug and play is not how trading strategies work and no system will just generate
profits right from the beginning. I urge you to stop system hopping and choose your one method
that you fully commit to and focus on making it work. Youll probably say but what if it doesnt work?
and thats a normal reaction, but you have to push through this phase and become the expert at your
chosen field and not hope to get lucky and stumble over a Holy Grail system.

Tip 2: For the next 12 months, pick one system and make a contract with yourself that you will not
change your method again. No matter what.

3. The most important day for a part time

trader with a job is
Your Sunday should be your most important day of the week. I personally do 80% of all my trading
work over the weekends and then do very little throughout the week. Every Sunday, I sit down and
go through all the markets that I consider trading and perform a detailed chart analysis. I adjust and
re-draw my support/resistance levels, I study my indicators, review the last trading week and cross-
check with my previous Sunday analysis. I then create potential trade scenarios in the so-called if-
then format where I come up with scenarios that would trigger trade entries based on my strategy
and I place price alerts at the levels that I identified.

Then, throughout the week, I just wait for my price alerts to get triggered and I update my if-then
scenarios based on what happens during the day. This approach takes up a few hours of time during
the weekend, but it frees up so much time during the week and it is ideal if you have a day job. It
helps you stay on top of things, while being totally organized and creating a professional routine for
yourself.

Tip 3: Price alerts are the ultimate time-saver and the most overlooked trading tool. Use them after
you have done your weekend analysis

Further reading:

How to perform a multi time frame analysis

How to create a watchlist step by step
4. Active improvement as a trader
We mentioned that you should avoid system-hopping at all costs, but the question that then naturally
comes up is: how do I turn my current (losing) trading method into a winning one? Here are 2 tips
and things you should focus on to improve as a trader:

#1 Identify your biggest problems and take responsibility

Traders often mistakenly believe that their lack of trading success is caused by their trading method
which then usually leads to system-hopping. However, failure typically comes down to undisciplined
trading, a lack of professionalism and a pure gambling mentality.

Thus, the first step for you should be to identify your greatest problems and your most commonly
made mistakes. Audit your trading and take a good look at your past trades and find your 2-3
greatest mistakes that cost you the most money and work on them. Youll see that those problems
are usually always of personal nature and not a flaw in your method. Traders who always try to
blame their system avoid taking responsibility and look for excuses instead of doing the work that is
necessary.

Tip 4: Over the next weekend, review your past 30/40 trades and see what caused your losses.
Then come up with a top 3 list with your most commonly made mistakes.

#2 Process-oriented thinking

This ties in with the previous point. Most people act from a goal-oriented mindset where they
automatically connect winning trades with good trades and see losses as failures. Such a way of
thinking shows an amateur mindset. The professionals, on the other hand, act from a process-
oriented mindset where they look at how well they have executed their trades and how disciplined
they perform. Thus, for a process-oriented trader, a loss does not necessarily equal a bad trade if
they have done everything they could. Professionals accept the randomness of the results and
understand that over the long-term, things will work out.

Tip 5: Avoid monetary goals and for the next 2 months, stop looking at your P/L. This will be tough
but the impact will be huge.
5. Get your priorities straight
There is an interesting survey I came across and it shows how people structure their day. The
average employed American spends 7:45 hours at work on a regular work day. At the same time, the
average American watches 2 hours and 9 minutes TV each day and only invest 25 minutes per day
in education. Also, the average sleep time is at 8 hours and 48 minutes which exceeds the
recommended 8 hours per day by almost 1 hour.

When you are working towards becoming a full-time trader, you have to be clear about your priorities
and make sure that your actions align with your goals. Are you willing to wake up one hour ahead of
schedule every day, stop binge-watching random TV series, skip a night out with friends every now
and then and re-invest that time back into your trading? Granted, those are tough calls to make and
you might say that you still need to live a little, but putting in the work now to reap the benefits in a
few years will take your life to new heights.
Tip 6: Audit your week and identify time wasters. Then, just eliminate 1 such time-waster and use it
to work on your trading.

The ability to discipline yourself to delay gratification in the short term in order to enjoy greater
rewards in the long term, is the indispensable prerequisite for success.

Brian Tracy

6. Dont focus on the when and the how

much. Asking the wrong questions at the
wrong time
I often get the question of how much you can make and how big your trading account needs to be to
live off your trading profits. When I then counter with the question how much those people are
currently making as traders, it becomes obvious very fast that they are focusing on the wrong things
at the right time and they are not even profitable yet.

Especially at the beginning of your trading journey you should not worry about how big your annual
return can be and how much capital you need to save before making the transition to trading full-
time. Focusing on those things will get you off track and keep you from making progress it can also
demotivate you when you see how much work is ahead of you. Instead, focus on your problems and
struggles that you have RIGHT NOW. How can you stop losing money consistently, how can you
stop repeating the same mistakes, what was the major cause for your past 30 losses, what does it
take to become a break-even trader, how do you manage your risk and size your positions and so
on

Tip 7: Focus on the immediate task ahead and work on your current problems. Small
improvements over time add up.
7. Spending vs. Income
This is another very overlooked aspect when it comes to full time trading. Most people only focus on
making more money, whereas there are two sides to the equation of being able to live off your
trading:

The regular view focusing on making more money: Income > Spending = Enough

The opposite view controlling your expenditures: Spending < Income = Enough!

I sometimes get critiqued for this point, but mainly because traders have a completely wrong
perception of full time trading and they believe that all full time traders live on yachts, drive the latest
sports cars and go Rolex shopping each weekend.

When I started out, I decided to move to a country with lower costs of living because this allowed me
to significantly reduce the amount of money I had to make and it eliminated the need to trade. I
understand this is not for everyone, but I feel its an important thing to keep in mind. You can read
more about my story here.

Tip 8: Controlling expenditures can often help people make a transition sooner.

8. The dangers of demo trading

There is a place for demo trading, but most people stay on demo too long. What I have seen in my
own trading and from the traders that I helped is that demo trading often lets people adopt negative
behavioral patterns that are then very hard to unlearn. When your actions dont have any real
consequences, you are more likely to repeat mistakes and engage in bad trading behavior. This also
holds true for trading with too small trading accounts and we wrote about those dangers earlier.

I typically suggest staying on demo for the first 6 12 months until you have a good understanding
of the nuts and bolts and then take your trading to the next level. Be prepared, youll very likely lose
your first few live trading accounts and its important to make sure that (1) you trade with money you
can afford to lose, (2) your trading account is not too small at the same time, (3) you HAVE TO learn
the right lesson to make the losses worth it and (4) become self-aware of your problems and
shortcomings.

Tip 9: The pecking order is:

Demo > small live account > decent live account > an account where your winners are impactful||

And make sure that you learn your lessons from the first trading account(s) you lose!

9. 4 tips for growing a trading account

If you are like most traders (and thats also how I started), you probably dont have the capital to start
with a trading account that allows you to generate a decent income right away and thats totally fine.
But you have to make sure that you follow the right path. Here are our top 4 tips that will help you
grow your account and enjoy the process:
#1 Patience and expectations

Lets start with the most important point. Having unrealistic expectations very quickly lead to
frustration when those expectations arent met. Always keep in mind that what you are doing is
creating a new life and a new career for you. You have to get away from the get rich quick mentality
and accept that this is a long-term play. Dont expect to quit your job in a 1 or 2 year, but
acknowledge that trading is just a different career path which requires time and effort.

Tip 10: Adopt realistic expectations and avoid monetary goals.

#2 Recognize your true edge as a part time trader

This is often your greatest advantage over full-time traders and its also the reason why I also
engage in other business activities besides trading. When trading is not your only source of income,
you can eliminate a lot of the pressure that often causes traders to make mistakes. Also, when you
are not glued to your screen all day long, you are less likely to make bad trading decisions just
because you are bored or havent taken a trade in a while.

I have talked to many traders who enjoy their day job and pursue their trading as a side business
where they find an additional challenge to their regular routine, while earning some complimentary
income. Maybe you dont even have to become a full-time trader and just trade a few hours every
day?
Tip 11: Understand your motives and become self-aware about how you perform best while
achieving your life goals.

#3 Honesty with yourself

The cold, harsh truth is that, in the end, no one cares if you make it as a trader. Thats why it so
important to be honest with yourself and with your current situation. Analyze your approach to
trading realistically, your level of professionalism and whether you are serious enough about it, or
whether you are just trying to get lucky and find a Holy Grail system.

The failure rate in trading is somewhere around 99%, but its not necessarily that high because
trading is so damn hard, but because most dont give it their full attention and just see it as a quick
way out. However, many people have done it and realized their goal of becoming full-time traders
and if one can do it, there is no reason why you cant do it too.

Tip 12: Are you serious enough about trading? Be honest with yourself and evaluate your current
approach to trading.
 Find the best Forex trades every week by using a watchlist
Rolf How To, Technical Analysis 11 Comments 6,873 Views

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Rotating market cycles
Know your edge and when you can make money
Market-pool and inner watchlist
From watchlist to trading plan
Bonus: What I do when I screen an instrument

How do you find great trades? When it comes to being practical, most traders have a very wrong
approach if they have an approach at all. Especially as a technical trader, it is essential that you
choose the right markets you are trading very wisely. Even more important, you constantly have to
reevaluate whether the market you chose last week is still good or not for your trading today. This

principle is called watchlist rotating (well, I just made that up so dont bother googling )
and it means that you regularly screen and pre-select the markets you trade from a larger pool of
markets; but I will show you exactly why and how to do this.

Rotating market cycles

Every trader will agree that there are different market cycles and that all instruments alternate
between the different phases with varying degrees: ranging and consolidations are followed by
trends that then sometimes turn into longer and strong trends, until the trend slows down and enters
a range or reverses into a new trend. Of course, its not always that clear cut, but you get the idea.
Those individual periods (each circle) can last hours, days or weeks and a single trading system is
usually only going to work during one of those periods: range strategies only work during ranges,
momentum strategies only work during trends and reversal system work only during when
momentum is fading during a trend.

A trader who just follows 1 or 2 instruments often ends up forcing trades because he cant be
selective enough with the general market environment. Thats why I use a larger market pool where I
pick my pairs every week depending on the price environment and why having a watchlist is key.
Know your edge and when you can make
money
If you are like most traders, you probably have a very specific trading approach and a trading
method that focuses on one pattern or setup. Furthermore, your system most likely favors one type
of market environment. Let me explain what this means with my trading and it will become obvious.

I am a pure reversal trader and my system works very well under certain and very specific
conditions, but it fails miserably most of the time. When I created and improved my system, I
became VERY clear what the optimal market looks like for me and what price behavior I need to
avoid.

As a reversal trader, I dont trade during: ranges, breakout scenarios, very early trends, trends with
only one trend wave, very explosive trends, high volatility market, pre-news situations and around
absolute highs and lows. This leaves only very few, very specific market conditions where I might
look for trades: trends with very clear swings and with at least 2 trend waves, close to important key
price levels, moderate volatility and where price hasnt breached the 20 SMA on the 4H for quite
some time. You can see that you wont find such a market very often and even once I find such
conditions, it does not mean that I get a trade its just my first screening process.

Tip: Become VERY clear about your trading system, what defines a good trade, how does the chart
have to look like to signal a good environment and when do you stay away from a market.

Market-pool and inner watchlist

Once you know which market conditions dont work and which ones do work for your trading
method, we can move on to look into utilizing a watchlist and then see how I structure my whole
approach.

First, I always start with my larger market-pool which includes roughly 25 selected Forex majors,
Forex crosses and a few commodities and indexes. Every week, I will then go through those 25
markets one by one and first see which ones show the market conditions I need for my trading
method. Usually, I can immediately eliminate 30/40% because they are not in a trend or have too
much volatility. During the next step, I only keep those instruments that are trading close to important
price levels mainly support/resistance, supply/demand, swing highs/lows, double tops/bottoms. In
the final step, I eliminate all those pairs that are still trending too strong and dont show signs of
fading momentum. At the end of my screening process, I have narrowed down my initial 25
instruments to 6 8 which I will then analyze closer and write trading plans for those are the
articles you find on Tradeciety.com every Sunday as market preparation.

Further reading: Forex resources and Forex trading tips

From watchlist to trading plan

Once I have narrowed down my 25 instruments from my market pool into 6 8 instruments for the
week, I will sit down to write a trading plan for each one. A trading plan consists of if-then scenarios
where I create potential trade scenarios and what I want to see before I enter a trade.

1) My Sunday routine

Although it takes me roughly 4/5 hours every Sunday from market pool to trading plan, I never miss
my Sunday routine. Without a thorough analysis and well prepared trading plans, I dont even bother
trading. With a trading plan, on the other hand, I can trade with full confidence because I know that I
have done my preparation and that I am perfectly prepared for the week. I dont miss trades, I am
not chasing price, I know when to trade and what, noting surprises me and I just sit back and wait.

Further reading: The perfect trading routine

2) During the day

After I have done my Sunday preparation, I set my price alerts at the key price levels that I have
identified and then wait until the alarm goes off. I dont look at charts throughout the day and I dont
flip through timeframes trading is then just waiting.

3) Mid-week update

After the Tuesday market close in the US, I will go through my watchlist pairs again and cross-check
with my trading plan to see what has happened so far in the markets and what I expect next. Here I
will update my trading plans, eliminate the instruments that dont show interesting setups, write new
trading plans for new potential setups and then set my price alerts again.

This is a very different approach when you compare it to the general (losing) trader who is glued to
his screens all day long and does not really know what he is looking for until he stumbles over a
trade or randomly enters bad setups. I highly recommend giving my approach a try if you are still
struggling; it might sound like more work but, in fact, you can save a lot of time once you have done
your preparation.
 Bonus: What I do when I screen an
instrument
Every now and then, I stumble over a new market when doing my research and when something
peaks my interest, I will start my screening process to evaluate whether it is worth having an
instrument in my market pool. When I screen a new instrument, there are a few very specific things
that I look for, especially when it comes to price action and price analysis. I included a video below
that shows how I screened a new instrument, the USD/SGD, before I added it to my market pool.

Is it respecting the technicals?

Since I trade purely technical, its very important to see that price action is actually adhering to
conventional concepts of technical analysis. I mainly analyze how trends and trend waves move, if
supply/demand and support/resistance is applicable and if I can spot any other patterns.

Level of volatility, size of wicks and whipsawing

Although an instrument may adhere to principles of technical analysis, the level of volatility is
important for me. A market that moves back and forth too much, has wicks that can easily take you
out or where whipsawing is a common behavior, make an instrument unattractive to me.

Can I see my pattern in very recent trading history?

I dont backtest or run simulations, but I briefly go through the most recent price history and try to
find some signals based on my criteria. I try to see how price is reacting under such circumstances
and whether it would be tradable or not. Youll be surprised but different markets and instruments
often follow very different patterns.
 How to perform a multiple time frame analysis
Rolf Beginners, How To, Tradeciety Academy 6 Comments 9,651 Views

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Top-down vs. bottom-up the biggest mistake of multiple time frame analysis
Multiple time frame analysis helps you stay open-minded
Multiple time frame analysis step by step
Staying open minded 2 tips

Most traders pick their one time-frame and then almost never leave it. Or they just leave their time-
frame to go down to lower time-frames to find more trading opportunities which basically means
they are recklessly hunting for signals on time-frames they shouldnt be on.

The professional trader knows that the only way to approach trading is with the top-down
approach and youll shortly see why.

Top-down vs. bottom-up the biggest mistake

of multiple time frame analysis
The biggest mistake traders make is that they typically start their analysis on the lowest of their time-
frames and then work their way up to the higher time-frames.

Starting your analysis on your execution time-frame where you place your trades creates a very
narrow and one-dimensional view and it misses the point of the multiple time frame analysis. Traders
just adopt a specific market direction or opinion on their lower time-frames and are then just looking
for ways to confirm their opinion. The top-down approach is a much more objective way of
doing your analysis because you start with a broader view and then work your way down.

! Tip: Doing a multiple time frame analysis while you are in a trade can be a real challenge because
of the trade-attachment. Once in a trade, the supposedly objective performance then turns into
justifying your trade. Especially when you are in a losing trade, you have to be very aware of how
you are doing your analysis; avoid justifying a (losing) trade based on the bigger-picture market
view.

Multiple time frame analysis helps you stay

open-minded
Obviously, the daily time-frame is less important if you are trading off the 1 hour time-frame.
However, a trader who never leaves his execution time-frame has a very narrow view on the market
and cannot put things into the right context.

Every trader, regardless of his main time-frame, should has to start his trading day looking at the
higher time-frames to be able to put things into the right perspective. But looking is not enough
because once you arrive at your lower time-frame and are in the midst of your trading session, you
will have forgotten what you saw on the higher time-frames. There are two ways to deal with this
problem:

1) Get a physical notepad

On your trading desk, place a physical notepad and for every market you trade, write down what you
saw. We also offer a free trading plan template that can help you stay organized.
2) Annotate your charts

All charting platforms offer text objects and you can use them to directly write on your charts. It is
also advisable to mark the areas on your chart that are your areas of interest. This way you are less
likely to jump the gun and enter prematurely.

Multiple time frame analysis step by step

When it comes to actually performing your multiple time frame analysis, you dont have to get too
fancy. But knowing what to do and how to approach it can help you build a time effective routine that
guides you through your trading sessions.
Weekly / Monthly Where are we?
If you mainly use the 4 hour or 1 hour time-frame to execute your trades, you dont have to spend
too much time here. Basically, you just want to get a feeling for the overall market direction and if
there are any major price levels ahead. Especially long-term support and resistance or weekly or
annual highs and lows should be marked on your charts
Daily Strategic time-frame
On the daily time-frame, you have to spend a bit more time on. Here you analyze the potential
market direction for the week ahead and also determine potential trade areas. Again, draw your
support and resistance lines and mark swing highs and lows even if you dont use them in your
trading, it is worth having them on your charts because they are so commonly used.

4H (1H) Execution
Assuming that the 4 hour is your execution time-frame, this is where you map out your trades and
specific trade scenarios. Take the levels and ideas you came up with on the daily time-frame and
translate them into actionable trade scenarios on the 4 hour time-frame.
Ask yourself where you would like to see price going, what has to happen before you enter a trade
and what are the signals you are still missing.

Staying open minded 2 tips

Always create long and short trade scenarios when doing your multiple time frame analysis. This will
keep you open-minded and it avoids one-dimensional thinking. A trader who is only looking for short
trades, will blank out all signals that point to a long trade. Or, a trader on a long trade will miss the
signals that could signal a reversal.

Furthermore, separate your charting from your actual trading platform. If you can see your open
orders on your screens during your analysis, you are much more likely to be biased during the
analysis.

Here is a live example of a multi timeframe analysis: