You may have come across news articles and personal stories on social media about traders who have made huge profits and achieved early retirement. Such stories can motivate you to learn and practise to achieve your personal highs. In this FXOpen article, you will find out more about the most famous traders and their success stories.
What Makes a Trader Successful?
It’s important to realise that success is subjective, and there is no one formula for achieving it. For some people, success is earning as much as possible in a short period, while for others, it’s about gradually saving up and building capital for retirement.
Still, people who come to succeed generally share certain character and behavioural traits. Let’s consider what can positively influence trading.
Experienced and successful traders:
- are well-educated in their fields
- have a solid trading plan
- are disciplined and patient
- can control their emotions
- are flexible and adaptable
These qualities are essential for navigating the changing markets and finding profitable opportunities, and developing these characteristics could help you on your way.
Edward Arthur Seykota: an Algorithm for Success
Edward Arthur Seykota is known as a “Father of Trading Systems”. This man is a legend in the world of trading, and for good reason. Ever since beginning his career as a trader in the 1970s, he has been captivated by the concept of a mechanised system for conducting trades and performing technical analysis.
Ed Seykota developed algorithms for trading and used computer programs to execute trades. The profit made by his robot used between 1972 and 1988 was over 250,000% — the assets of his client grew from $5,000 to $15 million. He has been consistently profitable in the markets for more than four decades, and his success has inspired countless traders around the world.
Andy Krieger: How to Hack Forex Trading
One of the best day traders is Andy Krieger, a currency trader who gained notoriety in the late 1980s for his aggressive trading strategies. He worked for Bankers Trust, and he’s best known for trades against the New Zealand dollar. His primary strategy was to bet against the NZD because he believed it would be susceptible to short-selling.
Krieger enlarged his risk by combining foreign currency options with his significant trading limit, took a position, and benefited from the 1987 New York Stock Exchange crash. Andy made a profit of over $300 million for his employer in just one day.
Ingeborga Mootz: A Great Female Trader
Ingeborga Mootz is a woman from Germany who proved that there are no age or gender restrictions on trading. Having no relevant education or experience, she became a successful investor at the age of 75. Now she is almost 100 years old and a millionaire, and she keeps advising others on how to make money in the stock market.
Ingeborga Mootz used to have a humble existence, and when she married, her husband forbade her from working. Her stock market activity began after her husband’s death when she found a thousand shares of VEBA while going through his papers. She sold the shares and made a 100% profit, and trading became her point of interest. The main area that Frau Mootz looks at is banking.
Richard Dennis: How to Trade a Trend
Richard Dennis inspires traders with his ingenious and innovative approach to commodities trading. Dennis was a trend trader who preferred identifying trends and making trades in their direction with increasingly high leverage, maximising profits in good scenarios.
Richard was born into a poor Irish family in Chicago, and he made a name for himself trading on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange at the age of 17. Within ten years, he turned a borrowed $1,600 into an astounding $200 million through commodities trading.
One of his most famous experiments involved training a group of people known as “Turtles” for just two weeks. The Turtles reportedly made an impressive cumulative profit of $175 million over five years.
Bill Lipschutz: How to Learn From Mistakes and Manage Risk
Bill Lipschutz began his trading career after graduating from Cornell University in the late 1970s. During this period, he managed to turn a modest investment of $12,000 into a staggering $250,000. However, there was a setback, and one bad trading decision caused him to lose his entire stake. This experience taught him a valuable lesson in risk management that he has carried through his career.
In 1981, Lipschutz took a job as a currency trader at Salomon Brothers. At the time, forex trading was only growing in popularity. He quickly established himself as a very successful trader and, by 1985, was making the company more than $300 million a year in profits. He eventually became Salomon’s chief currency trader and held this position until his departure in 1990.
Final Thoughts
All these experienced traders who have achieved success differ from each other in biography, trading style, and strategy. The amounts they have earned are also different. It is important to remember that these are the exceptions rather than the rules, and most traders face losses while trading.
However, what you can learn from them is that they possess some specific qualities such as risk management skills, emotional control, loss acceptance, discipline, and flexibility. You can develop these skills as well, and to do this, open an FXOpen account and start your journey. To boost your performance, consider using the advanced trading tools offered on our TickTrader platform. We are sure that they will be helpful for trading, learning and skill development.
This article represents the opinion of the Companies operating under the FXOpen brand only. It is not to be construed as an offer, solicitation, or recommendation with respect to products and services provided by the Companies operating under the FXOpen brand, nor is it to be considered financial advice.
