Do you believe it’s possible to hit rock bottom, start anew, and rise again? In the world of trading, that is.

Dave, one of our students, is living proof that it’s possible. After being knocked down by the dot-com crash, he built resilience through relentless study and research until he discovered the right method.

Dave once believed there was no trading strategy that could alleviate the constant anxiety of uncertainty. Then he came across the Unger Method, even though it was an ocean away.

His curiosity and eagerness to experiment have been key, supported by all the resources offered by the Academy.

In today’s video, you will learn:
oHow Dave managed to achieve his outstanding results
oWhich tools have been most beneficial for him
oThe path he followed on his journey

Enjoy the video! 😉

Transcription

Introduction

Chelsi
Hey, everybody. Welcome back. If you're new with us, I'm Chelsi from Unger Academy. Today, we have the pleasure of chatting with Dave, one of our many students who's found his calling in the world of systematic trading. He's here to talk with us about his experience with us and with trading in general. Welcome, Dave.

Dave
Hi. Nice to be here.

Chelsi
Cool. We're glad that you're here. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where are you from? What do you do for work?

What Dave does in life

Dave
Currently, I live on the West Coast in the US, in the Seattle area. I'm an electrical engineer. When I got out of school, I started to be an electrical engineer for some big companies within the US. Then I wound up moving to Germany. I lived in Germany for a few years. Then I lived in Italy for 15 years. At some point I moved back to the US, and eventually I became a manager, and I worked as a manager for several years. I worked for very large corporations and very small, personally-owned companies. And a little over a year ago, I quit working, so I currently don't work. I'm having time now to spend more time with the systematic trading and doing things that I really like and enjoy.

Chelsi
That's great. Congratulations.

Dave
Things are good.

The challenges Dave encountered before discovering the Unger Method

Chelsi
Yeah. Awesome. So what kinds of problems did you have prior to joining our program, trading-related and otherwise?

Dave
So for me, with trading, I started trading probably over 30 years ago before the dot-com bust. So I participated in the run-up with the dot-com. And at that time, I just kinda started buying calls, some options. And it was just nuts. About every four months or so, my account would almost double. And then when the bust blew, it all came crumbling down. And, because I had been trading for so long, I've seen and traded through several market cycles, both going up and coming down. And going up is great and coming down is not so great.

But when I was working, even with the market down cycles, I wasn't too concerned or it wasn't too painful just because of the fact I was getting a paycheck and all my expenses were being covered and I didn't really need to take money out of my investments. So, yes, I could see my brokerage account go down and sometimes quite a bit, but it didn't change my life or anything. I just knew, okay, eventually the markets would turn around and it would come back. But it was painful. The ulcer factor was always high sometimes.

Chelsi
Yep!

Dave
But after a couple of big drops, I just said, Okay, I should try to find some way of trading and investing that gives me a decent upside, maybe not as big as some of the ones I had seen previously, but I really wanted to prevent the huge downsides. And, since I quit working, that's become even more important because now not working, I don't have a paycheck coming in. So, if I do get really hit, really strong down market, financially, I don't think I'll have any issues. But the stomach ulcer problem, that could become more painful.

Chelsi
Yes, you always see something coming in.

Dave
Yes, that's when I really started to look to see: "Okay, how can I diversify myself?" And I would really wanted to try to do things that are not so tightly coupled with the US stock market. Nasdaq is always great, but when it goes up it comes down. So, I've tried different things in the past, and futures is something that I thought would be the ticket for me because it is diversified markets. You can make money going up and going down, and you're not completely connected to the US stock market.

Chelsi
Makes sense. It's crazy but being able to experience the Wild West that was the dot-com bubble...

Dave
Yeah.

Chelsi
I bet that gave you some thick skin, at least. But yeah, I hear a lot about the emotions side aspect of trading. It really impacts everybody. Very cool story. What made you choose our program specifically over any other program out there? Because I know in the US market, yout have quite a few options.

Why Dave opted for our program instead of others

Dave
Yeah, so... I thought it was kind of funny when... you know, Now that I'm not working, I probably do spend too much time watching YouTube videos, and I watch a lot of videos about trading and different techniques and stuff, and because of the program and what they do, what YouTube does to watch what you look at, then they target ads and stuff, and I looked at different opportunities and things.

When I first got, I don't remember if it was an ad or an email or how I received the first thing about the Unger Academy, I just thought it was... I just I took a really quick look at it and I thought it was about Larry Williams because it said that he'd won the World Championship and had taught some of his students too. I don't know why. I guess you could say it's like Pavlov's dogs... World Championship and I always think of Larry Williams because of his huge win he did, I think, it was in 1987.

And I know he taught his daughter, and he has some classes, too. So, I just thought it was him, and I didn't really think too much about it. And... I wouldn't say, ignore it, but I didn't really pay too much attention to it. And at some point, I noticed, I think it was in an e-mail that I got, there was an Italian flag in the upper corner. That's a little strange that Larry Williams would have an Italian flag on the email.

I looked at it, okay, it was Andrea Unger's Academy, and they were from Italy. And since I lived in Italy for 15 years, I was curious. And so I started to take it more seriously and looked at it and read through everything. And the things that really impressed me were the fact that he'd won it multiple times. He won the World Championship multiple times. And he taught some students, and he's got multiple students that have also entered the contest and have won the championships.

For me, the fact that he won is great. But for me, it's more important that he was able to teach people that were able to win because I have looked and followed other traders that do very well, but I don't think the things that they do are very teachable. There's been people that I follow that look at a day chart or something or 15-minute chart, and they can just have a feel of what the market's going to do, and they'll make trades based on what they see.

But for them to explain to me what they see and why they trade, it's very difficult. I just really struggled with some of that trading like that. And the fact that Andrea has been able to teach people and they won the World Championship, for me, that was a huge plus. Also, since I am an engineer, I'm a very methodical person, and systematic trading really seems to make sense to me.

I've read lots of books on trading and investing. And several years ago, I read a book, and the author had mentioned that you should try to find a trading strategy that fits your personality. And when I read that, I thought, well, that's just that strange. Who cares what your personality in trading is going to be? They're completely independent. But after all these years, I really think it does make a difference.

I just really think for me and my personality and how I think, systematic trading for me makes sense, and it's in a line with me personally. Like I said, I thought it was silly when I first read it, but I really believe that to be true.

Chelsi
It makes total sense.

Dave
Yeah. And then another thing that I really liked about the academy, the Unger Academy, was that I was given access to the Million Dollar database. So that allowed me to get trading with some strategies with different markets before I'd start even writing my own. Currently, I am trading strategies that I wrote, but I also am using some from the database. That was also a big plus for me.

The emotional benefits Dave gained from systematic trading

Chelsi
That's great. Really great to hear. Back to your point about finding a methodology or a way of trading that fits your personality. I would assume also that the systematic method is going to lessen the anxiety that maybe you had before because maybe in an engineer mind, you have more control if you're using systematic trading in a method, a specific method. So yeah, that makes total sense.

Dave
Yeah, Exactly. Plus the fact that if you do systematic trading and you do lots of backtesting, you can look and see and have an idea of what to expect in down markets or when the strategy is not working, because no strategy works 100% of the time, all the time. There's their down times. But in a systematic approach like this, you can look at what happened in the past. You can say, Okay, yes, it's in the ballpark. Don't panic. It's okay.

Whereas if it's having a feel or looking at a chart and you start to have a bit of a drawdown, you can't really convince yourself this drawdown is just normal. Okay, even though you could say it's normal, but there's no concrete evidence for yourself to say, "Okay, it's okay. I'm doing things fine. I'm doing it the same way I've always been doing", that's probably the big key for me. I'm doing the same as I've been doing before, whereas it's too vague and you're not done defined by a set of rules, it's easy to not follow the rules or not do exactly the same thing. So yes, for me, the systematic approach is much better.

Chelsi
It's easy to deviate, I guess, from your system. Yeah, that makes sense. And probably also knowing that you're programming it to do what you want, when you want, or when something happens, you also have that, "Okay, I can back off from the computer a minute, maybe not look at every minute what's happening". So maybe also that could make sense. Cool. Was there anything in particular about our program that really helped you?

The program feature that made the biggest difference for him

Dave
I'm a very big believer in "you don't know what you don't know". And also, the more you learn about something, the more you realize that you don't know much about what you're trying to learn. In systematic trading futures via software, I think is definitely the same type of thing. When I first started, especially being an engineer, I thought, Okay, this is going to be I'll get this up and running in a few days, I should be able to understand everything pretty quickly.

And I realized that, okay, I understood things, what I needed to do, but I started to realize pretty quickly that there was a lot to learn. Even today, after several months, I still realized there's a lot to learn. But every time I had a question or I just didn't understand something very well, I could get help, and I got great help, either from my coach or from participating in the coaching calls or sending an email to support.

Everyone that I've spoken with has been extremely knowledgeable. As an engineer, and in particular as a manager, lots of times you would ask people questions, and it's very valid to say, "I don't know", but I will get the answer for you. But I have never asked a question and someone says, I don't know. I will check for you. They always know the answers. I've just been really impressed on how knowledgeable everyone is, everyone that I've had any contact with the Unger Academy. They're all really good.

Chelsi
Worked really hard to have a team of A-players on your side.

Dave
Yeah.

Chelsi
That makes me so proud. Okay.

Dave
Also, after I got started, I started to think of some software tools that I would like to have to be able to help me in my situation. And as I started to look, I realized that Unger Academy, you know, their coaches and people are also traders, so they have the same needs. And so, a lot of the things that I thought that it would be nice to have some software to do, they have the software. So, a couple of the examples are the Bias Trader...

Chelsi
Oh, you have the Bias Finder.

Dave
I did some studies some years ago of the bias, and I thought it would be fun to try to look into that better. And there's a tool for that. So I was able to use that tool, and I'm now trading some of the stuff that I did with the bias in the tool. Another example is the Strategy Checker. So, with the Strategy Checker, you can monitor very easily the situation of how your trading is going in your account and the systems that you're using to be sure everything's up and running. So that's fantastic. The service and the help is very good, and there's lots of tools there.

The results Dave has reached

Chelsi
Amazing. Very cool. As a result of implementing the program, so what you learned so far, what results have you achieved?

Dave
I I've been trading, I think now since February, so four months or so. The gains are in line with what I was expecting. Yes, I've had some down months and I've had some up months. Last month was almost an unbelievable up month, and that was lots of fun.

Chelsi
I bet.

Dave
The interesting thing or the thing that I really liked, I said at the beginning, really was trying to get into is I'm currently trading: Copper, Gold, Crude, Sugar, DAX, Euro. So, I'm not based... I'm not stuck on Nasdaq. I trade Nasdaq and I trade S&P, but they could just stop working or whatever, and I would still be making... Last month, when I had my best month so far, it was gold and copper. So had I not I started this, I would have made nothing last month.

How systematic trading has transformed Dave’s life

Chelsi
That's great to hear and wishing you continued success there. So how have things changed for you since achieving this outcome?

Dave
Since I'm not working, I do have more time. I really enjoyed spending time working on new strategies, playing around. I'm using MultiCharts and Easy Language writing code, playing around with trying to figure out different strategies. I'm just having a really good time. I'm hoping that... I don't want to say "hope". My plan is that by the end of the year, I'm hoping that I can be consistently making money, enough money, be covering my expenses so I don't have to take any more money out of my other, like my 401-K or IRA accounts, my retirement accounts. But it's just been a whole lot of fun.

Where Dave might be today without the Unger Academy

Chelsi
That's great. That's really great. So, where do you think you'd be right now if you hadn't taken action to join our program?

Dave
So, I mentioned it before, I probably would be spending more time watching YouTube videos of people that do stuff on investing and wasting a lot of time. Everyone's got something to sell "you make lots of money with doing nothing and you don't need any intelligence and stuff". I get sucked into that, too, I'll admit, I watched way too many of those and think, "Oh, I wonder if that would work for me". So, I probably would be doing more of that. But I made the right decision for myself and things are going well, so I'm happy.

Dave’s tips for aspiring systematic traders

Chelsi
We're very proud to be part of that story. If anyone is watching this and they're on the fence about joining our program, what would you say to them?

Dave
So, I guess my suggestion would be that in life, nothing is for free, and that includes money, but also time. This is not a get-rich-quick scheme by any means. You have to spend some time. As I also mentioned before, there's lots to learn, but I think it's well worth the time. Probably more important than anything, just always remember that the Unger Academy is behind you. It's a proven system. It's been proven many times by many different traders. If you ever need any help, there's a great team behind to help whenever you need it, and they'll answer all your questions.

Chelsi
So proud of this review of our service and all the hard work that we put into making this program for our students. Well, thank you so much, Dave.

Dave
Well it shows...

Chelsi
Sorry?

Dave
No, it shows that you guys have put time and effort into this. And the people that work for Unger Academy are top-notch, and they really know what they're doing. And they're all very helpful. Yes, they are an Italian company, but everyone that I've spoken with speaks English very well, so the language is not an issue. I'm fortunate enough that I can speak, like in a coaching call, I did that in Italian, but I've heard him speak English before. He had an interview like this very early on when he first got started, so his English is very good. But even in the coaching calls, the language is not a problem.

Chelsi
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for that because I think probably a barrier is we are an Italian company and they're thinking... "Ah,, so there's going to be a lot of thick accent, maybe not speak English well". It's already a pretty intimidating, let's say, world to enter into. Maybe the language would be a barrier. But I'm glad for the confirmation from one of our students that that's not an issue.

Dave
Not at all!

Chelsi
Well, thank you so much, Dave. Thank you so much for your time. And we hope to see that you have continued success with your trading.

Dave
Great. Thank you very much. And thank the Unger Academy for everything.

Chelsi
Thanks!

NEXT UP ON THE BLOG

World Cup Award Ceremony

Interviews

Read More...

---

Robbins-PFGBEST World Cup Trading Championship Awards Presentation at CME Group

Interviews

Read More...

---

On forex markets - Dukascopy

Interviews

Read More...

---