As one of the top commodity futures traders, Richard Dennis had successfully turned $400 into a fortune of $200 million while trading in the Mid Am commodity futures market. Although he had subsequently suffered losses in a public fund, Richard had the ability to brave through these hard times and emerge as a winner. What are his abilities or attributes that have made him such a huge success? How did Richard pick himself up from failure and restore his past successes?

One of Richard’s commodity futures trading strategies is to use trend following systems. This means that once he locates a trend, he will have to work his way to find an entry point. Following this, Richard will then observe market reactions towards news to determine if these reactions are as expected. If they are, he will then enter the market and ride the trend. Conversely, if the market does not react as expected, he will then wait for the trend to be stronger before making his entry.

Richard Dennis also believes that markets may at times behave unexpectedly. These are points in which traders should get out of the market. Another exit strategy would be when the market trend has change, as signaled by a technical indicator. In instances where fundamentals may indicate differently from technical indicators, Richard believes that traders should still follow what their charts show them.

Another top trader in commodity futures trading would be Paul Tudor Jones. His success was marked by the growth of the Tudor fund from $1.5 million to a value of $300 million within a period of 4 years. What are Paul’s secrets that have resulted in such an outstanding trading success?

The first rule that Paul goes by would be that traders should not trade like average losers. Therefore, they should decrease their trading size for losing trades, and conversely increase their trading sizes for winning trades. Apart from that, Paul also advocates some form of trader intuition – if the trade does not feel right, get out. There are always other trading opportunities coming up.

Commodity futures traders should also always have a trading plan in place, taking care to place stops in the event that a prevailing trend changes. In addition, traders should also have an exit strategy for situations where a trade does not go as expected. Another aspect of trading involves the ego of a trader. Many traders fail in the market because they are unwilling to admit defeat. Therefore, they hold on to losing trades for far too long, and break their own exit rules. Paul also believes that traders should always question their own abilities and not let pride get in the way when they are making profits.

Finally, the ability not to be emotionally attached to any trade has made it easier for Paul to exit a trade when it is not going right. With this, he maintains an open mind for other opportunities even though a trade has failed. Therefore, Paul is able to quickly move on and strategize for his next entry into the market.