Once a Demo, Always a Demo

Traders either loathe them or worship them, but, if the truth be told, demo accounts are used by brokers to entice traders to open live accounts.

Conventional wisdom suggests that demo accounts are a safe way to sample a risk-free trading environment, since we all know that plunging into the deep end and placing orders with no prior experience can result in a loss of large sums of money.

Demo accounts are supposed to combat inexperience and trading naivety, but do they?

The main factor of Demo accounts is that they do not trade with real money. This lack of risk would be considered an advantage in itself, but it does not make the trading experience realistic, it makes it emotionless, you don’t care if a position goes well or if you lose all your trading capital. There are no consequences for your actions, you don’t bother to learn from your mistakes and there is no disincentive to trade in a particular way. You don’t get to rationalize in real money – there’s no impetus to cut your losses and run on with your profits, nor is there any means of truly highlighting the riskier strategies from those that are more cautious. With a demo account, there’s no real accountability, which can and does hamper the trading experience.

Overconfidence, a detrimental factor– demo traders enter the financial markets with unrealistic balances in their account of up to $100,000, possibly an amount bigger than they would ever have in a live account. They will hold large losing positions which would be impossible to float on a live account with their own capital. This big amount of virtual moneyaccessible to the demo trader is highly unrealistic; imagine if he only wants to trade a mini or a micro account? It will encourage the demo trader to take on riskier trades than he would normally do in a live account with real money, developing excessive risk trading into a habit which will be disastrous when the demo trader becomes a live trader!

Limitations of a demo account-their impact on trading strategy and style is actually much less than it could be. Demo accounts are often inherently limited, either in functionality or in the markets they represent. Market data is often delayed, as it is fed through the demo trading platforms/servers, eliminating much of the intricate features of trading, such as news announcements and live market events, this somehow prevents a demo trader from  becoming an accomplished trader ready to take on the real world of FX trading!

Demo psychology-demo trading does not accurately reflect the true psychology of a live trader as trading with virtual money will not allow you to have the real gut feeling of making trading decisions on the spot and under extreme pressure that trading with your own hard earned money entails. With no real money at stake, the trader’s understanding of the underlying risk is actually limited or impaired. Alternatively, when you do trade on a live account, you can clearly see the need for discipline and risk management, elements which are not deemed necessary when trading with virtual money.

Conclusion-few will argue that a forex demo account can be undeniably useful in developing and mastering a certain trading strategy but unless the trader experiences the difficulty of making trading decisions involving real money and experiencing the pain of losing funds, he will not fully understand, much less avoid, the real risks of FX trading!