Greg Stefaniak offers to send his trades to a metatrader 4 EA that will automatically mirror his trades in your account.
I’m sure if you’re searching for a Greg’s Success Signals Review, you came accross a lot of obviously fake ones. That’s a big problem with any product that can be sold through an affiliate program. People create a website called productX.com or whatever, throw up a fake review and try to earn money through their affiliate link. So here’s an actual review from an actual user.
So I stumbled upon this great sales video for Greg’s Success Signals and thought I’d try it out, since I’m already investing in forex and would like to be doing better. Somehow the video convinced me to put some trust in Greg to help me out. The price seems very reasonable compared to the earning potential and compared to what I’ve paid before. It’s a $47 a month subscription.
It’s sold through Clickbank, where I haven’t had problems with getting a refund. So I figured the risk was worth the potential reward.
So what is it?
You get a program for metatrader that basically mirrors Greg’s trades. There are different versions that you can get for a one-time upgrade. I think the difference is that with the basic version, you don’t get all the trades; you get the more basic trades.
You’ll need to run metatrader 24/7 on a computer with internet access (possibly a VPS) to get this to work.
Results So far
So far I’ve only been running this thing for a couple days and I’ve been very impressed. In about 2.5 days, it’s completed 13 trades with 11 profitable trades and 1 losing trade.
The average profit so far has been $8.90 while the average loss has been $0.94.
Of the 4 trades in play at the moment, their profit so far averages out to about $1.45 each.
If this pattern were to continue, you could expect to see about $8 for every trade. With an average of 5 trades a day, that’s $40 a day. Multiply that by 20 trading days a month and you get $800 a month.
Not bad, but not a job-killer. This being forex, you can easily scale things up.
UPDATE: 4/27/2012: Last week was especially bad. Greg started opening up positions much larger than usual throwing good money after bad trying to recover from losses. As a result, my accounts were cut in half and I suspect many accounts were virtually wiped out.
Trading concerns
Right now all trades are being placed as 0.02 lot trades. They say that in the future they will contact you and ask if you’d like to start placing larger trades.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to get a grasp on how much is actually being risked for each trade because no stop-losses are being placed through the metatrader platform. How stop-losses are handled is a question that I’ve asked the support team, but I’m waiting for an answer.
Ideally, I think the trader should have an algorithm that allows you to choose a percentage of your account to risk on each trade. That way, you choose exactly how much risk you want to take on for every trade.
UPDATE 4/12/2012: I’ve figured out a way to automatically add a stoploss to orders made by Greg. Read through the pages of this post to find it on page 7.
UPDATE 4/27/2012: You MUST limit the lot size as well as adding a stoploss, otherwise Greg may open up crazy large trades as he did last week.
Risk / Reward Ratio
Without seeing a stop-loss, I have no idea how much is being risked for the average $8 reward that are being earned. This is a problem and prevents me from recommending the service.
The problem is that some systems make small steady gains, but then wipe out your account with big losses. It’s OK to have lots of small gains as long as they compensate for the large losses, but for this kind of a system, you need to have an adequate account size so that you can survive a few large losses in a row.
Greg’s success signals have not mentioned anything about what account size you should have for what risk level.
You can, however, set the metatrader agent to trade with a maximum lot size. This way, you can ensure that you are never trading more than X.XX lots at a time, whatever your risk tolerance happens to be.
Conclusion
I can’t fully recommend Greg’s Success Signals until I know more about how the system handles risk and stop-losses. I can recommend that you test out the service on a demonstration account, or on an account that you can afford to lose.
So far, I have been very impressed with the trading record and the I must admit that the greed fairy has been planting ideas about sinking a lot of money into this system and scaling it up to earn a passive income.
UPDATE 4/12/2012: I’ve changed my conclusion to a recommendation after having found a way to limit risk by using the Swiss Army EA to automatically add stoplosses. I now recommend Greg’s Success Signals, but only when limiting risk this way and risking only 2% of your balance on most trades. I also recommend it if you have a broker that allows you to place hedge trades as Greg uses these to handle risk. You must add stoplosses even if you can an account where you can hedge, as Greg doesn’t seem to use the hedge to control risk.
UPDATE 4/26/2012: After having a lot of good trades, things went against Greg. Instead of accepting loss gracefully, he opened up positions 9 and 12 times as large as normal; all without any stop loss. The account took a mighty beating. I’m pulling my recommendation for Greg’s success signals. If you are a subscriber already, I’d say the best thing to do is use a fixed lot size and use the EA on page 7 of this article to automatically add stop losses. You have to control risk here because Greg doesn’t.
UPDATE 4/27/2012: If you are not already involved with Greg’s Success Signals, I do not recommend that you join. The reason for me pulling my recommendation is that in the last week, Greg started opening up trades that were many times the size of his usual lot size. This has caused havoc. You must read Graeme’s comment below. While I do think that Greg is a good trader, I think he wasn’t ready for the stress of handling lots of client accounts. I think when things started not going his way, he panicked, and started gambling wildly instead of accepting his losses and starting from square one. UPDATE 5/22/20122: There is some evidence that Greg never actually placed trades; he just sold everyone a trading robot and hoped for the best.
If you are still trading with GSS, I suggest that you change both the Fixed Lot seting in the EA and the Maximum Lots setting to whatever lot size you are comfortable with. Then use the Swiss Army EA on page 7 of this article to automatically set stop losses.
My sympathies are with anyone who’s account was leveled or decimated this past week. Mine were pretty much cut in half.
Another option
OK, here’s a possible option for coming up with profitable ways to trade the forex market. I’ve discovered a free software project that produces trading strategies automatically, using many many different possible indicators. I think there’s some real potential here.
Check out my post on forex strategy builder to learn more
Update 5/11/2012: Graeme’s Positional Trading may be coming soon
Graeme and I are working on a project to teach others his Positional Trading strategy. This is exciting stuff. Read this positional trading post for more information.
Update 5/22/2012: Beta tester slots open for Graeme’s positional trading
I have a couple slots open for beta testers. Please see the forex positional trading post for more information.
Review continued on the next page… see links below
If you find this review helpful, please share it, comment, or hit the google +1 button so this review will outrank the phony ones in Google. I’ve looked around and this is the only place where an honest discussion is being had. Please help this page rank higher in the search engines so people can find a real review.
Incoming search terms:
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Hi Edward,
It was very refreshing to read an actual review and not a biased one. There is a lot of rubbish reviews out there just designed to pick up sales by affiliates.
Keep up the good work,
Cheers,
Wayne
Thanks Wayne. I agree. It’s getting harder and harder to find real reviews of pretty much any digital product; especially if there’s an affiliate program. I wish there were a way to search for real reviews…
Hi Edward
Great review – and much along the same lines as my experience thus far although I hadn’t realised the computer needed to be logged in 24/7! Did you take the additional upgrade? How much extra was it? I thought it a bit cheeky to offer a system – and in the next breath say ‘and we can upgrade that system’ – why not offer the upgrade as standard?? The $47 is for standard system – it would be interesting to see if the upgrade earns you enough to cover it’s cost?
Many thanks
S
Steve, yes. I went for the upgrade. It’s $97 and I thought it was a one-time-only payment, but I’m not 100% sure anymore. Fortunately, I knew that this required a 24/7 login.
That kind of upgrade offer is becoming the norm. It is pretty annoying isn’t it?
So far, the system has covered it’s own cost and it’s only been about a week and a half. My big concern is how risk is handled. Sounds like you are from the UK, so you don’t have the strange problem that Americans have. We can’t use the hedging trades that Greg places. Hedge trades are prohibited in the USA. I don’t really know why.
Luckily, I found a foreign broker that accepts American clients: FinFX
Ed, Thanks for having a REAL review site!! I bought the first upsell also, but not seeing anything extra. I’ve been called by Greg’s team to get mentoring too.. only $3000.. Honestly, I’m not sure how this strategy will work in a trending market when the price doesn’t come back to his hedged trades. Are you keeping the signals or ditching the service?? I might ditch it because of the hedging and constant marketing..
BTW.. FinFX is unregulated, & so was Inovatrade when they took mine & everyone’s cash and ran.. literally… I’ll never go unregulated again. I want them accountable to someone..
Ralph, thanks so much for the warning about FinFX. They seemed more trustworthy to me because they’re in Finland rather than Cypress. Sorry to hear about Inovatrade. That sucks big time. I still haven’t sent any money to FinFX… maybe I won’t now.
$3000, Hah!
I’m going to stick with Greg’s signals for now. I do have concerns about risk management, but I’m also impressed with the gains he’s made… so I’m conflicted.
How much money do you have to have in ur. Forex. Account to start
Sarah, I started out with about $525.00 in that account and have a balance of about $800 now. I’m also carying about a $30 floating loss at the moment – meaning that if I closed all open positions now, that’s what I’d lose. Those open positions might turn around and be profitable, or they may get worse.
Thanks for the question!
Hi Edward, you said you found a way to automatically place stop losses?
Yes, Andrew.
I wrote about it on page 7. http://edwardshapard.com/money/gregs-success-signals-review/7/
Basically, you can do this with a free EA called the Swiss Army EA. It does lots of little things for you such as automatically placing stop-losses.
Sorry Edward, it’s page 7! Just read it thanks. Will your EA just be for your own personal use?
Andrew, thanks for the question.
I didn’t write the EA. I just found it on a forex forum. It’s free, so anyone can use it. You should give thanks to the author.
I provided a download link on page 7 for anyone who wants the EA.
Oh, I just realized that you were talking about the EA that I’m working on right now. I’m not sure if I’m going to release it or not. But I’ll let you know when I decide.
Hello Edward, thanks for the good advice on here. After using the Swiss Army EA has it made the signals still as profitable or wouldn’t it affect profit or the way Greg closes trades?
That’s a great question Rob. So far, the Swiss Army EA has not interfered at all with Greg’s signals. It doesn’t affect the take-profit or any manually closed trades. It just provides kind of a safety net to close a trade before you lose too much.
Greg did send out an email saying not to close trades yourself, but if you live in the USA, you can’t use the hedge trades that he seems to be using to limit risk. You’re only option is to use stop-losses.
This is a fairly new regulation by the NFA (2009) that a lot of people outside of the USA are not aware of.
A very interesting and refreshingly honest review. What does the upgrade service offer that is not oncluded in the standard service? Also, having signed up for a trade mirroring service the further promotion for a mentoring service does seem to contradict the reason for using the service in the first place. Your thoughts on this?
Stephen thanks for leaving a comment. I’m not entirely sure what the upgraded service offers that the basic service does not. My understanding is that the upgraded service creates trades that the basic service does not. You actually get a different EA for the upgraded service.
I haven’t tested the basic EA, so I can’t say for sure.
I’d say that selling the upgraded mentoring service isn’t necessarily a red flag. You can continue using the service, but at some point Greg may decide to retire or something and then you’ll be left without a trader. So for that reason, I think a lot of people would be interested in learning how to trade on their own.
That being said, $3,000 seems like an awful lot of money. And hitting people up for this so soon after they’ve purchased the signal service seems pretty shady to me. Personally, I never got a call from them. But I don’t answer calls if I don’t recognize the number.
I’d recommend testing the signal service for a year or so before going for the training. Let Greg prove to you that he know’s what he’s doing. And let him pay for training with the profits he earns for you with his service.
Hi Edward, as of today, 20th April, drawdown reached 25% on my live account mainly due to GBPUSD trades. Slightly unnerving, but it seems that’s how it is with Greg. Hope things turn round next week.
Yeah, it sucks doesn’t it? Are you able to hedge? The way Greg trades leaves us open to big drawdowns without the hedge trades that non-USA traders can make.
Yes, I live in the UK so am able to hedge – still only one GBPUSD buy taken while six sell trades are in drawdown. It was good UK retail figures that sent sterling rocketing on Friday.
Thanks for the reply Andrew. Markets opened today and the account is taking a beating.
Looks like you have to expect big drawdowns from Greg.
I have about 8 sell orders for GBPUSD and one buy. That doesn’t do much of anything to control risk. I don’t know what his strategy is. He seems to be willing to risk a lot to try to remain profitable rather than just dealing with periods of loss.
Hi, any of you guys seeing open trades with 0.06, 0.12, 0.18 and the latest 0.24 lots for GBPUSD (all sitting on a loss now)? Based on the rest of the open lot sizes of 0.02 for EURUSD and GBPUSD, my account is currently having a drawdown of $800+. I have not made any manual adjustment to the lot size (via divide ratio in the tradecopier). I am starting to feel a little uneasy because of the current drawdown (with no SL as per his signals) and those with account size started with less than $1000 would probably have been wiped out….
Any comments from any one?
Tom, I had a 0.18 trade, but not the 0.24 lot trade; probably because my account size wasn’t large enough for that one.
IMHO, this is extremely irresponsible of Greg. The usual lot size is 0.02, so an 0.18 lot trade is 9X as much and a 0.24 lot trade is 12X as much. Just insane.
Greg seems to be gambling; chasing good money after bad. I’m going to change my recommendation.
Hi Tom, yes I have those open trades but I changed the lot size to fixed 0.02 at the start of the week, but still have one from last week at 0.12. I’m trading a small account of $820 and am at 45% drawdown at the moment. I’m feeling more than a little uneasy. I take it Greg doesn’t look at upcoming news events as he carried on making sells on the GBPUSD last Friday when the UK retail figures sent the GBP skywards.
Tom, That was smart of you to use a fixed lot size. I think that’s probably the way to go here since Greg seems to be handling risk as well as a drunk gambler.
Andrew
How do you change fix lot size to 0.02? I thought the copier software only allowed you to play around with divide ratio. I just changed mine to 0.5 (which means half of what he opens) and there’s another new order of 0.12 to sell?? I agree that Greg is gambling (reminds me of Henry Liu whom I used to subscribe to and lost quite a lot of money). I went from Demo to live last week after testing for 4 weeks and I am already down more than $1.8K! Guess it’s my arse luck…I hv topped up my account to $2.2K and if he blows it, that’s all I am prepared to lose. If he somewhat gets lucky and recovers the account, I am going to stop using his services. Good luck to all of us!
Tom,
There are two settings in the EA: Fixed Lot, and Maximum Lot size. Set them both to the number of lots you want traded per trade. Then use the Swiss Army EA to set a stoploss (see page 7).
Hi everyone, I just wanted to let you know about my experience with Gregs Signal Service.
Greg uses a technique which is a mix of positional trading, hedge trading and grid trading which is actually a good way to trade in my opinion if you really know what you are doing. With no stop losses the obvious danger is in a fast trending market because positions are hedged and opposing positions are closed for a Nett Result OR Multiple positions of the same type are closed for a Nett Result.
In was actually quite pleased to see Greg trading this way and for the past month he has been doing quite well in managing the fluctuations between buy and sell positions, the objective being to be Nett profit in the direction of the market. eg You can have 4 buys and 3 sells when the market is moving up and you are gaining on a Nett Basis for all trades combined.
Over the current week however the wheels have fallen off and Greg has shown himself to be nothing more than a Gambler with other peoples’ money which is really disappointing.
To be specific, Greg has placed short positions on the GBPUSD at 1.5828, 1.5881,and 1.5951 a total of 123 pips loss, then 65 pips later at 1.6016 he placed another short but this time 3 times the base value. The reason for this is that if the market fell it wouldn’t have to fall all the way back to 1.5828 (the original entry point) In fact it would only have to drop back to the 1.5951 level to break even, then all four positions could be closed at B/E and start again.
However, then market didn’t drop back but continued trending. At 1.6071(243 pips from the original entry) Greg placed another Short 6 times the base value.
Then at 1.6088 he begins to panick and places another Short at 1.6088 7 times the base value and tries to close them all out at 1.6047 for a hefty nett loss. But the market continued the rally and he then placed another Short at 1.6172 again 7 times the base value.
Things are now totally out of control as the market hits 1.6257 which is 427 pips above the original entry price. Now here’s the killer, 7 short positions are active and if you had say, 0.1 lot or $1/pip as your base value, those 7 positions are trading at 26 times the base value. So your account is going backwards at $26/pip when you told him to trade at $1 per pip.
I think this is absolutely criminal and he is trading other peoples accounts with 26 times the leverage without your permission. If your account hasn’t been wiped out with margin calls this week it is a miracle.
Last month I earned $2,622.38 profit from Gregs Trading. I started at the base rate of 0.02 lots and as he was doing well I became more confident in Gregs ability to manage the account. By the end of the month on 21st April I had given Greg permission to trade at 0.3 lots With approx 5 trades open and hedged I didn’t think this was a huge risk as my account was at $12,000
I have just received a margin call and one position was closed by the broker at -$3,111.00 loss which has more than wiped out the total months earnings. Added to that my account is still in Drawdown of almost $9,000 which means that if the market continues to rise my entire account will soon be wiped out. The only hope I have now is to wait for the market to fall back to the short entry points which are over 400 pips away.
I have a hard time explaining the sick feeling I have right now.
In fact as I am typing this, the GBPUSD has just hit 1.6280 I can’t imagine what has caused the USD to be so weak on a day when the BOJ has devalued the Yen and Spain has been downgraded and reported their highest unemployment in 18 years and England is officially now in recession. I am confused.
By relating my experience here I hope I can save other people from the same fate. My suggestion is that if you want to continue with this service, you better have a lot of money and set the lot size to a minimum.
Good luck trading. I think my trading days have now come to an end.
Graeme,
I can’t thank you enough for sharing your experiences here. I think we all have had a similar experience, though not as drastic as yours.
I too became convinced that Greg could be trusted based on his performance in the last month. But last week, we all saw him panic and behave like a gambler.
I never expected him to start opening positions so much larger than his default. Although I had automatic stoplosses, I didn’t touch the Max Lots setting, so Greg started opening relatively huge positions in my account.
He pretty much cut my accounts in half.
Your blow-by-blow analysis was particularly valuable and worthy of a post of its own. It’s rare to see people spell out failures and that way, but necessary. I hope your comment serves as a warning to those interested in GSS, and those already trading with Greg.
Thank you again. I wish there were something I could do to help. Here we sort of have a little community of GSS victims…. maybe there’s something we can do together.
Graeme, not sure what I can say to console you but I have been in a similar position when the previous guy I followed (H Liu) traded without sticking to his rules by removing the stop loss and wiped out almost my entire account of $10K due to margin call.
The main reason I followed Greg was because I was too busy to trade on my own these few weeks and I thought that with his small lot size of 0.02, it would bring a small additional income with limited risk. Unfortunately, Greg went crazy with his trade and money management and created a big mess for all of us.
I suppose I have learnt my lesson this time and trade only when I have time to look at the chart and monitor the news. Hopefully, you are able to pick yourself up from this nasty one and persevere on with your trading. and recover what you have lost.
Stay strong and all the best!
Thanks Ed and Tom for your kind words.
My conclusion from all this is that you can’t pass the responsibility for your success onto someone else.
All the best to you all.
Thanks very much for your experiences Tom and Graeme. Tom, I’ve also had some experience of Mr. Liu and the way he operated, the present situation is a painful reminder. I had no alternative but to close some trades tonight as drawdown was over 70%, losing 50% of my $950 account. I left open one sell that was taken at 1.60180 for when hopefully price reverses. Best wishes to everyone for the future.
Hi. I read all of this and I’m terrified. I bought this system in March, but because I followed Henry Liu as well I started on demo account. I was surprise by performance, and on 17.04 I went live trading. I traded default lots size (0.1). I’m base in UK than I can use hedge. Up to date my gain is 600 pounds and drawdown 830. I didn’t experience multiply my default lots size. I don’t know why it didn’t happen on my account. Maybe because I changed my fixed lot size to 0.2 on 26th . I didn’t change my max lot size. After reading this I think I’m very lucky.
Jacek, I’m pretty sure it was your EA settings that saved you from some of the madness. I’m glad you weren’t as affected as some of us were.
Hi everyone, I just wanted to follow up on this GSS service. I placed a copy of my post in the Forex Peace Army Review site. Greg Stefaniak replied accusing me of setting my base lot size too high at 0.3 lots. I have just sent the following answer to that which will help to clarify just what is happening here and it’s useful for other people to know so they can avoid it. If I stop one person from losing their entire account it will be worth it. Here’s the transcript……
Greg, I find your comment to be unbelievable. You are sorry for my losses, they are your losses, you are the one trading the account.
Ok, so let’s look at this closely in the light of your comments.
You said I am using a lot size too large. I disagree completely.
I watched your trading style for 1 month and I fully understand the risk of DD. With a $12000 account 0.3 lots is quite safe.
Now, what actually happened here is that you traded my account at up to 2.0 lots compounded over 7 countertrend positions for a total of 7.4 lots or $74/pip leverage. That’s 24.6 times the leverage I authorised you to trade.
You said you only trade micro lots so 0.02 lot is your base trade. Therefore if you apply what has happened to my account you would be trading at .48 lots ( 24 x 0.02) for anyone with the minimum lot size selected.
Therefore a $1000 account will be wiped out in 20 pips. Now that’s scary and that’s over leveraged.
I don’t know of any occasion where I authorized you to trade with 24 times the set leverage. I also refer to your setup video in which you discuss the maximumlotsize parameter defaulted at 2.0 You state that you never trade at a high lot size and there is no need to adjust this setting.
Well, Greg you are a liar because you not only traded my account at 2.0 lots but increased the same trade on the GBPUSD to 7.4 lots.
I’m sure that every one of your members would like an explanation for this.
Which brings me to my next point. By the fact I have not heard of anyone else losing their entire account, can I assume that my account was the only one being traded at a 24x leverage?
I thought the same trades and therefore lot sizes went out to everyone.
Is there anyone else who traded GSS on GBPUSD last week during the GBPUSD rally have 7 counter trades opened at a leverage of 24x the base lot size?
So if you were set on the minimum lot of 0.02 your account would have been going backwards at $48/pip on Friday. Please let me know if you experienced this.
If other peoples’ accounts were not being traded as was mine, then this is a scam and I will be reporting it to the authorities if I don’t get a good explanation for this.
So, Greg this is your chance to explain how this has happened and that the same thing happened to everyone’s accounts.
Some people start with $200 at .01 lot minimum so their account would have been losing at 2.4 lots or $24/pip if it was traded the same as mine. So how was their acccount not wiped out also????
I look forward to your explanation
======================================================================================
I then followed up with this post………….which is being moderated at present
Further to my previous post I wish to answer the accusation from Greg that my lot size of 0.3 lots was too high implying that my greed was at fault, so let’s discuss that for the benefit of every member using Gregs Success Signals.
The following positions were opened on the GBPUSD last week:
#1 Short 1.5828 @ 0.2 lots
#2 Short 1.5881 @ 0.2 lots
#3 Short 1.5951 @ 0.3 lots
#4 Short 1.6016 @ 0.9 lots
#5 Short 1.6071 @ 1.8 lots
#6 Short 1.6088 @ 2.0 lots
#7 Short 1.6172 @ 2.0 lots
The GBPUSD peaked on Monday at 1.6300 so let’s look at the risk involved here.
Trade #1 ended up 472 pips in DD
Trade #2 was 388 pips in DD
Trade #3 was 371 pips in DD
Trade #4 was 316 pips in DD
Trade #5 was 251 pips in DD
Trade #6 was 181 pips in DD
Trade #7 was 128 pips in DD
That’s a total of 2,107 pips in DD @ 0.3 lots is a DD of $6,321
So, is my $12,000 account large enough? Of course it is. Then to improve the situation even further there only had to be a few hedged buy positions opened at the same time. Why no buy positions were opened only Greg can tell us.
But, let’s look at what Greg did. If you apply the lot sizes that Greg used on my account the DD blows out to $16,375 so it is no wonder he wiped out my account.
I did not give Greg permission to trade at a higher lot size than 0.3
In a nutshell, Greg you have really screwed this up big time. If you are the highly successful trader you claim to be, travelling the world making hundreds of thousands of dollars, why can’t you just admit there was a problem with my account and reimburse my $12,000 that you lost through your trading efforts.
Then, I could be writing into this forum about what an honest and trustworthy person you are.
I am waiting for Greg’s reply which should tell us a lot about this guy’s integrity.
Graeme, Thanks for adding your posts to the comments here. I’ve read the forex peace army site and it had a lot of what I like to call premature recommendations. You know, when someone who’s been involved for a week posts a review… and then you never hear from them again.
I’m hoping that this site will be a much better place for information.
I think Greg has probably stopped by here, but he hasn’t left any comments. So that’s interesting that he responded on Forexpeacearmy… maybe he’ll comment here too.
Firstly, I would like to apologize for a couple of errors in my last post regarding lot sizes although the errors don’t change the facts at all. The reference to .48 lots at 0.02 lot size should read that it would take 208 pips to wipe out a $1000 account. But that is still a dangerously high leverage.
Also if you were set to trade at 0.02 lots it would be $4.80/pip not $48/pip at 24x leverage.
The reference to trading at 0.01 lots with a $200 account would have been losing at $2.40/pip not $24/pip. The point being that it would only take 83 pips to lose your $200 account at that leverage.
I just wanted to clear up those errors so that I am not confusing anyone.
I have just received my refund from Greg and he made the final comment……
Hi,
I’m really sorry about your loss but you set GSS up in a wrong way and it looks like you were using the broker that doesn’t allow micro lots. This is the reason you lost your money.
The biggest drawdown we had ever was $1000 and I cannot be blamed for what happened.
You were aware of the fact that trading is risky, and losses can occur.
I wish you all the best and I’m here if you have any additional questions.
All the best,
Greg
I was using a broker that allows micro lots as my first months trading started at 0.02 lots. For him to say that this is the reason I lost my money and ignore the 24x leverage that he used is utterly incredible.
It is obvious that Greg will not take any responsibility for his trading activity and then try to blame the client. Well, as I have no money left to trade with I can now spend all of my time launching an investigation into who is to blame.
He said the biggest DD he ever had was $1000. How does that help a client who starts off at $500 or less. Nowhere on his website or FAQ does he state a minimum Account size to start and the safe lot size for the account.
On the trades that were opened on my account at a lot size of 0.02 the DD would have been $1,169 so what is a safe level for the account? On that basis, you would need at least $2,000 to trade at 0.02 lots.
I think that is highly critical information for a client before they start trading.
Moving on from the negatives of using GSS I would like to start a trading discussion group of the trading style that Greg Stefaniak is employing. I happen to agree with Gregs trading style even though he panicked and over leveraged everyone’s accounts.
I call this style of trading, “Positional Trading” where you adopt a position in the market without really being too concerned with the direction. This is why you place hedged positions in both directions.
The rationality for this trading style is that in the short term the market can behave very irrationally and erratically and it is this “uncertainty” that causes the psychological problems that plague most traders. Dealing with uncertainty is the challenge because we were not brought up in society to do this. We were taught that it is better to have a secure income, have 2 children to replace the parents, drive carefully, etc, etc, So in our secure job oriented existence we are safe.
Now you start trading and your world and emotions are turned upside down. Suddenly the uncertainty and unpredictability hit you so hard that the subconscious “fear” takes you over. You trade irrationally and don’t follow your system and possibly blow your entire account then in the light of day, you look back and can’t understand how stupid you were.
This cycle can continue until you learn to embrace uncertainty, expect it, respect it, and trade with it not trying to find certainty or safety within the uncertainty. That is why good traders trade based on probabilities not certainties. Their expectations are realistic within the uncertainty of the market.
Imagine being able to trade without fear of being right about the direction because you trade in both directions.
Imagine trading where your stop loss can’t be taken out by the commercial banks spiking the market. Even a 200 pip spike can’t cause you to lose your trade because you trade like an investor and the market will turn in your favour so long as you are trading with very low leverage.
Greg is trading with this very style except when the market goes into a strong rally, the potential large DD is the problem unless you manage it correctly. But it can be managed, that is the interesting part.
So, I wanted to start this discussion by asking if there are any traders who use this type of trading and discuss the ways of controlling the DD effectively in a fast trend. Any thoughts?
Graeme,
I love your idea of starting a ‘Positonal Trading’ group. Personally, I’ve never used that style because I don’t know how to do it. I just control risk to the downside and pick a direction. Then I hope I can be right often enough to make a profit.
I’d definitely be interested in helping you get this started. I’ll send you an email with my ideas.
Graeme
Sorry to hear your news. I have been searching for weeks on Gregs style of trading. I use his basic signals and have contacted him 3 times to ask about SL’s and I always receive the same email back: ‘We dont use Sl’s and we monitor the trades and they are only micro lots’. I even suggested we take his signals which mostly are 30 pip moves and take one third as a SL. That got no reply. I even said pots were being blown and he got quite defensive.
The trades I am convinced are an EA. I dont keep my laptop on and only use his signals for guidance and interest. But as soon as i turn on……BOOM…….the signals arrive.
Greg promoted himself on tackling scams and I fell for it but now I am even more annoyed with as I get weekly emails from Greg on buying other EA’s from so called mates for $47 all with the same script. ‘I am a programmer and I was lucky to meet a forex guy that had millions of $ etc etc’.
Greg even gave away a travel trade system for 15 min and 30 min timeframes but when you lookat the examples they are on 4 hr charts…..
Now, to the point of my message. I am keen on the way he trades. I use no SL’s and sometimes hedge but its an interesting concept and would like to be involved in the discussions.
Kind regards
Dave
Hi Graeme. I dont know why this happened to all of you. I started live trading with default lot size 0.1 on 17.04. I can hedge. My entry point on GBP/USD are different then yours. I think Greg don’t trade and we don’t copy his trades. Just EA trade. Today GBP and EUR hit my take profit which was 1.6173 and 1.3171. Up to date I’m 274 pound in profit. The biggest drawdown was 940 pound for me. I think if you have 2500 pound or 4000 USD and trade 0.1 lot (1USD) you will manage any drawdown (so far). My leverage is 1:300. I like his style of trading as long he doesnt do nusty thing like overleverage. I was scared when I read what happened to you. I trade fixed lot right now.
Jacek,
In playing around with more than one EA, I’ve found that they will open up trades at different times based on perhaps the number or open positions, account balance, etc.
I don’t know if this means that Greg isn’t trading and this is an automated EA, or what.
It’s possible that Greg sets some kind of criteria that the EA fills rather than matching exact trades.
Just was wondering if the Swiss Army EA sets the stop losses on already open trades… or should I do that myself?
Jeff,
The way I have it set up, I would need to manually change the stoploss on open trades.
There might be a way to do this automatically, but I don’t know how to do that right now.
I’m not at my trading station, so I can’t play around with it to figure it out.
Jacek,
Thanks for the feedback. If Greg is running an automated EA then he has misrepresented himself to everyone. But, the fact that everyone are receiving different trades it really seems like you are right. That’s disappointing to know. It is important that this is brought into the open however for everyone’s safety.
I do disagree that 0.1 lots with $4,000 would be adequate. I was trading at 0.3 lots with $12,500 and it wiped me out. In my opinion you would need $1,000 to trade 0.01 lots safely. Let’s face it, strong rallies can last longer than this one.
Don’t forget that the upgraded version of GSS trades both the EURUSD and GBPUSD at the same time. So you have to double the risk because they are very highly correlated and will tend to trend together but not always.
I have a big favour to ask everyone. I have just gained access to the history of another GSS members trades between 15th April to 30th April and the 7 short trades that wiped out my account didn’t even appear in his history.
Therefore it seems that Greg is not mirroring his trades at all or at least not in my case. So I am launching an investigation into this whole fiasco with Traders Court on the Forex Peace Army site so we can get to the truth.
If you have traded GSS between the above dates can you please let me know or let Ed know and take a copy of your trading history during those dates to compare the trades opened on your account and those opened on my account.
I would really appreciate your help with this.
Ticket Open Time Type Size Item Price S / L T / P Close Time Price Profit
299309 2012.04.27 12:20 buy 0.20 gbpusd 1.62214 0.00000 1.62520 2012.04.27 14:54 1.62520 37.66
298495 2012.04.26 12:40 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.32078 0.00000 1.32638 2012.04.27 14:49 1.32638 34.49
298383 2012.04.26 10:00 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.32580 0.00000 1.32638 2012.04.27 14:49 1.32638 3.57
298379 2012.04.26 09:49 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.62041 0.00000 1.62346 2012.04.27 11:40 1.62346 18.79
295270 2012.04.20 10:50 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.60787 1.61840 0.00000 2012.04.26 23:05 1.61810 63.22
297749 2012.04.25 12:17 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.32242 0.00000 1.32551 2012.04.26 09:33 1.32551 19.07
298066 2012.04.25 20:40 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.61646 0.00000 1.61951 2012.04.26 09:26 1.61951 18.83
296901 2012.04.24 13:48 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.61587 0.00000 1.61594 2012.04.25 20:22 1.61594 0.43
297658 2012.04.25 10:48 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.60996 0.00000 1.61594 2012.04.25 20:22 1.61594 37.01
297045 2012.04.24 15:51 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.32003 0.00000 1.32313 2012.04.25 12:03 1.32313 19.26
295419 2012.04.20 12:50 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.31994 0.00000 1.32026 2012.04.24 15:43 1.32026 1.98
295947 2012.04.23 09:49 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.31439 0.00000 1.32026 2012.04.24 15:43 1.32026 36.35
295617 2012.04.20 17:43 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.61306 0.00000 1.61605 2012.04.24 13:37 1.61605 18.50
295231 2012.04.20 10:20 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.31728 0.00000 1.32036 2012.04.20 12:41 1.32036 19.11
293910 2012.04.19 09:21 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.60681 0.00000 1.60959 2012.04.20 10:54 1.60959 17.27
294783 2012.04.19 16:31 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.31431 0.00000 1.31739 2012.04.20 10:01 1.31739 19.16
294007 2012.04.19 10:11 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.31408 0.00000 1.31413 2012.04.19 16:20 1.31413 0.31
294455 2012.04.19 13:47 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.30791 0.00000 1.31413 2012.04.19 16:20 1.31413 38.73
294005 2012.04.19 10:04 sell 0.10 eurusd 1.31347 0.00000 1.30798 2012.04.19 13:30 1.30798 34.27
293227 2012.04.18 11:26 sell 0.10 eurusd 1.30865 0.00000 1.30798 2012.04.19 13:30 1.30798 4.18
292789 2012.04.17 20:00 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.31349 0.00000 1.31320 2012.04.19 09:11 1.31320 -1.81
293264 2012.04.18 12:15 buy 0.10 eurusd 1.30797 0.00000 1.31320 2012.04.19 09:11 1.31320 32.54
293509 2012.04.18 17:13 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.60375 0.00000 1.60679 2012.04.19 09:10 1.60679 18.92
293453 2012.04.18 16:28 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.60062 0.00000 1.60368 2012.04.18 17:02 1.60368 19.08
293163 2012.04.18 10:31 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.59691 0.00000 1.59990 2012.04.18 14:23 1.59990 18.69
292995 2012.04.18 04:26 sell 0.10 eurusd 1.31170 0.00000 1.30858 2012.04.18 10:49 1.30858 19.51
293107 2012.04.18 09:33 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.59014 0.00000 1.59565 2012.04.18 10:30 1.59565 34.53
292795 2012.04.17 20:31 buy 0.10 gbpusd 1.59509 0.00000 1.59565 2012.04.18 10:30 1.59565 3.51
profit 587.16
Ticket Open Time Type Size Item Price S / L T / P Price Profit
294500 2012.04.19 14:28 sell 0.10 eurusd 1.30852 0.00000 1.31000 1.32375 -93.68
294796 2012.04.19 16:39 sell 0.10 eurusd 1.31424 0.00000 1.31000 1.32375 -58.50
295418 2012.04.20 12:49 sell 0.10 eurusd 1.31942 0.00000 1.31000 1.32375 -26.64
292855 2012.04.17 23:10 sell 0.10 gbpusd 1.59226 0.00000 1.61002 1.62574 -205.94
293195 2012.04.18 10:55 sell 0.10 gbpusd 1.59868 0.00000 1.61002 1.62574 -166.45
293853 2012.04.19 08:45 sell 0.10 gbpusd 1.60385 0.00000 1.61002 1.62574 -134.65
295641 2012.04.20 20:30 sell 0.10 gbpusd 1.61143 0.00000 1.61002 1.62574 -88.02
298502 2012.04.26 13:00 sell 0.10 gbpusd 1.61828 0.00000 1.61002 1.62574 -45.89
299418 2012.04.27 15:14 buy 0.20 gbpusd 1.62517 0.00000 1.62819 1.62554 4.55
drawdown -815.22
Thanks Jacek,
It seems you haven’t received the same trades as I have.
Hi Graeme, I was trading during that period unfortunately and had the ludicrous GBPUSD sells. Can I email you my statement?
Hi Andrew, that would be a great help. Please send to graeme.info77@gmail.com
If you don’t mind, let me know what % of your account was affected and your leverage at the time.
Hi, Graeme,
I have the same trades like yours. And suffers a lot of course. Because I also kept trading by myself and making money at the same time, so my account hasn’t been blowed out yet. But certainly makes me feel awful. I am thinking quit this service soon.
Wish you the best.
Hi Jennifer, Sorry to hear you got caught also but it is good you are still trading. If your account can sustain the DD, perhaps just waiting will see the GbpUsd fall and restore your equity. The French elections will have a big impact on Europe this weekend.
As you can see from my statement I can trade in both direction on EUR and GBP. I have basic version of GSS. I think Greg didnt mess up with my lots because I can trade only mini lots (0.1 lot). Since begining the biggest drawdown was last time -960 pounds. When trend is going against us and let say he’s got 4 or 5 sells than he starts buying. I think he’s got different strategy when you trade 1 pair, 2 pair, if you can trade mini lot or macro lots. My leverage is 1:300 then even when I have 13 minilots open I have about 180 pounds margin. Rest my money can cover drawdown. I think that I’m lucky that I have choosen broker with mini lots then macro lots. Bad luck we don’t realy know what he is doing. Right now I have 7 trades open, 6 buy 1 sell.
Hi Jennifer, I forgot to ask you if you would be able to send me a copy of your trades for 15th April to 30th April. Please send to graeme.info77@gmail.com
It would be a big help in sorting out this mess.
Hi, Graeme,
I will try to send you my trades as soon as possible as I am quite busy these days.
Hi all,
Anyone have any other success with any other Forex Signals?
This response was written by Graeme, and posted for him by Edward Shapard.
Hi Leb,
It is so hard to find an honest person who can help you to trade. Personally I’m really negative about putting my money in the hands of someone else who takes no real interest in your success.
As you know GSS just cost me $12,000 and this matter is currently being reviewed by the Traders Court of Forex Peace Army as we speak. The interesting thing about this is that Greg won’t even respond to any emails or allegations. So much for honesty???
Meanwhile I have personally taken my last remaining $600 and I am trading a little known method called Position Trading . This is my preferred style of trading and it is similar to what Greg was attempting to do except he used a Martingale type system which belongs in the Casino not a trading platform. It involves using hedged positions in place of a Stop Loss and yet if managed correctly can operate with a very well defined risk
I am going to stick my neck on the chopping block and post my results of my Live account at VantageFX which is my local broker in Sydney Australia. All my results are fully verified and you can see my trading activity in real time. http://www.mt4i.com/users/glittle56
I have asked Edward to mirror my trades to test this over the next few months. Now, this testing will need to go for some time before I will be satisfied with the results and before we can offer anyone to mirror my trades.
Learn more about my Positional Trading project that I’m working on with Edward.
We see now the same shit happens like few days earlier. I had lost the half of my account by the last drawdown. When I don´t closed the positions manual I had the same problem like Graem. A total loss. After the loss I set divide rate 0.5 by deposit 1500 usd and thought I was on the safe side. And now, when eurusd and gbpusd fall some pips, comes the margin call. 13 open trades with 2600 pips loss.
Equity 580.14 Floating – 907.36 Free margin 411.73 Margin in use 168.41
In the videos, which he sent by email, he shows ho to detect and trade a trend. Why he don´t do this? Succesful extreme signals? Extremely shitty. I don´t think that Greg himself trade. Or he has too much vodka in his venes.
Yeah,
At this point, I’ve lost all hope for GSS. I’ve stopped trading with it, cancelled my subscription, and asked for a refund.
Uwe, I’m so sorry that your account has suffered too. I was hoping to warn as many people as possible about GSS. He definitely does not trade manually which to me makes him a liar because he makes everyone believe that he is.
Uwe, it would be great if you would also warn other people on Forex Peace Army website.
As you can see Ed and myself will be trying to help everyone in the near future so keep checking in on the forum.
I just wanted to add one more thing regarding Signal Services. These seem to be popping up everywhere and I think they are the latest way for scammers to take peoples’ money.
In all the advertisements I receive in my inbox, none (0%) tell you exactly how they trade. They expect you to hand over the control of your account to them and you seem to have no right to know how they are trading your account.
They also take no responsibility for the outcome of their trades. All they say is that trading is risky. Well, handing your account over to a complete stranger is even riskier.
They publish results that are not even from actual trading and how do you prove that this person actually made those trades. Almost all results I have seen published are backtest results from MT4. Back tested results are absolutely useless.
I guarantee that 99.9% of these scammers are using a useless robot which works some of the time and fails most of the time. GSS is a good example.
I am publishing my trades in real time http://www.mt4i.com/users/glittle56
You can write in and ask me questions about why I placed a particular trade if you want to follow my trades.
As you know Ed and myself are creating a place where you can come to discuss the actual trades you are seeing on my account. You have access to Closed trades, Open trades, Pending Orders
Also you will notice I have increased my lot size to 0.02 because I made a deposit and the account is now over $1,000 Lot size 0.01 per $500 account size. After Greg wiped out my account, I am restoring the balance as fast as I can so I can draw a weekly income from my trading. This is why I am making the deposits.
DD is capped to 550 pips or $55 which is 11% on a 300 pip market move against me. My risk is clearly defined and acceptable.
How many signal services offer you this level of transparency.
As we get fully set up, we may charge a fee for access (still undecided) but you will actually be mirroring real trades and also have the opportunity to learn the system yourself so that you can take control of your own financial future.
Just start saving up for a new account so that you can make real money when we get started.
Gream, I sent you yesterday 11:10 am Sidney time a link to my mt4i-stats where you can see the signals I get from Greg. At the moment a have the choise to see how I loss all my money in the account or fund my account with my last 1000 usd and hope that´s enough to survive the drawdown. I don´t now how deep erusd and gbpusd will fall and how to save my deposit. You are in the lucky situation that you can go to work. I´m so deathly sick that I cannot work. And I hoped with Gregs Signal I could get an income. Not for me. For my highly skilled children and the expensive advancement.
I see that your system is that what Greg had promised. Succesfull. At the moment you choose sell trades in eurusd. Do you mean the falling will go on? You wrote that you want more time for your wife. In this case you traded Gregs Signals. When your system is simple to learn and has clear rules maybe we could build a group and every member will trade only 2 hours.
Hi Uwe,
To answer your first question, when I trade I trade with the trend until the trend changes, that way my DD is never very large. I don’t know how long the trend will last so I just trade with the trend until it changes.
Ed will contact you about becoming a Beta tester for my Position Trading Course as it is developed. We will teach you how to trade for yourself so if you can hold onto a small bank to trade with you can mirror my trades. This will not be a get rich quick scenario but you won’t lose everything either, and you will earn a lifetime income.
I’m not sure what to say right now. Greg is absolutely crazy. Any fool can buy in a downtrend waiting for the market to turn around and then say you just need low leverage so you can wait it out. Markets can trend for thousands of pips. There is no way to know how far it will go.
As far as the Euro goes, some analysts are talking about 1.2000 and some are saying Parity at 1.0000 but no-one knows how long that might take. It could be falling for the next year. It also may go into some brief rallies or consolidations but no-one knows these things.
The entire Euro zone could break up and this has never happened before so it’s anyone’s guess as to what might have happened.
At one point I was really concerned about my account and it was then at around $5,000 out of $12,000 equity. I wish that I had taken the $7,000 loss looking back now. But I hoped it would improve and I lost the entire $12,000 It’s always easy to make great decisions after it has happened.
You are in a similar position now, not knowing what will happen. If the Euro and Pound continue to fall, you will run the risk of losing everything. This is the gambling way to trade that Greg uses and it stinks.
You can cut your losses and take what you have left to trade another day while you have something left but please be aware that if you do that and the market goes into a rally you can’t beat yourself up for making the decision. There is no way of knowing what will happen. Your decision has to be your responsibility and a decision that you can live with. I do know one thing and that is Greg will lose all your money at some point whether it is this month or in 6 months time. You will never make a steady income using his gambling robot.
If you continue with GSS make sure you have fixed lots and maximum lots set at the same level so that at least you control the bleeding otherwise he will keep increasing the lot sizes by 3x every new position opened. Your largest lot size currently is 0.18 so the next position will be 0.24 then 0.30 and so on until it turns or your account is wiped out. And according to Greg it will be your fault for not having enough money to ride it out. Nice Guy Huh!!
Good luck Uwe and whatever decision you make, we will be there to help you as we move forward as fast as we can.
While the last big DD with GSSE I closed the trades and made a big loss. After this the course came back. Now it seems the same will happen. Today I closed all the trades. And than the downtrend was stopped. I can´t believe it.
You wrote: “This will not be a get rich quick scenario but you won’t lose everything either, and you will earn a lifetime income.” 30% monthly return in your stats is very good.
Please ignore my response about how I trade without stop losses etc etc., I have had 32 trade signals from gss in 3 days. Account going bang unless I get a miracle today.
oh and just to add, those 32 trades are now nearly 2000 pips negative. I ask myself why, why did I fall for it? argggghh.
Decision time. Need to pick myself up and start again.
Sorry Dave, I’m trying to stop the carnage but shutting this guy down isn’t easy. I think we can start a “Victims of GSS” support group which seems to be growing more rapidly every day.
When to take a loss is always the hardest decision but sometimes your survival to fight another day depends on it.
Good luck.
Hi Uwe,
I think you have done the right thing by closing your positions as the Euro has plummeted to 1.2515 on Thursday 24th May. Anyone who is using GSS signals in this environment is in really big trouble.
Meanwhile I have been trading the exact same market and my results are posted in real time for complete transparency. http://www.mt4i.com/users/glittle56
Ed and I have been busy with our new course to teach people how to trade the Forex Market and never lose again. If you are interested in this course please contact Ed through this forum and we will keep you informed.
I have made a formal complaint against GSS at the Forex Peace Army Traders Court. The application first gives Greg the opportunity to respond to accusations made against him. So far he has not responded at all. The case has now been escalated to “Open Case” status where people can go to make comments and vote for/against GSS. If Greg does not resolve this issue he runs the very real risk of being branded a Scam and damaging his reputation. I encourage all of you who have not been treated fairly by Greg Stefaniak to go to the Open Case Folder and have your say.
http://www.forexpeacearmy.com/forex-forum/open-cases/20008-case-2012-043-glittle56-vs-www-gregssuccesssignals-com.html
I started with Greg on 16th March, then there was silence until the 10th April when trades started.
A total of 39 trades were opened between the 10th and 20th, of which 34 closed within the same period with two losses totalling 17 pips. Four trades remained open until the 17th May when they were closed.
Overall I made a profit of 1813 pips in that ten day period(I was ready to order a yacht!!), quite exciting. I have had no trades or comunications from him since the 20th April, and trading with no stop loss is living too dangerously for me, so I have cancelled my subscription.
From previous postings it looks like I have been very lucky to escape with a profit.
Well done Don, you have read the writing on the wall very accurately. I too had 3 weeks of outstanding profits. I tracked every trade Greg made and I was very pleased with his exit strategy so I gave him complete control over my main account. Greed knows no bounds it seems. Then the Counter trend started on the GBPUSD and Greg started increasing his short positions against the rally and multiplying each position by a factor of 3 until my account of $12,000 was completely wiped out.
All lessons in Forex are very costly but that’s the way it is. Keep popping into the Forum here and we’ll be announcing updates on the Real Position Trading Method that I am using now which I have designed myself and with the help of Edward we are setting up a group, trading club or something similar not yet decided on to teach people to trade without Fear or Greed and a way which frees up your time completely.
I first want to put the record on the board so there is no doubt that Real Position Trading is the only way to trade profitably in the long term. In my previous post you will find the link to my account so you can follow my progress.
The voting has started for whether Gregs Success Signals is a scam or not. Have your say here:
http://www.forexpeacearmy.com/forex-forum/open-cases/20008-case-2012-043-glittle56-vs-www-gregssuccesssignals-com-5.html
The Poll closes on the 10th June.