Hi Syswizard, I never heard of this trader, before this post-you ever hear of this guy? Does it mention his losing percentages must be very low? I bet he uses larger than average mental protective stops. The insane amount of back testing I have done to do ave down shows me you can't use stops and your low losing percentages have to be very low to succeed. I know that guy is in London, but I simply can't imagine 25,000rt, here in USA, there are 23,400 seconds for day session New York, so he having to take multi trades within a second? Is this even possible using one PC? Even with automation, when order sent in on one trade, it next second before another can be done? Before automation I scalped, so two or more extra clicks of mouse to cancel stops, but most important is you have to take your eyes away from what you concentrating on to find the stops, my eyes scans between charting and volume on Dom at levels on each side of current, so it hassle to canceling anything.
I never heard of trader Dante. A quick look on the web and he has is not showing his ROR yet he is selling lots of books, classes, and mentoring. Very suspect - looks like he has a full time job promoting 'selling the dream'.
very insightful, thanks for the clarification it's good to know that in practice the prop traders do average, such that doing this for a position that is initially underwater is not a cardinal sin by default i guess the context & precise execution matters
so there are actually a few separate guys which came up during the course of discussion, let's get everyone on the same page... 1) original article - lawrie inman (the trader who was reported as doing 25,000 roundtrips a day) 2) the Flipper - another trader which had lots of trades in a day 3) nav sarao - the trader who supposedly averaged his way into 1500 contracts on the ES 4) trader dante - the trading educator guy in the video who talked about his prior experience being around nav sarao on the trading floor
The only things that stand out to me here are these figures... 25,000 RT per day at ~$5 per RT =$125,000 in costs. (Volume discounts not applied) Ouch. 1,500 contracts on ES at ~4.6K per ct in initial margin = ~$7 million just to satisfy margin requirements. And if your 1,500 contract ES position is down by, say, 100 ticks at market close/settlement price? Hmm. 100t*$12.5*1,500 cts = another $1.8 million. So you'd need 9 million just to survive that scenario on paper. And then what about SPAN? Fucking retarded. Just trade one stupid contract, get a grand a day, be happy. Because if you have 9 million to risk, and you are risking it on trading ES to the max limit of both yours and the CME's ability? Then give it to the straights out here in the real world.
If you are a member by owning or leasing, fees are way different at CME, and stair steps up as far as volume, one gets more discounts. http://www.cmegroup.com/company/files/CME_Fee_Schedule.pdf It is not retarded, this is a Business. Once you pay house off, have a savings, it is a way to keep score. Everyone has their hobbies "to be happy".
No pro trader pays anything like $5 a round turn. Intraday margin rates are low and prop firms will give you about 10x leverage on top of that anyway. As for how much he made, good on him. He figured the game out and should be allowed to enjoy all the rewards he earned
Is anyone here a "pro-trader"? If not, then why post pro-trader stats, since we cannot be them? If folks here ARE pro-traders and are banging on in ET, then I weep for the future.
Compared to 1980s, ES is watered down market to entice anyone to come to trading thinking they have a shot, CME makes so much more in fees. I use to have margin of at first $25,000 then lowered to $15,000 each contract, each full point was $500 and each nickel was $25 min. tick, so guys trading 50 lots, is now 500 on watered down ES. Markets moved better then, some of my best trading was 4 point range, I laugh now when so many complain of ten point ranges. But you really learned how to counter trend trade. Averaging down is nothing more than like trader waiting for 61% retracement for Fib trade, they could be taking on more as market goes higher, they have built up profits by doing so whereas I have picked up possible losses going down, who is right, both, neither, depends on outcomes. Should anyone average down, no unless they have traded very long time and know more about their system than most anything else in their life. It is like the barista at Starbucks, they make 500 lattes, you think they have to actually think about what they are doing? If someone makes a ton of dough in trading, why not? If they don't, someone else will.
It is like working at a company as sales person and one day they work up to become a CEO of same company. I applaud anyone who succeeds in their life, whether they come to ET for knowledge or entertainment. There are some people who weep at almost anything.