I've been trading stocks for 3 years i originally started with 5,000. I was going to invest in sprint (S) when it was at $9.15 but one of my buddies had a "lock" on a penny stock QBID. So i investd the 5,000 there. You probably know what happened. So determined to recoup my losses i then deposited another 10,000 and started using wizetrade ( a $2000 stock trading program) which did not help whatsoever. And within a few months of up's and down's of penny stocks Poof 10g gone. With the dedicated never give up attitude and some loose change i ran to my broker with another 20,000 this time i waited for a "good" stock and within a couple of days a buddy of mine with a degree in accounting tells me about SIRI so on the rush to get my money back i buy 20,000 @ 2.90 and wait. Within a few months howard stern announces he is going to the satelitte company and the stock nearly triples. Me being the noob dumbfuck decide to HOLD thinking it will climb higher than rival XMSR which was at $38.00 at the time. Hoping to retire the stock begins to slide. What i was thinking is beyond me. As i sit daily in front of the T.V. wathing maria bartiromo and an unforgiving ticker i dump 2/3rds of my share's take my small profit and reinvest in some small cap companies, Which all lose in percent daily. While in this process i start to notice more good news about SIRI Sub growth and profit gains. With rejuvinated faith and me down to my last 20,000 i decide to take a last ditch effort and let it ride on siri at 5.60 it tanks. I sell half of my share's and invest it in 4 or 5 blue chips. They begin to lose percentage daily. SIRI begins to lose daily i hold. i Take my loses from the blue chips and invest in other blue chips which gain in the double digits ($10,$20,$30) per month. Which no where near makes the money back in what i have lost. I now hold 1500 shares of SIRI, 15 shares of BBY, 10,000 shares of MOBL (my biggest loser which is a whole nother story in itself) 15 shares of HNP, 30 shares of XMSR, 20 shares of C and hoping that DALRQ would come out of bankruptcy which it did and begin to rise i bought 1000 shares at 1.90 it tanked they cancelled the symbol and reopened in the NYSE at 22.00 a share how i lost thier im still trying to figure out. In conclusion my portfolio is worth 7,500 most of it in SIRI waiting for the big merger. And the stubborn entrepenuer i am makes about $200 a week playing poker. Hoping that one of my many business plans makes me some money someday.
Poker > trading, for most people. At least with poker, its a known fact, that if you master the rules and stick to them, you will make money in poker. In trading, you may never, ever, find the rules, and they are always changing. Kiss that 60G's goodbye, because you will probably never see it again. It would take many many years of study and hard work to trade well enough to get it back. More than likely, you will revenge trade trying to get it back and lose more. Dont do it.
I dont want to change the subject of the thread but i was watching poker pro Daniel Negreanu on High stakes poker starting with 1 million and losing 80% of that without breaking any rule.It was bad luck, losing streak. That just cant happen here if you know how to trade.
the perfect reply. seriously. i've lost 60k multiple times and i've only made it back after many months, many nice trade setups, lots of market volatility, and lots of lexperience~very difficult to duplicate in today's environment. but if you wait for my new book this fall, you'll never think of microcap trading as gambling again
The nature of poker [no limit] is you sometimes have large amounts of your capital (or table stake) at risk, and at least sometimes you lose. That's a "single event, huge loser"... relative to your capital/stake. You can have an "all-in" loser early in the game (when you don't have much money), and you're knocked out. You can have an all-in loser late in the game, lose LOTS of money, and still be knocked out. Therefore, in poker whenever the large loss comes it's usually devastating. The history of trading is rife with examples of players having long periods of success having made gobs of money... yet still end up like bleached bones in the prairie sun. In trading, you can ALWAYS eliminate that "single large loss" possibility by your behavior. In fact, it's essential to survival.
The way to make money in the markets is to buy companies that pay solid dividends, then reinvest the dividends. Over a life time you will be happy, at least my father is. Very old fashioned, does not watch the market at all, just reads his quarterly statement. Swing trading is ok if you are well capitalized and have an edge and your are very disciplined. Day trading, is for gamblers, the brokers love day traders, the commissions really add up.
Don't feel too bad 98% of this board has done similar things at one time or another. Losing isn't a problem, making a habit of it is.
Gambling on trades makes a bad trader, regardless of timeframe. There are plenty of day traders who are not gamblers, and who don't treat their trading as such. Don't be so narrow minded. The OP's problem is that he listens to other people for trading ideas and doesn't have his own edge.
Don't worry, I've done $60,000 in a day so at least it took you three years. On a serious note, do your own work rather than listening to other people, that's where you are going wrong.