The best you can hope for on ANY trade is the Possibility that you will be right and price will move where you anticipate. That's it, that's all. No one and I do mean no one knows where price will go for certain. Not even the CEO of a company that just closed a huge deal knows for certain how the market will react to anything. It's all just possibilities !!!
but show me someone who has a 10k account which after 5 days of trading ends up with $7-8 million and a nice bracelet....
It's all about managing risk and perceiving opportunity. Playing the markets, you are able to exit/enter during the running. So, if you know what you're doing... you're a winner. Owning a horse... being on the inside, there is nothing like it!
Trading = gambling ONLY if you do not understand when probability is in your favor and bet (or not bet) accordingly.
Like trading, betting the pony's requires being able to pick up the "tells". I knew a "railbird" that would only bet on a horse he saw take a crap prior to the race. His theory was that the horse was now lighter and in a better mood. He actually did OK with this. Sadly he lost every dime and more at the casinos. Died broke, but he was a fun guy to be around. Had a zillion stories.
Your friend was smart about horses but not smart about casinos. Everything in there is a sucker bet except blackjack (if you can count the cards well and avoid getting caught) and poker, where you're playing against other players, so the house doesn't care if you win or lose so long as they get their table fees.
I didn't have much success trading until I approached it as if it were gambling. As another poster said, it is all probabilities, nothing more. Like Mark Douglas says, all it takes is one trader out there that disagrees with you and is willing to act on it to make you wrong. Given that truth, the outcome of any given trade is unknowable. You apply your edge across a large enough sample size and allow the ege to play out...just like the casinos.
No, too many people seem to misunderstand the intention behind the 1st post. It is not meant to equate trading with wild misinformed speculation. The point I was trying to get across is that; successful gamblers do well-- PRECISELY, because they understand when probability is in their favor and bet accordingly. Think about why thorp and co beat the dealers. While we can quibble about the nuances, trading, like blackjack, when viewed properly as a gambling system, can be analyzed similarly. --------------------------------------------- Give the ET posters a fish to eat, and they'll tell you why it's poisoned. Teach them to fish and they'll throw the podium at you.
In addition to understanding probability, professional gamblers have the necessary mindset for trading. If you understand that the trade is nothing more than a possibility, there is no reason to continue to hold a loser after being proven wrong. Master this one thing and you are halfway there.