Does anyone know which trading writers, if any, actually make a living by taking money out of the markets on a regular basis, as opposed to earning the bulk of their income comes from marketing books, seminars, newsletters, consulting arrangements, TV & print fees, corporate salaries and so on? I would be interested to know who actually trades for a living, as opposed to marketing for a living. I'm especially interested in the people at realmoney.com, tradingmarkets.com and anyone who offers trading "courses" or "trader coaching". Also the prominent authors that all the newbies love, like Alexander Elder, Mark Douglas, etc.
I'm very curious about this too. Why would anyone spend time giving seminars etc.. if they're making decent money? It just doesn't make sense to me. Chinook
I made more money guruing last year than trading. That mean I suck at one or the other? I guess that is up to you to decide on your own, but I would be very comfortable with either income stand alone, though not happy because I enjoy doing both. Brandon
Linda must make about 30k a month from her chat room. I know she does a lot of seminars but not sure how much she makes off those. Id be willing to bet she makes a lot more trading, tho.
IMHO if they had something truly valuable you would never hear the details and they would be too busy trading the strategies to spend time running chat rooms, sending out newsletters, or engaging in other marketing and sales related activities. If these activities are their primary business - training - then if they state this there really is no problem. However, anyone that spends most of their time training rather than running a business and executing the strategies that are part of the training should be suspect. For example, In my operation I run on average two seminars per year and these are only for our direct employees and are not detailed to the public. Use your common sense and the answer should be clear.
It's a bad to assume a good trader would only trade and not teach. From what I understand, trading is a lonely profession that gets boring (if you're good). Filling in that time teaching and helping others may be rewarding to some.. or maybe they enjoy the recognition of their trading skills.. those are personal rewards that can't come from just trading markets. Some good traders truly want others to join them in their success.
If they do it for free and in private then I would be the first to agree that they are interested in helping others. However, if there is a fee and/or they are holding themselves up as "experts" to the public then they are engaged in marketing and sales in a training business. Most teaching is simply showing others how to effectively reason through a problem in a particular discipline. Valuable money making strategies are simply not given out to the general public - be it in applied quantum mechanics, encryption algorithms, or trading strategies. Such information is usually branded trade secret UNLESS your business is training in which case your training course it what you are selling. Even at Universities, professors that start valuable companies dont end up discussing the details of their invention or operation in their public classes at the university.
You might want to check out "Rev Shark" DePorre at RM. I doubt he makes much writing for Cramer, so maybe his trading is working? He also has a trading room. I just stopped my RM sub and I'm not a member of his room, FWIW. I never follow other traders, but I do try to learn from those that have had success. I get the impression from reading him last year that he trades a 2 - 3 Mil account. I believe he looks at sector strength/weakness and buys/sells breakouts/breakdowns on big volume jumps. He also hedges often with QQQ. He mostly likes small caps and sometimes gives his positions (hope it isn't a pump), but not any real trades. Don't think he uses much T/A. Seems like an honest guy, but then you never know when it comes to money... Here are his room and RM's links: http://supertraders.com/about.asp http://www.thestreet.com/realmoney/
Show me the money...blotter copies...email is cheap...any reason given not to post simple everyday results from an actual trade blotter...is rediculous...and those who buy from "picks and shovels" salesmen deserve what they get... There are...and will always be those who glean their revenues off the hope of others... Bad news will travel... A site should be set up for "picks and shovels" salespeople that insist on daily blotters...if the service doesn't submit them....then they are not for real...