So its 1500.00 per student, times, what 9-10 students that he maxes it out at, Lets say 11 students. so 11*1500.00=16500. So 16500 two times per year is a lot of money. Hell, i feel like a high roller all of a sudden. EF
The class is $7,500 not $1,500. So that is around $150,000 per year from the two classes alone. The webinar is a self-study course and he can sell many more than just 9 or 10 so this number could be even greater than the class revenue depending on how many he sells... there is no limit because it does not take any more time to sell 1 or 1000. I would estimate he is probably pulling in at least another 150K from the webinars based on selling at least 100 per year. He is not running an altruistic charity as you seemed to indicate is what I'm saying.
So hats off to him for having a product people want. LIke i said i dont trade like he does, nor would i want to. All i am saying is Don seems like a decent guy, he stresses balance in life, and good pysch talk about trading as a career. Those things you dont really find in most sites. EF
You know, I always wondered why he stopped posting his monthly returns in 2009, since he was making 30K or so monthly at that time. I think I have found the answer. Actually, pretty much that is why he makes money. When you quote his returns minus the savings of his membership, you always use his VERY BEST year. Why don't we use an average year for Don and see how he would do?? Here we will assume that on a yearly base he pretty much trades the same amount of contracts, and that was 293K in 2008, so about 1170 returns per day. Now Jeb quoted the numbers for 2008: Cost savings of IOM membership $510,051 So if we assume (again) that my estimate of 550K profits in 2009 is fairly accurate and we subtract the savings from that, we get 40K as profit for a trader trading exactly the same style, but without the benefits of membership. 40K on a 2.4 mill account is less than 2%. What does it mean in plain English? That Don has to make more than half million a year in profits just to beat the charge of "he only makes money because of his membership." And he should make well over that, because making 2% return on capital isn't what most retail traders are aiming for. So why did he stop posting the monthly returns in 2009? Because he did the math and realized that he would make only a little above his membership advantage, thus proving the charges. Had he made way over that 500K (let's say 800K), we sure would have heard about it. Now before some sorry apologist starts to cry, I don't have a problem with Don making good money because of his membership discount. But his students should be aware of the fact, that using average retail commission they are not going to be able to duplicate his numbers and %... Just 2 quick replies: 1. My great granddaddy sold a cancer cure, and that was also a product what people really wanted. Hats off to him too. 2. Mother Theresa was such a decent, sweet lady, but I wouldn't buy any product from her just based on that alone.
Agree. 2008 was a good year for many traders, included myself and many blogs on elitetrader too (eg neke's blog). I try to mention transaction costs to day traders who spread bet (here in the uk), the bid ask spread is normally triple that of the underlying market. I tell people that might ok if you are making 100+% year in year out. But if you have a breakeven year or just a slightly profitable year (eg 'only' 30% up before costs).. the extra transaction costs are really going to hit you.
I reviewed both the TAD videos. Looking at the trades, he is averaging about $5/contract. Interestingly, in both the videos, he started with the loss, and then he makes up by pressing hard when he senses the "edge". Cherry picking the winning trades as he is not showing the losses.
first, there are going to be a lot of turkeys blowing thier accounts because of trading after dark. they are going to try and duplicate what he does. good luck. second, i dont believe he is trading live. he fills so quick, 30, 15 at a time. just seems unlikely unless his seat provides him with some advantage over us. i have yet to see one of his trades sit. third, when he is willing to put performance data(his reaction to my query was thats all in his blogs) up and offer a guarantee on his pricey product, then maybe ill consider him the real deal miller is the ultimate marketing machine. he is self promoting from his interviews to his charitible work(those percentages arent that impressive) to making people believe he has extreme insights that are beyond us. we are all jeolous not of his trading but of his ability to present more than he is successfully and at a profit.