the point is that it amuses me to see people on this site speculating that if you only 50% you arent doing well enough when most can only hope to ever see that level.
The main point is "consistent", try computing the Sharpe Ratio (or Sortino) on your periodical returns. Anything > 0.5 can be considered pretty good, anything > 1.5 is fantastic, I have never seen anything > 2.5 that is credible. The best I have ever seen (not mine, not even close), is around 250% annualized net return for 2 years (and counting), all verifiable at the clearing firm, and tracking sharpe ratio of around 1.7. There are literally investment banks calling him every day to put money with him, and this fellow just turns them all down. Unbelievable.
I want to achieve this once in my life. Thanks for the perspective. I am not trying to challenge the trading world, so please do not misunderstand me. I was once young and thought I could challenge God, But not now. Could you imagine turning down banks! What a dream. I just want one offer to prove myself and get my foot in the institutional door sheeesh... but anyways, perhaps I should own myself and just trade my own money and get my head out of this compulsion to be a part of the professional trading world. lol I don't have a degree, how could any bank worth anything with a well known name, explain me? I can't even figure out how to get Sortino in my spreadsheet... Michael B.
Vhehn---------- the 50% number is very relative, as I can say 50% of $10,000 in a year is very doable. Now 50% return with 25 million is a very different target. I agree that hitting 50% a year with an account size of 1 million plus would very well be in the top 1%. I guess I was surprised how they are actually out shopping for systems so actively to dump money in, and that 30/10 was the benchmark----------this gives me the impression what they currently have is a bunch of 15/10 systems right now.
Electric------------- my advice for you is to focus on your system and not the need to trade dollars for some institution. They are a rough crowd so be very apprehensive when dealing with a system you have developed trading their monies {or their clients monies}. If your system is good and can handle a large account size, like 1 million plus, then try to find a way to do it on your own {cta/cpo/hedge fund route} . If your system is robust the money will come to you with at least half a year proven track record. You could also team up with a hedge fund and get your cut of the profits as a part of the hedge fund for the use of your system or team up with a cta------------there is other options out there.
I'd think with ES's systems using forex, size would not be that much of an issue, even for a very large account. Perhaps if that number were large enough, he would not have to deal with the pseudo-market retail spot fx spreads and increase his returns even further. But generally the difference between 10k and 10mm is leagues apart, and this question is a serious issue to consider for any method or system development. With a long enough trading time frame applied to the deepest markets, certain strategies can compound continuously without any scalability issues within the first few decimal places -- think and plan way ahead, you future dyi money machines.