perhaps if gary smith would raise the stakes from $500.00 to $50,000.00 he may generate more interest in the assinine contest. NO ONE who is succesful would have any interest in divulging anything for $500.00. what a LOSER ! best, surfer
Kicking.... I assume that you were referring to me in your last post (at least in general)... What you don't seem to note is that I agree with your premise. And we don't simply "trade in and out" daily...we do much longer term trading with excellent results as well. Glad to see you're making some good money, and with consistency! No anger here.... I hope you "wrangle out" those that make claims that are not valid. And, yeah, I gotta agree, who's gonna bother with any of this for a lousy $500 bucks....LOL Don
Some thoughts - On 3 years of profitable record. There are BIG speculators (or gamblers) who could keep averaging down all the way to a bottom and then hang on to the position. Then they hold it through new highs after new highs before unloading. The records of these people look so bad and they win it all. Case in point, Warren Buffet was having a 50% drawdown during the internet bubble. If he started out only from the few years right before his crashing draw down period ... he would have been cleaned house But, there are also hedge funds with amazing track records year after year which blew up overnight. Cases in point, Long Term Capital and Victor Neiderhoffer. So it is very hard to justify whether a fund or a person can, or, will perform in the future, even equipped with a long term track record. The reason is pretty simple but often ignored - the markets we are dealing with keep changing everyday. The competition we faced yesterday are mostly gone (90% failure in 1st 3-months of index future trading). And newcomers are more likely to be better equipped in terms of knowledge (acquired from the internet and books ) and tools (better technology, cheaper execution cost, etc.). It is not the ability to extract the most amount of money from the markets you have traded that allow you to survive your next big draw down, it is your ability to swallow your ego and understand that what you know at this point in time may not be applicable tomorrow and you have the capability, confidence, and most important of all, patience, to figure out what will work tomorrow. That, work against undercapitalized accounts. There is a parallel of the changing environment of the markets - blackjack in Las Vegas. It used to be 4 decks of cards, then 6 decks, now some casinos using 8 decks. And rules are changing too. From pre-fixed point to scramble the cards, to the current shuffle every hand if needed. If you are a pro blackjack player, you must modify your style to adapt as your edge has changed. I have seen enough hot shots during my career in this trading field from floor traders (I was one), to hedge funds (I worked for one), to self-educated independent traders who can survive and making good money for a few years and then just disappeared. So beginner beware!
There are over 21000 members on this site. Probably 19,500 of them are losers at any given time. You have to keep that in mind whenever you read threads like this. Traders that are making money aren't going to start a thread about how they make $5K a day and how they want to prove it to you. If they do, they are probably trying to market something to you for _their_ benefit, not yours. I happen to be a profitable trader (knock on wood.) I have been more profitable in the past, and less profitable, but I am always up at the end of the year enough to pay bills. Some years I have done this in equities, some months in stock index futures, this year options will provide a large portion of the food on my table, along with equities. Futures are by far the hardest game I have ever played, but I am always researching looking for an edge in all trading markets, and I do not discount going back to trading the ES or NQ or YM or ZN or ZB or whatever. I know of several groups that make fortunes trading stock index futures and have done so consistently for many years. Although I do not know _exactly_ what they do, I know enough to know that 99% of the people on this site would be incapable of it. I also know that they are constantly researching for an edge, as they have lived through seeing their strategies live and die. Everything has a shelf life... The challenge posted is absurd. It was clearly made by a piker. The people that are making money trading these markets are making $10,000 - $50,000 a day. What on Heaven or Earth would cause them to go after a $500 "prize?" nitro
Hold on a minute its Gary Smith that is saying that the Average Joe can not make it as a trader with $25k. LOL this guy wrote a book on it called Living the Dream.... Hello So you guys that are defending him need to take a look at the irony of that and realize the stupidity in it. Don Brights point is well taken and his experience and knowledge are blatantly obvious to anyone with any true history in this business. His point is that this job is constantly changing and adaptability is a very key part of extended consistent success some can and some can't. It is really only the later that get cynical and thats the category that I but Gary into.... at the moment. As for a lifetime of trading well ..... I started in the "Industry" when I was 20 and now I'm 40 so how about a half a lifetime.
Don, No I really wasn't refering to you but to all the guys who generally populate the daytrading journal threads. Samson, I just don't think you read the book.
"Living the dream by profitably daytrading stock index futures" I'm looking at it right now on my bookshelf !!! Don't get me wrong it was a decent book BUT very biased to a strong bull market and it lacked depth for other market conditions. IMHO So if this is the same Gary Smith it wouldn't surprise me that he has fallen on hard times, that's all and if so thats to bad but he shouldn't be raining on everybody else's parade. We need to encourage and help each other as much as possible this is a hard business let's not make it any harder than it already is.
This is an interesting statement coming from someone who is, from what I gather, respected in the industry. If I was starting out trying to daytrade index futures, this statement might discourage me. I hope that any newbies that read anything on this website, from any person, takes it all with a grain of salt. What is gold to one man is the next man's garbage can apply in many aspects of life and certainly in trading as well.