Goldman loses money on just one trading day in Q3.

http://www2.goldmansachs.com/s/prospectus/ProspectusSummary.html

 

This is true to a certain degree...

When a person wins the jackpot in the lottery it defies statistical probability...but when a person wins the jackpot in the lottery 9 times out of 10, the only logical conclusion is corruption.

 

So where do you draw the line? 4 out of ten? 6 out of ten? 8?

 

so why not jump on the bandwagon and buy GS.

 

Did you read the link, Pabst, to determine what they were referring to when they said "winning trades"?

 

There is no need to draw a definitive line. If I told you I won the lottery 1 time you'd say "you sure are lucky". If I told you I won the lottery 5 times you'd say "you sure are lucky, something smells rather fishy here". If I told you I won the lottery 9 times out of 10, you'd say "that's not possible - you cheated somehow".

 

I see nothing in the article referring to the data on a trade by trade basis.

 

can everyone please stop responding to Karl.....his mental health issues will cause this thread to extend to 100 pages, which I would rather not see.

 

Huh? So if the odds of a baseball player making $25mil in a year is 1 in 100 million I'd deduce A-Rod is "cheating" because he's made 20mil 10 consecutive years?

Or if a local in the bond pit goes several months in a row without a losing day he must be stealing?

The article makes some asinine statistical errors. If a dealer has an edge than his odds of making money are not 50% but rather higher. And if one has infinite flow than his odds are extremely favorable.
In other words if you have a 55/45 edge per trade but make just 1 trade a day than we'd expect you to make money 55% of sampled trading days. What if you have a 55/45 edge but make 10,000 trades a day? We'd then expect you'd make money virtually every day, eh?

So then answer me. How many losing days does Oanda have? Or Harrah's? Or a disciplined floor trader?

Comparing the profitability of a speculator or a gambler to a market maker or a casino is akin to comparing a 16 inch softball player to Albert Pujols. Other than everyone is swing a bat not much commonality....

 

I think we might be defining trading wrong.

GS makes ridiculous money creating products that they sell to the Fed and other idiots. that spread is massive

then they get FREE money from the Fed and can do the carry trade.

now, let's say they do sell 1,000 ES and lose.

I bet that ES trade doesn't eat up the other profits.

so, for the day, profitable.