I agree with that 150%... and one needs to define the term, "trade for a living" to some standard of measure... The median annual income is $30+K as profiled here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_household_income So with that as some sort of basis to work from, it would take +300 cents CL or +240 pips 6E or +300 pips EURUSD, GBPUSD (etc) or +30 index points TF or +60 points ES monthly to make +$3,000 calendar month gross, before all trade costs involved. That is pure math on its face. Of those choices above, I'd rate ES as (by far) most difficult to accomplish due to its congestive, choppy nature and then CL due to its wildness nature. The ES offers least potential price range opportunity, CL offers ample potential opportunity but frequently blows thru stops for slippage AND blows away from targeted entry-point fills (on winners) without ability to execute. Remaining symbols are a matter of personal choice. They all have their own bad-hair days and warts. TF offers the greatest reward/risk parameters in price movement for all eminis. 6E is much more methodical than CL, albeit more muted too. FX pairs are perfectly fine with any reputable FX broker... no broker-dealer trades against anyone's 1-lot or even 2-lot to 5-lot FX positions. FX brokers with dealer desks trade against their collective book positions, blended. They cannot trade against thousands of open positions individually... nor would they need to. Trading against the collective sum of all open positiions is the same end result. So any individual FX spot trader with a couple of contracts on thru reputable brokers only needs to worry about overall markets and news events... no one is hunting individual stops. All that said, I don't know why anyone would need to try and make a living with one contract of anything. If you're profitable with one, then two or three or five of whatever is no further stretch to accomplish.
Well, I don't know if Twitter was done, but the trades I made today didn't show. Kind of disappointing.
guys in the market wizard. I am a true follower and fan about Martin Schwartz. I read his book 'pit bull' over and over. martin schwartz is a true success. since lots of his trading strategies I used day in and day out, and I found them pretty profitable. the first option trade he did after he quit his job is averaging down, he down 3k+, he hold on and gained 8k+. I did those kind of things too. he shorted a strong breakout in election till a lock limit up, lost almost 1millions. I do. I shorted crude when it broke through 100, and it soared to 114+, I do, I aveage down, it paid me out finally. his so called Magic-t, never saw its usage, this guy have some preservation to make you confused, I believe his magic-t never works. but his EMA, green light and red light concept, I do use it frequently. most successful traders use ordinary strategies (fading, bottom picking, trend following, top picking....), successful traders use ordinary stragtegies, not fancy ones. or try to build a system. when i trade option, just buy. no more other strategies. just like Martin. whe butterfly, why horizental spread...? warren buffet is a good example: buy and hold. what elese? those who claim they have magic trading ideas or systems are failures. of course, another side are success. pretty simple answer.
in one chapter, he wrote: he scaled in S&P 500, and the market did not move up, he felt pressed, he danced and shouted " I am LONG...". obviously he was trying to pick a bottom. what is wrong about bottom picking? very profitable! bottom picking is kind of fading strategies. use it wisely, money will keep printing! if you believe those MACD divergence will tell something, or those EMAs or Oscillators or oversold/overbought indicators... then you are asking TIPS. use TIPS to do trade, of course failures. use your own judgement. we all have those capibilities, why not use them
I post live calls in my journal every time I enter/close a position. I was profitable in 2011. But I'm not day trading so that probably doesn't count for what you're talking about in this thread.