Hopefully this poll will show new traders what they are up against. Best to start out with small positions and discipline until confidence is built up.
The process of becoming a trader is a mental beat down, there are no quick ways. The time spent and money lost depends on how deeply engrained our belief is in traditional problem solving and our intellectual pride. It's a process of extracting poor thought patterns rather than the acquisition of discreet higher knowledge or secrets. The notion that losses or blowing up an account as a symbol of failure shouldnât make sense to us, itâs what traders go thru to become traders.
true in the beginning it is hard to even make a consistent living, but the real danger actually comes when you are consistently making, you think you have made it, you start buying stuff, paying mortgage build a new house,. buy a new car, ur living expenses increases...and then the market dries UP. you are not losing any, but you are not making any either. You will be whacked out of the game not by a sudden blow, but by attrition, by failure to pay your bills, this is another reality that is not talked abt that befalls many traders at the 3-5 yrs mark. you see, it is like crossing a derelict iron bridge with many holes over a grand canyon, even if one grand mistep dosent kill you, many small ones can and will, and it will not stop until you leave the game for good, i.e. you quit or simply DIE.
I'm kind of like the guy who had a job in the circus parade walking behind the elephants cleaning their poop off the streets. A friend told him he should quit and get a better job. He replied, "What???......and get out of show business. No way..." Stosh
inrespect to stosh's post, how many times does a tightrope walker fall to the net before making it across for the first time?
I have never blown up an equities account, but trying to day trade futures was another story. Blew up in 03, 05 and 06 before I finally cried uncle. My best success was early on, late 90's and early 2000. Made plenty of money swing trading equities. I was really ignorant of market realities. Now that I'm better educated in the markets, I do worse, naturally.:eek: I wish I could unlearn some of the things I know. Made it easier to just hold on, rather than jump the gun. All in all, I still have considerably more than when I started, so I won't bitch too much.
Wow. We have the two outliers running practically neck and neck. Statistically, we already know that the rate of failure is high in this field, especially among the newcomers. However, who would have thought there would be so many successful traders. Of course, this is a very small sample and I would be naive to construe the outcome as representative of the whole picture. Personally, I'm more interested in the middle selections. These present more clear picture of the traders who have been in this game for awhile. These traders have either blown up their account at one time or are struggling to keep their heads above water. On that note, I have a couple questions. For those who have since recovered your losses, are you now consistently eking out a profit month after month? And for those who are currently struggling, are you experiencing a wild fluctuations in your monthly statement (ie. up one month, down next) or are you marching ever closer to what you believe as a slow but painful death?