Now why would a successful trader have so much venom for such a simple question? Hmmmmm.. As for those claiming its easy...... Yes, I believe you..... Igor, bring the next flask with my newest experiment. Thats not Igor, thats a scalper who thinks its easy.
Hey Longhorns, my friend. Remember this one you were pumping at 8? I was saying it was a scam, but you disagreed. Yes, those were the good old days. Have a good one buddy!
I don't know why I'm doing this, as this thread is a waste of time and I feel no need for vindication of my trading style, but I'm going to give you a serious response although you don't deserve it. Scalping is an art form. To deny that people make money scalping is to to be ignorant of tangible evidence in the form of successful scalpers who make a lot of money daily. To suggest that computer programs are somehow making scalping more difficult shows to me a complete and utter lack of understanding of scalping; speed is a huge part of scalping, but it's not just a speed game - without market feel, logic, and real time pattern recognition of the sort that only a human mind can can create, the full art of scalping cannot be mastered. A computer can be programmed to scalp a certain very algorithmic and repetitive setup, I'm sure, and in the most black-and-white high probability setups the computer can beat the human in terms of getting the order in (which doesn't mean the human can't also get stock off). However, I know of very few black and white setups that can easily be programmed... (only one that has enough consistentcy and lack of variance that a computer program can repeat it)... A lot of scalping is market feel. OMX today, for example, kept coming in with stepping buyers, who would get taken out. But they would come back and the stock would go up. The time to buy for the scalp was after the bids got taken out and the stock fell 10-15 cents; then, when a bid would come back 5-10 cents higher than it originally was at when it got taken out, and if you offered 5-10 cents in front of it, you got taken out for a quick 30 cent profit. A computer's speed advantage doesn't exist when I'm putting in a bid 15 cents below a 10,000 share bid anticipating it getting taken out and then coming back; furthermore, I have better judgement than computer ever can for when it's a good idea to do what I just described and when not. Sometimes when bids step up, it's good to buy the offers in front of them and lean on the size; sometimes (a lot of the time, actually) it's not. I'm more than smart enough and familiar enough with algorithmic trading to devise a decision making branch that explains all the variables that go into my decision making as to when it's appropriate to buy in front of stepping bids and when it's not; I don't even try to bother, because I know that until a computer can be programmed to figure out how a particular buyer in a particular stock is working a particular order on a particular day, it will never be as good as I can be. Also, on top of that, you're acting as though black boxes are machines at war with human traders; they're just algorithms written by traders - some are good, some aren't. There are black boxes which compete with me in certain setups I take, and will beat me in getting orders filled; however, there are also a lot of really dumb boxes. There are so many add-liquidity boxes which have no concept of when it's a good idea to add liquidity and when not to which frequently are there to get me out of stock at a much more favorable price than any human ever would. Those add liquidity box programmers need to learn about the concept of intraday mean-reversion. A lot of boxes are turned on every day, and a lot are turned off. Just as the good ones take away some money from us scalpers, the bad ones give money back. And in my professional opinion, there are more bad boxes than good boxes out there.
Nice of you to reply with at least a semblance of logic. I'm well aware of the mechanics of scalping, but talk is cheap. Many claim to be able to out trade the boxes, but proof is hard to come by. Sitting below the bid, waiting for a flush, well, sometimes it works , and sometimes you carry the bag. If its working for you , wonderful.
Are you sure this is true? I know the hybrid washed out some scalpers, but did you know any scalpers 2 years ago? If you knew 10, I'd guess at least 3-4 are still doing it successfully... and new ones come around all the time... Exactly. Sometimes you carry the bag; I don't see how a box can differenciate between when it'll work and when it won't as well as I can, because the algorithm for that judgement would have to be sophisticated to the point of being eerily AI like, which I'll bet most boxes aren't. That's a setup I don't usually take, but if I see it working in a certain circumstance I might involve myself; that's the beauty of not being a machine, I can constantly adapt and see what setups are working and trade them until they stop working. A computer can't do this. ---- Why are you so convinced that scalping is impossible? Do you not believe that many of the machines are really fucking stupid and make the life of a scalper easier?
Scalping has definitely got harder as the years have gone by,the 'computer scalpers' are a real nuisance,yeah they get it wrong but because they are relentless and don't lose confidence when they do a crap trade as they have no concept of money they just don't seem to leave it alone. But is it all the 'computer's' fault,I reckon there's so many people now going for the same obvious trades(these stock markets seem a bit high,bunds look cheap etc etc) that everyone screws each other up.
Dunno, I think many of the responses were seriously immature, only now are we getting discussion. I think I hit a nerve, which is not the same as antagonizing. If you have no sense of humor, I suggest trading is not the business to be in.