I like the suggestion that a trader must make 100% on his or her account every year to be successful. So if I have $1 million to trade, I should be a billionaire within 10 years, or else I am not a very good trader. Now I just have to make that first million.
i think it's questions like these that fail a trader. a lot of people are attracted to the market because of it unlimited earning potential. the keyword is potential. how much you earn is up to how skilled you are as a trader, and how comfortable you are to trade for a living. what does it matter if ppl say how much you should earn? they say you can earn 20k/yr per contract, what if you have a strategy that make much more than that? what if you have a strategy that earn less but you're more comfortable trading it? ppl asking too much for external advice without looking inside to see what's good for them and them only. and trading is one of the professions that you have to look inside to be really good at it. ahh, but what do i know jmi
Your thinking seems to parallel mine. But I think one reason some people want to make more and more $$$ is perhaps power and all the "stuff" it can buy. For me, I have what I need and am happy with that so I trade accordingly. I do have daily (weekly/yearly) income objectives. But rather than trading more aggressively or longer hours each day to make more $$$ I try to enjoy the other aspects of life (volunteering, exercising, for example). At the end of my life I'd rather have explored other avenues and interests than have a zillion dollars in the bank.
You will earn as much as your mind will allow you. Interesting point. To allow for acceleration, thinking in points rather than dollars help achieve this freedom. This is not limited to more and more dollars as one can "start over". I have "started over" 3 times in trading. This last time has been my longest survival. Michael B.
When self-worth equals net worth, there is never enough. At the same time, one's "modest" goals may be another's gluttony, and vice-versa. Hence, specifying a number that defines a "good" trader strikes me as a somewhat meaningless exercise.
A nice statement. Is there anyone here who can name a real number x so that he would like his own self worth to be exactly x dollars?
Thanks for the explanation. It still would be possible to calculate a % return on total assets in this situation, however it would be too difficult to be practical, given that the total assets employed each day would be different. Another alternative would be to measure the % return on total assets used by the prop trader on plain vanilla directional trades, i.e. not those that require large buying power, such as on open orders and arbitrage. This probably would be too difficult to measure as well, but maybe easier than the measure in the preceding paragraph.
Amazing! Not only would you want your self worth to consist only of money, but you also choose a mediocre amount. Do you realize what you said is 100 million, not 100 billion?