forget elitetraders. There are literally thousands of CTA’s and startup hedge funds that boast profitable strategies. Yet virtually none of them get funded.
This is very untrue (I wish it were the case). Marketing yourself is far more important in raising capital than an actual strategy. @Same Lazy Element made a really good post on what a hedge fund is looking for in terms of investing in a start up/strategy. Many retail startups think "I only need to have a track record" - I had that mentality as well. It is much more than that unfortunately. Something else I have realized and am struggling with is - to work at a firm or not. Many of us half decent retail traders might think "lets just raise a bunch of money". What about your learning curve? Working for yourself may cripple us in the long run. IMO it is probably best working for someone who is much smarter than us (learning downstream). This will pay off much more in the long run. If I didn't have access to a good pipeline of traders, I would be sending my application to every IB, HF instead of "trying to raise capital".
Not true. yes, there are 1000s of CTAs, but many can not even clearly explain what they really do in DDoc, have shitty performance, short track record and etc.