say 35% but having to stayed glued to the quote machine al lday. Say you are a day trader. you can make what 6% per month but you have to watch the quote machine all day....what a life :-( Wouldn't it be better to auto trade even if it means taking a 50% pay cut? Does anyone actually enjot watching the quotes go up and down all day? What a terrible life. Not for me.
IMHO, to be a good day trader, it requieres more than the urge for money. You have got to love what you do! Making money of it becomes second hand. The better you become, the more fun you have. The feeling of mastering the market I am not saying I am there. But I love staring at the chart all day long, every single day. At sunday night, I can barely wait for the markets to open again!
I prefer trading with automated systems so I can remove emotion from it, and just trade what "I see", ie what I told the system to "see". I still want to be involved. Sure I may sleep in or go get lunch and leave the system to trade, but for the most part, I am not far from the system at any given time during market hours. Not so I can adjust it, but because I _want to be_. If you don't enjoy the fundamentals of trading... quotes, charts, the thrill of taking money out of the market because you made the right decisions... etc etc -- then I would suggest you get out now. If you are making money trading and you still don't enjoy what you do, something is not right. Trading is one of the most coveted jobs of all.
i hear you. manual trading doesn't pay off the time, stress and frustration of being there all day long entertaining worthless blinking numbers and non-sense pseudo chart patterns. however, a professional automated system will beat any manual day trader hands down. so your suggestion that you'd settle for less in exchange for automation is totally off base.
OK what I am saying is much better to work ON YOUR BIZZ than work in it. Get it? Staring at the quote machine al lday long to make a few (maybe afew thousand) isn't the smartest thing to do. Better get an auto method and conentrate time and effort elsewhere. I.M.H.O. 80% of the time even for day traders you are actually monitoring. It's hardly a good use of time is it? Work ON your bizz...not in it! Anyone who loves watching the quote machine all day..... I don't know how you do it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Guest? Who's a guest, where? I don't get what? Are you drinking? ----------------------------------------------------------------------- My guest is, you don't get it.
I maintain the very best traders wil lbeat asystem. Even by a ,lnog shot. BUT, what I am saying is it's not worth it for 99.99% of us to do this. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Super trader makes 7% per month: Ties to quotes al lday, 12 hours a day, stressed, no time away from the computer, great days, losing days. What if he's ill? Holidays, etc..Unhealthy obesession, no interaction, System makes 3% per month: Take all of the above (apart from losing days) away. I'd rather go with the system. I have a life away from the markets.
Automated systems are usually derived from human observations of price action, etc that are hand tradable. Edges come and go so your automated system that works today may not work next year. I'd argue you need to keep your hand in so you can come up with new automatable systems when your current one(s) lose their edge.
A successful autotrading system would be the Holy Grail. Just turn on the computer in the morning, go play golf, then come home pick up the money take it to the bank.. Voila! I suspect few ever achieve it. And even for those who do, their success is likely not durable. I'd like to hear stories of success in this arena, however...
For someone who has been around a while, I would think that your opinions would be slightly more informed. Obviously what you fantasize does not exist in terms of "easy money", but, long term success and durability with automated trading certainly does exist. Anything you can imagine can be programmed. Your skill set can be translated, step by step into an automated system. You might chose to argue this point, but, you'd be wasting your time, we are all algorithms in one form or another. Second, if your "edge" isn't durable, then you never had an edge in the first place. You were just lucky. Edges exist that work on all products ALL THE TIME throughout history. These edges exploit fundamental market behavior that repeats perpetually. Again, and I can't stress this enough, automated systems require discipline. One still takes significant losses from time to time and all the other factors like data issues, random news events etc. make things interesting on a daily basis. What you seem to forget is that trading an ATS is not "hands off" in many aspects. A skilled and experienced trader is always behind any good system.