The dream is an illusion, at least the one he is thinking of. All trading offers is a chance to be your own boss and do something that is "fun" & full of motivation. It is still a REAL JOB when done full time. It is not a sinecure position, it requires a certain schedule mandated by the market you are trading. On top of that, you have to do outside preparation. While your passion & drive is there, it's great, because you love what you do and you do not feel like you are going to "work". But once you get burned out or simply get sick of the crap (it is quite repetitive, IMO), it starts to feel like just another job. The guy says he is sick and tired of work. Well then, look elsewhere, cause to even get to make profit trading full time is WORK. If you take it slow and part, at least you can keep a dependent income and allow yourself flexibility.
Hi Elit, I'm sick and tired of work! Show me someone who isnt? You share the dream of almost every other poor soul stuck in the rat race (myself included!).The easy life: lots of free time, no idiotic boss, no comute, long vacations, loads of money.. It sounds too good to be true and thats because it is. How many people do you know who do this full time? Sure we might meet people through the internet or read books, but I personally dont know even one, and i dont know anyone who knows a full time trader either. Successful arbs, scalpers & floor traders who make it past the learning curve can make something that resembles a steady income but speculative directional trading is a different matter. I made a tidy sum directional trading over the last 12 months, but i have to tell you its not a life most people would want to lead, it requires constant work on yourself, the temptation to break your rules is always there, it takes only one mistake to ruin months of work and it can take months to recover. The only way i can do it is because i have a full time job and a partner who checks everything i do. And it took me 5 years of hard work to get this stage. If you dont have a balanced life then the stress of full time trading might eventually kill you, but more likely youâll just give up sometime in your first year when your account has been decimated. Find an enjoyable (but probably not high paid) IT job and also trade, that way you get the best of both worlds! Maybe just maybe, one day your trading income will dwarf you job income, then you can think about it.. But until then its better to trade and have a career at the same time (it can be done).
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Thanks for all the answers! I highly appreciate all input! The answers are in general divided in A) the ones that says it can't be done, that it is impossible to be a successful trader and to keep my job and B) The ones saying to follow the dreams, but to always keep my feet touching the ground, not to float away to fantasy land. To give you some of my background. I live in Europe. In my country, going to university doesn't cost that much, there are no fees for attending university like in US. About 100$ a year for tuition. That's it. The government even pays you a monthly contribution for part of your rent and living expenses. So I didn't piss away my familys money or anything like that, like was pointed out. I've been working part time to earn my living while studying. I'm a M.sc. Economics with IT as major. I've been interested in the financial markets for about 5 years. I've been looking into trading/investing, reading and learning for about 2 years. I've been papertrading off and on for maybe 1 year. I have my system that I think is producing some nice results. What I need to do now is to test it live for some time to see if the results are similar to my backtesting/papertrading. I have also been dreaming of owning my own business for some time now. I have a lot of business ideas that I believe could be lucrative. Some of them are in finance som of them in IT other not related in anyway to my knowledge. My country is pretty positive to new entrepreneurs. (except taxes sigh!). Again you can receive aid from the government. They sometimes even go surety for you in bankloans. My degree gives me some "authority", and for example banks could give me loans more easily and so on. The degree makes a great base to build upon. The world is filled with entrepreneurs. I think I have just a good a chance to make it like anybody else, sometimes even better chance due to my degree and so on. Maybe my dreams are just an illusion, like someone pointed out. Maybe they are, but i don't think they are that unrealistic after all. I feel some of the answers in this thread sounds like bitterness or maybe even jealousy. For this I am sorry. I didn't mean to stir up any bad feelings in you. I also get the feeling there are no successful traders in here that don't have a regular work. Or they don't want to share any of their experience. This surprises me. I guess this is no forum for entrepreneurs either, but I would guess that some are and maybe trade at the same time. After some years owning your own business if it is successful should give you more spare time that you can use to trade. I would hope so.
elit I'm from Europe as well (Belgium). And we have a big edge over our working/part time trader colleagues from the US: We are able to trade in the evening. I myself skip the morning session and lunchtime. I trade from 19h till 22.15h. (That's 13h - 16.15h RTH). My situation is a bit different. I have a wife and kid, a loan to pay and I also spend (to much) money on weekends. I'm not able to go from a decent paycheck (I'm in IT as well) to "nothing". The steps I would take are: First, trade small lots and prove to yourself that you are profitable trading parttime, while keeping your fulltime job. Take at least six months for this. Start a savingsaccount to live by when you start filltime trading. Don't use all your savings to trade. Second, look for a parttime job or take some time of at work to trade fulltime. A few months at least. Make sure you are profitable. Third, when deciding to go fulltime and quiting your job, make sure you have enough money for a year of trading and to live. (Like 50k$ for living and 100k$ to trade). Try fulltime trading for a year. If it doesn't work for you, go back to a job (no shame in that). Remember, now you are a "lone wolf" but in 2 years you can have a wife, 3 kids and a house (which the bank owns) that you need to support. Most important IMO is to trade real (scared?) money for a few months so you know it's working. Don't go from papertrading to fulltime real trading. Emotions are a lot different (harder to control) when trading for real.
I trade fulltime w/ some moderate success. It can be done, but it takes total commitment. Dont let people tell you that its a waste of time, that you're better off doing something else. If trading is something that you are very passionate about, you should go for it. Just make sure you can afford to live w/o any income for a year. You have to be realistic when approaching the markets. Good luck to you. You have a good, positive attitude which is a great start.
Great insights, rverheyen! This seems to be the best way to do it without risking to fail too much, for sure. Thanks Steve!
Ok first, having the same chance to make it as everyone else is no good, since only a small minority make it. And your degree is absolutely useless when it comes to trading by yourself (although certain degrees might help for being a quant at a bank etc). As for full-time traders, since I graduated I have had only 1 job, which I left after a year. Ever since then, my only source of income has been trading. So yeah, it's definitely possible. But in my case, and that of most other traders I know, you have ups and downs along the way, it's much more demanding than normal employment. You have to constantly be searching for new edges in case your old ones go away. As markets change, you get periodic tough periods when your old methods make less or even lose money - it's possible to adapt, but it takes a lot of damn hard work and inner conviction that this is your true calling. Otherwise how are you going to get the motivation to keep working 12 hours a day researching for a new edge, even if you are flat or somewhat down on the year? I just got the feeling from your post that you were taking things a bit lightly, and underestimating the commitment needed, and the potential problems and downsides. Yes, it is possible to make it. But it's not an easy achievement by any means. You owe it to yourself to really research the subject as thoroughly as possible before taking the plunge. But if after considering everything, you are still totally committed to becoming a successful trader, then you simply have to plunge in and go for it. It's better to start now than wait for years, or even never try at all. Just make sure that if you do fail, it was after honestly doing everything in your power to succeed. Don't you dare come back in one year and tell us how you blew your stops and doubled down, or risked everything on one huge position which blew up in your face, ok? Anyway, good luck!
Cutten, I agree totally to your post. I just want to clarify that when I talked about my degree I wasn't talking about trading, but talking about starting a company. Where my degree definately would open some doors easier than without the degree. Anyway, I don't take this lightly. I might underestimate it a bit, but in no way am I underestimating that merely by denying facts. As I have no experience I obviously might underestimate it because I don't know what is coming. You always forget some details and so on, that you then notice at the moment the appear. That is why i started this thread, to find out if my picture of doing this correlates to reality. That's where you come in, you who have done this. And you who have lived the dream of mine. I'd rather know all the facts before i plunge in, than to find out everything on my own. Thanks!
Disagree. If you have an aptitude for statistics, and like making decisions, you can succeed in trading but maybe not another business.