My point exactly. Risk is the hardest to master and something every trader has to master before becoming successful. However, most people grow up avoiding risk. We tend to take the path of least resistance. In America today, we can do this and get away with it most of the time. In trading we cannot. Between greed and fear, fear is the driving force. Why - people are not trained to handle risk. It is the single most important reason traders fail, IMO.
cafeole, I respect what you are saying, but i still disagree. Traders fail because they have do not take the time out of like to studying how to trade. Risk has nothing to do with nothing. We ALREADY know each trade will require a risk (stop loss). This is a no brainer. Traders fail because they risk money before learning how to trade. Risk you say? Well,..., risk what?, risk where, when to risk, how much to risk, why I am risking, how do I know risking X will work, what if I risk this or that, but last trade I risk this, damit if only i had risk this I would have made money?, next trade i will risk this?, oooohhh shit?, I risk this much this time and it work, I will risk this much every time I trade,..., ohhhh shit, why is not working, like y trades ago. Do you see my point now. All those questions marks are solved when a trader knows how to trade and their trading is verified over time. And all that comes with good and quality experienced training. Risk has nothing to do with it.
We will just have to disagree. I believe that you can know everything there is to know about trading and disregard risk you will fail. I believe it is the absolute most important thing to learn about trading there is. I took a course from a successful trader who said (paraphrasing) "You can take any trade at any time, long or short, and be successful IF you use the proper risk management". I believe that. The topic of this thread "is trading really that hard". I say yes, and I say it is because people are trained in life to avoid risk at all cost.
No one can trade with 100% wins. most trades have a 65-35 probability or even 60-40 %. So if you don't master risk, you will lose the edge that keeps you green. Once you manage risk then you will manage greed too. I also am in the same school that says risk management is most important trait of a successful trader. Your points about having a good trading plan or strategy is also relevant but most successful trader have a risk or mental stop loss even before they get into trade.
BTW, I am not trying to win an argument. Most people do not work hard enough to be successful at trading. I agree. But I think it is more than that. We fear the risk more than we want the profit, IMO. That is partially because of survival instincts, partly learned.
That question has thousands (millions maybe) of different answers which are all correct. A lot of parameters influence the grade of difficulty to become a trader. Some of these parameters: intraday or not scalper or not swingtrader or not the level of control over emotions level of education how motivated analytical skills did you have luck or not and to what degree how many years of experience did you get help or not and to what degree able to study trading fulltime or still having a job have financial responsabilities (wife, children) amount of money you have to start with ... For all of these parameters there are at least two but many times several different answers possible. Each different combination will give another type of trader with another answer to the question of OP. I think there are not two different traders that make the identical traject, so their answers will not be identical too.
Right on and you might find that the work is so remunerative that you love it. Then you take it to where it truly shines as a job. ....... log time spent for all analysis, learning, improving, testing, then compute hourly return each month after estimated Taxes. For long duration trades the stoploss at the time of computation is the number to use. Your bare acceptable minimum wage for this godsend job should be no less than $1,500/hr. Once done for months in a row, shoot for raising the floor to 3k/hr ...... then it becomes Rapture. Try it. Keep raising the bar by 20% increments till a brick wall is reached. That becomes your plateau to bust out of over the course of the next 2 years or so. Love with skill & experience has No boundary that cannot be exceeded. Next time you go to McDonald's you will appreciate the sheer agony of the cashier you order with - make her day and drop a $50 tip. Tips will become your main expense. Rewards for being a high tipper? You don't need more than 4 hours sleep/nite and your trade win/loss ratio stays above 85%. . God guarantees it!
The really hard work in a project should be done before it starts. That's when you should bring in the back-up teams and run the over-time total up and develop and resource your Plan B too. Usually in the projects I got involved in, you could only get a bump in resources of you had 3 days to go and the job was 6 days behind. Grrrr. But ark's case was a good one. There is so much blind faith in hard work......