As the OP of this thread, I will defend Sig (partially). First the bad: Sig did make incorrect assumptions, come across a bit preachy, and avoid answering the original question, but, but, BUT!!! Sig did provide some information that I was not aware of: some leveraged ETFs have not historically decayed. (I will admit, I still do not completely understand why). I am willing to take the good with the bad. At the end of the day, this message board doesn't pay the contributors. Sometimes, a little hubris, leads to some very worthy contribution. So, I say, thank you, Sig. Hopefully we can all have a great night and wake up well rested for profitable trading tomorrow.
After consideration of your post I’m going to say thank you, I appreciate you pointing this out. I live in a world where vigorous exchange of ideas is the key to success. Not only do I welcome someone telling me when I’m going down the wrong path, I’d be pissed if they didn’t and upset if they weren’t completely upfront, clear, and in your face about it. I’m also a golden rule/categorical imperative type of person who tries to act like I’d like others to act around me. The breakdown happens when you lose sight of the fact that not everyone wants others to act the same way I’d want them to act. It appears I’m guilty of that here. Looking at this post in particular, I certainly could have spun a story about the 10 or 15 hours I put into researching and back testing this idea, excited that I had a virtually risk free way to make money off inefficiency, only to find out that I didn’t understand how daily rebalancing works, then when I figured that out only find out that they didn’t really decay like I thought they would. And emphasize that I was conveying this information only to prevent others from having to retrace my path, or at least giving them a leg up while they did retrace it. Again, thank you for your feedback.