Lucias, can you do me a favor? I want you to e-mail Don Bright. His brother is worth tens of millions. I've actually heard a bigger number, but let's go with ten of millions. This guy could drop a million in Vegas this weekend and not care. Now they have about 250 traders. Surely some of them are making money right? Ask Don why he doesn't pay any of his traders a salary. Ask him why he doesn't back any of his traders. I mean surely out of 250, he must have some stars right? They can afford to lose money. He and his brother have been in the business since the 70's. The 70's Lucias!!!!! Ask him in 40 years how many guys they backed. Make this your little homework project. And get back to me.
How do you get to 166 traders with $1m? Who will provide that leverage for you? In a BD account, someone has to put up the balance. In a customer account, PM or Reg-t, you can't do it. You need over $5m for that type of day trading in a PM account and not get a day trading call.
Mav They neve backed me.. asked many times... Don did come on here once and say about how many traders made 200k.. he had a few, if I recall.. Speaking of Bright, I guess I could go cheap route and pick a random person off street.. send em to a bright webinar or even the boot camp... that should guarantee me money, right?
That's my point. But how many do you think they actually have backed? In 40 years. Rhymes with smero.
Awesome thread. Thanks, real professionals for giving a business owner's perspective. I agree with EMG. Why cast pearls before swine? :eek: I think $50k would be a low price for all the instruction. It's all about higher education.......
One thing I could do to raise the probability of break even/profitability is to have add 2 conditions to my program.. 1. Profit split is 75/25 on the first 6k of profits 2. Trader can't withdraw profits until 12k of profits clear. 3. Trader must split first 6k profits after 12k clear. 4. Trader must maintain the remaining 6k until seperation. That 6k and any other profits are split at 50/50. What this means is that every trader who clears 12k essentially becomes a "risk free proposition". In this way, it is possible even to have a net losing percentage of traders and still make money.. if they ever hit the high water mark. So, it works like this.. I fund the trader at 6k, he clears 12k, I take my profits and put a break even stop on him. He still has 6k of risk and made a bit of money. I can now fund another trader for free or just pocket the profits. I could also set other mandatory split points, if required. That way I can keep making money even if the trader eventually fails...
Well to add my two cents here to all of this.... I actually do run a group but it operates differently from what Patak does and what Mav's is is proposing. I do not pimp my product here, as frankly this cast of characters is unworthy for the most part, but u can search my previous posts to see that I've made mention of it. That said, here's how my program works: I run a CTA and am an AP of an introducing broker. I do not charge any upfront fees for you to enter the evaluation phase. However, I do require you to open your account through my introducing broker. You can select any major brokerage you like as we have relationships with all of them. I disclose and am disclosing that I will be paid by the FCM commissions on your trades. It does not affect your commissions as it is the same as if you joined the FCM on your own. I realize traders have a real problem with this (especially that gmst guy) but what's the diff to him if I make mine and it comes out of the Fcm's pocket? I provide a service, deserve to be compensated, and am not asking the trader to ever pay me anything. Traders are required to open their own account thru me with a minimum of 5k. They can trade any style they like, any way they see fit. I provide trade evaluation software that will not only keep track of their results, but also offer a complete diagnostic of their trades based on the actual price action that took place during their trade and offers stats that will help maximize trade potential or correct screw ups. In fact, Patak almost ended up licensing the software, but they low balled the cost of the software and didn't want to pay fair value. In any event, the onus is on the trader to upload their trading results. The trader has the option to cherry pick their start date, however once they get started they must provide weekly results as long as they want to participate in the program. So what do the traders have to achieve? Just the best risk adjusted return possible. Low drawdowns, positive expectancy, consistency. That's it. However, like Mav's deal, the minimum evaluation period is 6 months, unless you want to provide recent previous 6 months of live trading results. What do u get in addition to the trade evaluation software? You get my and my traders live trading calls, educational support, and one on one mentor ship with a senior trader. We will help you with whatever it is u need, but ur time is limited by your trading volume. Therefore bigger traders get more attention. Oh and the occasional instructional live trading webinar for newbies. So here's how it typically goes: trader opens account and starts trading. Experienced traders go for it and newbies tread lightly trying to gather all of the free info they can. Experienced guys typically start their evaluations within 1 to 3 months. Upon submission of their activity they are told where they need to improve. Upon achieving that improvement, the trader is offered a deal usually around 6 months. Every deal is different based on the trading style. The trader is required to get the proper licenses (series 3 and 34 for Fx) and then they join the CTA. At that point, they are not required to put up any of their own money (like a first loss deal) and they trade a house account. They have a max position size, max dd, and max leverage that they have to adhere to. Risk management is stringent. Eff up and you wings get clipped. Do that too often, and you are out. Newbies usually stay in the program and trade, all the while allowing me to collect commission. When they are ready, they start the evaluation. What I have found: Most traders should not be backed or trading institutional money! Sorry gang, that is a fact. Even if you are profitable! Running institutional money is a game. It's not good enough to just be profitable, or to have low draw downs. You have to be the total package. Running this program for 2 years, we have exactly 3 traders out of 7 offers. Yes 2 traders turned us down because they didn't like the terms of the deal they were offered, and 2 went on to bigger better things just recently. Such is life. But I am damn happy with the 3 I do have and the previous 2 as their combined records as well as my own stuff has allowed me to receive more capital. This is how I run my business. I dont care if u dont like it. I dont care if you think its a scam. Please dont PM me as I won't respond (i use headhunters) The purpose of my response was not to shill but to demonstrate how real businesses operate. There are far too many delusional morons on this site who believe in everything for nothing and then have a problem with capitalism to boot. I applaud Patak for actually coming here to defend himself... I usually just tell people to eff off. Perhaps it's this new millennial generation who have this sense of entitlement, have no work ethic, and were told from the day they born that coming in behind 2 others in a three man race was third and not last. Mav's has been on this site for a long time and is old school. Shill or not, most of you would be lucky to still even be in the game for as long as he has. Rather than spending your time trying to debunk all the bs, learn to trade and rise above it. Or don't, I don't care.
Mav, are you offering to back the traders, or are they putting up first loss deposits? Do you care if they trade equites, options, futures, options on futures or FX?
That's a recipe for churn, which in turn is a recipe for success for anybody making coin on commissions.
I posted an idea that would offer an alternative to the TST model discussed on the other two threads. So this would involve intra-day only futures trading. No first loss. The backer would absorb all trading losses.