Yea, hardly any guarantees in life except a guarantee to be poor if don't have courage to take some risks in order to become wealthy.
A great year to be a daytrader 2013 "Wall Street has rallied without a significant correction since the start of the year, pushing major indexes to all-time records and sending the S&P 500 up almost 16 percent for 2013 so far." 75% of all SP 500 stocks are up at least 10% wow this is a great year too be a daytrader. HELL YES
What you believe you have learned will be obsolete within 18 months-- what you are missing is markets are constantly changing, anyone who tells you differently is lying to you. Your edge now, will not exist soon-- therefore, having the dark pool access, routing advantages and other perks of prop will keep you on the cutting edge of the market where you can make money. And I am sorry, I simply don't believe there is edge by just looking at charts. surf
Nope. Know why? Because I trade basically the same way since early 2008. And things didn't get worse a bit. Only what changes is volatility, the rest of market behavior is not much different or at least doesn't affect my style. Probably because I evolve with the market being in the market every day. I believe HFT and other things could affect scalpers which are in the same niche, but general intra-day swings are still as normal as they were 5-10-15 years ago. And guess will stay for at least some time more.
lots of stuff from the article: <b><blockquote> on a slow day like this, they may unintentionally find themselves all trying to buy up the same 3,000 shares of a $3 stock.</blockquote></b> and that's why i don't teach my *specific* strategies and pitfalls - even if 90% of people using it fail with it, if enough other people start using it, i either can't get the size i want or i have slippage. yes, even on the huge stocks. i deal with, but don't like, either. <b><blockquote>Wall Street banks and hedge funds claim to do, but in reality gave up when they came to rely of (sic) computerized risk-management systems.</blockquote></b> yes, it's computerized, but there's people looking at the stuff input, and tweaking things based off their interpretations. and that's all after the initial computer system is programmed (in house) or set up to their parameters (bought from 3rd party vendor). two firms can have identical portfolios and different risk results. also, unfortunately, stress tests assume the same level of normal liquidity, and that's just not the case. on a crash, the buyers dry up and disappear... <b><blockquote>second Dylan in the office, who at 23 is the youngest of the crew, a recent graduate of Grinnell College where he was the leading three-point shooter on the basketball team</blockquote></b> probably dylan seelman. grinnell is basically a run, gun and press team, like loyola. paul westhead's system. <b><blockquote>WB spikes up sharply (thatâs Whistler Blackholm Holdings, the ski resort owner whose shares trade on the Toronto exchange.) Dylan shorts 2,400 shares and within minutes it begins to fall again. He takes his profit on 600 shares, earning $768.</blockquote></b> there's something wrong about this. over the past 6 months, there has been *1* day with a 1 point range. and it didn't fall back that point by end of day. if you had 2400 shares = $768 profit, that's possible (and i think likely based on early may trading), but that doesn't look like enough reward for that risk...and it's definitely not scalable on that kind of stock. again, that strategy might work for 1, or 10 people - but if you're doing it for 50 or 100, it's a dead strategy unless you've got the quickest fingers. i wouldn't have made the trade in an office because if it doesn't work, you've got too many people trying to get out of the same trade as you, and you're likely to toptick your cover. <b><blockquote> most of the profits any of the traders is likely to make in a year will be on four or five big days. On slow days like this, the bigger challenge is to sit there and do a few small trades or nothing at all</blockquote></b> true dat. once i cut back on my overtrading and stopped forcing trades, the "L" portion dropped substantially. <b><blockquote>his profit and loss balance for the day is actually negative because of a large position he took weeks before in a biofuels company that had recently gone public and was trading down more than 75 percent</blockquote></b> the article (correctly, yeah!) notes that it is a "rare longer-term investment", but the daytrading P/L should be separate from 'investment". unless the investment is a failed daytrade - in which case, that investment should be eliminated IMMEDIATELY. <b><blockquote> Despite having a bank account bigger than the 401(k)s of most 50-somethings, Chris just bought his first car last December â a black Cadillac CTS. Dylan motors around West Palm in a blue 2003 Jaguar sedan with 100,000 miles on it that he bought for $7,000 in poker-winnings when he still had no paycheck</blockquote></b> that's promising. you've got a startup business, you don't invest profits outside of the startup. <b><blockquote> <quote>âI can see even now that you can get burned out after doing it for five, 10 years. There are nights you canât sleep because youâre so exposed</blockquote></b> i know a bunch of people who were successful (non-equity) traders for firms, and left after a number of years (in their 40s, i believe) because the hours, demands, stress, etc. were getting to be too much. it's not just individual equity traders. there's a quote somewhere about not being able to sleep, and reducing exposure to the point you can sleep. that's true. i also heard someone say something like "it's not your position, it's the size of your position". if you put on 100 shares of MSFT and are wrong, it's fine. if you put on 8,000 on PETX (illiquid) you better be dead right on direction AND entry. but once i got my discipline down and had a few strategies that worked, i've had practically no stress. i've gone to the doctor and when they find out what i do, ask how my stress is...i say "virtually none", because i have strategies that work, have worked for years and years, these are unlikely to change because they're not based on gaming a loophole which is likely to be plugged or discovered. i get time with my family, friends, no commute, people interaction when i want, and enjoy what i do. i do fine financially, and have turned down making it a fund or having money raised for me) because that immediately changes my comfort of life. trading isn't for everyone - or even most people - but it works real well for me. oh, please don't feed the troll! 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