Have you made a decision on this yet? I'm in a similar situation. Coming from banking and trying to decide whether to stay or go. Also have an ETF trading offer (I think we're talking about the same firm). What do you think about this?
Arnie, what's wrong with this time window? If I can't make solid progress within a year's time then it's time to move on. Are you suggesting that it will definitely take longer? Or that it's much faster than that? I'm curious. I went with the daytrading firm. FNYS is far from desparate to hire new traders and I'm not patient enough to wait for these guys to take a serious look at me. I tried aggressive tactics, but I'm sure they get those on a regular basis. They've seen most of what I have to offer and are taking their sweet time, so I have to move forward. Besides, I'm excited about the daytrading and I think the recent return to a more "normal" level of vol will only help accelerate my learning curve. Better to learn in this market than the low risk low vol environment we're emerging from. I scrapped the ETF idea because I'd be constrained to trading ETF's on the floor of an exchange vs. more job and personal flexibility with daytrading. Anyone have any insightful tips they wish they had gotten right before they started daytrading? I've read a shytload and spoken to some experienced guys, so I've processed all the surface stuff, momey management, discipline, etc. Looking for any tips that might be valuable but I may have missed? One example was advice someone gave me to start trading right away and not take any vacation time until the end of the summer when the market traditionally slows down for a spell. I Thoughts?
When I started trading futures, the firm I worked for wanted me doing a TON of trades everyday. They said "just trade away....you are new....get in and out....blah blah blah". Well...as I learned , the best traders are the ones who are patient and wait for their spots. It took me a while to break the bad habits they taught me. Be careful, because what you first learn is most likely gonna stay with you, and it might be difficult down the road to change habits. A question I would ask any trainer before you go work for them is what their style is. If they say "we do a lot of trades and keep our trades VERY tight", stay the hell away. Most likely they just want you to churn away while they take in commisions. As far as going prop? There are some excellent groups out there, and some horrible ones. Stay the hell away from the groups that say they trade for a tick or 2 and give their positions very little room. That is a losers game. Breakeven at best.
Stay with a major I Bank if you can and work your butt off for 5 years. Save your money and then decide if you want to get into prop or day trading. The reason being, if you trade prop for a few years and don't do well you will have a tough time getting back in with a major firm. ( i know, I am talking from experience)
Too late now. Last day is next week. =) As far as the run-around on the daytrading and high-frequency trades... I'll take that advice. So far the guys i'm going to be working with seem fairly successful, the partenrs all have advanced degrees but opt to trade, and have been trading for a number of years. We'll see how it turns out. I hear you the safety and security of staying witht he IB, but if I was still at a bank after 5 years, I probably wouldn't want to take the (even bigger) pay cut and risk daytrading. Now's the perfect time since I'm hungry, I've learned enough about the markets not to be totally green, and I have the stomach for little to no money for the next year or so while I'm learning. There is no safety net. I am going to make money daytrading or I will probably end up leaving finance altogether. I said something contradictory to this earlier in this post, I said that I'd go back to a finance gig. But honestly, the only thing I like about finance is risking capital to earn a return. That's it. Forget structuring, accounting, and all that other worker bee sheet. If I can't trade well enough to rearn a living, then I need to be back in grad school studying languages or trying to earn a fortune in an emerging market by helping to build a business... trading is the only desk job I could possibly see myself working for any period of time.
Since you asked, I wish someone would have told me this from the start. Its somethings I was told later: "No amount of training is going to make you profitable. You need to learn to trade for yourself, its all about you." Before I had done any daytrading, I was very insecure about my future. I thought what separated the good from the bad was the "training". Hell, it might. But throughout this time many folks i've met who are profitable just figured it out, one way or another. They didn't have some elaborate training scheme. (a buddy at cheiron, some futures shop that pays a draw, when asked about the training just laughed and said, "does demoin count?") Sometimes I think, "man, my so called tape reading skills are probably laughable". Double prints, clean-up prints, print print print. I have no idea what this means. Its all explained in a forum thread, but I don't use it. Does it work? Probably. But what I realized is there are so many other traders out there that don't know this stuff; futures for example, or naz. Ironically I trade NYSE. But in the end its all about you. Just have some confidence and go for it. If its meant to be, you'll know soon enough and no amount of discussion will give you a better idea then going live. good luck man!
Take the safe job. Swing trade and see how you do...if you cant make money when you have days to decide what to do, you wont make money when you have less than a second to figure out what to do.