should i pursue a trading career?

Hi traders,

I have an account with IB and just pulled out LTM performance report (9/09 - 8/10)... and would like to know if I should try out a prop trading firm...

Any comment will be appreciated,

Thanks,


S

 

In prop firms you really trade (and lose) your own money, not other people money.
They just lend you money so you can overleverage beyond what's legal.

All prop traders lose.

 

Your equity curve looked good for the first 6 months then started being inconsistent.

What happened?

 

I cant speak for him, but that looks pretty similar to mine when I first started.

In my case it was some beginners luck, followed by some over-confident large size combined with me thinking I knew what i was doing. It turned into a more straight forward downward sloping line until I took a break and re-evaluated my methods.

 

thank you for the comments guys,

to answer your question, i was net short on options and vix jumped... eventually it came down.

but i also agree with you that i was lucky for few months... so i need to improve my trading skills.

so, on average, how much do i need to generate % return on monthly basis to take the trading full time?

right now, my trading size is about 50k...


S

 

You need about 2% a year to beat money market rates and about 100% a year if you plan on living off your trading

 

thanks,

okay, i guess 100% return is a good benchmark... =)

 

I think you guys are looking at it wrong .... it's not an equity curve, it shows returns by month. If that is right, it's not too bad.
Some firm out there will take you

 

thanks,

yes, those were showing monthly return... i tried to be positive every month, but it was tough... =)

 

Have some food stamps application forms handy.