<Two of the best stock traders I know of (both made eight figures net in 2002, no losing months) are treading water this year> you should tell those traders to speak to the market wizards book author about being in his next book ( if there is one ) those are stupendous returns ... wow what went wrong this yr for them ?
A friend of mine, t thomas, recently told me about this guy heâs been reading. The site is http://www.tatoday.com and he appears to be doing pretty good in these times. He posts all trades publicly and has a winning record so far this year (thru March) of 13.18%. His gain for 2002 was 32.6% which equaled $31,437.00. I donât trade like he does but have enjoyed his analysis of the market. BTW, Jerry Medved of Quote Tracker, if you happen to read this post, thanks for the advice on the extended desktop the other day. I finally got the right video card and have it working now.
Samba: leverage, no market makers, no specialist, no downtick rule, a single tick in your direction and commissions are covered, taxes, hedging, diversification, liquidity, volatility, reacts like stocks to earnings and news, all make a sort of "purer" trend. TA works a LOT better on the SPOOS, IMO, because now you don't have to figure out if the market makers and specialists are playing mind games on you. P.S. Almost 24 hour trading too. P.S.S. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe limit orders and stops are placed on a Globex machine. So you wouldn't have the specialist shakeout since he can see all the limit orders in his limit book. P.S.S.S. Almost instantaneous fills too.
OK, so good liquidity I see as a slight edge over stocks. I was wondering besides the tax treatment and leverage, what kind of edge do you have trading futures? to the ones who are consistent trading e-mini's, kind of approach are you taking?
Been saying for quite a while now that trading has sucked big time. I mean trading where you have an edge, not gambling. My theory is and has been, that there in not enough SUCKER MONEY around. The deep pockets that are gaming the ES and the other indexes are pulling all the strings. If you can outguess , there's money to be made, but it aint easy.
When stock trading is good....I.E. lots of volume and volatility it is almost a free money marathon. When there is alot going on in the mkt, I.E. several sectors moving good with lots of volume..... I'd say that i have about a 85% success rate on the day. When its lackluster, like right now, i'm making money about 3 out of 5 days. Last year i made money 78% of the days trading stocks. I don't think i could have done this trading futures. There are somedays when the futures are predictable. But it is tough to go in 5 days a week and try to make a living trading them. I'm not sure that you can have an edge every day trading s&p's (Any full time futures traders care to comment??? As i'm not one). But as a stock trader i feel i do have an edge every day. Stocks are much easier when conditions are good. There are a zillion more inefficiencies in stock trading than futures. In stocks, you can profit off of other people's stupid decisions. Much harder to do so in futures.
Yes you can. Out of curiousity...if you don't trade futures...why would you think a futures trader cannot be as successful as you were last year? silk...I too feel like I have an edge. Most successful Emini Futures traders I know don't trade every trading day. They are like hawks...patiently flying above an open field full of prairie dog holes. Once again...how do you know this after you admitted you don't trade futures? (maybe you tried trading them...but not fulltime...if so...I think now is a good time for you to revisit trading the Eminis) The Eminis have tons of inefficiencies to be exploited. In fact, their inefficiencies have a more higher probability for profits than the inefficiencies in stocks. (I've traded both and made the switch to Eminis exclusively many many years ago) silk...hang in there... grind it out and patiently wait for those few trend days to appear... then swing hard to put it over the center field wall. NihabaAshi
Stock trading getting worse Silk...you started a good thread...during these times many traders are having a difficult time. Its interesting to find out how fellow traders are doing and what they have been doing to cope with the current market conditions. Unfortunately we have the Dear Abby crew, such as Kaizen with 26 posts who chooses to character assassinate BobCathy1 and throw the whole thread off track...Hey Kaizen...you'd be a good candidate for the Jerry Springer show I'll bet! Hats off to you guys who kept the thread on track, and just offered advice as to how you were handling things. Actually BobCathy1 idea about being FLEXIBLE in an every changing market is a great idea...its probably why she is doing good and you are not Kaizen...your probably stuck in the mud with a fixed set up that just simply won't work in this environment. Bye the way Kaizen I don't think I heard you offer up any advice as to how to handle these market conditions....no not you ...just smart ass remarks is all I heard from you. Sorry guys...but I just could not keep my mouth shut this time...its just what we need here on Elite Trader....some more Kaizens.
bobcathy, how do you do it?!! You should start a forum. I would gladly pay you if you can teach me your ways. To pull 10 points today is sick. Congrats. Hopefully i can have even half your success going further.
but lets get better and more prepared/armored Im takin dough everyday.. EVERY SINGLE DAY.. primarily scalping NYSE remotely. 100K shares av.... granted Im NOT making a ton, but the harder it gets the harder I work. My point is to get better everyday! never give up, it will pay off