How did you eventually become profitable? You must have done something different For me it was to automate as much as possible
Only trade setups with extremely high winrate by using 2 emini contracts to begin with. I currently use between 6 to 10 emini contracts to trade these setups everyday where some of these setups only occur once or twice per week. Increasing lots do force me to stick to my trading plan and become more discipline. I can't automate my setups yet due to sophisticated stuff that I use to read PA, timing entry, exit and cut loss which ain't easy to program. I tried to hire a programmer here on ET but then I stop bc I might end up to reveal my edges so he could do an evaluation whether or not he could write the codes for me.
the 2 emini special is very well understood. however it can be performed with very different skill levels. for example, how fast you can trade or how accurately you hit the ticks means not every emini special is equivalent
You have plenty of funds, no prop firm needed. I would definitely go with one micro NQ, get consistently good with it, and then incremental progress to two and so forth. It is a great trading instrument if one has some understanding of its behavior, I have had the best success with the micro NQ out of the 4 micro stock indexes. All the best with your endeavor, it can be hard to predict who will succeed and who will fail. Some segue into it within months, and others are still searching for the holy grail after a decade, with a bankruptcy or two and a failed marriage. For most traders it is best to have some other streams of income, unless they become the 1 % who make annual six figures consistently. I have not personally met any such individuals! In general, I have heard numerous tales of very bright, successful, well-funded people who quit their jobs to be day traders. For most, trading with real money is vastly harder than they expected. Maybe 5 % succeed in time, and not without major psychological pain. I would never advise anybody to quit a job unless they have sufficiently proven that they have the requisite capacities, and even then realize income is going to vary greatly due to varying opportunities day to day. It helps you enormously that you have rental property, otherwise the pressures to perform would further impede your chances for success. Black box systems work for a few, for awhile at least, until the market changes ... Above all else, trading is personal psychology, and very few humans can handle continual uncertainty and working from a probability mindset day in and day out. One basically has to almost evolve into a different species, and only the elite make it. To me it is a lot like Special Forces, a tiny percentage of humans can be a Spec Op. But even there, they build up their skills set via incremental progress, punctuated by occasional extreme real world tests.