Apo99, 5000 trades a year averages around 20 trades per day. Are you taking these manually from Lvl2 data or did you automate your setup scan process? What are a few of your favorite penny stocks to trade? T
Hi apo99, Welcome to ET. I am a newbie here aswell. I have worked in L/S fundamental equity for the past 10 years, but am having a break now, and testing a few ideas I have to see if I can trade them full time. I like your response to all this forum's negativity. It shows maturity. So far I think 10_bagger had the best advice for you. I agree with his points. Thanks for posting 10_bagger. Similar to you, I have realised I need to devote a lot of time to this, much more than I thought or that I have to my previous jobs. I think you should finish your studies. You are close and its a good Plan B. Congratulations on your results so far. It shows you have found a profitable approach with longevity. Sure, it may one day go, but you should make hay while the sun shines. Full steam ahead. Should you ever need to go to Plan B, your track is impressive and makes your very employable. CFA always good. I got mine in 2003. Make sure you finish it. But your bank is small. It may not provide great comfort in difficult times, and could be insufficient to live off. So I think you should continue to live as a student, particularly in regards to keeping your living standards basic. Do this as long as you can. Keeping an alternative part time job makes sense, as it gives: a) regular income to support yourself, b) allows you to build your bank, c) provides you with real-world contact. I understand your 150k-75k trade-off. I faced a similar question 3 years ago, with a much larger fall at stake. Sometimes lifestyle/family outweigh the money. I think you should try to diversify your income stream, even if it means more effort for less return. You could backtest different market caps, different markets, maybe different approaches. You could spend some time learning some programming languages, and backtest some I ideas you get from your current approach. Maybe also look at more fundamental /swing trading. In short, continue learning. It may mean lower returns today, but the potential reward is diversification. I have about 6-7 different ideas I am looking at, over a range of time frames, instruments and markets. This gives me some good diversification and comfort. I need it with a big mortgage and 2 kids. Apart from your part time job you could also look at an alternative income stream. Again, to provide you some income to live off and allow you to build your bank. I am fortunate to have: a) numerous rental properties, b) a stake in a small property development business, c) a wife with a good full time salary. You could consider using part of your capital to buy a rental property for example. It will lower your trading returns, but maybe the alternative income and higher comfort it provides makes it worth it. Good luck!
Good luck!! You welcome Cartmm. Thank you for sharing your views as well. . (in honor of Lawrence-Lugar. I noticed that he makes one of these emoji in all his posts.)
Right now i have a predetermined watch list that Is made from about 400 picks and i narrow it down to about 50 stocks and its revised every day. All the trades are done manually so everything is very labor intensive at this point which makes it very hard and stressful to me to focus on work/ school/ developing another strategy and a secondary income source. I think i have even begun to lose hair this year.
Thank you, A CFA in 2003 was a lot more difficult than it is today, you should be proud. Im spending a few days a week now back testing and trying new systems on paper and then i execute them on smaller separate accounts of $5000 for 3 months and I take it from there. So im hoping one or two will work out. I started a small company within my company at work that is just starting to make a little bit of money which helps a bit with stability and as a plan b. As for rental properties and other investments I will only start looking into that when my current method is showing signs of slowing down or when i hit the 500k mark which will be hopefully in 2-3 years. It gives me some comfort that there is people out there who have done this successfully. Thank again