..continued In the evening of the same day I quickly deposited $8K to my account bringing my total deposits to $10K and the next day I won $2K. Needless to say I was elated. I made plans to become a millionaire by the end of the year. I believed that it was a manifestation of my destiny. I did not know that it was not destiny but some random luck. At that time EUR.USD was rising consistently for a few days and I just happened to start my trading in this trend. The funny thing is that I did not even know there was a trend because I never looked at daily charts. I did not even look at hourly charts. I was trading off 1-minute charts. Just buying low selling high. The next day, May 3, EUR.USD reversed its course while I was holding a long position. I held my position for hours hoping that it would get back up but it just kept going lower and lower. I could not understand what was happening. It was so painful. When I finally closed my position at the end of they day I lost more than $2K. I was devastated and angry. I withdrew my deposit and closed my account with TradeKing.
Guys, you are borrowing money the wrong way. I posted this in the "Took out a loan to transition to full-time trading. 24 years old." thread also. If you have a decent credit score, you can borrow cash money for 2% flat fee per year in the United States.
This is an interesting post. "you just need to get lucky a few times" sounds good in theory... But if you understand randomness, you can calculate the probability of hitting a very profitable "lucky" trade - the chance is pretty low. It is highly highly likely that you will go through a lengthy losing streak before you finally hit that one lucky trade. If you believe in Efficient Market Hypothesis, then it's a zero-sum game. Even if you get one huge winning trade, the large amount of losses will bring you back to $0. So essentially you would only be relying on luck - hoping to avoid the long losing streak before you get the lucky trade. "Then with a bigger capital you make even more bets and the cycle repeats." - you are hoping to get lucky systematically, which you said you don't believe is possible. As for Technical Analysis - some aspects of Technical Analysis can be back-tested and clearly prove that the markets are in fact not random. Though it doesn't necessarily mean that these back-test results are tradeable. Did you think about trading options? It may be a better approach. Aggressively trading options hoping that you get rich before Tail Risk takes you out of the game.
If he had difficulty making money day trading futures, day trading options is as hard if not harder. Being there done that: Not profitable for me. Maybe others could have done better.
In the past, ET posters reminded me that "hope" was not a strategy. You were basically gambling and not trading.
I don't fall for these threads, nobody who knows how to read and write would do something that stupid.
Account is down to $8K, have not had a winning day for a long time. Yet, I remember a quote I have seen on this forum: "The number one trait of all successful traders is the refusal to quit in the face of adversity". It sounds very true. Stubbornness might not make you a great trader, but lack of stubbornness will surely prevent you from becoming one. Nevertheless, I updated my resume and started sending it out. Just in case..
Now that your trading account is closed (good decision)... What type of jobs are you applying for ? How much savings did you have saved up for living expenses until you find a job ? Did you ever consider just starting a business in the field of the type of jobs you've been employed or your applying for considering you seem like the type that's a high risk taker that's looking for a change in your life ?