I noticed there are a lot of traders on elitetrader posting their trades without rationale, charted entries and exits, or statements. I'm just curious what's in it for them? What's in it for us? Has today's trader advanced from the stochastics and MA indicators of the golden years of trading? My thought is it's because there are green light opportunities to anticipate volatility and no need to predict if it's a buy or sell. It can be both.
Trade calls/journals...are a waste of time, in my simple humble opinion Maybe you can argue it's a learning experience for the poster, and maybe a few religious followers -- but I still feel it's a waste of time. It's like opening a political forum to debate topics -- it can go on forever... Chatting about past performance is kind of irrelevant; each new day or trade situation...is truly unique, It's like walking in the jungle...you can do it 100 or 1,000 times...don't matter, you're still susceptible to getting killed by a python or wildcat. All that matters is how you handle yourself in the present moment or day or trade...and live to talk about it. I just frankly care about market performance, the bottom line -- I wish there was a mouse hover function or something in this site...that can quickly show your returns. and other relevant info you wish or not wish to share. because talk is cheap. Maintaining a journal, and explaining it down to the very last detail, is too time consuming -- and besides, I don't want my trade/philosophy exposed. True trade talent...requires tactical skills and intuition; anyone explaining theirs...sounds like a system salesmen only. The best traders are a master of one -- not people making calls left and right across different companies or instruments.
I just sent an Email to one these 'traders' who recently started a Journal on ET posting paper calls for the month of March, this was his reply: "I will be offering signals beginning Monday. April 3. I would love for you to join me. The minimum capital suggested: $10000. I have not settled on a subscription as of yet. Any ideas on the cost of monthly subscription fee? 300, 400, 500?" So you have your answer.
LOL I can see only one specific case where there is value to posting trade calls and discussing them here. That's some crowd-sourced form of activist investing - in that case, you'd post an idea (e.g. let's take a 5% stake in some small cap stock), present some form of justification/research and once you have a critical mass you can actually make things happen. It's a tricky business, but I am surprised it's not happening here much - certainly more edge there then in some RSI mumbo-jumbo.
It's truly is remarkable how quickly the internet went from a place for folks to exchange ideas to a cesspool in the blink of an eye. Behold, capitalism. As I stated, even retail trading sites like this went from guru's selling indicator trading to price action trading to just making unsubstantiated calls, intuition trading and, what the hell, posting tomorrow's chart TODAY!
This is where I disagree with you, even though I do agree with much of what you say. Perhaps if you just come to ET for entertainment, then these calls don't matter, but assuming someone is a real trader, and wanting to speak with other real traders, even if they aren't looking for help, it still is nice to know if you're dealing with someone legit or not. Rather than posting hundreds of messages about how to trade, much of which is easy to say once you've studied for a few months and hence can act smart, trading in real time, with real money on the line is a totally different beast. There are many experts here right now who I question strongly. It would be a nice benefit to know who is the real deal and who is full of shit. At the very least, a trade call or journal takes you half way there. It also puts into context what they are saying. The more I learned, the more I realized how often even very profitable traders are wrong with their trades. The secret to making money was on where to get out. But you see, too many dipshits here pretend to have amazing win rates, and later you find out that they aren't even trading. Or you see them making grand predictions about the future, and yet you find out they only scalp for a bunch of ticks with barely a 60% win rate. If they can't trade the market in the same way they talk about the market, its a huge red flag.
The sad reality from the start of chatrooms... this was no different back in 1996 when I was chatting up chicks on chatrooms in Uni... or so I hope it were chicks
That's a good point. I read a post by some imaginary trader who said why would you trade if you don't know how markets work? Same could be said for sites like this. Why would you come on here and just assume you are interacting with other traders? Even the sponsors know that 99% of the posts on this site are content marketers with fake handles that drive morsels of recurring traffic here for clicks and impressions. But you know the old saying. 100 pennies makes a pound!
Well there are certain dipsticks on this forum who claim TA is a hoax. They also claim to have superior trading skills albeit their calls are chronic. A few traders know how to trade and all they are doing is displaying an example of legit calls and results.