Question says it all I would think. One day you are totally clueless and can't even tell the difference between a stock and a bond, the next day you are up all night studying historical soybean charts. What happened?
The collapse, plain and simple. I heard tales about Ron Paul on the internet since a lot of his followers are on there and then I just started studying economics and politics more and more. I then figured well how do these morons actually get that much money in the first place? Then it's pretty much just panned out into now where I'm learning to trade through Micro Forex and hopefully I'll be able to build up a small fortune and begin some real trading. It also has to do with me trying to find away around this shitty system where you are constantly lied to at a young age and tricked into believing the moment you exit the education system or fail in it then you yourself will be a failure. Being self-employed is also awesome and I'd rather go bankrupt and at least still be able to live in a house than go bankrupt and homeless and be in debt because everything was provided by a company and you were supposed to work it off.
Imo, the markets are a place where you can try out an idea immediately. What other endeavor offers that? You can talk about whatever you're trading while it's happening. Whether something works or not, you can go back to the drawing board and start over, quit and try something else and there's always the thrill of hitting a home run being a third string player.
Very, very few companies provide you with a home, and failing at trading also means you can't pay the mortgage.
Finally after 10 plus years of watching the market and doing what little trading you can in a 403-b I have a real trading account and the power to choose. Have read trader Vic ,Gary Smith, Lynch etc Know I'm just a rookie and am trying to be very careful and am alot more conservative than I expected at 62lol. The mkts offer a million ways to make or loose money.I feel like a picker at a yard sell thank God for the internet and a love of reading I can't wait to retire,so I can watch the mkts when I want.
The lure of easy money, i saw a $16 stock move $2 in one day. I thought i only need $8 or margin and i can make $2k in one day.. At least you could do that before the Pattern day trading rule came in. Before 1997 i never had a feel for price action, then the world wide web made it easy to look at all sorts of charts..