Long term, trading stocks turned into a 14 hour day, most days, ended up watching live anyway, research for the next trade, nightmare, one of the reasons im sticking to short term. I open a device when free, I watch or maybe see a trade, place a trade not always, generally make some okay $$$$'s, lose sometimes ofcourse, but over all up. Log off, do something more fun, which i prefer, its more like playing a game for 20mins. I would like more time to trade, but more to life than money.
I believe the smart guy like you are talking about forex, commodities, options, bonds and even the bucketshops (the biggest casino since 100 years ago) ? The smart trader been taught by bogus guru that they should trade using Price Action, indicator, TA, market "context", DOM, free internet info for economy news and etc? Do you ever think why institutional never trade using this approach ?
If you are a long term holder, you're more likely to get killed by certain unseen factors such as the recent market downturn. In short, the longer you hold, the higher the chance of such events happening.
None of the long term trader will run away in the recent market meltdown. The downturn indeed provide the best buying opportunities in certain equity such as energy. e.g. My energy ETF is up nearly 10% after a week I bought them, but do I care it may go down in coming week so I better sell them to capture the "tiny" gain? not really. I doubt Warren Buffet even bother to look at the market at all last Friday/Monday.
Depends which one you are more proficient at, isn't it all about maximizing your talents. In short term trading, execution is harder and in long term trading you must suffer more pain. Speed (volatility) of the market also matters eg you do not want to be doing long term trading during slow markets. Last two weeks short term trading was more profitable.
You should do what your best at just like an athlete doesn't decide which sport to play based on the earnings. They do what they are best at to maximise the chance of success in a talented field. You can make a decent living at both long and short term if you are good enough.
No doubt about it, and even have a staff/automation past four years plus for day trading, still making more long term which is nearly automated. When commodities go lock limit, there is no day trading but long term one is reaping profits. There is great deal less of traders busting out by long term trading and average of new day traders is less that three months. There is 60,000 new day traders on average per year and 3,000 still at it past one year, others either quit or dreaming, or back testing. I have not read how many new longer term traders. Many don't have clear idea of the risk, quality of life, lost income from missed earnings, losing years, emotions that you never knew you had and all bad, lack of study, lack of intelligence, lack of programming skills, lack of common sense, all problems of day trading. All thinking that dream "imagine golf at noon" and many after five years are saying "I am so close". People come to day trading futures cause lack of funds generally, tougher to save over $25k, cause of pattern trading rule requires over $25k. And leverage in futures you lose it quicker. Most day traders don't look at the monies you can make long term trading. And most don't have clue how Warren Buffet makes most of his money, he has an idea of stock staying neutral or bias of trend up, then sells prem options, he gets the dividend money too, he looks for as little risk as possible. And buys entire companies as well, I think he owns over fifty companies. Day traders seldom think is terms of risk, have you ever added how much total risk was used in your day trading in a year's time? Just doing a one lot of ten trades at $100 risk per trade is about $253,000 of risk, commissions retail are approx. $11,000, that is like a yearly mortgage bill for small home? Too many think day trading is easy, it not, mind plays little games of what it thinks in terms of logic, day trading is not logical if you want to profit on regular basis and you have to make decisions in seconds. Long term you have days or at least night before, you have ways to hedge well and collect dividends. If you a nervous person, day trading will make that much much worse, you have to be calm and realize you will make mistakes each day and even after many years, stress causes this, must have incredible Trading Plan for answer for every question and remember them. There are a number of very good day traders on the forum, and many more dreaming the dream. Good trading all.
Thanks for all the advice. For someone with a full-time job, is it correct to say he can only succeed at long-term trading? Short-term trading is too distracting for someone holding a full-time job. Is it realistic for someone with a full-time job to succeed at short-term trading? Does he need to become a full-time trader in order to succeed at short-term trading?