Would you give up a steady job to Trade?

Discussion in 'Professional Trading' started by NJ1000, Sep 29, 2003.

  1. ElCubano

    ElCubano

    Thats all you had to say...... Take the leap of faith NOW, before you move out, get married and spend the 35k on some punnani that you wont even marry......but I would look at swing trading if i were you and if you have time at work to do this.....peace
     
    #41     Sep 30, 2003
  2. Dustin

    Dustin

    I think anyone under 25 with no major expenses and a true desire to trade should give it a try. Even if you fail it won't affect the rest of your life...so go for it!
     
    #42     Sep 30, 2003
  3. GO FOR IT!

    -FastTrader
     
    #43     Sep 30, 2003
  4. Btw, with $35K, I would recommend trading index futures over stocks. Much more opportunity and no BS PDT rule.

    -FastTrader
     
    #44     Sep 30, 2003
  5. breakin

    breakin

    Fastrader, im not trying to flame you but.....

    im kind of in the same position you are, learning to trade and not making much money. I read a lot of post on this site to gain information and i have seen many many of your posts. You seem to hold yourself out as someone who has useful information to give or at least some experience.

    Why are you giving this guy advice on what to trade and how much money to use when you have never made a living at trading or made any real money? he could make the wrong assumption that because you post 30x a day you have some idea what you are talking about.

    just to let you know people who post questions generaly want a response from someone with experience, not from someone else who is new and just read a book or knows a few terms
     
    #45     Sep 30, 2003
  6. funky

    funky

    yes.
     
    #46     Sep 30, 2003
  7. It's simply my opinion and advice based on what he's posted so far, and since it's free, guess what it's worth...maybe $0.02.

    Lets summarize:
    NJ is 24 y/o and lives at home, so barely any monthly expenses which means he doesn't "need" to make money right away. He has $35K saved up, but doesn't even need to put that up since the prop firm is giving him cash + salary to trade. Does it get any better than this? No financial risk; no financial liabilities; meaning he has a very good shot at being successful.

    As far as myself, I'm actually making money now, but just not A LOT of money since I'm trading small size in futures. I've traded stocks, options, and finally futures so have a good understanding on what kind of capital is needed to have a good chance at succeeding in each. Now, these are all my OPINIONS, not facts, so please take them for what their worth.

    -FastTrader
     
    #47     Sep 30, 2003
  8. breakin, if it makes you feel better, I can post a Disclaimer in my signature telling people I'm a newbie and to take my advice for what it's worth. Please let me know if that will help.

    -FastTrader
     
    #48     Sep 30, 2003
  9. Hawker

    Hawker


    Between the lines of your post I can see that in an unconscious way you're looking for approval to go for it. You can do it with no risk at all with a trading simulator at the beginning .

    Challenge yourself with some goals, ( e.g. 200 trades in a particular instrument: index, stock, bond, etc ) then take a pause to analyze your results, study your loser trades, the conditions of the market in any particular trade, where you succeed the most, where you fail the most, then focus in the conditions that make you fail more often.

    Filter those results with your analysis and make another challenge ( 100 trades ) and analyze your results again, be honest with yourself.

    If you finished your challenge with "good " net points on your favor, you'll be ready to write your trading rules, based on your experience through the test.

    Only after that your can seriously consider to start with your hard earning money and go slowly and little by little.

    Many people gonna tell you that trading with real money is much much difficult than paper trading, which is true since there's a big emotional force driving your decisions, however let me tell you that trading is not different from other business if you an enterprising person you must play the odds.

    On the other hand almost everybody in this business is talking about the successful traders percentage, well in my opinion the same happens in other business.

    If you go ahead and start a coffee shop, who's gonna tell you that you'll be a winner ? In the same way as in trading you're putting your capital on risk, and you gonna have losses and emotional pressure .You must pay the rent, all the services, employees, taxes and whatever.

    So you'll be forced to learn how to make money, how to reduce your expenses and how to avoid losses.

    Sounds familiar ?

    Some people seems to don't understand this. They narrow their vision with statistics of failure.

    We must look at such statistics through the time frame so we'll realize that the longer the time frame the higher the rate of success and the reason is obvious, your need time to learn the business and the money to paid for that tuition, unless you've born gifted you'll need education and training to get experience.

    Good luck.
     
    #49     Sep 30, 2003
  10. breakin

    breakin

    my opinion of what happens here on elite trader all too often

    Someone becomes interested in trading and comes on this site to learn more. The new trader begins to read some books and articles on trading and does some basic research.

    Now this person has many questions about trading any begins to post; mostly asking questions about prop shops, terms and strategies. After a few weeks/months of this our new trader begins to trade.

    This is the point where the trader believes that he/she knows how to make money and has expertise in some area of the market. Doing things like pulling out a calculator and figuring out how much money needs to be made per day to make a quarter million a year....and figuring out how easy it will be to trade a certain size a certain number of times to get there. Never having done it consistently is a sure sign of this stage.

    at this point our new trader begins to have some small successes and attributes any losses to "learning". It is now after an up day that he/she begins to post again, but this time not to ask questions but to answer them.

    So now what we have is the new, new people getting the same old questions answered over and over again by semi new people who should not be offering advise in the first place and the cycle begins again.

    --just something I have noticed, also the guys who actually make money don’t give the quick and easy answers and maybe not the answers the new, new person wants to hear.......that is if the successful trader takes time to answer new trader questions in the first place
     
    #50     Sep 30, 2003