lol
90% traders don't make it???
- Thread starter kalashnicac
- Start date
lol
Quote from kalashnicac:
I agree trade4success...
But even with one in ten traders making money, you would end up with an ever-increasing number of successfull traders. That doesn't make sense either.
This is a point I have often pondered. Thousands upon thousands of people have entered the markets over the last few years. If 10 percent of them succeed who supports them? This is kind of like social security.
I suspect the number is actually 99% or greater.
markets have grown tremendously over the last decades..
my take on it is, 100% of forex traders bite it.
a few survive. even fewer go on to being successful.
stats say 13,000,000 peeps trade money.
and that's the thing... even with equities/commodities you've got money involved and most people are just not used to dealing with such a highly-advanced degree of intense money management.
haven't most been taught to get a job, keep your money in the bank, use credit cards, and invest in a 6-mo CD?
trading is so opposite of that. It is literally taking your own life (money) into your hands - daily, YOU are the master of your own destiny.
beginners blow up because they may not realize this stark reality, that when you enter the markets you're as individual as you can get as a human being.
perhaps martial arts is similar.
you're up against the sharpest minds (unless you're opposite my trades), the best money managers on earth, the most jaded investors and the coldest speculators.
you don't stand a chance as a beginner and most people are not that fast to pick up on everything they should before they get wiped out.
the only reason I have made it for 2 years now is because I have luck built into my trading system. and trading a demo for the first 6 months also helped.
if it were not for these factors... I would been bagged long ago.
then just think how much comedy you would have missed on this forum!
theskalp
a few survive. even fewer go on to being successful.
stats say 13,000,000 peeps trade money.
and that's the thing... even with equities/commodities you've got money involved and most people are just not used to dealing with such a highly-advanced degree of intense money management.
haven't most been taught to get a job, keep your money in the bank, use credit cards, and invest in a 6-mo CD?
trading is so opposite of that. It is literally taking your own life (money) into your hands - daily, YOU are the master of your own destiny.
beginners blow up because they may not realize this stark reality, that when you enter the markets you're as individual as you can get as a human being.
perhaps martial arts is similar.
you're up against the sharpest minds (unless you're opposite my trades), the best money managers on earth, the most jaded investors and the coldest speculators.
you don't stand a chance as a beginner and most people are not that fast to pick up on everything they should before they get wiped out.
the only reason I have made it for 2 years now is because I have luck built into my trading system. and trading a demo for the first 6 months also helped.
if it were not for these factors... I would been bagged long ago.
then just think how much comedy you would have missed on this forum!
theskalp
I think 90% is probably too low, probably closer to
99% than 90%. Ofcourse i dont know for sure.
Only the brokers know and they dont say (we can only assume because the figures must be really bad)
we need a retail brokerage that opened say 10,000 actively traded
accounts over a 10 year period. Then you just need to know how
of those accounts were up or down when they were closed.
Quote from easyrider:
This is a point I have often pondered. Thousands upon thousands of people have entered the markets over the last few years. If 10 percent of them succeed who supports them? This is kind of like social security.
I suspect the number is actually 99% or greater.
The question would be the same. There is no proof that it could be 99%.
Besides, don't forget that stock markets have a bullish bias : they mirror the country's economic evolution. As long as the economy is growing (faster than the inflation, that is), the markets will follow and investors will prosper. Had 100 traders invested in stocks 30 years ago without ever selling, they would probably be all successfull by now.
See that's the problem 90% losers percentage : on what basis?
That's my point: nobody knows for sure, not even the market gurus who come up with that statistic. You say its close to 99%, but there is no proof
Yes the idea of a retail brokerage coming up with a figure seems reasonably good, at least we'd have some kind of sample. But then again, would a broker bother to do that? I'm not sure they know either-you have potentially successfull traders withdrawing funds, remember.
Define active traders.
And don't forget that if they're that active, they are probably much more aware of the risk than individual investors who hold on to shares for years.
How about all those hedgers who hand out money to the markets just so that they can reduce their risk? Isn't it them giving money to traders, and not other traders?
Since most markets (futures at least) were set up to enable hedging, I view an active trader as a person who will accept to take the risk handed over by the hedger-and get paid for doing that, of course. That's one of the speculator/active trader's real edge IMHO. But again, it depends on plenty of things (time frame, notably).
It does seem logical to me .. as traders fail new ones enter the market. It's no different than someone opening a small business where the failure rate is 80+%. As restaurants fail to operate profitably there's always new people out there that think they have a way to make it work. But the failure rate continues to be high .. some are undercapitalized, some lack a sound business plan, etc. Same with trading ... some lack discipline, some have poor money management skills. Just because someone worked in a restaurant doesn't mean they can successfully transition to owning a restaurant. And with "wanna be" traders .. just because they read the WSJ or IBD and picked one or two stocks over the years doesn't mean they can make a living trading. I've seen lots of prospective traders fail because they didn't want to work hard enough to succeed.