It's not a totally terrrible attitude. If you really can feel like you can take a $100 bill, take a torch to it and burn it and not feel bad, you _might_ succeed after the trashing you will get at -$2400.
Thing is, do you really think that is going to be enough to make you profitable? Probably not in my experience...All you will have at the end of it is -$2400 and a believe that trading is gambling.
Let me give you a little history of what the markets are like. There was once alot of money being thrown around in the markets. This made the food chain not so bad. At one end ofthe spectrum there were the sharks, and at the other there were the guppies. But there were so many guppies that the big shrimp could feed on the little shrimp. In those days, the little shrimp could even pick on the whales that came by with their titanic inflows that everyone made money.
Now the situation today. There is little if any shrimp left in the sea. There are mostly sharks, and they are really really pissed that there is no shrimp to eat. So when a paper trading newbie shrimp comes in, there is this feeding frenzie for that shrimp. Imagine yourself benig a little shrimp and 200 piranhas see you as food. The situation is so bad that only the big sharks are left and there is lots of cannibalism going on amongst the sharks that the weakest of the sharks have bit the dust.
Welcome to the eMini Stock Index Futures.
nitro
Thing is, do you really think that is going to be enough to make you profitable? Probably not in my experience...All you will have at the end of it is -$2400 and a believe that trading is gambling.
Let me give you a little history of what the markets are like. There was once alot of money being thrown around in the markets. This made the food chain not so bad. At one end ofthe spectrum there were the sharks, and at the other there were the guppies. But there were so many guppies that the big shrimp could feed on the little shrimp. In those days, the little shrimp could even pick on the whales that came by with their titanic inflows that everyone made money.
Now the situation today. There is little if any shrimp left in the sea. There are mostly sharks, and they are really really pissed that there is no shrimp to eat. So when a paper trading newbie shrimp comes in, there is this feeding frenzie for that shrimp. Imagine yourself benig a little shrimp and 200 piranhas see you as food. The situation is so bad that only the big sharks are left and there is lots of cannibalism going on amongst the sharks that the weakest of the sharks have bit the dust.
Welcome to the eMini Stock Index Futures.
nitro
Quote from tradertony76:
Thanks all to everyone who pitched in their thoughts. Some final thoughts of my own.
I am fully aware that "teaching myself the markets" and "knowing how to trade" are two completely different animals. I can read books on trading. I can take classes in trading. That doesnt mean I know squat about actually trading.
Of course I have pride. Going from a normal corporate job to running or interning isnt exactly a great career jump. However, my mentality here was that either of these moves would enable me to work along side traders who have been in the business awhile. My thoughts were that I might do better learning from actual traders than trying to teach myself. However, it doesnt seem like many trading firms want to bring on a 28 year old trading assistant/intern/apprentice. So much for that idea.
Sounds like my best bet is to paper trade until I'm confident in my abilities, and then open up a futures trading account and see how I do. Trade for awhile, add the experience to my resume and see if I can get picked up by a prop firm as a trader instead of trader's assistant . Hell, IIT classes are $2400 a pop. I'll start trading small. If I lose a couple grand, I'll chalk it up as an elective.