Confessions of a successful trader

Quote from StLouisTrader:

BW: This thread is about real trades by an actual trader. Also I'm not trying to raise capital and don't have anyting to sell. From what I gather, you are trying to hock your half assed paper trading system to people since you have no money. If your piece of shit strategy worked you could be an actual trader, but u are not b/c it doesn't work in real time. If u think there's nothing to get out of this thread, pls move along, as far as I know no one is forcing u to read it.
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Surgical demolition. If you trade like this today, significant profits are assured.
 
Quote from StLouisTrader:

good question. I start out w a few stocks I think might "work" then ramp my fills up as the volome presents itself at what I consider to be favorable prices. The problem w trading more size is the "adverse selection" principal meaning I run a high risk of getting bigger size on the crap ideas that won't work and getting small size on the ones that will work. So, to get this much size my picks have to be really really good in order to not have my ass handed to me. Said another way: the degree of difficulty goes up exponentially. Some days I would do way better by putting far less money to work or at least making sure I have really high confidence in the big positions which I did not have today on stx. Obviously that was a big mistake.
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Good answer. In other words, price movement against the direction of the trade around the time of entry gives you a superior fill but possibly inferior odds of success. This dynamic -- the balance between signal quality and fill quality -- is of course a big piece of the trading puzzle.
 
Quote from tommintj:

I couldn't imagine that there were so many INTJs on ET. I have just started day trading this year, am profitable, and make enough money to live on so long as I am not too fussy about what I eat.
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This reminds me of someone a couple years ago who said he was making a living trading, then it turns out he is living on his friends couch (not paying any rent) and eating out at taco bell once a week.

so making enough money to live on is very subjective. :)
 
Quote from ProfLogic:

Let's see, StLouis has been on here since 2004 with just over a couple hundred posts and your current alias has been on here not quite 18 months with over 4400 posts and HE is a newbie attention seeker?

Interesting.
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I noticed the same thing.... LOL.
 
Quote from StLouisTrader:

Trading individual stocks has been my full time profession for almost 7 years. I've made more money than I ever could have hoped for or expected. Confession #1 is I read the elitetrader site and sometimes even post. I think this is mainly due to bordeom. I'll follow with more confessions whenever I run out of anything else to do. Confession#2 is I believe very few people on this site actually make money. Confession#3 is I believe none of the gurus on this site or pretty much anywhere else can make money themselves or help anyone else do so over any extended period of time. I'd love to hear confessions from the other dozen or so successful traders on the site if u choose to share.
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Confession: I let my old football coach fire me up every morning in pre market and remind me that EVERY movement made on the field has a reaction to the outcome.
(and I get to see young Geez laying wood again)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6TJ5TP--mI
 
Quote from greenlander1:

I am mainly daytrade as independent contractor (also swing trade but more effort goes into daytrading).

I dont like trading multiple intraday positions. I prefer giving one trade my full attention and taking on a larger position.

That having been said, most of my trades are 1-30 min tops. Maybe I will have a trade that lasts an hr or two maybe a few times a month.
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please explain independent contractor and trader?

is this some new category of distended trader for a firm, without liabilities to the trader?

is this some form of proprietary trader status?

never heard of this combination,
pm me if its too personal or company specific, would really like to understand that title
 
Quote from mhparker:

Good answer. In other words, price movement against the direction of the trade around the time of entry gives you a superior fill but possibly inferior odds of success. This dynamic -- the balance between signal quality and fill quality -- is of course a big piece of the trading puzzle.
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I have been going over this the last couple of weeks, I have a lot of trades where I put in a limit order to exit, the market goes right up to my limit order, then stops. I want the little extra I would get if I get filled on my limit order but then the market turns and I end up using a market order to get out while the market is running the other way and losing most if not all of my profits.
 
Quote from StLouisTrader:

Trading individual stocks has been my full time profession for almost 7 years. I've made more money than I ever could have hoped for or expected. Confession#2 is I believe very few people on this site actually make money. Confession#3 is I believe none of the gurus on this site or pretty much anywhere else can make money themselves or help anyone else do so over any extended period of time. I'd love to hear confessions from the other dozen or so successful traders on the site if u choose to share.
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#2 => for certain. including the OP by demonstration through this thread

#3 => for certain. in particular the OP of this thread. free information is often worthless or costly. case in point demonstrated live here so far
 
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