Day trading article on nytimes.com

Daytraders used to be a very diversed crowd.

Yes 90% fail (i.e. account got cleaned) in their first year. And another 50% drop from trying in the next.

There are still a lot of daytraders making their living - just like any other scalable skills. e.g. sports, singing, acting.

There are big time movie stars but there are also local channel entertainment reporters =)

Currently, as the market maker bots dominating the MM scene, one part (the liquidity provider part) of the daytrading opportunities is getting closer to the point that only big shops can survive. It is no difference from variety stores got crushed by Walmart.

There are, however, still a lot of other daytrading opportunities around.
 
Quote from loik:

Day Traders 2.0: Wired, Angry and Loving It
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from one of the most comprehensive looks at the subject in a yet-to-be-published study conducted in Taiwan. (The country is ideal for this kind of research because all trades go through one place, the Taiwan Stock Exchange, which is willing to share the information.) The authors sifted through tens of millions of trades, from 1992 to 2006, and found that 80 percent of active traders lost money.

“More importantly, we found that if you were to look at the past performance of these traders, only 1 percent of them could be called predictably profitable,” says a co-author, Brad M. Barber, a finance professor at the University of California, Davis. Everyone else, it seems, was on a short-term winning streak. Even those who did modestly well found their that profits were wiped out, and then some, by transaction fees like commissions and taxes.
 
The guy has been trading 10 years and has averaged 100-120k a year in that time frame and the best he can do is a $5 per thousand commission rate?

He is pissing away so much of his profit in commission it's amusing.
 
The article itself is harmless--nothing about nasty short sellers, ruined lives, or some guy shooting up a place. Even the amount of money made by this new version is perfectly acceptable to the average folk--$100K, ordinary, almost like a job. Daytrading is no longer an object of scorn because Version 2.0 of Daytraders is a dud. It's all good.
 
Quote from icarus618:

Even the amount of money made by this new version is perfectly acceptable to the average folk--$100K, ordinary, almost like a job.
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That income puts him in the top 10% or better in the US, way above the median of 45K.
 
Quote from l2tradr:

That income puts him in the top 15% or so in the US, way above the median of 45K or so.
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Are $100K/yr jobs rare in your area? Perhaps living in metro areas most of my life skews my perception. My point was not that it is the income of the average person or even the median, but that it does not raise eyebrows.
 
Quote from icarus618:

Are $100K/yr jobs rare in your area? Perhaps living in metro areas most of my life skews my perception. My point was not that it is the income of the average person makes or even the median, but that it does not raise eyebrows.
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I live in Toronto actually, and making 100K doesn't raise eyebrows, that's for sure. Statistically though, he is way above average, in the top 10% or better; most make it seem that 100K is peanuts (certainly in e-standards it is) which is just not the case. Median HOUSEHOLD incomes in large metro areas barely exceed 100-120K per year, all I am saying is that making 100-120K by himself is pretty good. Of course there are people that make more, with the great majority making less.

If the "average folk" find 120K acceptable, the average folk is obviously delusional.

Anyways, didn't want to come across as being argumentative, just pointing out the realities.
 
The thing is IF you go to school to be a Doctor or Lawyer your pretty much guaranteed to make a living from it (or something related to it).

Even if you spend 3-5 years at this craft then your still only a 10% chance of success.

:cool:


btw, I did spend sometime in their room and they are legit but I was never able to match what they did.

It goes to show you that even when you trade along side a successful trader, it means nothing at the end of the day.

This guy uses basic simple set ups and nothing special or proprietary.

What he does right is control his emotions and he let's his winners run and cuts his loses pretty fast. No Rocket science to that !
 
Quote from l2tradr:

I live in Toronto actually, and making 100K doesn't raise eyebrows, that's for sure. Statistically though, he is way above average, in the top 10% or better; most make it seem that 100K is peanuts (certainly in e-standards it is) which is just not the case. Median HOUSEHOLD incomes in large metro areas barely exceed 100-120K per year, all I am saying is that making 100-120K by himself is pretty good. Of course there are people that make more, with the great majority making less.

If the "average folk" find 120K acceptable, the average folk is obviously delusional.
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I am located in Toronto too.

Cdn median income is way lower comparing to US. Toronto is an exception because it is so called a financial hub of Canada. It is not and far from it as most highest paying "trader jobs" are held by the big 5s executives' 2nd generations and their pals. It's been like that for many many years (20+).

For people born outside of this kind of luck, real economic independence in Cda lies within its gray economy like Swiss.
 
Quote from Lawrence Chan:

I am located in Toronto too.

Cdn median income is way lower comparing to US. Toronto is an exception because it is so called a financial hub of Canada. It is not and far from it as most highest paying "trader jobs" are held by the big 5s executives' 2nd generations and their pals. It's been like that for many many years (20+).

For people born outside of this kind of luck, real economic independence in Cda lies within its gray economy like Swiss.
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These were US figures I was using and was referring to US averages, not Cnd. Agreed re the rest of the comments though.
 
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