Day trading realistic expectations

[Andy1_1]

Looking for some experienced traders to give me a realistic expected profit mark for growing my account based on their own experiences. Is it possible to make upowards of 2-5% a day? I am new and have been trading for about 3 months seriously, 2 years prior on and off playing around non seriously. I've done rather poorly lately (lost $12,000) although I have identified the reason this happened is not because my system sucks, it's because I did not cut my losses and got into holding and hoping habit, or would put on impatient trades.

I'd like to make myself trading goals to reach, but I am wondering about the potential growth possibilities here. Is 2% a day (on capital traded not overall account) realistic? 5%? I trade with around $30,000, often going full barrel, but with tight stop now of 2% no matter what. Any hints as to setting realistic growth goals here?

 

[Robert Morse]

Setting a goal of $500/day or $200/day does not help you get there and you have to expect to have losing days and weeks and months. Find a process to get to consistently making money first then you can set some goals for yourself. This is a little backwards.

 

[SunTrader]

Exactly right.

 

[lindq]

Looking for some experienced traders to give me a realistic expected profit mark for growing my account based on their own experiences. Is it possible to make upowards of 2-5% a day? I am new and have been trading for about 3 months seriously, 2 years prior on and off playing around non seriously. I've done rather poorly lately (lost $12,000) although I have identified the reason this happened is not because my system sucks, it's because I did not cut my losses and got into holding and hoping habit, or would put on impatient trades.

I'd like to make myself trading goals to reach, but I am wondering about the potential growth possibilities here. Is 2% a day (on capital traded not overall account) realistic? 5%? I trade with around $30,000, often going full barrel, but with tight stop now of 2% no matter what. Any hints as to setting realistic growth goals here?

Maybe 2% a week after 5 years if you are exceptional, and the top 1% of the 1%.

 

[tiddlywinks]

Your goal should be to minimize losers.

Moments, maybe even seconds after you enter a trade the market moves meaningfully against you.
THAT is the only "realistic expectation" you should have.

What are you going to do?

Setting a goal of $500/day or $200/day does not help you get there

 

[lawrence-lugar]

Is it possible to make upowards of 2-5% a day?

I'd like to make myself trading goals to reach, but I am wondering about the potential growth possibilities here
Any hints as to setting realistic growth goals here

"realistic goals" in trading is highly subjective from person-to-person.
The worst, or very average, traders will say you're dreaming, if you want 2-5% a day. -- While maybe more skillful and experienced traders may tell you otherwise.
With Risks, comes Rewards , It's important you understand this simple concept...and where along this spectrum you want to play or splash around in.

Achieving your goal of 2-5%/day mainly depends on what you trade, and how.
If you want to become a millionaire...you wouldn't train to work as a school teacher or cop.
This same concept applies to trading, and what and how you decide to trade.

You truly get what you want out of the Market, and in life, what you put into it. People who live their life dragging ass will drag you down to their level...it's best to avoid this area and mindset, if you have loftier goals and ambitions in life.

You seem smart enough to realize your initial trading mistakes. Hopefully, you're even smarter to remedy that problem, before you burn any more cash away foolishly and blindly.

You don't need a huge six figure account, you can make $1,000/day on average if you want to, with a much, much smaller account.
$2,000 a day, on average...$3,000/day on average,...maybe a 4,000 average, -- I wonder if there is someone on the history of this ET` forum that averages to net $10,000/day,
No one truly knows what the guy next to you makes. (or losses)

 

[maximumpossiblesuffering]

Looking for some experienced traders to give me a realistic expected profit mark for growing my account based on their own experiences. Is it possible to make upowards of 2-5% a day? I am new and have been trading for about 3 months seriously, 2 years prior on and off playing around non seriously. I've done rather poorly lately (lost $12,000) although I have identified the reason this happened is not because my system sucks, it's because I did not cut my losses and got into holding and hoping habit, or would put on impatient trades.

I'd like to make myself trading goals to reach, but I am wondering about the potential growth possibilities here. Is 2% a day (on capital traded not overall account) realistic? 5%? I trade with around $30,000, often going full barrel, but with tight stop now of 2% no matter what. Any hints as to setting realistic growth goals here?

My long term trading experience, discipline, trading plan, and consistent money management allow me to go a full year before I lose $12,000.

It sounds like you are way undercapitalized, have discipline problems, have no edge, and have very limited experience trading. You are gambling and your odds of “winning” in active trading are very low, as in less than 1%.

Hopefully you have a job that pays your living expenses and are not trying to trade for a living.

Your most sound option at this point is to maximize your job/career skillsets and take the time (years) to learn about trading without wasting your money.

 

[Andy1_1]

Maybe 2% a week after 5 years if you are exceptional, and the top 1% of the 1%.

I have a win rate on my trades of ~60% on about 98 trades. With an average profit of ~$200 a day or 0.66% I think my problem really just was refusing arrogantly to let go of a trade and ending up losing like 10-20% by being stubborn.

 

[Andy1_1]

My long term trading experience, discipline, trading plan, and consistent money management allow me to go a full year before I lose $12,000.

It sounds like you are way undercapitalized, have discipline problems, have no edge, and have very limited experience trading. You are gambling and your odds of “winning” in active trading are very low, as in less than 1%.

Hopefully you have a job that pays your living expenses and are not trying to trade for a living.

Your most sound option at this point is to maximize your job/career skillsets and take the time (years) to learn about trading without wasting your money.

Absolutely, I was gambling which is why I lost the 12k, but I did so knowingly because I was overeager to grow account even at great risk. I thought I was the shit because I had several wins in a row with almost 0 errors. I realize this was incredibly stupid now. My performance is actually really good, considering I hear most traders claim 50% win rate is good. My problem is just when the going gets good I get arrogant and end up deviating from my strategy. Market kicked my ass and flattened my ego, and I totally deserved it.

 

[TDMA]

Looking for some experienced traders to give me a realistic expected profit mark for growing my account based on their own experiences. Is it possible to make upowards of 2-5% a day? I am new and have been trading for about 3 months seriously, 2 years prior on and off playing around non seriously. I've done rather poorly lately (lost $12,000) although I have identified the reason this happened is not because my system sucks, it's because I did not cut my losses and got into holding and hoping habit, or would put on impatient trades.

I'd like to make myself trading goals to reach, but I am wondering about the potential growth possibilities here. Is 2% a day (on capital traded not overall account) realistic? 5%? I trade with around $30,000, often going full barrel, but with tight stop now of 2% no matter what. Any hints as to setting realistic growth goals here?

The average is 1-2% return on capital, 3-5% if you are exceptional, 7-10% is unheard of and all assuming you are trading for preservation of capital, not martingale style. That's per month, not per week, and certainly not per day.

You could theoretically make those daily figures on a sub $1k account, or the same on a weekly basis with a $10k account, but up to $100k that would be monthly, and because professionally trading you need 6figure capital you come back to the 1-2% per month which provides a solid income.

You can slice the figures a million ways, but they always come back to the foundation, average, exceptional, unheard of. Not counting the 1,000s of hours training, which in reality is measured as 10,000+ hours. Now, if you evaporate another $288,000 in losses you should be able to fast track the 10,000 hours, but I'm presuming that's not what you had in mind.