Five things to improve your trading

[MrRenev]

I don't know, If you are struggling with discipline then being responsible to someone else, even anonymous posters on an internet forum, might help.
You are more than likely going to do what you said you would do if someone else is aware of your plans.

Not only is it lame but is that person going to be here all the time? And what when you get real big obstacles?
This reminds me of drill sargents, they're screaming not just to toughen up recruits but to weed out the ones that cannot make it from the start.
Even institutions afaik are not constantly behind their traders making sure they stick to their plan.
Not saying only people that are perfect from the start can make it but this is too much imo.

Why not.

(About demo trading until profitable). Let me explain.
1- I do not think (not sure) it recreates the same conditions, with widening spreads every NY close.

2- It won't filter out "emotional" investors, they will just find out they cannot stomach it after having wasted years

3- Hey imagine you have a good year then go live and lose xd you wasted your good year only making paper money, so then you go back to demo and make money on paper, then live until you lose real money, then back to demo until you win but on paper only, would be pretty sad (and funny )

4- Unless you daytrade in which case you might be losing 1% a day to spreads alone, you should not be losing that much (you worked on getting an edge before going in or will get one soon). It's easy: Either you make money: great, or you breakeven: work on an edge, or you lose money: good, just do the opposite now. You should not need to spend time on demo to figure out you should not be risking big, and that losses can add up fast, and that big black swans can wipe you out if you're dumb about it.

5- Afaik every single famous successful trader made it pretty much from the start. They spent years improving and eliminating dumb mistakes but they had success from the start. I don't know anyone (except people that sell courses) that have been struggling for 3 years and then magically became a great trader. It would be the same as the most boring unfunny guy one day hitting his head on a wall and magically becoming the funniest guy. No, funny comedians have always been funny.
I would be willing to bet the longer someone has been trading with no success, the lower the odds of that person turning into a consistent profitable one.

You should try it. It might improve your trading.

(clear your mind)
No no, look I've spend thousands of hours (decathousands actually) constantly thinking about hundreds of things, and this is how I come up with edges, ideas, etc. My second best strategy also came from me raging and revenge trading, I noticed hey wait a second I win alot when I do this...
I am constantly thinking about past trades and the news and all sorts of things. Trading is an intensive thinking activity, we are predicting the future, takes alot of thinking to beat others, we aren't obedient wageslaves paid to do some repetitive job and the less we think the better.

The "KISS" & "don't overcomplicate" & "find a magical strategy" are cringe tips meant to attract lazy get rich quick people into "I'll teach you how" scams. Obviously it has to be more complicated, not less, and people have to watch everything since everything is correlated and analyse all the PA & news all the time.
I recommend on making a system, including your daily analysis, checking trades, checking major currencies, etc... you know the whole process, as simple as possible (I will check 20 pairs +10 commidities & indices every weekend and I will use alerts on the price before making my full analysis to save time) right, not sure how to explain it clearly, but this is to get more efficient, you're still thinking alot etc, it's just how to put it, organise our habits as efficiently as possible.

If you meant like think about the current trade as you enter rather than some girls tits well then ye.

Hope you are not offended.

 

[deaddog]

If you meant like think about the current trade as you enter rather than some girls tits well then ye.

That's what I'm talking about. You shouldn't have porn streaming on one of your trading monitors.

 

[deaddog]

Not only is it lame but is that person going to be here all the time? And what when you get real big obstacles?
This reminds me of drill sargents, they're screaming not just to toughen up recruits but to weed out the ones that cannot make it from the start.
Even institutions afaik are not constantly behind their traders making sure they stick to their plan.
Not saying only people that are perfect from the start can make it but this is too much imo.

No that person doesn't have to be there all the time. If you have a friend, girlfriend or an anonymous poster on an internet forum and you tell them that you are going to do something, there is a strong probability that you will do it.

If you review your trades with someone there is a strong probability that you will follow your plan rather than have to rationalize why you didn't. Especially losing trades.

You can justify losing money on a trade because you followed your plan. It is tougher to justify losing money when you ignored your own well thought out plan.

I know nothing about institutions but I would think that someone reviews the losing trades.

 

[deaddog]

(About demo trading until profitable). Let me explain.

1- I do not think (not sure) it recreates the same conditions, with widening spreads every NY close.
I'm saying if you can't make it on demo your not going to make real time with the spreads and the emotion involved.

2- It won't filter out "emotional" investors, they will just find out they cannot stomach it after having wasted years
That's true but they have to find out if they can trade.
3- Hey imagine you have a good year then go live and lose xd you wasted your good year only making paper money, so then you go back to demo and make money on paper, then live until you lose real money, then back to demo until you win but on paper only, would be pretty sad (and funny )
I'd bet against that happening. Although apparently some can make money on demo and can't stand the heat of having their own money at risk. Nothing is fool proof.

4- Unless you daytrade in which case you might be losing 1% a day to spreads alone, you should not be losing that much (you worked on getting an edge before going in or will get one soon). It's easy: Either you make money: great, or you breakeven: work on an edge, or you lose money: good, just do the opposite now. You should not need to spend time on demo to figure out you should not be risking big, and that losses can add up fast, and that big black swans can wipe you out if you're dumb about it.

Granted you should have an edge. How do you know you have an edge? Back test and forward test. Maybe trade on a sym??

5- Afaik every single famous successful trader made it pretty much from the start. They spent years improving and eliminating dumb mistakes but they had success from the start. I don't know anyone (except people that sell courses) that have been struggling for 3 years and then magically became a great trader. It would be the same as the most boring unfunny guy one day hitting his head on a wall and magically becoming the funniest guy. No, funny comedians have always been funny.
I would be willing to bet the longer someone has been trading with no success, the lower the odds of that person turning into a consistent profitable one.

Are you saying that people can't be taught to trade? That you either have the talent or you don't. That you couldn't take a bad trader under your wing and show him the error of their ways?

 

[MrRenev]

That's true but they have to find out if they can trade.

I'd bet against that happening. Although apparently some can make money on demo and can't stand the heat of having their own money at risk. Nothing is fool proof.

Granted you should have an edge. How do you know you have an edge? Back test and forward test. Maybe trade on a sym??

Are you saying that people can't be taught to trade? That you either have the talent or you don't. That you couldn't take a bad trader under your wing and show him the error of their ways?

Idk demo is for the weak. Maybe it can get someone hesitant into this game if I made a demo at 15 I would have gotten earlier into this. Especially back then costs were higher and min orders bigger.
And so someone part time should be investing which should take time and then spending time on demo (which is time not spent going for good investments and also they just spend all of their time on this after work people are tired)?
Doesn't really make sense to me.
The purpose would be to avoid bad individual investors (at least 90%) from getting destroyed, not sure a demo will scare them and save them.


Are you saying that people can't be taught to trade? That you either have the talent or you don't. That you couldn't take a bad trader under your wing and show him the error of their ways?

Exactly. Einstein was not taught what to look for and how to think. Actually he hated school and thought it was stupid.
Tesla was mocked by his plebe teacher for coming up with continuous-alternative electricity conversion.
People born in a cave looking at shadows on the wall aren't going to be taught.

The people saying it can be taught all sell courses, and peak cringe is they use the turtle trader example.
The damn guy that invented this dogshit no brain strategy made money for 10 years because of all the dumb money chasing obvious bubbles, and then he wasn't able to teach himself how to make money and made 0 since 1985 35 years already.

3 ways to make money:
- Get lucky
- Cheat (insider info for example)
- Be smarter than others

Traders improve but their returns mostly depend on the market Warren Buffett and George Soros did not start making 5% a year then 10% then 20%.
Even if they did so it would be skill = imp*base
And with noobs skill = imp*base with base =0 so gl getting above 0

If we look hard enough I am sure we can find the magical wonderboy that struggled for 10 years then magically became profitable, the 1 in a billion.
The boy that sucks but starts lucky then loses and never makes money again is waaaaay more common.
Just watch Davey Day Trader from barstool sports lmao.

Not to say people should not learn the basics and the good ones won't make (big) mistakes, plenty of guys blew up mostly gifted overconfident idiots (Ray Dalio). Livermoore was a floor trader for a while before taking big speculative bets, Warren Buffett started at 8 before "really" starting at ~20, Soros worked in finance for a few years before "going in", RenTec guy same, etc.

People can end up making money without being a super gifted genius but I mean there's a min intelligence 90 IQ truck driver that always hated maths and never sees anything coming (but thinks he has great foresight because of hindsight bias)? Don't make me laugh this is an abstract intellectual thing not a manual job people love to dream.

"Learning lessons, knowing by heart a grammar or a compendium, repeating well and imitating
well - that," writes a former french Minister of Public Instruction, M. Jules Simon, "is a ludicrous form of
education whose every effort is an act of faith tacitly admitting the infallibility of the master, and
whose only results are a belittling of ourselves and a rendering of us impotent."

People got brainwashed into thinking they need "to be taught".
"The primary danger of this system of education - very properly qualified as Latin - consists in the
fact that it is based on the fundamental psychological error that the intelligence is developed by the
learning by heart of text-books. Adopting this view, the endeavour has been made to enforce a
knowledge of as many hand-books as possible. From the primary school till he leaves the university
a young man does nothing but acquire books by heart without his judgment or personal initiative
being ever called into play. Education consists for him in reciting by heart and obeying."

From a book about crowds.


The basics can be taught, the history of derivatives (something not a single retail fx day gamblers gives a rat's ass about interestingly), crowd psychology, what a hedge fund is, statistics, max drawdown, time risk, the exchanges (CME, LME, Nasdaq, etc), the open and close hours. All that stuff that can be easily found for free, all a class would do would be to frame this all, make a standard package, test the students, and then guarentee recruiters the students have the required basic level to understand markets etc. Doesn't give an edge and doesn't tell if the students will have an edge but at least might prevent them from buying "cheap Oil" at $1 or "hold cheap ETF" USO (lol).

Also school for young kids forces them to learn lessons when they'd rather play video games.
I hated school and it really got in the way but for average people it's not such a burden I guess?
Still a waste of money and time if you ask me.



EDIT: Could have made it shorter. Look at university NBA (or whatever it is called), all the sorts of "schools" for soccer players and junior rugby players etc. They aren't just picking random bums that "really really want to play" they pick the gifted ones and train them, get them used to regular training. There is no school to be Messy. Not even to be a second division bench warmer. Plenty of schools to learn by heart text-books to be a sports teacher in high school.
Not sure how it is in burgerland but here in France to become an engineer or manager (via a legit school) you have to pass exams over the years and in particular pass a competitive exam to get accepted in schools. Doctors same story, after 1-2 years they have sort of filters.
Trading is more competitive than "just" being a doctor or engineer where you can simply learn text-books by heart and hurray here is your diploma.

 

[deaddog]

Are you saying that people can't be taught to trade? That you either have the talent or you don't. That you couldn't take a bad trader under your wing and show him the error of their ways?

Exactly. Einstein was not taught what to look for and how to think. Actually he hated school and thought it was stupid.
Tesla was mocked by his plebe teacher for coming up with continuous-alternative electricity conversion.
People born in a cave looking at shadows on the wall aren't going to be taught.

The people saying it can be taught all sell courses, and peak cringe is they use the turtle trader example.
The damn guy that invented this dogshit no brain strategy made money for 10 years because of all the dumb money chasing obvious bubbles, and then he wasn't able to teach himself how to make money and made 0 since 1985 35 years already.

What steps did you take to learn the business?

Could those steps be repeated?

Especially if an experienced trader was showing you how.

Yup; I'm trying to get you to contradict yourself.

 

[MrRenev]

What steps did you take to learn the business?

Step 1- Get the right parents. My father is a post-doc graduate (Medical PHD + years into Oncology).
My mother prob smart too women didn't go study much in the UK she got a bachelor or something not sure not that degrees mean much but w/e.

Step 2- My parents told me when I was 5 an old lady asked me what Santa brought to be for chistmas and I laughed at her face. Same story later on with the "tooth fairy" etc. Come on adults I ain't that dumb. Other kids bought it all up.

Step 3- I knew I was different at 13, I knew it for a fact with proof at 19 when I made some sort of discovery (top secret). I've been predicting shit that seemed obvious and sometimes considered a fool for it by the sheeple (and once proven right everyone is silent).

Step 4- I also am on the far side towards "logic" on the emotional-logical spectrum. Lucky genes.
If I was emotional I wouldn't try this I'd be an actor or marketting or some shit idk.

Step 5- I always went deeper in my understanding of things, I always think outside the box whereas the sheeple just goes "it's normal". Soviets that grew up in the 70s to early 80s when price of Oil skyrocketed thought their standard of living was "normal" and when the price went back to the previous price (it had been at for 100 years) they got mad it was not "normal" and then the soviet union collapsed. Perhaps in 20 years wearing a mask outside will be considered "normal"? People often laugh at me and call me a conspiracy nut then I nut when I am proven right (and they pretend they knew from the start because of their disgusting inferior genes hindsight bias GL teaching those dogs)

Step 6- I checked trading after seing an ad as I was desperate to find activities I could take advantage of my skills with nearly 20 years ago but min account size was 10k (50,000 francs) or maybe 50k euros ridiculous and 50 euros commissions there was no way. I didn't really hear about trading until much later. Could have used the info I just didn't know it was a thing. Sure now I know about it they keep spamming me with ads useless cunts couldn't have told me earlier?

Step 7- Between 2017 and 2019 I spent more than 10,000 hours:
+ Looking at videos and reading things etc and processing all of it (most is BS especially the folksy wisdom omg) it's all useless garbage but I find it interesting especially the anecdotes and life stories, it gets me to think, triggers my imagination, that's the most important part
+ Wasted no time on idiotic indicators and made stats. I got thousands of screenshots (10's) on a hard drive somewhere an excels, numbers for alot of things
+ I think "outside the box" GL getting the conforming sheep that believe in climate change "6xst extinction" (I know its spelled th) and cannot figure out the healthcare system will be able to take care of the millions of baby boomers getting old. Literally when I was 12... ye 12... I was told about the USA debt thing like it was "normal" and it just made no sense to me and now I am adult and know more here we go I was right it makes no sense and is unsustainable.
+ I was good at predicting price action from the start especially crypto 2017-2018 that's when I rly good at it, but past March 2018 it got boring (I was correct at predicting the price would really slow down and be boring af and often flat btw) and I got into other assets ended up being FX & a few commodities
+ I came up with original ideas and I cannot unsee what I saw it really is "in your face" but no one gets it. Beats me. People are npcs maybe?
+ It's basically constant thinking and analysing and going back on the past (past trades I took or past events and trades I did not take)

Step Bonus- I have high adversity too. All these spoiled brats are less than men. Life shat on me enough for me to be a rock now. They are pathetic entitled losers that are beneath me. And in general most people do not have enough adversity.

Step more- A last one: You got it. I am risk resistant and emm let's say confident. I don't think myself as a demi-god rather I consider the competition are untermensch. Pfff people have disappointed and disgusted me and wasted my time so much with retarded advice I have negative respect for them. George Soros has said he saw himself as a Messiah sent from god to save humans. Livermoore was pretty cocky and laughed when dumb politicians blamed him for the 29 crash. Warren has a ridiculous "awww sucks" grandpa persona he thinks very little of people (and he is right) if he plays this role. Ray Dalio & Bill Lipschutz lost everything in one mistake in their 20s or 30s as they were so overconfident they were so sure of getting it right.

I could go on. Every day I think of things no one would think of, every month at most I test things that would not even cross people mind let alone go and test. They are stuck with their dumb indicators and being too lazy to make stats about anything. And if they don't "have it" they are going to run stats on pointless silly things makes me almost feel sorry for people.

Could those steps be repeated?

Teach people how to be born smart? Pretty hard.
95% of retail gets into daytrading. You tell them it is stupid with proof and they still argue.
No, these steps cannot be repeated until we truly master the human genome and can create freaks.
And also we'd have to include the entire planet in a giant conspiracy to turn someone into something specific.

No.

Especially if an experienced trader was showing you how.

Showing me what? His edge? The magical system?
Sort of like a quant then? They find flaws like different prices on 2 exchanges and do stat arb and idk what else.
If they will teach an edge they will lose money so have to charge for it as much money as they estimate the edge can exploit.
They're all trying to hard to keep those a secret but maybe someone knocks his head on a wall and magically decides to tell everyone his system!
And maybe aliens appear and make us all beautiful and smart and yes and let's say oh I know let's say we all had wings and also fountains of honey wouldn't that be great and what would you do if you won the lottery?

If we are looking for someone to teach people how to think the correct way on the other hand, this would not require an experience trader this would require a nerosurgeon and psychologist.


Gathering info is necessary but no magical piece of info will turn someone into a winning trader.
League of legends bronze players that read guides and watch streamers do not become challengers, they actually waste time compared to someone that plays during that time and actively tries to improve (watching replays, getting used to spell cooldowns, getting used to what works what doesn't (forcing baron) things like this). Same thing basically.

And pro players all have coaches to help them perform better. If you are selling courses and you are looking for a reason this can be it. To be a coach. Regulators always crackdown on false promises.
And courses sellers all sound the same the lambo lifestyle guy, the I've been around grey guy, the "I don't make promises others are scammers". No one was bright enough to come up with the "coach" approach (this is more than just calling oneself a coach I mean coach as in the whole concept and going over people trades etc).
Here, I thought outside the box. I'm no scammer I just write this as I go fresh out of my fucked up mind.
Might not work, not sure exactly how dumb and greedy people are they might fall for it but not get excited enough to purchase.


Hey but anyway you know what would help with this? Putting side to side the outcome of the average individual investor and the results of those that followed a trading course.
I am sure the "educated" ones have WORSE results

 

[longandshort]

Always understand why you think your trading strategy should incur excess returns. If you can’t explain that and develop some theory that’s tied to market dynamics or economic operations then you’re really just gambling poorly.

 

[deaddog]

Step 1- Get the right parents. My father is a post-doc graduate (Medical PHD + years into Oncology).

I think I did alright. Next time around I'll try and do better.

Hey but anyway you know what would help with this? Putting side to side the outcome of the average individual investor and the results of those that followed a trading course.
I am sure the "educated" ones have WORSE results

I'm surprised someone hasn't done that.

 

[SunTrader]

Who has the time to compose and type miiiiiiiiiiiiiile long nonsense posts?

Or expect others to equally waste their time reading them.