How little capital could you make a living off?? ;)

How low capital (All the money you have in the world as capital), could u make living

  • Could consistently do it and survive with under £1,000 capital.

    Votes: 7 4.4%
  • Could consistently do it and survive with betwen £1,000 - £10,000.

    Votes: 31 19.4%
  • Need minimum 10k, but could sustain making a living with under 30k

    Votes: 42 26.3%
  • Need over £30,000 capital to be able to do it.

    Votes: 80 50.0%

  • Total voters
    160
Quote from spanish89:


However its not the risk side of trading taht i dislike,
its more just that i only like trading when theres decent volatility.

(Oil Market last year from May t End of year)


Lots of fast intraday swings and i have a giant smile on my face all day as i can tear the market to shreads whenever it does that. :cool:


But the way the market is now and how slow movement is and how elongated trend are, but how slow they take to move in both directions,
i now sit at the screen 16hours per day waiting for the perfect entry, often takes 1-2 day now before the entry is there,

You do realize that a lot of people made money during that time right? That doesn't necessarily mean they're good traders. Everybody at my firm made money then even the 1 month old trainees. Actually, I don't know a single person who didn't make money day trading then at my firm and others. But I can tell you they're hurtin now. So don't be so cocky kid.

My grandma was an awesome trader too.... well, during the tech bubble run up. She should come here and tell all of you how amazingly awesome she is and how she pwned NT everyday.
 
Quote from bespoke:

You do realize that a lot of people made money during that time right? That doesn't necessarily mean they're good traders. Everybody at my firm made money then even the 1 month old trainees. Actually, I don't know a single person who didn't make money day trading then at my firm and others. But I can tell you they're hurtin now. So don't be so cocky kid.

My grandma was an awesome trader too.... well, during the tech bubble run up. She should come here and tell all of you how amazingly awesome she is.

You do realize that spanish is a trading jesus right? so everything you said doesn't apply to him. He took 700 pounds and turned it into 30,000 pounds. So everybody that comes in here with their "can't do" attitude needs to consider who they are talking to

so in a way, spanish answered his own question. The smallest amount of capital you need to make a living is 1k
 
spanish89,

If you're making 300% on your investment you don't need another job and wouldn't be bored with trading because you could take off and do what you want when you want. How long have you been making 300%? If less then one year then come back and 3 or 5 and tell us your story. Good Luck to you!
 
this clown doesnt even trade...wtf is this thread doing here?this is just pure bs chit chat ...waste of bandwidth on a 19 yr old jerk troll with nothing to do...
 
Quote from dsq:

this clown doesnt even trade...wtf is this thread doing here?this is just pure bs chit chat ...waste of bandwidth on a 19 yr old jerk troll with nothing to do...
Well this all sounds like riskfreetrading to me. I gotta mortgage my pampers box and sell my panhandling spot in front of the car wash and get into this get rich day trading ASAP!
 
Quote from spanish89:

*Btw i saw a few guys were talking about their leverage.

At the end of the day your leverage is irrelevant though.
Since its not a case of 'bigger leverage easier to make money', since the more leverage teh more risk there is, so that negates the 'extra easiness', and so its just no actual difference overall.

Most people think it's an invitation to double their bets.

The 2 rules that everyone says are the most key and important 1s, and that everyone says they follow.

1. Risk 2% of your capital per trade.

2. Have a risk reward ration of atleast 1:3.

The 2% figure is generally a suggestion to risk no more than 2% on a trade, and I doubt most experienced traders risk that much. Risk-to-reward varies greatly from trader to trader. I've most often seen 1:1 thrown around as the minimum to shoot for.

12% return is seen as very good for ''an entire years work''!!

I think many people are comparing apples and oranges. A comparison just can't be made between a longer term trader and say a scalper. The latter will have many, many more trades and should be expected to achieve a much higher return. I can't imagine any trader settling for 10%. A day trader can make than in a single trade by lucking onto a larger move, which frequently happens.

I've given a far more conservative earlier on about a day trader achieving 344% (10 trades per day, risking 0.5% per trade and making 10% of risk). Perhaps longer term trades are underestimating the volume of the shorter term traders.
 
Trading with 1K is like jumping off a 4 story building. Sure there are a couple of people who managed to survive the jump, does it mean it should be the modus operandi of the rest?

As for operating capital, 50K is imho bare minimum to do ES without undue stress. 100K being an OK amount and 500K optimal amount to do this right.

Good luck!
 
Quote from Mr J:

Say I make 10 trades a day at 0.5% risk per trade and make 10% of my risk per trade. That's 2.5% per week, or 344% compounded annually (of course it won't be quite this efficient in reality). I'm inexperienced at trading, but I don't believe that any of these statistics are unreasonable.
Anything is possible but annual returns like that are not likely for most people. Sooner or later most people hit a losing stretch or a serious drawdown that eats up an awful lot of those small winners.
 
Back
Top