I am the best!

[ironchef]

Every dog has their day - going back to the early days of the Internet (dial-up Modem), when I had a real stand out week up $20-50k, I always felt like making a web site to spread the word how to trade - I was sure I had it all figured out. How could I fail - I was killing it and had half a million after taxes, 5 cars, no bills and a luxury condo on the best beach in Hawaii. A few years later I walked the streets at night in Montery looking for change and bills people drop by self pay lots, night clubs, etc. so I could get the 2 for $1 Ramen noodles to eat in my budget hotel - one bathroom per floor which was barely covered by my degrading min wage job complete with a name tag and was kicking a serious Oxy/Cocaine/GHB addiction from the non-stop years of self medicating to unwind from trading. A real downer after have been a network engineer for a global Telco for 16 years and clean/sober most of my life. Took 15 years to get back to where I was - doing well now but never want to forget the last time I felt invincible.

Don't be a hero. Don't have an ego. Always question yourself and your ability. Don't ever feel that you are very good. The second you do, you are dead. - Paul Tudor Jones

Folks like you are the reasons I keep coming back to ET.

Best wishes.

 

[Max E.]

I walked uphill to school-both ways

sorry,looking at the title i couldn't resist

@themickey best of luck mate,I am nowhere near this level.

Themickey is the Dos Equis guy.

 

[Max E.]

Great story man, youve been through the ringer and came out on top, must make you feel good, even though there was a lot of suffering to get there.

I hear ya man, trading is a tough gig, ive went from boom to bust 3 times, when i started we figured out a ridiculously easy way to rape the dark books, basically we would ping every stock on the market looking for a dark book order, then put a couple thousand shares through it to test it, then you could literally buy as much stock as you wanted, drive the stock up and dump it into the dark book at the top.

It was free money, wed make 10-20k on any given day and then go to the bar, which was right below our office, no research, no homework, nothing lol, I was so naieve thought that would last forever, the dark books figured out how bad we were burning them after about six months and they made their algorightms much more complex, so it stopped working, but i kept swinging the same kind of size once it ran out, and bled myself dry. There was times wed have a two to three hundred thousand share position on a 20 dollar stock, now i am biting my nails when i take more than a couple thousand shares, lol so funny how your perspective gets so jaded.

Then ended up doing systems trading and was crushing it there again, until my broker stole all my money, lol its always such a humbling experience going from making 4-5 figures on any given trade to back to chipping away at it a few hundred bucks at a time, its always so much easier making money with discretionary trades when you have a reliable system making alot of money every month. You tend to just wait for the best set ups and go all in, cause worst case if you lose the other system will make you the money back tomorrow. So much harder grinding where you rely on every trade for your income, but i hope after being through the cycle a few times ive learned not to take it for granted anymore.

Simply put trading is the hardest way to make an easy buck in the world, but i wouldnt trade it for anything, i love waking up every morning and looking at the market, and trying to put the puzzle together. No matter how bad you screw up (provided you dont blow out) you can wipe the slate clean and start fresh tomorrow, wish life was as forgiving as the markets

Every dog has their day - going back to the early days of the Internet (dial-up Modem), when I had a real stand out week up $20-50k, I always felt like making a web site to spread the word how to trade - I was sure I had it all figured out. How could I fail - I was killing it and had half a million after taxes, 5 cars, no bills and a luxury condo on the best beach in Hawaii. A few years later I walked the streets at night in Montery looking for change and bills people drop by self pay lots, night clubs, etc. so I could get the 2 for $1 Ramen noodles to eat in my budget hotel - one bathroom per floor which was barely covered by my degrading min wage job complete with a name tag and was kicking a serious Oxy/Cocaine/GHB addiction from the non-stop years of self medicating to unwind from trading. A real downer after have been a network engineer for a global Telco for 16 years and clean/sober most of my life. Took 15 years to get back to where I was - doing well now but never want to forget the last time I felt invincible.

Don't be a hero. Don't have an ego. Always question yourself and your ability. Don't ever feel that you are very good. The second you do, you are dead. - Paul Tudor Jones