I finally Quit Daytrading after 5 years

Quote from Notes123:

You said: You have traded for 5 years, first 2 years were unprofitable, the last 3 years were profitable, but you are NOW stuck in an 18 month long drawdown.

18 months are 1 and 1/2 years. If you take this time out of the last 3 years, you are left with 1 and 1/2 years of profitable trading.

Where did the 3 years of profitable trading come from?
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You lack in the imagination department. See below.

Quote from thesniper:

The first 2 years were unprofitable the last 3 years were profitable but I'm stuck in an 18 month long drawdown.
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I would eneterpret this as "each of the last 3 years was profitable".

Notice, this doesn't contradict to "stuck in an 18 month long drawdown". If the OP had an unusually large profit 18 months ago and quickly lost most of it, he could still be profitable in each of the last 3 years... but hasn't made back all the money he lost (shortly after he made it)

Imagine the following scenario:
Year 1 Quarter 1: P&L 30K
Year 1 Quarter 2: P&L 30K
Year 1 Quarter 3: P&L 30K
Year 1 Quarter 4: P&L 30K Year P&L 120k
Year 2 Quarter 1: P&L 120K
Year 2 Quarter 2: P&L (150K)
Year 2 Quarter 3: P&L 20K
Year 2 Quarter 4: P&L 20K Year P&L 10k
Year 3 Quarter 1: P&L 20K
Year 3 Quarter 2: P&L 20K
Year 3 Quarter 3: P&L 20K
Year 3 Quarter 4: P&L 20K Year P&L 80k

In the above scenario the trader was profitable in each of the last 3 years but still needs to make 30k to "get out of the drawdown".
 
Quote from thesniper:

I have absolutely zero interest in regaining my motivation to daytrade. I thank God for my protracted drawdown because this is exactly what I needed to quit and to get on the path of true success in this business: managing risk as a portfolio manager.

Here are all the insane huge macro moves I missed the past decade because of being focused on DT:
2001-2003 one of the largest bear markets in history
2003-2008 one of the longest bull markets in history
2001-2011 the most insane bull run in commodities
2008-2009 the most insane volatility ever
Huge moves in FX, dollar getting crushed against all currencies
Huge moves in lots of stocks every year: AAPL, AMZN, GOOG, TZOO, LEH, BP, LULU, NFLX, and way too many stocks to list.

If I were to ride any one of the above multi-year macro trends I'd would have made as much as I did DT with like 1/1000th the effort and 10 times more free time to enjoy life.
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it's called the hindsight, idiot.

by the way,
2011-2015 will see the biggest collapse of US dollar in history.
2011-2025 will see the longest bear market in history.
2011-2014 will see the biggest increase in gold price, to 4,500 dollars an ounce.
2011-2016 will see the birth of the first great grand child of Osama Bin Laden (a bookie at King's Cross, London, is accepting bets on the gender of the child, place your bet).
you are not very smart, you should quit.
 
Quote from Notes123:

it's called the hindsight, idiot.

by the way,
2011-2015 will see the biggest collapse of US dollar in history.
2011-2025 will see the longest bear market in history.
2011-2014 will see the biggest increase in gold price, to 4,500 dollars an ounce.
2011-2016 will see the birth of the first great grand child of Osama Bin Laden (a bookie at King's Cross, London, is accepting bets on the gender of the child, place your bet).
you are not very smart, you should quit.
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An idiot, calling another person an idiot.

2011 to 2025... wow! you can predict *14 YEARS* into the future!

Your day, like all others who day trade... is coming. You watch.
 
Quote from thesniper:

The first 2 years were unprofitable the last 3 years were profitable but I'm stuck in an 18 month long drawdown. I'm just too demoralized and tired of the stress to continue.
The money I can easily make back but all the time wasted impulsively gambling and all the life wasted from the stress - that I will never regain. No regrets, however - I learned lots about myself and the market. And fortunately, I have more than enough money to make it as a swing trader and investor so I will try that path the reminder of the year.
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Moving from DT to ST is your prerogative, but I think you're making the right choice. Go back and re-read Reminiscences of a Stock Operator and you'll observe that he too, made this move.

DT and ST has both its good and bad, but think about it, if you can make the same amount of money with both ST and DT, why would you choose facing your screen for 10 hours a day when you could have the same result fo 2 hours?
 
+1

Quote from Magic8:

An idiot, calling another person an idiot.

2011 to 2025... wow! you can predict *14 YEARS* into the future!

Your day, like all others who day trade... is coming. You watch.
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Quiting daytrading and stop fighting the robots and at the same time increasing your timeframe is the right step in the evolution of a trader. These are the steps:

1. Beginner: technical day trading, which leads to
2. emotional day trading, which leads to
3. position and swing trading for larger avg. win, which leads to
4. trend following, the method of the masters

Your move proves you are on the right path. I am level 3 now and I hope soon to migrate to level 4.
 
worrying. I would have thought after 3 years of consistently profitable trading, most would assume that they have finally 'made it' or 'got it', and not have to worry about becoming a losing trader again. So maybe we must be profitable for more like 10 years before we can call ourselves a profitable trader.
 
Quote from Eddiemorra:

worrying. I would have thought after 3 years of consistently profitable trading, most would assume that they have finally 'made it' or 'got it', and not have to worry about becoming a losing trader again. So maybe we must be profitable for more like 10 years before we can call ourselves a profitable trader.
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Day trading is a negative sum game for traders.Trading is a zero sum game.The brokerage industry wants to promote to churn out commissions all day long , at the expense of trader's wealth,health and stupidity.

This threads says it all.

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=218977
 
Quote from bearlion:

My sincere suggestion is that when the future in uncertain, go for daily trading only and book your profits everyday or every week in stock markets. Do not invest for long term.
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+1
 
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