I'm 21 years old, couldn't enter University, planning to trade full-time.

marketsurfer said:
If you are not educated in higher math, computers, or stats-- the ONLY way to make it is to joun a prop firm that will provide leverage and teach edges. If you are educated, you can join hedge funds , institutions, etc and learn under a mentor if they think u are a smart cookie.

With the prop firm u may have to out up first loss capital, but its way smarter than the stupid DIY 10,000 hour way -- which just ends up making you poor and desperate friendless and angry. unless u get lucky.

EVERY verified succesful trader on elite worked for a firm first or still did. No one DIYd with evidence-- lots of keyboard cowboys pretenders and stealth vendors trying to convince you otherwise but after 13 years on this forum, i have never seen evidence of a non firm trained trader ever being succesful.
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and just exactly who are the verified successful traders who post on et?
 
wrbtrader said:
Yeah, markets were very different back then in comparison to today.

1) Surprise FOMC rate announcements during trading hours

2) Crazy volatility surrounding IPOs

3) Enormous directional price movements due to the crazy volatility...moving 10 - 20 points in stocks and futures in minutes

4) Late afternoon trading session often had more volatility than the morning session

5) Huge commercial growth of the internet that had an enormous impact on price movement in the markets

6) Then the bubble burst and a wilder price action occurred...stocks like Amazon dropping from +100 to +7 range in a very small duration although they have fully recovered today.

7) Explosion in tech stocks and web stocks especially if you lived in cities that were considered to be a hot bed of such (e.g. San Francisco, Seattle).

It was also the day trading excitement, the investing excitement...it was like rock n roll almost every trading day. I remember several analyst on TV that said they had been at Woodstock and saying the markets of the late 90s was like the financial version of Woodstock. I also remember all those weird commercials by discount brokers, day trading, IPOs that was giving a clear message...if you want financial freedom...you gotta get involved in the markets before the historical times are no longer (burst). Then when it burst...it was more wild. Stocks dropping faster from those crazy inflated prices than they had gone up. Day traders that had easily and quickly made millions in the markets...lost it faster than they had made it.

If you traded in the 90s...it really was a very special time and today's markets do not even compare to the type of volatility (crazy price movements) back then.
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Yeah. I remember that surprise rate cut during Greenspan's time as fed chairman. It was 11:30 a.m. edt, I believe on a Friday. Out of nowhere. Nobody saw it coming. The Sp's were down like 10 points or so. I saw the headline on Reuters. The next quote on my screen was SP +10.00.....+30.00..........+60.00....... It all happened in seconds. A few guys on my desk were short. The losses were staggering.....unheard of. The prices you saw on your screen weren't even close to accurate. I only had on like 2 positions at that time of day. Luckily long. One was SUNW which at the time was a slower moving tech stock. I saw it was trading 82, up like 3 bucks from where I bought it. I just sold it at the market, got 87. That was a huge move for SUNW back then. Crazy stuff.

Yes...also the last hour of trading was the wild west. These days a majority of the volume is done the first 2-3 hours or so, then very little throughout the day. Back then you had a ton of volume in the last hour, probably more than the first hour. Much different now.

Your last points are all on target. Back in those days guys could have brutally bad mornings trading, but make it all back and then some by the close. Now a days if you get obliterated in the morning it's not nearly as easy to get it all back. Trading back then was like some kind of Woodstock for traders.

I think a lot of problems for guys who started during those times was they never experienced a market really going down. During the bubble you could just keep buying with reckless abandon, and you always got bailed out. But when the bubble burst a lot of guys at my old firm got clobbered and never recovered. All of a sudden they would dig holes, but couldn't get out, and made it worse. Our firm saw huge turnover when the bubble bursting began.
 
Laissez Faire said:
Thanks for clarifying. I suppose what you're really saying then is that markets were way more volatile. I didn't trade back then, so I don't know how it was. Further, my experience with intraday trading is really limited to index futures and crude oil. That's pretty much all I know.

When you said markets were way different, I thought you were perhaps impyling that they were predictable in the past , but not now, which is what I believe Marketsurfer seemed to imply when I gave him the following quote:

“I always laugh at people who say “I’ve never met a rich technician” I love that! Its such an arrogant, nonsensical response. I used fundamentals for 9 years and got rich as a technician” – Marty Schwartz.

As for Zanger, it may very well be that there were quite an amount of luck involved or that he simply mastered CURRENT conditions at the time being. The toughest thing with trading is being able to adapt to ever changing conditions. That's why a lot of traders can do great during one period, but blow up when volatility dries up or markets become more range bound than directional, a bull becomes a bear, etc.



Got it. I tend to think the same way.



I don't think Marketsurfer is to be taken seriously. I'm pretty sure he has some other agenda he's pushing, i.e., trying to get publicity and attention.
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You are welcome man. That was exactly my point. The volatility was insane. Also it was basically all day long from bell to bell, everyday. So there were tons of opportunities. These days it seems once you hit noon edt, the market volume dries up and the moves are basically done for the day.

As far as predictability/the way the markets trade in that sense? I don't think it's much different than the old days. Trading is trading. Markets are going to go where they want to go. Been that way forever.
 
Only read first page, you say you gave 10k is that USD ?

If so i have less than that and make 50% living trading averagely, so better trading than average and you could easily grow that pretty quick to 100k as is.

Markets havent changed in 10 years, they are either going somewhere (trend), or trying to decide on direction (chop), then there is the annoying grey area between the 2 you need to learn to cope with.


Its really not that hard, we just make it hard iver thinking it, so no science or maths degrees required or english thankly for me :)
 
lawrence-lugar said:
What are their annual average % rates of return o_O ...actually, since this is a Trader forum...i should be asking more of what are their Monthly average % rates of return?
do they compound it?
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No idea--

LOL! Rearden made multi millions with his prop firm -- you need to ask directly for specifics from prado or rearden.
 
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marketsurfer said:
No idea--

LOL! Rearden made multi millions with his prop firm -- you need to ask directly for specifics from prado or rearden.
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You know I never talk about how I do....good or bad. Been that way forever. The guys who showed me the ropes when I was new to the game instilled that in me. I can vouch for Rearden. I sat 2 seats down on a trading desk with him. The guy was a top guy in our office. His only drawback was when he got away from trading and made side bets with me. When things got slow guys on our desk would bet on anything. Rearden made the mistake of taking my action on an episode of the dating game. Yes....as I said we bet on anything. I took him for a nice pile of cash that day. We had a blast on that desk. RM is a good guy on my book.
 
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