Is Trading Itself a Bad Trade? I Analyzed the Industry- Prove Me Wrong

[Stockolio]

The problem is your argument was more self-serving than a true attempt to gather data for research/evaluation.

You make an assessment based on your one sided evidence that successful retail trading isn't possible and a "bad trade" compared to other professions, and thus, shouldn't be pursued.

You act surprised at the wave of negative responses you receive when you KNOWINGLY and INTENTIONALLY decided to post an anti-trading post on a board dedicated mostly retail traders.

You could have found another site dedicated to long term investing or even trading skeptics where you would have been better received, but you choose to post to a site guaranteed to be full of people opposed to your viewpoint.

Getting a visceral negative response is no more surprising than if you visited an "I Love Florida" forum and made a case that due to increasing hurricanes and sinkhole formations, living in Florida is a losing proposition and folks that stay there are delusional, then take offense when your basic feedback is if you don't like Florida, stay the hell out.

You knew you'd get a large negative response and posted PRECISELY for that - it's nothing new. It's the quick and dirty way to get attention.

Next your premise that other "maverick type" of occupations are superior is flawed. You took the time to list problems with those who pursue trading and conveniently ignored the difficulties with the other occupations.

Example- take owning a business, being a star in sports or Hollywood. For every successful one you see that is accumulating great wealth, there are a vast majority more that fail or live marginally at best.

Businesses have to deal with regulations that favor prior entrenched companies, corrupted or inept officials/regulators that force you to learn how to play the game, and then avoid being stepped on by the larger firms if they take notice of you, and all this while having to carefully navigate social media to not create bad press.

Sports stars and actors not only have to be extremely talented, but they need to know the right connections and the spaces for top tier folks is limited by the number of sports teams or big budget movies produced. You also have a short career clock where your chances for success drop dramatically as one closes in on age 40.

Working the standard 9-5 is not such a great deal either- there are only a limited number of executive positions, most places are poisoned by office politics and you also have an age clock ticking.

I gave you a prime example of published successful trading- Renaissance Medallion Fund, and your response was telling. You claimed not to know much about the company and casually dismissed their impressive return citing the lower returns of their other funds. Unless you believe Medallion is a fraud, your quick dismissal shows you have no intention of being unbiased and your conclusion was already set.

Trading is one of the few industries that is incredibly difficult, but is closer to a true meritocracy than the other professions where you don't have to deal with office politics, back stabbers, and credit stealers. You will go as far as your talent takes you. If you're no good at it- you move on- simple as that. Or I suppose, one can then start arguing the case that trading is a fraud and a losing game for all but Ivy League quants to make one feel better- but that is clearly seen by all as a case of sour grapes.

There will always be people attempting to do great things that only a smaller percentage will succeed at, and there will be folks like you trying to make the case that they should never be attempted because of those difficulties and high rates of failure- likely due to many of them having failed at the task or being afraid to try and now seek to justify themselves.

People can't do something themselves, they wanna tell you you can't do it. If you want something, go get it period... You will come across losers on a weekly basis, don't bother trying to re shape how they view things. If they viewed things right, they wouldn't be losers in the first place

 

[ironchef]

Viewers,

This was my first post on Elite Trader and I was going to leave it to run for longer but I am posting my final assessment after just 12,000 views.

I posted this thread because:

1. A while back I was interested in making a lot of money and doing it ethically. I am completely unapologetic about this. In order to do this I decided that I would take an unconventional route and employ myself in the financial services industry mainly in London (at times I felt almost as if I was a corporate spy but I prefer to think of it as multi-year industry research). I worked for years in various firms and studied the industry from the inside out qualitatively and also through interviews and desk research. I learned valuable insights as to how to make money and a lot of it. However, my ethical value system constrained me from implementing most of the things I learned.

2. I felt I had an ethical responsibility to share some of my conclusions and felt it would be an idea to possibly write a book (although I would do this under another name) or perhaps convey my knowledge anonymously through a blog or social media. I planned to donate any proceeds to charity, This is because I had seen the sheer suffering, lost money, gambling addictions, miss-selling, damaged relationships and so on which retail clients experienced when they were ‘on the wrong side of the trade’ . The worst being, in my opinion, the loss of the most valuable commodity that these clients had….their time. I thought this forum might be a test as to how this book might be received.

After posting a thread on this forum, I was shocked that, instead of receiving lots of questions asking me, for example:

• For advice as to what unethical tactics to avoid.
• Successful strategies to make money.
• Questions as to any case studies, examples or facts I may have gathered.

…..I was bombarded with swearing, ad hominem attacks, conspiracy theories, labeled variously as a ‘loser’, ‘failure’ etc. Truly very very surprising. I had no agenda and was not selling anything, In fact, in once incident, one individual asked me to PM him, I sent him some guidance as to how to avoid being scammed by brokers (free of charge or agenda and just to help him). He immediately stabbed me in the back and publicly slandered me without even thanking me a few hours later.

My Synthesis

Broadly, my preliminary synthesis is that there are two general ‘themes’ into which participant behaviour can be categorized….In my opinion, they define success in trading (or any high-performance field for that matter).

1. Theme 1: Individuals who are ‘truth-based’. They make decisions based on evidence and facts. They are not afraid to confront difficult facts as they know that they help them make better decisions. Often, but not always, they accept and understand mathematics or hard sciences. Such individuals are prepared to work very hard in order to pursue their goals and dreams. They are not afraid to accept the difficulties/challenges of competition/adversity that they know they will encounter and try to overcome them. They often ‘study the game’ in order to succeed rather than impose their own idea of it on the world.

2. Theme 2: Individuals who are emotional weak and inherently intellectually (even physically) lazy. They are usually looking for a short-cut and are unprepared to do the necessary work to achieve their goals. In order to justify this, they often try to aggressively suppress evidence or facts as it is more comfortable for them psychologically that way. In many cases, they are manifesting signs of compulsive, addictive or delusional behaviour. A preliminary ‘acid test’ I used to identify such people (in the case of trading) is to ask them to provide a risk-adjusted P&L. An emotional, defensive or aggressive response indicated someone of the second ‘theme’ . Whereas, a ‘theme 1’ individual would have a different response.

I have come to the conclusion that the majority (but by no means all) of the posters on ET are in the ‘second thread’ and therefore have no value. I have also come to the reluctant conclusion that they also should not be helped or any time wasted on them even to ‘protect them from themselves.’

I have also obtained also psychological insights which leave me to believe that:

1. They themselves do not want to trade profitably (i.e. in a quantifiable sense).

2. They know exactly what they have to do to produce quantifiable results and yet are not prepared to do it.

3. Rather than quantifiable results, they want and pursue emotional results or fantasy results. This is the true reward that they seek rather than a quantifiable one. The reason being, in my analysis, that such emotional or delusional results are easier to obtain and require less effort.

I have also come to the conclusion that:

1. For the unethical, they represent a lucrative market segment. There is a very very strong argument indeed to take money out of the pockets of people of the ‘second thread’ and transfer it to pockets from where it will be better spent or invested as they are almost certain to lose it anyway.

2. A lot of very profitable companies and individuals do this currently (chop shops, brokers, education providers etc).

3. What is disturbing me a little is that, increasingly, following this forum, I am beginning to think that it would actually be ethical to do so whereas in the past I thought differently.

Summary

Regarding the issue of trading. I have come to the conclusion that:

• Trading can be a rewarding and highly profitable career or livelihood for a fraction of percent of individuals.
• Such individuals never follow the conventional retail day trading path 'sold' to such people but other ones (some of which I have outlined in this thread- elite universities,external resources, mathematical aptitude etc).

I read an interesting thread on another forum yesterday with a completely different level of participant (more ‘Thread 1’ people). These were people who were prepared to educate themselves, work-hard (100 plus hour weeks), compete, network and hustle their way to success. This was just part of the equation, however, with employment at high level firms and being located in a major financial centre being others. Many of them fail, but some of them appeared to become very successful at trading. I think for people with such a mind-set and external resources then trading can indeed be very rewarding and lucrative career. However, this is not for everyone.

• On average, however, I still think that there are better ‘trades’ out there for the 99 % of other people who do not have this inner mindset (CPA, med school, investment banking, trade school, school teaching etc). Nothing here has changed my initial analysis.

I will not be spending as much time on this forum. Please feel free to PM me if you have any questions.

I appreciate you spent a lot of time and effort to post your views and responded to our comments.

There may be a lot of other better trades, but, most of us here are just following our passion, like a moth flying into flame. You don't have to tell us this is not a good trade, we already knew when we started, that it is not a good trade, for the other guys.

It would be helpful if you can shine a light on how to improve our odds, like some of the regulars who spent their time doing. Then you will be valued by this community.

Have a good day.

 

[MeAgainstTheWorld]

I think running sucks, therefore no one should ever run, after all it sucks.

 

[Visaria]

I believe Cityboy to be either Anton Kreil or one of his associates or one of his students. The language and comments are very similar to writings and videos of Mr Kreil. Please prove me wrong*. I want evidence.

*I refer you once more to the title of the thread.

 

[JB1234]

I believe Cityboy to be either Anton Kreil or one of his associates or one of his students. The language and comments are very similar to writings and videos of Mr Kreil. Please prove me wrong*. I want evidence.

*I refer you once more to the title of the thread.

I agree. Have you done Mr Kreil's course? Or do you know anyone has done it? Any thoughts on it ?

 

[volpri]

I believe Cityboy to be either Anton Kreil or one of his associates or one of his students. The language and comments are very similar to writings and videos of Mr Kreil. Please prove me wrong*. I want evidence.

*I refer you once more to the title of the thread.

Possible Bingo?...I believe you may have hit the nail on the head..ROFLMA..

 

[CSEtrader]

I believe Cityboy to be either Anton Kreil or one of his associates or one of his students. The language and comments are very similar to writings and videos of Mr Kreil. Please prove me wrong*. I want evidence.

*I refer you once more to the title of the thread.

Maybe. I only did not meet in Anton's videos the type of snobbery Cityboy has towards self-directed traders.

I agree. Have you done Mr Kreil's course? Or do you know anyone has done it? Any thoughts on it ?

Returning to our outrageous and unbelievable for many, even here story, which is sadly true [ https://letsmaketheworldfairer.wordpress.com/2019/02/27/27-february-2019/], I contacted Anton Kreil and asked his support in terms of opinion. Silence.

"Traders help traders"
And there are many real examples of that in Mr. Leo Melamed book "Escape to the futures"

I don't believe that a sincere and real successful trader, who is really willing to help others to rise through the wilds of own weakness and cruelty of unscrupulous brokers, would not be moved to help us.
If one has at heart the self-directed trading then, the path is made of two core parts:
- help novices to understand that it is work, burning, learning and exercising. It is easy and will become such when you will release your in first your two "little" friends - ego and any type of beliefs about money, combined with hard work and martial arts like attention; and here city-boy's two categories are in the same wave;
- trying to clean up space from all type of sharks, to help the rules and standards to be respected, to stop the ongoing party of dishonest brokers who are taking illegal profits from genuine novices or to breaking all laws in hope to hide behind "trading is risky and 99% are losers".
No, we are not 99% losers.
And for me Anton's silence makes me understand that all his affirmations of having at heart to help traders are to say less, not true.

 

[Cswim63]

I dont think anyone has mentioned the obvious, that some people win by failing, some people win by not participating in the game. Or that some people try trading and discover a different kind of livelihood, one to which they are more suited. Some people seem to even enjoy analyzing the game with no apparent intention.

 

[Cswim63]

Someone mentioned old Seinfeld episodes in this thread. After recently watching a few, it's fairly obvious that much of the humor comes from the fact that the characters are all pathetic and never learn.

 

[ironchef]

Maybe. I only did not meet in Anton's videos the type of snobbery Cityboy has towards self-directed traders.


Returning to our outrageous and unbelievable for many, even here story, which is sadly true [ https://letsmaketheworldfairer.wordpress.com/2019/02/27/27-february-2019/], I contacted Anton Kreil and asked his support in terms of opinion. Silence.

"Traders help traders"
And there are many real examples of that in Mr. Leo Melamed book "Escape to the futures"

I don't believe that a sincere and real successful trader, who is really willing to help others to rise through the wilds of own weakness and cruelty of unscrupulous brokers, would not be moved to help us.
If one has at heart the self-directed trading then, the path is made of two core parts:
- help novices to understand that it is work, burning, learning and exercising. It is easy and will become such when you will release your in first your two "little" friends - ego and any type of beliefs about money, combined with hard work and martial arts like attention; and here city-boy's two categories are in the same wave;
- trying to clean up space from all type of sharks, to help the rules and standards to be respected, to stop the ongoing party of dishonest brokers who are taking illegal profits from genuine novices or to breaking all laws in hope to hide behind "trading is risky and 99% are losers".
No, we are not 99% losers.
And for me Anton's silence makes me understand that all his affirmations of having at heart to help traders are to say less, not true.

You both are saying OP is making a sales pitch for XXX?