Poker player moving to trade/advise please

[Scataphagos]

What poker skill can compete with trading experience? NONE.

Ditto.

IMV... There is literally ZERO correlation of skills between poker and trading. That's not to say a good poker player can't be a good trader, but that's not a given.

There is a bit of correlation between black jack card counting and trading the markets, however.

 

[MattZ]

To OP:
If you sat around poker tables long enough, you were exposed to certain "personalities" that have a similar pattern of behavior. You can identify their thought, habits, and their game. What you probably noticed, is that you have amateurs who play against all the rules of logic and still win(not for long). Then you have those who appear to have "no game" and walk away with everything, and at times you have those who play for fun and walk away when their bankroll is done. You could probably name lots of personalities you came across.
In the market place, they are all under one price and line. Trying to figure out the behavior of all them under one direction is your challenge. You are not playing against one table but a thousand. Single player versus crowd.

This thread points to a lot of similarities between Poker and Trading and I do not want to repeat what has been said, but essentially poker is similar to trading because they both have an element of odds and psychology. Intuition plays a considerable role in Poker in figuring out your opponents, but as you know, strategy comes ahead of everything and acting on a hunch alone will lead you to collapse, and the same is in trading.

As you start trading, keep score of your trading. There are many tools out there, and I am sure you can find plenty, but I genuinely like this one: EdgeWonk You will gain a full insight into the way you think and operate by looking at your numbers objectively.

Above all, best of luck!

 

[Chris Michaels]

OMG really?!?

*collapses*

What bloody tell does the market have that a player does? How can you possibly compare a human being's tell to a chart, or price-ladder, or order flow, which can reverse in a picosecond? Poker player tells are TELLS. They do not change.

Markets eat you up and spit you out by reversing their tells on you in the blink of an eye.

Am I totally off-the-mark here? Am I on some new planet of incomprehensible understanding?

No you aren’t considering what the “tells” are. “Tells” are usually found in back trading. If this, then this should happen as an example. A good tell for example is the N225 when trading the ES. Timeframe also plays a factor in my opinion.

 

[Chris Michaels]

Hi,
I am profesional poker player for 10 years. Lately the market for my kind of game shrunk and i am trying to expand my income with trading.
I started reading a book of techinical analysis and checking out some blogs.
I came here to ask for advise where to start and where to find the best material.
In high level poker the best material and knowledge you find in forum and small groups of study.
As well in poker best strategies change so fast that you need to be up to date.
I think in trading must be similar
So i believe i will find some answers here.
I have full time to follow markets as i am on computer playing poker full time anyway.
As my poker action decreased a lot i will have plenty of time to focus on markets
Thanks

You can follow me if you want on twitter. @stfrtrader. The best think you can do, (wish I had done this) was follow the market using something like TOS (thinkorswim) on demand service. You can go back in time and watch the market move, historically in real time. I use it when creating studies, or oscillators.

You can read books if you want. I’m not a person that learns through reading. I’m more of the “see it” guy. Of course there is a mix that I use in macro, and daily charting, or backtrading, price action, fibanocci, oscillators, news, Fed, Trump. It’s all inclusive. RN I’m studying the affect keywords in fin media have on AI/algo/black box trading mechanisms. Also watching dark pool volume daily. Then there’s timeframe, open interest in options, Bonds, EM.
It’s a lot, and no book that I know of will include all that, but then there’s more I haven’t even addressed.

Anyway, GL and if you have a question feel free to follow or just ask.

 

[sle]

You can follow me if you want on twitter. @stfrtrader.

LOL. Another celebrity trader in the making

 

[Bekim]

Well I would say they are very similar.
If you are a professional poker player then you already possess the ability to do nothing when their is nothing to do which would be to fold in poker. Bet when opertunity presents itself. Fold when you are wrong. You just have to figure out what your strategy and edge are.
You could still fail but I believe your chances would be 50% better or more then someone who is not a pro poker player.

 

[destriero]

You can follow me if you want on twitter. @stfrtrader. The best think you can do, (wish I had done this) was follow the market using something like TOS (thinkorswim) on demand service. You can go back in time and watch the market move, historically in real time. I use it when creating studies, or oscillators.

You can read books if you want. I’m not a person that learns through reading. I’m more of the “see it” guy. Of course there is a mix that I use in macro, and daily charting, or backtrading, price action, fibanocci, oscillators, news, Fed, Trump. It’s all inclusive. RN I’m studying the affect keywords in fin media have on AI/algo/black box trading mechanisms. Also watching dark pool volume daily. Then there’s timeframe, open interest in options, Bonds, EM.
It’s a lot, and no book that I know of will include all that, but then there’s more I haven’t even addressed.

Anyway, GL and if you have a question feel free to follow or just ask.

Where are you getting your info on dark pools?

 

[soulfire]

As you say.



How does that work for you in a situation like this?

View attachment 199840

How would your poker mind have calculated the odds of that down suddenly jumping up for 20 points on the NQ in the next 5 minutes, from that point? Remember, you had no time to think about it, you had no chance to calculate your odds...

What the frak does it have to do with professionalism? Math? Determination? My God man, you really never have traded, have you?

The approach will depend on your trading style certainly. If you are a very short term "tick by tick" or "bar by bar" trader- working in HFT lanes of sub second trading, I agree that isn't a good comparison to poker unless you have a computer driven program that can match that speed and make lightning fast calculations and model projections.

For human non computer discretionary trading, you wouldn't be limited to just that small reference of date, but all the chart data, patterns and statistics prior to that to map your model to. Once you believe you recognize a high probability trading pattern (tell), you can use that to determine your best entry area, combined with a stop loss if prices move against your entry enough to invalidate the model/pattern, and a limit order for the anticipated target price. At this point no more human calculation/input is necessary - either you get stopped out (fold), hit your target (win pot), or decide to close manually within your defined range. Being able to close manually is an advantage over poker in that you can take your winnings at any time without needing to wait for your main target to be hit.

If I were forced to trade with just the data shown - one of the simpler patterns is to just connect peaks or troughs to establish a trend channel. You have two initial peaks So the believed "tell" in this case is that the channel will hold and there will be buying at the bottom of the range. So you have a limit buy order near the bottom with a stop outside the range of the channel floor based on your risk mgmt/comfort levels. If the limit order is hit, then you have a target sell anywhere from 1/2 to 2/3 the way up based on your past experience/risk mgmt.

 

[Bye aces]

The markets will require an increase in your level of discernment.

It’s a bit like an inverse onion. Similar to an onion in that there are layers of logical truths. Inverse in that as one penetrates the mystery from the outside toward the center and as each layer is transcended it encompasses and encapsulates the prior layer.

Continuous dual auction markets operate via a sequence of events. A fundamental archetypal pattern expresses itself both long and short. Volume leads price provided sufficient liquidity exists. To truly ‘see’ a market one must interpret what the majority regards as noise and through a deductive process by observing the market’s basic granularity of information; transform that noise into signal.


As one’s discernment grows, it’s easy to see which layer other participants are operating within - what their beliefs are and how those beliefs shape their perceptions and what they experience as possible and not possible.

As for players one is trading with, it’s easier to reduce them to types which there are roughly 30ish. Each have different motivations and goals with their market participation.

The most formidable is the one staring back at you in the mirror.


The velocity of capital growth is truly awe-inspiring, scales in a way that is incomparable to a game like poker. It is mesmerizing, visually stunning and can sound like an exquisite orchestra - or it can be quite the opposite.

Through your own self-determination, self-discovery and growth, you get to choose.

Good luck with your journey, may participating in the markets give you what you are looking for.

Thanks for the input. All the help is welcome. This is inspiring and motivational

self-determination is something I got from learning poker throughout the years

 

[Bye aces]

I was a winning poker player (At least for live games) before switching to trading. I think you will adjust to it well, there are alot of similarities and I think the best aspect is controlling emotions from years of playing poker, or not being tilted in poker talk.

In fact, I think the learning curve in poker is higher than trading. That has been my experience, but surprisingly playing the markets is even more volatile than playing poker. In poker, you would lose at most $1k in a $5/$10 game if you only bought in for 1k and that is if you all in. Most likely as a fulltime pro you would have at least $100k bankroll to buyin 1k. In the markets, you can easily lose 5-10% in a short time. Essentially means losing 5-10k if you put in a 100k. Also, most of the time in poker you have more "control" over the outcome by playing in certain ways. In the markets, the swings are more unpredictable and you have less "control", its more about risk management and going with the trend.

Do pm me if you want to know more.

Thanks! Controlling emotions is something I mastered for poker levels.

Loosing 5-10K in one night was easy digested after some years. I know variance very well. But was easy as i knew I was doing the right plays and sure was all variance. I do not know how sure can i be I am doing the right trades in a post-analysis study of my operations

I will pm for sure