Second account blown and conditioned to lose

[Leob]

Sim trading does work in terms of what you described. However, one can do this better with using a small account and trading small. That learning is real learning because Sim trading will make traders feel differently (specifically in psychology) and they have to correct it later, which causes more harm/trouble than good (by saving a little real money).

My belief is that if you don’t lose big money you won make big money. There’s no free/easy lunch of not losing or losing small but making big money. That’s a fantasy of most amateur traders including myself for so many years until I finally realized it.

The only thing you should " lose" is time.
If you not play live market same as demo account, don't start. Systemic processing is systemic processing. Feeling uncomfortable, psychology issue, don't trade. Gather confidence in your understanding with demo.
Than start small..

 

[Laissez Faire]

$3,500? I thought this would involve at least a few hundred thousand if not more. The loses can easily be recovered with a part time job or as a tax write off.

Plenty of traders have taken losses that they would be lucky to ever back fill in their life time.

I came back in my 40's after a loss of $1.2M (inflation adj double that), it took 10 years working my tail off & having some luck catching a few big trends.

Its how we come back from loses that defines traders, for some its a just a blip in the past on their way to getting better.

I was thinking the same. $3500 have to be the cheapest tuition I ever heard of for an aspiring trader. The OP should consider himself very lucky to not have lost more.

That said, we don't know where the OP lives. In some parts of the world $3500 is a lot of money, but unless it's a third world country, hopefully it's not a disaster for the OP.

Your story is an inspiration.

10 + years and a lot of money lost on the way is not an uncommon success story. Sadly, many people spend that and more and still don't make it. So, the decision to continue pursuing trading is a hard and very personal one.

 

[smallfil]

Hello again, first of all thanks to all of you that took your time to reply to my thread. I never once thought this journey would be easy. I knew right off the bat that it would be extremely hard and experienced how hard it is several times.
Ofcourse, I had/have no guidance, no mentor ( I don't even know how real mentors are found to be honest and why they would be willing to mentor someone in the first place unless the mentee is a relative or a really close friend, since it costs them their time= money and at the same time they do not owe you anything in the first place).
Next, my former career, was in the shipping industry. I was working onboard vessels as an officer, so I spent a good portion of my adult life, onboard a ship. And yes, I hated it. I stopped doing it, with a few years worth of living expenses available. And this might be a contributing factor to my failure, among others, the lack of a stream of income.
So, I started this pursuit (wouldnt call it a career since I didn't manage to be successful in it and earn a living through it), in hope of escaping the "hamster wheel". Coming from poverty, my goal was/is, to live a good life. Do I like trading besides the promise of money? Yes, I do. But, it brings the worst out of me hence the monetary results.
Then when it comes to paper trading. I tried it. Did I do it methodically and well planned? No, I did not. I was/am way too calm when paper trading, losses do not affect me, price fluctuations do not affect me. I am a completely different person when trading live.
Regarding statistics. My win percentage is 64.5% in 2600 trades, which means, well nothing. Over the course of 2.5 years my total loss amounts to approximately 3500 euro. These losses, were accumulated over the course of, 4 days. 2 days (1500 euro) while trading equities in Feb 2022 with IBKR (revenge traded the result) and the next was on this Monday and Tuesday (same pattern, same result).

After reading through all your comments, I am probably destined to fail.

Whether you succeed or fail depends on you. Only you can determine your fate as a trader. Most of the top traders blew up accounts and lost huge sums before they figured out how to trade stocks and make lots of monies.

 

[Tradess0610]

Read the whole thread. Few things that jump to my mind:

- how in the world do you start without a mentor, community, proven strategy? Find a community (they are not for free so mentors are there trying their best to explain)
- once you have the proven strategy, BACKTEST it.
- once you are profitable backtesting, go with a small account. Get your risk management under control!
- and last thing: if the loss makes you nervous, DECREASE LOT SIZE.

 

[Specterx]

Hello,

this is my first topic here, and sadly, it wont be a good one. I have been trading for the past 2.5 years and apart from a brief success period it has been nothing but struggle. Started with stocks and IBKR, then 1 year ago moved to futures (DAX, NQ, rarely YM) trading via CFD. Started with a very small account which I raised and nearly destroyed several times.

My common behavior was/is : Eat like a bird and shit like an elephant. As soon as I enter a trade, if the trade goes in my favor I will exit my position for merely a few points and so many times see the trades I were in developing into huge winners without me in them ofcourse. But I will always take the full hit in a loss. And this has been going on for so long. And this isnt even the worst part of it. I started revenge trading. If I got stopped out and saw a small retracement in my prior basis I would reenter my position with a new stop loss in place at the next support/resistance area, but also increasing my position size, or add to my position if the trade went in favor for 2 consecutive candles for example. This is clearly a sign of decline instead of improvement.

My first blowup was in November of 2022. I stopped trading for 3 months. I refinanced my account in February and started trading again. And this week, it happened, on Monday I had a moderate draw down day, then on Tuesday, traded the EU session profitably and during the NY session, one small loss started a downward spiral which ended with me obliterating the account.
I feel like I failed my wife and kids completely. I do not follow other people in trading, am not member of any discord or other groups, have read books on psychology ( Trading in the zone, Best loser wins, Trading beyond the matrix etc), none of it worked. A good friend of mine told me, even in the past, "if you can't fix your problems and are constantly afraid of your positions then quit".
But, I don't want to quit. Do I want to continue doing the same mistakes? Ofcourse I don't want to. But I don't seem to be able to stop myself or develop the discipline I desire.

Is this even achievable or am I simply conditioned to be a permanent net loser? Landing streaks of small winning days and one devastating day. Is there any light in the tunnel? I see that no matter how many books I read, videos I watch, conversations I have, when in the trenches the same mistakes are repeated over, and over.

Thanks for reading, and please, do not be too harsh, I am already more than harsh at myself as is.

Stop trading immediately, close all your brokerage accounts (you can open or keep a cash-only investment account for passive indexing at a broker not offering futures or CFDs), delete your usernames on ET and similar forums. Find a new hobby and don't look back.

You can do it now or do it five, ten, or 100 grand down the road, plus a lot of emotional struggle. With a family to provide for you are also risking your marriage and self-respect / status as a man and a provider.

 

[longandshort]

@Anothertrader1 h/t for @MrMuppet

just putting this out there:

If you’re interested in becoming a serious trader, then I’d be willing to train you in exchange for a 2year NDA + 2yr exclusive ownership of your trade ideas (though you may trade them too).

After training you would cover shipping & logistics companies, along with global freight indicators.

 

[Overnight]

Lol I do already bro. Long syn straddle with a PF and a put cal. How do you like them apples

I've never before heard anyone saying their options straddles were "swing" trading, although technically it goes for day and days until you exit. I've only heard the "Day" "Swing" and "Position" terms used in pure stocks/futures.

 

[s trader]

Like in business if you are not good enough alone why don't you team up with others to trade one account. You have more capital more brain power. Star trek do not have one guy running the ship.

 

[getthatintoya]

I've never before heard anyone saying their options straddles were "swing" trading, although technically it goes for day and days until you exit. I've only heard the "Day" "Swing" and "Position" terms used in pure stocks/futures.

Hey O/N sorry for slow reply have been away on holidays.In this situation I could get a better result than just going D1 in futures. I'll break it down. My outlook was to either trade sideways for consolidation or a bounce of some sort and for the market not to puke below 6700.
Long futures short 7300 call in a 1*2 ratio (short syn straddle)
Short the 6700 PF in a 1*3 ratio (short syn straddle) This was giving protection to the above position and even though a market fall would have resulted in mtm loss my theory was for 6700 to hold and therefore run to expiry if needed. Upside BE on that is 7200 and this is my upper limit for a bounce.
The 6600 put cal was protection for a sharp move down after entering. This will go out at a small loss.
I am being paid to hold this position for the upward move.