I'm sure SMB warned her about the failure rate. They come across as pretty straight up and have a good reputation (if such a thing exists in the prop world). WSW promotes the dream to the public they don't want to include negative stats in a 30 minute show. They edit the film to show it as glamarous and attainable as possible. The girl does come off naive about six months to money, but it could be that her self confidence is less visible than the typical new yorker. Plus she clearly never had to struggle for money at any point in her life and my experience has always been that those folks don't ever grasp the reality of being without until their credit card is taken and the eviction notice arrives. Perhaps being naive about reality can make you more fearless and accelerate your learning curve if you have skill. Plenty of skilled traders still fail based on fear alone. Seriously how many of your losses are from really picking the wrong side or panicking out of the right side too easy. I know I am much more a victim of the latter.
When I initially got into trading after five years of banking, I was clearly warned about the 90% failure rate in interviews (i use this term loosely with props, because they almost have to sell you), but I wanted to live my dream. I started with Madison Trading at .01 a share, no deposit, and a "training program". The 3 free lunches a week weren't bad either especially for a guy whos rent expense just tripled and 65k salary and bonus opportunities just disappeared. They also covered health care after six months, once I left I came to understand why .01 with health care is not a bad deal for a beginner. Self insured health care in NYC sucks, no wonder Health care stocks are considered defensive they rape my wallet worse than any specialist ever did.
Five years later I don't own a $2 mil condo in nyc but I'm still doing what I love and take checks on a regular basis. I've seen guys own the world one year and be out of the business two years later. I'm using the slow and steady wins the race approach, though it would be nice just to crush it one time.
I preach the ability to situational trade all the time on this board. There's no one right way to make money in mind, but guys here constantly bash anyone who does it different then they do. I use a little of several different strategies and master none. Not yet a millionaire but very happy to be debt free and enjoy my job.