Yes, money printing by Central Banks worldwide has elevated most asset classes, but done little for the real economies. We've seen this movie before (directed by the evil Alan Greenspan, who continues to attempt to re-write history) and know it will end very badly, but timing is tough. It could last another 3-5 years, or 3-5 months. The S&P may have already put in a high, and the decline could be starting.
But back to my trading. Even though I may build-up a position of 100+ lots, most of my e-mini orders are for 1 -5 lots. There is too much liquidity and too many smart traders, and computerized algorithms, so, IMO, scale trading is mandatory.
And although I sometimes scalp a few ticks, that is generally because my position has increased, say to 70- 100 lots, and the mkt is still showing too much strength (I'm almost always short.)
Hopefully anyone who has traded for more than a few days, knows the trick to trading is not finding profitable trades, or bull or bear markets, but how one handles losses. So in my case, if I am short 10 or 20 or 50 lots, I'm always worried what would happen if the mkt ran-up 5 or 10 or 20 handles. I'll take losses of $50 - $200 per contract, or preferably profit of $10 per lot. What kills both the pocketbook and especially the soul are losses of $30-50,000 (50 lots x 15-20 handles.)
I consider myself a good trader, and over tens of thousands of trades, spanning 20-30 years, I am profitable on maybe 30-40% of my trades. A successful scalper would have a higher %, while long-term trend followers (some still remain) might only be correct on 20%. Most top-notch traders fall into above. Anyone claiming greater than 70% profitable, I dismiss as a liar, or has too short a trading history. High frequency systems would have a much higher %. And likely major Wall St houses, playing customer flow, etc., would have the highest %, but I don't really consider them traders, per se.
So at 1/3 profitable, the statistical chance of string(s) of losses is huge, which translates into draw downs that can be measured in dollars, days, weeks, months. It is the psychological stress of losing, on balance, weeks on end, that does in most traders.
What I look for is to every so often, have a 50-100 lot position and capture 20 - 50 SP handles over a 2-5 day move (drop, in my case.) Or maybe 100 handles. That could yield say $250-$500,000 in 1-2 weeks; every so often, in 1-2 days. That would make my year, with hopefully all the other approx 200 trading days break-even. Sounds odd, but as we know many retailers make their year during the 2-week Xmas period. One big difference is the retailer is able to calculate his draw down period from Feb - Nov, while a trader must be ever vigilant to control the inevitable draw down periods.
I rambled above, but that is due to early Sunday morning, and a good reason why I rarely visit/contribute to trading sites/blogs.
Got even worse when he moved up from paper trading
