Trading fulltime retail with $50k

If you have not blown up in trading to the point where you have a zero or negative networth, then don't go full time. This is the reality of this business. Some can be successful without experiencing it, but i personally dont know a single sucessful specualtor that this has not happend to before they become profitable. every trader should always prepare for this possibility and have safegaurds.

It took me losing inital 50k and making 50k over in stocks, forex and futures about 3 times over and over before i became profitable over a 6 year span and i am not a full time trader. I'm not going to go full time till i get close to 500k. I am 26 years old.

50k is not enoguh. it will be too stressful and mess up your trades, goals and you ability to run it as a business. You will not have the ability to start over if you need to.

I would work some more till you have minimum 100k behind you.

If you fail, you need to have the ability to take what you learned and start over a few times over and figure out what works best for you.
 
I disagree. I will not lose $50k trading. No way in hell. You must not have had a clue what you were doing.


I've blown up a $10k swing trading account before. But I dont intend on doing that daytrading. My system works too well for that. At worst I'll be a net loser, but not to the tune of $50k.
 
Quote from psperos:

If you have not blown up in trading to the point where you have a zero or negative networth, then don't go full time. This is the reality of this business. Some can be successful without experiencing it, but i personally dont know a single sucessful specualtor that this has not happend to before they become profitable. every trader should always prepare for this possibility and have safegaurds.

It took me losing inital 50k and making 50k over in stocks, forex and futures about 3 times over and over before i became profitable over a 6 year span and i am not a full time trader. I'm not going to go full time till i get close to 500k. I am 26 years old.

50k is not enoguh. it will be too stressful and mess up your trades, goals and you ability to run it as a business. You will not have the ability to start over if you need to.

I would work some more till you have minimum 100k behind you.

If you fail, you need to have the ability to take what you learned and start over a few times over and figure out what works best for you.
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That's a good post ...

... and even though the dollar amount varies, it is possible (and certainly probable) that you can/will blowout at least once if not multiple times (even with SIM, Backtesting, Modeling Multiple Strategies, etc.) while pursuing your career as a full-time trader.

Eventually you will probably end up with multiple strats across different time frames and multiple instruments to insure your continued success, once you find what works for you.

I ended up getting an evening position and dedicating myself to trading for the last couple of years to the exclusion of everything else while putting together my pieces ... time to get a life.

Good luck to you.

P.S. I just saw your reply, and I certainly think/hope that will be true for you. But just remember, trading involves a whole host of psychological issues as well as an inordinate amount of knowledge to able to consistently succeed at it over a long period of time. Many many traders who have substantially more to work with than we do (in terms of money, education, resources, experience, knowledge) have bitten the dust, so the most important think to take from this process is to stay humble (at least when actively trading), most don't.
 
Quote from wiesman02:

I disagree. I will not lose $50k trading. No way in hell. You must not have had a clue what you were doing.


I've blown up a $10k swing trading account before. But I dont intend on doing that daytrading. My system works too well for that. At worst I'll be a net loser, but not to the tune of $50k.
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Proverbs 10:8
The wise in heart will accept and obey commandments, but the foolish of lips will fall headlong. :eek:
 
Truthfully, I'm sick and tired of everybody on this site telling I'm going to fail or I'm going to blow up my account.

Everybody on this site is so damn negative. Granted, I understand why. 90% of traders fail. But also, 80% of the world population is filled w/ idiots anyway.
The 90% that fail is mainly due to lack of preparation (not looking at intraday charts for hundreds if not thousands of hours), psychological factors, and crappy risk management.

It can be avoided damn it. And i will avoid it
 
Quote from wiesman02:

Truthfully, I'm sick and tired of everybody on this site telling I'm going to fail or I'm going to blow up my account.

Everybody on this site is so damn negative. Granted, I understand why. 90% of traders fail. But also, 80% of the world population is filled w/ idiots anyway.
The 90% that fail is mainly due to lack of preparation (not looking at intraday charts for hundreds if not thousands of hours), psychological factors, and crappy risk management.

It can be avoided damn it. And i will avoid it
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Bro, forget the fundamentals and the technical side - prepare yourself emotionally and everything else will come together

Wish you the best - understand this - trading is gambling - anyone tells you differently - RUN - when you do NOT know the outcome of something and you bet on it, you are gambling - call it what ever you want - you could work your ass off studying charts, preparing yourself and having the sufficient capital and you could still fail. Again, you do not know the outcome, if the market is going to go up pr down. All one can do is speculate -

so you have a choice, become a professional gambler and treat it like a fucking business or be like the majority - deny it that is NOT some sort of gambling and bet foolishly
 
Quote from wiesman02:

I disagree. I will not lose $50k trading. No way in hell. You must not have had a clue what you were doing.
I've blown up a $10k swing trading account before. But I dont intend on doing that daytrading. My system works too well for that. At worst I'll be a net loser, but not to the tune of $50k.
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After I finished college, I took 80k and turned it into 230k. Then in 5 months I lost all those gains. I was taking large bets making huge swings leveraging over $6 mill at times in futures and forex. Win some lose some, up and down 35k/ day . I eventually stopped and went to full time job to where I am now and I have been profitable for 1 ½ years trading larger timeframes in the FX market. Some equity stuff too.

it doesn’t come down to knowing what you are doing. As for strategy, I would ask, are you stupid enough to make money? The real brains and talent are employing proper money, trade, and psychology management. This is what separates the 5% from the other 95%. The best way to gain experiences in these departments is through experiencing them. Unfortunately in this business, it costs losses to do this.

You may have experienced these while swing trading, but you haven’t experienced theses at a time when you will rely on trading for a living. Where every dime counts for money to trade with and live. What do you do if you make 5k profit one month, and lose 10k the next? Do you take what’s left of the other 5k from the month before to put it back in to trading? Will you look at this as a going backwards, or will you just take the loss and consider the 5k from the month before as income and trade with what you have? You don’t have to answer that, but these are the hard decisions you get hitting your brain when trading full time while relying on the profits for income. This is the psychology that can ruin your strategy.

Some may disagree, but I think 50k is excellent to trade with, but not to quit your job and trade with. You will need to take 50k, or a small amount of that on more leverage, to make what you make at your current job and this will equate to you expecting to double 50k. This is very possible but not with large out risk. Considering you will have normal living expenses, you need to have a plan that allows you to live the way you currently do and not expect a profit for at least 8-12 months.

From my experiences I have concluded the best way to do this for a living is with large capital, not all in trading accounts. Diversified in many strategies in different markets. Once side you are an investor holding your safety for living and net worth asset allocation, while running a position trades off daily charts along side having a price action day trading strategy or something else. This ability is what would make quitting a job worth it, but this is for me. Some here do amazing things will small capital, and use that base to build from there.

I think you should keep your goals, but try doing as much as you can with trading before quitting your job. Good luck at whatever you choose to do.
 
I make use of $3M of buying power every day. In order to do that, I have to put up $250,000+++.

While it is possible to make a living on $200,000 of buying power, it is very difficult unless you trade highly leveraged instruments like futures and options. Unless you are extremely experienced, I would stay away from both.

What is the answer? You have to go pro or prop, where with 50K they will give you access to $1M++ of buying power.

BTW, buying power is great in the hands of a skillful trader. In the hands of a novice, it means you lose faster and bigger.

nitro
Quote from wiesman02:

I'll be 24 in a month. Currently have about $30k in my brokerage, and around the summer of next year I'll put $50k in my acct. I have NO DEBT, and live with a buddy so if I cant pay rent at worst i'd move back w/ mommy til i'm back on my feet.

My strategy will entail buying/ shorting the gap ups and gap downs, as well as scanning for the largest % gainers and losers at 10:00 am.


why I've chosen gappers and high % winners: support/resistance and price action is more predictable w/ high VOL.


starting equity: $50k with $200k buying power.


max per position size: $25,000. $10-$20 stocks will most likely have 1000 share sizes. lower volitility = more shares, but most gappers won't exceed 1000 unless its an under $10 stock. Max stop loss per position will NOT exceed $300. Not sure what exactly it'll be yet. I do not plan on blowing out my account, b/c I will not continue if I get a 40-60% drawdown right away. I've been studying gappers and I feel I am beginning to strongly understand price action.


Here's the kicker. I have a steady job at a bank making $42-$47k depending on bonus. I hate the 9-6 grind and I love trading. I feel I am young enough to try my stakes at what I love but I refuse to go prop. I'm going to trade retail with $50k. $45k just isn't enough for me. I'll never make $100k in banking, and I don't like my current lifestyle.

When I end up quitting, I'll have 2 yrs experience in banking with my series 6 just renewed if anything goes wrong


Thoughts ? Words of wisdom? Wish to talk me out of it ? I'm all ears. i appreciate your comments. $50k enough ?
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Quote from wiesman02:

Truthfully, I'm sick and tired of everybody on this site telling I'm going to fail or I'm going to blow up my account.

Everybody on this site is so damn negative. Granted, I understand why. 90% of traders fail. But also, 80% of the world population is filled w/ idiots anyway.
The 90% that fail is mainly due to lack of preparation (not looking at intraday charts for hundreds if not thousands of hours), psychological factors, and crappy risk management.

It can be avoided damn it. And i will avoid it
More...
The Long and Short of it.

We're on your side.
 
Quote from wiesman02:

Truthfully, I'm sick and tired of everybody on this site telling I'm going to fail or I'm going to blow up my account.

Everybody on this site is so damn negative. Granted, I understand why. 90% of traders fail. But also, 80% of the world population is filled w/ idiots anyway.
The 90% that fail is mainly due to lack of preparation (not looking at intraday charts for hundreds if not thousands of hours), psychological factors, and crappy risk management.

It can be avoided damn it. And i will avoid it
More...

Most stock traders, 95% of them (Since they use 95% freely, why can't I?), are idiots, or rejects. Their opinion reflects one thing and one thing only: stupidity. For example, they kept saying that, in order to be profitable, a trader must blow several accounts. To these people, cutting off one finger (blowing one account) is not sufficient to make them realize that it hurts, it has to be cutting off several fingers (blowing several accounts). Sometimes I think the stock market needs these suicidal idiots who are willing to blow several accounts.
 
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