Who Is A Bad Trader?

BlueTurtle · Mar 29, 2013

I've never given money to a guru....but I think you CAN blame them.

Like you CAN blame a broker, realtor, teacher, etc....for violating your trust and taking advantage of you......of course, maybe you should never trust anyone, get 1,000 opinions, do a double-blind placebo test, and then make a decision...but it doesn't work like that.

gurus blatantly lie, steal your money, and give you absolute crap while making up stuff about making money while they are secretly losing it all......it's all smoke-and-mirrors, which we say ad nauseam; however, if you are new to trading and they preach all this stuff like it's the bible and when you lose they run away.....yes, I think you can blame them.

if you have been trading for over a few years....then you are on your own.

A bad trader is anyone who loses money...it's that simple. that is the metric....this isn't basketball where good defense gets added value. this is not a team game.....if you get out quick, ok, but that doesn't make you good.....because 100 small losses will be bad.

and making a point a day won't pay the mortgage....so that is bad also. if you are an adult and responsible, you have to make enough to cover expenses....or else that is bad.

newwurldmn · Mar 29, 2013

Yeah. You can. And often with good reason.

But I have never met a good trader who blamed someone else for their loss, even if their mentor/teacher was misinforming them.

Quote from BlueTurtle:

I've never given money to a guru....but I think you CAN blame them.

Like you CAN blame a broker, realtor, teacher, etc....for violating your trust and taking advantage of you......of course, maybe you should never trust anyone, get 1,000 opinions, do a double-blind placebo test, and then make a decision...but it doesn't work like that.

gurus blatantly lie, steal your money, and give you absolute crap while making up stuff about making money while they are secretly losing it all......it's all smoke-and-mirrors, which we say ad nauseam; however, if you are new to trading and they preach all this stuff like it's the bible and when you lose they run away.....yes, I think you can blame them.

if you have been trading for over a few years....then you are on your own.

A bad trader is anyone who loses money...it's that simple. that is the metric....this isn't basketball where good defense gets added value. this is not a team game.....if you get out quick, ok, but that doesn't make you good.....because 100 small losses will be bad.

and making a point a day won't pay the mortgage....so that is bad also. if you are an adult and responsible, you have to make enough to cover expenses....or else that is bad.

billyjoerob · Mar 29, 2013

Quote from BlueTurtle:

I've never given money to a guru....but I think you CAN blame them.

Like you CAN blame a broker, realtor, teacher, etc....for violating your trust and taking advantage of you......of course, maybe you should never trust anyone, get 1,000 opinions, do a double-blind placebo test, and then make a decision...but it doesn't work like that.

gurus blatantly lie, steal your money, and give you absolute crap while making up stuff about making money while they are secretly losing it all......it's all smoke-and-mirrors, which we say ad nauseam; however, if you are new to trading and they preach all this stuff like it's the bible and when you lose they run away.....yes, I think you can blame them.

if you have been trading for over a few years....then you are on your own.

A bad trader is anyone who loses money...it's that simple. that is the metric....this isn't basketball where good defense gets added value. this is not a team game.....if you get out quick, ok, but that doesn't make you good.....because 100 small losses will be bad.

and making a point a day won't pay the mortgage....so that is bad also. if you are an adult and responsible, you have to make enough to cover expenses....or else that is bad.

Blueturtle makes many good points. I listened to a dentist and had my wisdom teeth removed. Perfectly good body part, now permanently gone.

Eminis strike me as being a really lousy, alpha-poor market to trade. Does Steve Cohen trade them? No, not even close. Would he employ 1000s of people if he could sit at his desk trading index futures? There's no edge there, and you don't benefit from the "drift." If there are profitable index futures traders, then they should be massively wealthy, because even a small edge in a market that huge would be extremely lucrative. But the biggest hedge funds are not run by emini traders. QED

ChkitOut · Mar 29, 2013

Quote from billyjoerob:

Does Steve Cohen trade them? No, not even close.

In addition to trading his own stocks and overseeing 300 managers, analysts and traders globally, Cohen buys and sells âminis,â says one former employee.
âMiniâ is short for a security called the S&P 500 E-mini future, an electronically traded derivative that rises and falls with the Standard & Poorâs 500 Index and is sold in smaller units than other index futures.
âMiniâ Trading
âHe does that all day, every day, completely intuitively,â the former employee says.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-02-26/steve-cohen-s-trade-secrets.html

the internet is a funny place where everyone knows everything. billybob is a master trader, al brooks makes 100 million, steve cohen doesnt touch eminis, anybody that places trust in a guru has noone to blame but themselves, al gore really did invent the internet, it goes on and on and on...

logikos · Mar 29, 2013

I was in agreement with this:

Quote from BlueTurtle:
A bad trader is anyone who loses money...it's that simple. [/B]

but adding the word "consistently" to it. Everybody has losing days.

But, you lost me with this:

Quote from BlueTurtle:
and making a point a day won't pay the mortgage....so that is bad also. if you are an adult and responsible, you have to make enough to cover expenses....or else that is bad. [/B]

One point might be plenty for somebody, but a drop in the bucket for others. If your equity curve steadily rises over the course of years and through different market conditions, you are a good trader. It doesn't matter if it rises an average of $5 a day, or $5000 a day.

A good trader has learned to listen to what the market is telling him and take what it offers. He has no expectations of what it must do at any time.

cornix · Mar 29, 2013

Quote from billyjoerob:

Eminis strike me as being a really lousy, alpha-poor market to trade. Does Steve Cohen trade them? No, not even close. Would he employ 1000s of people if he could sit at his desk trading index futures? There's no edge there, and you don't benefit from the "drift." If there are profitable index futures traders, then they should be massively wealthy, because even a small edge in a market that huge would be extremely lucrative. But the biggest hedge funds are not run by emini traders. QED

Who do you think produces those massive volumes in the e-minis, especially ES? Retail traders?

BlueTurtle · Mar 29, 2013

Quote from logikos:

I was in agreement with this:

but adding the word "consistently" to it. Everybody has losing days.

But, you lost me with this:

One point might be plenty for somebody, but a drop in the bucket for others. If your equity curve steadily rises over the course of years and through different market conditions, you are a good trader. It doesn't matter if it rises an average of $5 a day, or $5000 a day.

A good trader has learned to listen to what the market is telling him and take what it offers. He has no expectations of what it must do at any time.

Yes, you are correct. I was thinking someone would get me on that one.......no problem, I will retract that statement from the record!!!

Judge.....tell the clerk!!!

stricken.

piezoe · Mar 29, 2013

It is Good Friday --we are waiting now to celebrate the coming back to life of someone who was dead for two and a half days and then, presumably, a giant sucking sound, a la Ross Perot, was heard all across Judea land, and they were sucked up to Heaven in one fell swoop and took a chair on the right side of God -- the markets are closed (Amen to that!).

So while having my wake up coffee, I looked for the usual gag post about someone's trading platform locking up, and the poor soul's quotes are all frozen. Not finding that, I looked for more ways to waste time, and found one here in this thread of posts by the usual suspects that I have now joined.

I found bighog's nasty post that provoked an irate response from ChkitOut. What's interesting is that they both made sense -- well, maybe that's a bit of an overstatement. Of course I had to disagree with ChkitOut on one point, bighog is not a "moron" -- far from it.

Anyway, bighog made the point that a ready supply of suckers was a necessary component of the casino owners' business model, and ChkitOut made the point that Roosevelt's SEC was needed to keep the great white sharks from devouring their little fish "clients" more rapidly then new "schools" of little fish can be generated by the sharks' media hype. And ChkitOut did this without ever mentioning the SEC, or Roosevelt, or even Joe Kennedy. Well done boys, and a happy and joyous Good Friday to all!

billyjoerob · Mar 29, 2013

Quote from ChkitOut:

In addition to trading his own stocks and overseeing 300 managers, analysts and traders globally, Cohen buys and sells âminis,â says one former employee.
âMiniâ is short for a security called the S&P 500 E-mini future, an electronically traded derivative that rises and falls with the Standard & Poorâs 500 Index and is sold in smaller units than other index futures.
âMiniâ Trading
âHe does that all day, every day, completely intuitively,â the former employee says.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-02-26/steve-cohen-s-trade-secrets.html

the internet is a funny place where everyone knows everything. billybob is a master trader, al brooks makes 100 million, steve cohen doesnt touch eminis, anybody that places trust in a guru has noone to blame but themselves, al gore really did invent the internet, it goes on and on and on...

OK got pwned by Chkitout. I think I read that, actually.

Still, trading against Steve Cohen seems like something to avoid. There are easier targets. I mean, by definition, futures have no alpha, being a two-sided market. Same for options. Better to benefit from the drift.

newwurldmn · Mar 29, 2013

Quote from billyjoerob:

OK got pwned by Chkitout. I think I read that, actually.

Still, trading against Steve Cohen seems like something to avoid. There are easier targets. I mean, by definition, futures have no alpha, being a two-sided market. Same for options. Better to benefit from the drift.

Aren't all markets 2 sided?