Quote from logic_man:
Well, I guess if there is a thread called "Daytrading is a pipedream" that must mean it's true.
Seriously?
I provide a link to an academic study showing that over half of the traders studied during a window in time were profitable and you link a thread you started calling daytrading a "pipedream". I guess in your world those two statements are equivalent, but in reality they are not. Is the study the end-all be-all argument? No, but it's a datapoint that undercuts the whole premise of this thread and it isn't based on some anecdotal evidence, but hard data.
The paper even provides a reason for WHY those traders made money, which is that they took it from losing traders. As far as brokers go, yes, they make money at a more steady pace than traders, but so? Every industry has its low-margin middlemen/distributors who make a slow and steady profit from transaction volumes rather than high value-add. UPS makes money whether they deliver a 1-lb package filled with some plastic junk from China or if they deliver a diamond ring of the same size. If being a broker or middleman is so attractive to you, become one. No one is stopping you. Clearly, you think you've got it all figured out. But, I think you will find that it is a cut-throat business where pricing pressures never stop bearing down on your margins and not the money-printing business model you imagine it to be.
The funny thing is, I'm not even a day-trader (I am just fine holding positions overnight). I just think dogmatic conclusions made on the basis of bad data don't help anyone.