Day trading to make serious money

[Heaney]

You're right but the thread title is also "To make serious money". I'm assuming due to his posts on how he hates his career (Which is supposedly over 100K per year) he wants to scale trading into a full time gig.
I was pointing out to him its hardly as easy as he's thinking. Or else everyone would just be balling out from day trading

The most he ever mentions wanting to make ITT is 200/day though and his OP lays out a path to making 24K in a year. That's why I posted what I did.

[SimplyFlacid]

I've been posting in the trading threads since early this year and haven't learned much outside the basics. Made plenty of rookie mistakes. However now I've devoted time to learning from some experienced people on the fundamentals. This is just day trading, not investing.

I'm an electrical engineer by trade and started wondering, why don't more people pursue day trading as a way to make serious money?

I'm aware it isn't easy for most people to have discipline and look for patterns and whatnot and really invest their time towards it, but for the ones that do, why is it that even they fail?

If you're trading with above $25k and focus on short term exposure to the markets for high volatility trades and you're familiar with the particular pattern of the trade at the time and you're not trading a stock dominated by HFT algos, why is the failure rate so high?

Say a guy starts off with $25k and shoots for a modest $100 daily gain for starters. That's $2k/month, or $24k/year. Say you have more capital than that and shoot for higher gains.

Why is the failure rate so high?

I’m an option trader

Nobody is gonna settle for $100 a day when you’ve made 4-5k in 5 minutes

You end under just losing everything in the end and having to start over it’s a vicious cycle I’m caught in

[Heaney]

I’m an option trader

Nobody is gonna settle for $100 a day when you’ve made 4-5k in 5 minutes

You end under just losing everything in the end and having to start over it’s a vicious cycle I’m caught in

Strong crews in sig.

[Crazy_Desi]

doesn't really seem difficult to do this, let's say you start with $25k and look at a stock with decent price movement. say you're looking at something that's already up 3% in the morning and you see that it continues to go up for 30-40 cents then down, etc. You put in your $25k and obviously depending upon the share price that will dictate the volatility of your P/L.

a stock like JWN for example, it's been hovering around $12.50 so let's say one day you notice it start to shoot up. you drop $25k in there and the share price increases to $12.77. that right there is a 2.16% gain that would take you to $25,540.

obviously, you would have to set a stop loss but the idea is to track price movements carefully either via fundamental analysis or just looking for patterns in the share price. usually it's not difficult to snag a small upward trend like this. caveat is that it would probably be a good idea to make sure your spread is very small when playing with that amount of money with such a sensitive share price and also setting a stop loss much lower than the profit you're trying to make.

suppose your goal is $500 a day, you don't just YOLO and shoot for $500 profit with a stop loss of $250, you'd be better off making a high quantity of trades with much smaller stop losses such as $20-40. that way you can take many more stabs at a solid share price increase before losing $250 or whatever your risk tolerance is.

[cihilt]

Day Trading is in/out of positions within a day before market close.

If you see support and resistance, so do million others.
If you see RSI high, so do million others.
If you see chart patterns, so do others.
If you see price under/above moving averages, so do millions others.

Broker bots don't care, they just see the volume and when the volume comes in, the banks(brokers) will counter those positions.
They have to counter them, because they are loaned positions.
Then they will try and liquidate the positions or squeeze you out, leaving you trapped before market close.

If I'm trading, I prefer to do a few steps to avoid this.

1. Set my stop loss as Resistance and Support to a 4 hour chart
2. Choose a leverage that can support that stop loss.
3. Define a profit point.
4. Stick to that plan and don't deviate.
5. Ride out the position, until the price hits my profit margin, or stop loss.

Or don't use any leverage, but for that you need big money.

[FFailed]

It always sounds easy on paper when you think of how little of a gain you'd need each week to make decent money. Especially with options since you'd need an even smaller movement in a stock price to get in/out with the % you are looking for but it probably never plays out well over a long period of time.

[manjay]

You have to have a serious interest enjoying it and the tenacity to sit through blowing your account up a few times. It takes years to really find your edge + trading style.. most people don't last long enough to find out. Check out the book 'Unknown market wizards' for a more up to date interview type book on the most successful traders, you'll find they have some common traits amongst themselves.

[Cartiac]

If I monitored a stock like AAPL for example, it usually has a sizable enough daily variance. If I drop $25k in there (I'm aware this is a questionable strategy, dropping a lot of capital for a small gain), and buy 218 shares @ $115, in order to make $200 I would just have to wait for an increase in share price to $116.

That's hardly a big risk, of course many days I may end up losing, or I may end up holding a bag for a while due to emotions, but that's just an example. That's a strategy that could conceivably earn me $500/week.

This type of thinking actually answers your initial question regarding day trading failure rates. Your example is not a gross oversimplification but a gross failure to understand the reality of stock trading.

You present your example of buying a stock at $115 and then "just waiting" for it to go up a dollar for you to sell take profit and then just do it over and over again. What could possibly go wrong? Well, what about when it doesn't go to $116? What about when it goes to $114, do you sell or do you let it ride while it goes to $113, 112, etc? How many bets on correctly guessing when you can buy and immediately get that $1 increase do you now have to win just to get back to even? Let's say you do guess correctly and get that $1 gain while the stock continues going up to $117,$118, $120 that day? You would have a better chance of winning going to a casino and betting red or black on the roulette tables.

Most trading today is automated by institutions with highly sophisticated algorithms way smarter than any strategy you could devise. On top of that in 2000 the SEC eliminating priority for small orders that effectively killed day trading by removing the ability for day traders to beat the markets by outsmarting and manipulating those algorithms to beat them.

[ppxldan]

ive been trading for a living for 6 years now, its not worth it, i would have made way more money starting a conventional business.

Dont forget you are drawing out money to pay for living expenses too

so if you have 500k and you make 25% a year thats only 125k minus taxes gives you a decent living but almost nothing left to re invest. Also edges come and die quickly. And this is if you have built up a 500k account.

Dont fall into the trap of thinking you can trade for a living with a 50k account its a fools game , trust me.

If you really want to do it, keep your job start small 25-50k and if you can double it in 3 years without a large draw down and have some real edge keep doing it. Then scale it slowly.

I only made it because i made some large returns at the beginning and took loans out to trade. Which you should NEVER do

apo

Finally someone that is honest. Usually everybody is talking about the private plane trader life
It's not that easy. I tried it a few years back and stopped trading

[apo99]

Finally someone that is honest. Usually everybody is talking about the private plane trader life
It's not that easy. I tried it a few years back and stopped trading

For some reason people love the retail trader "life" when all the money is in institutional trading. I am the only one i know who basically squeezes a living trading vs many of my friends who make way more and will be making 500K/ year in the future as mediocre risk managers and traders at small funds and banks. Trading has also made me almost unemployable, imagine being 35 after your edge dies with no work experience other that trading for 15 years from home lol. Im in do deep now so i cant quit, i have also been lucky enough to put enough money away to buy small house and live debt free for when that happen its not a question of IF but when

[SniXSniPe]

covered calls and cash covered puts my friends, there you go.

[TugOfPeace]

This type of thinking actually answers your initial question regarding day trading failure rates. Your example is not a gross oversimplification but a gross failure to understand the reality of stock trading.

You present your example of buying a stock at $115 and then "just waiting" for it to go up a dollar for you to sell take profit and then just do it over and over again. What could possibly go wrong? Well, what about when it doesn't go to $116? What about when it goes to $114, do you sell or do you let it ride while it goes to $113, 112, etc? How many bets on correctly guessing when you can buy and immediately get that $1 increase do you now have to win just to get back to even? Let's say you do guess correctly and get that $1 gain while the stock continues going up to $117,$118, $120 that day? You would have a better chance of winning going to a casino and betting red or black on the roulette tables.

Most trading today is automated by institutions with highly sophisticated algorithms way smarter than any strategy you could devise. On top of that in 2000 the SEC eliminating priority for small orders that effectively killed day trading by removing the ability for day traders to beat the markets by outsmarting and manipulating those algorithms to beat them.

The answer to your question is stop losses (and I'm aware that stop losses aren't always a good failsafe since prices can skip the stop loss). Fortunately I monitor my trades in real time so don't actually rely on stop losses.

So in my example if I were to go for a gain from $115 to $116 and it didn't work out, I wouldn't bag hold until I broke even.

I would have a set tolerance at which point I would sell (reluctantly). In the case of your example, if the price dipped below $115 I would sell at $114.80.

That means I set my risk for losing money very low. I would have a set tolerance for loss each day.

[elterrible987]

if day trading was easy, nobody would be working and everyone would just be sitting at home making 7 figures a year

inb4 you lose it all

[TugOfPeace]

if day trading was easy, nobody would be working and everyone would just be sitting at home making 7 figures a year

inb4 you lose it all

Idk. Woke up today and made $250 with just $10k of shares in a single trade. Will see where the rest of the week takes me.

[Hmatt330]

For some reason people love the retail trader "life" when all the money is in institutional trading. I am the only one i know who basically squeezes a living trading vs many of my friends who make way more and will be making 500K/ year in the future as mediocre risk managers and traders at small funds and banks. Trading has also made me almost unemployable, imagine being 35 after your edge dies with no work experience other that trading for 15 years from home lol. Im in do deep now so i cant quit, i have also been lucky enough to put enough money away to buy small house and live debt free for when that happen its not a question of IF but when

Balls of Steel

[Adnim]

Idk. Woke up today and made $250 with just $10k of shares in a single trade. Will see where the rest of the week takes me.

What was the trade?

[TugOfPeace]

What was the trade?

PLTR

I could have easily made another $3k last week swing trading but I was spending literally 16 hours/day moving so couldn't.

I'm finding that my full time job is distracting me. I don't just set things on automatic and leave them, my eyes have to be glued to the screen to make sure I'm not making a mistake

I think that long term my strategy in terms of what stock to actually swing trade will just be based on the largest volume/volatility stocks for the day. It will require some due diligence and attention to any particular stock to see what the status quo is like; PLTR for example, I've been monitoring it for weeks and pretty much know where the support/resistance is at this point so I'm comfortable going in and out. So far in two trades it's netted me $3,250 and if I had the time last week I probably would've made another $2-3k

Also many people seem to think that you have to go all in on day trading. They say you're going to "blow your account" as if I'm dumb enough to drop $25k into a single trade on a highly speculative stock.

Reality is since I've hit the $25k minimum now I can invest small amounts like $5k into a stock, look for a decent price movement, and cash out once I hit something like $75. Do that a few times a day and there's my daily quota. When the daily quota is so reasonable ($250-500), I really don't have to invest too much all at once and I don't have to hold any particular stock for too long. I have unlimited daily trades.

If I lose every now and then, so what? Never figured I'd be 100% consistent day in and day out, but I'm definitely going to be making $.



Every single person that talks about this says it's a huge huge risk but even the strategies that institutional investors use are a joke sometimes. There are people who literally just swing trade AAPL all day.. there are so many ways to make consistent $ that I just can't give up this easy. That, and I find it more interesting than my career by far.

[demfeelsbro]

Idk. Woke up today and made $250 with just $10k of shares in a single trade. Will see where the rest of the week takes me.

I'm judging by the lack of updates you're not doing well?

I've opened a small account for chits and giggles and gonna see how much I can make by day trading/swing trading by the end of year. I 'll then compare the % gain to my 'safer' long term investments, and so if it was worth it, or if I was just better off throwing it in the S &p500 and chilling.

[jBrahh]

OP, I lurk in the stock and crypto threads here and there, and if I remember correctly... you started investing right around the COVID crash. You'll see in the next 2 years that making money isn't nearly as easy as it has been these last 7 month.

EVERYONE is a genius/profitable when the whole market is trending upwards. Most stocks have seen nothing but up these last 7 months. When you experience an extended bear market, you'll see why a lot of people don't day trade.

[TugOfPeace]

I'm judging by the lack of updates you're not doing well?

I've opened a small account for chits and giggles and gonna see how much I can make by day trading/swing trading by the end of year. I 'll then compare the % gain to my 'safer' long term investments, and so if it was worth it, or if I was just better off throwing it in the S &p500 and chilling.

Doing pretty well actually, just didn't feel the need to update the thread considering I was the last poster.

OP, I lurk in the stock and crypto threads here and there, and if I remember correctly... you started investing right around the COVID crash. You'll see in the next 2 years that making money isn't nearly as easy as it has been these last 7 month.

EVERYONE is a genius/profitable when the whole market is trending upwards. Most stocks have seen nothing but up these last 7 months. When you experience an extended bear market, you'll see why a lot of people don't day trade.

I'm only trading in very small price changes. Think of 10-20 cent price movements with a sizable amount of funds, 20-30x a day. Been consistently profitable

[demfeelsbro]

Doing pretty well actually, just didn't feel the need to update the thread considering I was the last poster.



I'm only trading in very small price changes. Think of 10-20 cent price movements with a sizable amount of funds, 20-30x a day. Been consistently profitable

Well you should update every day wih your trades and win/losses. I would be interested to follow your trading journey

[SniXSniPe]

Learn covered calls and cash covered puts

Thank me later. Easiest way to make $ in a pretty solid manner.

[TugOfPeace]

Learn covered calls and cash covered puts

Thank me later. Easiest way to make $ in a pretty solid manner.

I've been looking into options but I feel that's a very easy way to blow money starting out. Part of my plan was to avoid losses as much as possible even if it meant reduced profits.

+$491 for the day

PLTR, TSLA, AMZN, BABA

[Heaney]

+1 for Tug documenting his journey. Would legit be fun to see.

[TugOfPeace]

Yesterday was up $490 but it dipped after hours to about $250.

Today, I’m up $1900.. probably break $2k after hours.

Mostly just swing trading TSLA, BABA, and PLTR (biggest gainer by far)

[demfeelsbro]

Yesterday was up $490 but it dipped after hours to about $250.

Today, I’m up $1900.. probably break $2k after hours.

Mostly just swing trading TSLA, BABA, and PLTR (biggest gainer by far)

Did a swing trade on BABA and NIO today. Up 9%

[DavidL913]

Idk. Woke up today and made $250 with just $10k of shares in a single trade. Will see where the rest of the week takes me.

lol strong risk reward

[TugOfPeace]

Did a swing trade on BABA and NIO today. Up 9%

Nice. I'm closing at $2050 for the day. If you're interested in PLTR, it's trading around $24.40 right now. In the morning it may run up a bit more, but it will most likely dip on open. Watch out for that dip, probably down to $22.00 - $22.50 and buy in. Easy money, at least that's what happened today

[TugOfPeace]

Shaky day today. Made the mistake of trading on open during extreme volatility and went negative $300. Slowly regained and was up $800 by noon. Then ended up bag holding negative $1200 due to my emotions, but recovered to close the day at +$650.

Usually dont make mistakes like that but given the stock.. too much skepticism which is why it happened (PLTR).

Had a total of 75ish trades today (just buying). Selling would be 75 more. In and out within minutes, sometimes seconds.

I think it’ll be quite a while before I really scale up my trades. Right now it’s nothing more than $5k-7.5k for quick trades.

[Heaney]

Shaky day today. Made the mistake of trading on open during extreme volatility and went negative $300. Slowly regained and was up $800 by noon. Then ended up bag holding negative $1200 due to my emotions, but recovered to close the day at +$650.

Usually dont make mistakes like that but given the stock.. too much skepticism which is why it happened (PLTR).

Had a total of 75ish trades today (just buying). Selling would be 75 more. In and out within minutes, sometimes seconds.

I think it’ll be quite a while before I really scale up my trades. Right now it’s nothing more than $5k-7.5k for quick trades.

150 trades today? Holy fuk thats wild dude.