Daytrading

[Chr]

I'm looking for information about daytrading.
I don't know much about it and can't figure if this is a serious way of making money or it's for the "roulette gambler".

Where do i find the best litterature and links on the net. Which courses are worth investing in. How big are the swings, standarddeviation etc. etc.

All information apreciated

[gilly]

IMHO, Daytrading is definitely as you say for the "roulette gambler". I am sure many people on this board will disagree but this is what I think about it.

I once heard a something about daytraders and the information they tell each other. It is like having a football stadium full with 65,536 people and they each flip a coin 16 times. One of them gets all heads and the other 65 thousand people run up and ask him what his secret is.

[adios]

""I am sure many people on this board will disagree but this is what I think about it. "

Out of curiosity why would you get that impression?

[Mark Heide]

Chr,

I consider daytrading gambling. There are people out their that claim they survived the bubble. But, there are people out their that claim they make their living off of the roulette wheel too. Here's a link to a day trading web site for more information. I don't believe you can make long term profits using just chart analysis unless you consider the economic conditions.

http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/stocks/styles/sterm/?src=pv_overture

Good Luck

Mark

[Mark Heide]

Chr,

The only person I know that claims to be successful at daytrading is Mark Likos at Firetraders. You can get some free information at www.webfn.com (http://www.webfn.com) or use the following link for subscription services and seminars. I suggest trying these before daytrading yourself. I've only listened to his webfn features when they used to be broadcast in Chicago for free. Here's a link to his subscription services:

http://www.thelikosletter.com/firetraders/

If you do purchase any of the services, I'm curious to how good you think they are and if you are satisfied with them. Currently, he's offering a two week free trial. But, I'm not convinced yet.

Good Luck

Mark

[zorak]

I've been daytrading for awhile, and sometimes it does seem like roulette. I use a profitable system, but still can't seem to get the performance I'd like to (I'd love to match my papertrading results). I keep a system journal on a trading site:

http://www.elitetrader.com/vb/showthread.php?threadid=15865

Perhaps if anyone is interested, you could skim through and contribute some thoughts.

zorak

[Wildbill]

My take on it is that you can make some money at it, but people don't enter it to make SOME money, they enter it thinking they can spend a few hours a day making 10 times what they do at the office. Further its not something that can be done by anyone, it like most ventures that involve risks requires proper perspective and discipline. Taking a job to work for a large company involves little risk, starting your own business or daytrading involves enormous risk. People just don't grasp this concept. The volatility of risk will kill most people that don't accept this and remember this and live by this. It would be one thing if you traded in a vacuum and looked at every trade for its merits. Think about the usual trader though, they are victims of their own successes and failures. If they go on a winning streak, they think they have found the infallible system or method and never tweak it or accept that it can easily lose its effectiveness over time. The people that hit a losing streak don't properly accept the downside and they go and change their method with no real clue as to if their tweaking or switching to completely different ways of picking stocks will actually work better than the old way. This is without a doubt the biggest impediment and what will wipe out 90% of the people that might even be properly bankrolled. To look at it and say you can or can't do it with charts or a system far understates the real problem here.

BTW, I think the deflating bubble should have made a lot of people rich, but most people paid no heed to shorting during that time. A true professional at everything uses every tool he has in his toolbox and leaves very little out on the table. The people that got wiped out in the bubble weren't real professionals so we shouldn't make too many conclusions off what happened over that timeframe.

[Talex]

Daytrading is a pretty risky proposition, especially in this market. By and large even if you happen to be able to pick well you're still up against a pretty heavy 'rake' in terms of fees. Decimalization has shortened the margins substantially even for the folks working without the overhead of per-trade fees.

It's no coincidence that the financial industry is going through a heavy consolidation period right now. Most of the smaller firms just can't find the margin that the larger banks can manage. Personally I'm a long-term sort of guy.

-Tim

[Mark Heide]

Wildbill,

I think your analysis is a good estimation of what went on.

Mark