I am a professional trader. AMA

[Deathninja328]

How long do you think would it take me to be successful in say forex at 16?

 

[Jatt]

Win rate is less than 5%. RRR is undefined. I ride out massive trends.

what instrument you trade I’m guessing forex? eur/usd etc because futures closes every day at like 4 pm CT can’t hold for multiple days

 

[Jatt]

Do

Constantly refining my system. Some years aren't profitable, some are and others aren't as profitable as others. The main focus is that the trading system is an asset that makes uncorrelated returns over time. That's all that matters really. And from a risk adjusted perspective, it's all you can do short of jacking up risk and putting the bankroll in potential jeopardy; and that's not an option with OPM.

Do you have any other source of income what is your average income per month or year if you can say

 

[Seth Walsh]

what instrument you trade I’m guessing forex? eur/usd etc because futures closes every day at like 4 pm CT can’t hold for multiple days

All asset classes. You can hold futures positions overnight. Financials, Commodities, FX.

 

[Patient A]

Are you white?

 

[Johanjohan]

Tales from mumbai

 

[incel194012940]

thoughts on a strategy based 100% on astrology and clairvoyance to forecast the future?

 

[Edgarpill]

notice how he didnt put profitable

 

[Patient A]

thoughts on a strategy based 100% on astrology and clairvoyance to forecast the future?

Beware: Trending PA does not care about astrology.

 

[Deleted member 126365]

Beware: Trending PA does not care about astrology.

nice profile pic, fellow femdom enjoyer.

 

[incel194012940]

Beware: Trending PA does not care about astrology.

 

[Deleted member 102846]

If that's you in your pfp you're a subhuman low t nice guy who probably drinks soylent and choccy milk

 

[tonka T]

what sources of knowledge do you recommend for learning

Youtube and my 2k course

 

[coo233]

I will literally pay $300 for anybody who can guarantee I will make a profit and make trading my full time job under their mentorship.

 

[Seth Walsh]

I will literally pay $300 for anybody who can guarantee I will make a profit and make trading my full time job under their mentorship.

They'll just scam you. No one can guarantee you anything.

 

[tonka T]

I will literally pay $300 for anybody who can guarantee I will make a profit and make trading my full time job under their mentors

i can do it for free

 

[coo233]

They'll just scam you. No one can guarantee you anything.

It's worth a shot

 

[Deleted member 15778]

You say that you're not self employed as a trader, meaning you work for a mutual fund?

You have entire years where you go in the red, how long can you go in the red before you are fired?

Markets are always becoming more efficient. The next step in that is with Ai, where you can tell "Deep research for example", come up with an algorithm to predict the banana market in Peru, and then turn that into a back tested trading strategy, and then implement that in python so it's automated. And the Ai does everything.

I can't imagine there will be very much alpha left on the table, given Ai's that have PHD level understanding, in every field constantly improving trading code.

 

[Seth Walsh]

You say that you're not self employed as a trader, meaning you work for a mutual fund?

You have entire years where you go in the red, how long can you go in the red before you are fired?

Markets are always becoming more efficient. The next step in that is with Ai, where you can tell "Deep research for example", come up with an algorithm to predict the banana market in Peru, and then turn that into a back tested trading strategy, and then implement that in python so it's automated. And the Ai does everything.

I can't imagine there will be very much alpha left on the table, given Ai's that have PHD level understanding, in every field constantly improving trading code.

Outperforming the market is not our selling point. But yeah I see what you mean, quant shops who discovered edges years ago might actually have AI discover their edges.

 

[Deleted member 15778]

Outperforming the market is not our selling point.

Well no fund can consistently and predictable outperform investing in the S&P 500.

This kind of confirms it's all about marketing, survivorship bias, and starting a new fund when the survivorship bias isn't working in your favor.

Essentially stealing dumb rich people's money by having them invest with you.

But yeah I see what you mean, quant shops who discovered edges years ago might actually have AI discover their edges.

I don't know. I tend to believe markets are probably mostly efficient when you take into consideration, the energy cost to constantly find edges as old ones go stale, the risk (including black swans), and taxes.

I realize there's regression to the mean after a big move that occurs 60%+ of the time depending on the duration of the move, which is most often measured with boilingers bands.

And there's other "edges" but I don't really think they exist when you factor in those other things I mentioned. The exception being maybe some non-publlic funds, where there's no outside investment and it's all the quants investing their own money, working full time, some of them may be able to retain a competitive edge with simulations of reality and constantly improving those simulations, which is essentially what it is.

But even then it only takes a few quants to leave for that competitive edge to die.

 

[Seth Walsh]

This kind of confirms it's all about marketing, survivorship bias, and starting a new fund when the survivorship bias isn't working in your favor.

Essentially stealing dumb rich people's money by having them invest with you.

Yep it's all marketing and redemption prevention. Gaslighting longterm investors with loyalty, and running the business on an AuM*fee basis. Performance is an afterthought. "We may not be the cheapest but we offer portfolio and P&L diversification at [far higher fee than index funds]"

 

[Seth Walsh]

Well no fund can consistently and predictable outperform investing in the S&P 500.

This kind of confirms it's all about marketing, survivorship bias, and starting a new fund when the survivorship bias isn't working in your favor.

Essentially stealing dumb rich people's money by having them invest with you.




I don't know. I tend to believe markets are probably mostly efficient when you take into consideration, the energy cost to constantly find edges as old ones go stale, the risk (including black swans), and taxes.

I realize there's regression to the mean after a big move that occurs 60%+ of the time depending on the duration of the move, which is most often measured with boilingers bands.

And there's other "edges" but I don't really think they exist when you factor in those other things I mentioned. The exception being maybe some non-publlic funds, where there's no outside investment and it's all the quants investing their own money, working full time, some of them may be able to retain a competitive edge with simulations of reality and constantly improving those simulations, which is essentially what it is.

But even then it only takes a few quants to leave for that competitive edge to die.

I'm in systematic trading so there's no looking for edges. It's just trade management when markets trend. ie, you're in a trending market - how do you size up your position, do you sell or hold through intra trend volatility. The mantra and what works, ceteris paribus is, "cut short your losses, let your winners run on". It's the outsized winning trades that account for a disproportionate amount of the P&L compared to the other ones; and most trades will be losers, with small controlled losses.

The hardest part to accept and get over is that the markets are COMPLETELY unpredictable. So trading many market sectors (commodities, financials and FX) and budgeting higher risk allocations across uncorrelated markets while never changing the trading system and refining risk controls, while letting winners run on, is basically the mission.

 

[Seth Walsh]

non-publlic funds, where there's no outside investment and it's all the quants investing their own money, working full time, some of them may be able to retain a competitive edge with simulations of reality and constantly improving those simulations, which is essentially what it is.

DE Shaw, Renaissance etc. Yeah. They pay far higher wages than pretty much anywhere else on earth and they do make huge profits purely from trading. Less visibility on Renaissance, and I'm skeptical about them tbh. But DES literally made $10b ish in 2024 purely from doing "quant trading".
Which is very different to systematic trendfollowing, which is a more suitable option for investors, since the smaller drawdowns and more predictable return range can help "asset gather".

There's this weird paradox where impressive high volatility classic trading firms struggle to gather assets even when they're far and away the best performing traders (even when they outperform the market and deliver uncorrelated returns), because investors are so scared of drawdowns.

Even in hedge funds and CTAs, people will put there money toward "high risk adjusted returns" rather than absolute returns. And CTAs tend to prioritise risk-adjusted returns and sharpe ratios because that's what attracts investors. The assets * fees is the business model.

 

[Deleted member 15778]

DE Shaw, Renaissance etc. Yeah. They pay far higher wages than pretty much anywhere else on earth and they do make huge profits purely from trading. Less visibility on Renaissance, and I'm skeptical about them tbh. But DES literally made $10b ish in 2024 purely from doing "quant trading".
Which is very different to systematic trendfollowing, which is a more suitable option for investors, since the smaller drawdowns and more predictable return range can help "asset gather".

There's this weird paradox where impressive high volatility classic trading firms struggle to gather assets even when they're far and away the best performing traders (even when they outperform the market and deliver uncorrelated returns), because investors are so scared of drawdowns.

Even in hedge funds and CTAs, people will put there money toward "high risk adjusted returns" rather than absolute returns. And CTAs tend to prioritise risk-adjusted returns and sharpe ratios because that's what attracts investors. The assets * fees is the business model.

That's interesting! I've had this theory bouncing around in my head for a while, that Alpha is created based on the strategies that most attract investors to invest in mutual funds. (Alpha is the inverse of those strategies somehow, even though those strategies might look bad on paper)

Like even if quants know more optimal strategies, they have to do what get's investors, if they are smart and prefer to risk other people's money.

That's why I was able to make some money in crypto (I'm don't hold crypto anymore). Because I knew mutual funds weren't touching it, so it was mostly just dumb money sloshing around.

As mutual funds adopt crypto, they add a certain kind of market efficiency to it (Sharpe Ratios, etc.) while creating other market inefficiencies, the opposite of whatever strategies are most popular with the biggest funds.

I was really expecting some push back, for you to call me dumb for keeping all my money in the S&P 500 or something. That I'm leaving gains on the table. And I surely am, but I just like the low risk being diversified across that many companies is, without trading significant fees, or taxes.

And you probably heard about Warren Buffet's long bet on the S&P 500 vs any one who would claim to be able to predict any fund or collection of funds that might beat it in a 10 year period. My take on it, it the standard take, though you may have a different opinion on that bet?

 

[Seth Walsh]

for you to call me dumb for keeping all my money in the S&P 500 or something.

That's like... the smartest thing anyone can do, EVER.

If you can do it completely tax efficiently, i.e., not paying tax on the accumulation over time, no exit tax. Then nothing even comes close.

 

[Seth Walsh]

That's interesting! I've had this theory bouncing around in my head for a while, that Alpha is created based on the strategies that most attract investors to invest in mutual funds. (Alpha is the inverse of those strategies somehow, even though those strategies might look bad on paper)

Like even if quants know more optimal strategies, they have to do what get's investors, if they are smart and prefer to risk other people's money.

That's why I was able to make some money in crypto (I'm don't hold crypto anymore). Because I knew mutual funds weren't touching it, so it was mostly just dumb money sloshing around.

As mutual funds adopt crypto, they add a certain kind of market efficiency to it (Sharpe Ratios, etc.) while creating other market inefficiencies, the opposite of whatever strategies are most popular with the biggest funds.

I was really expecting some push back, for you to call me dumb for keeping all my money in the S&P 500 or something. That I'm leaving gains on the table. And I surely am, but I just like the low risk being diversified across that many companies is, without trading significant fees, or taxes.

And you probably heard about Warren Buffet's long bet on the S&P 500 vs any one who would claim to be able to predict any fund or collection of funds that might beat it in a 10 year period. My take on it, it the standard take, though you may have a different opinion on that bet?

I personally know dozens of hedge fund managers and have the track records of thousands of hedge funds. Maybe 1 or 2 out of thousands have beaten S&P 500 total return index's returns since 1979.

And that's just 2, maybe 3 of the hedge funds that survived! Thousands of trading funds also completely blew up. I am talking specifically about systematic traders (CTAs). Idk about private hedge funds like RenTec, DE Shaw, Pershing, AQR and Bridgewater's discretionary strats etc.

But yeah, no one beats the market long term. Utter fools game to try.

CTAs selling point is to offer return streams that are uncorrelated to equities. (ex: Crisis Alpha.. 2008 crash etc). Many CTA's were up 100-150% on the year while the equity markets drewdown like 50%. It's the protection via diversification that's sought after, not the returns.

Discretionary long/short equity hedge funds are more correlated to equities however, and a larger proportion of them probably can beat the market for longer. But that's not my wheelhouse.

 

[Seth Walsh]

strategies that most attract investors to invest in mutual funds.

I'd say the strategies that attract the most assets towards them are the ones that prove to retain wealth intergenerationally.

Rich people invest the money. They want their great great great great great great great great great grandkids in 1000 years to avail of the resources to live a nice life. Ultra high net worth individuals get obsessed with diversification. They do not want to gamble their money.

 

[Deleted member 15778]

I'd say the strategies that attract the most assets towards them are the ones that prove to retain wealth intergenerationally.

Rich people invest the money. They want their great great great great great great great great great grandkids in 1000 years to avail of the resources to live a nice life. Ultra high net worth individuals get obsessed with diversification. They do not want to gamble their money.

So... then... a counter strategy to that would be shorting stocks that you predict to drop out of the S & P 500.

Or buying a stock right before they makes it onto the list.

S&P Dow Jones Indices typically rebalance on the third Friday at the end of each calendar quarter, as an example, so maybe with some math wizardry and diversification, there's a chance to make money with low risk four times a year.

Even if other people do this buying already, then you only need to hop in before them and make even more money. It's a pump and dump, but instead of a dump, rich people buy all your bags.

But if you're in the U.S. you have to factor in short term capital gains tax, and the risk. And the more you know exactly how rich people diversify the more you can counter trade it.

Just so long as it doesn't go into the territory of insider trading.

 

[Patient A]

nice profile pic, fellow femdom enjoyer.

I’m an extreme anti feminist chud.

 

[Patient A]

thoughts on a strategy based 100% on astrology and clairvoyance to forecast the future?

Like I said, it doesn’t work all the time when there is a strong mass crowd powered trend either bullish or bearish.

You will get wrecked by not having a backup plan

 

[Deleted member 126365]

I’m an extreme anti feminist chud.

me too lmao

 

[Funnyunenjoyer1]

Well my opinion is you'll 99.99999% lose ALL your money if you start trading regularly. So would anyone. It's all about risk controls, probabilities/payoffs and acceptance of the COMPLETE unpredictability of the markets. The markets only move based of the collective psychologies+actions of ALL its participants at any given time, and that can't be reverse engineered since its collective human behaviour. So I'd say spend years refining trading rules and risk parameters into a system that makes money in the long term. Backtesting with lots of historical data across as many markets as possible is very helpful.

this is too much to understand I don't even know how to read the candle sticks yet

 

[dookielooksmaxxer]

how much money u made unc

 

[looks>books]

How to make money?

 

[2marc1]

Title.

ik a lil but stock trading, but i trade memecoins and made like 500% already in 1 month , do you think i should go do a finance degree or js(just) stuck to this till i can tand get a mcdonalds job

 

[Funnyunenjoyer1]

Title.

can you guide me or give me a youtube video anything helps

I’m a complete beginner I just learned about the candle sticks

 

[Deleted member 81875]

Started off just by being very interesting in trading. Buying and selling trading cards when I was a kid. Practicing trading strategies, studying finance, then finally working as a trader. You are in effect, a product of where you spend your time. So I guess it's just a passion of mine.

You’re not a trader if you work at a firm you are a market maker

Trader means sitting at home daytrading

 

[the MOUSE]

Title.

stuff like programming etc has clear roadmap. what is roadmap to becoming successful trader like what specific shit to learn like support reistance, macd rsi, economic theory etc

 

[Seth Walsh]

stuff like programming etc has clear roadmap. what is roadmap to becoming successful trader like what specific shit to learn like support reistance, macd rsi, economic theory etc

Grit, determination, adapting. Get a job on the investment focused side of a quant shop or hedge fund. This stuff about learning technical analysis from your bedroom and trading freestyle needs to stop. If you want to be excellent at something, you need to keep refining and adapting towards WHAT WORKS. If you can't find that, you don't need guidance.

But there's lots of ups and downs and a long journey involved if you seriously want to be successfully.

The rest is cope.

 

[optimisticzoomer]

Professional larper

 

[Edgarpill]

Professional larper

your gonna be a 9-5 slave bro wake up!