| Trading as a Living - Can You
Really Do It Full-Time
It it ready true that there are people out there who trade full time for a living (option, futures, forex, stocks etc)? How did they do it? Can a retail investor achieve consistence profit for one to put food on the table? Currently, there are many trading courses in the market which promises wealth by attending their course? For those who attended such a course....care to share?....Scam? Yes, I am thinking for a career switch and trading is one of them. Passion, I dun really know, but, if I can profit consistently to provide for my family, I will definitely prefer trading over my current job. --- Well I have never attended a course which will promises wealth cause I always believe wealth is gain by one's own means not by some guru teaching you that secret method which can earn you millions. Well to me if they are that good most probably they would be busy earning money instead of teaching. Unless it is reknowned speakers like Warren buffett or Geoge soros then probably I would stay around to listen. At the end of the day but if they are teaching us something which we need to know or having a speech over a certain issue I'm interested in knowing, I would most proberly attend. Most people whom I know who trades for a living, live a pretty simple and frugal life. Unlike those that have being publised where they drive a ferrari and stay in a big big mansion .. To my perspective unless you are able to only live with 10% of your returns for every year .. you would most probably survive. Or else I think it is better of working. Don't be illusioned by just a bullish year to come into thinking that I can win more than I work why should I work? Try really working out you trading over the past 10 years or 5 years at least (consisting of a bear market and calculate your returns based on that with a year depreciation of your daily expenses... if you still have at least 20% returns after that then probably you would be able to survive. Trading for a living seems easy as you aren't calculating your drawings and you are counting a flat amount for the returns. There will be one day where you would lose and when it comes to you losing your pants and you are cash strapped in investments even daily expenses would come as a problem to you. Do consider properly before commiting. Thats my opinion... your opinions might vary. I have been trading for over a decade and it has not been easy. It does not get any easier because after making a certain amt, you want to do better. But if your are happy making a living then it is up to you. It will be better to just work for someone else if you want to make some money to get by. I am in it to make LOTS of money. Being self employed with a family is a tall order especially if you are the sole bread winner. So if you are in this situation, pls reconsider. Yes, money comes easy without having to do much physical labour except click buy/sell. Here is the reality :
2. Trading requires WORK! Hard mental work in my case. Imagine taking exam everyday. Plus the stress when you are losing money and you are trying to cover the losses. Here is where the tire meets the road. 3. Consistency. Biggest problem for full time traders. If you do not have a trading method. Be it fundamental/ Technical, you are likely to go bust in 6 mths. 4. Doing it day in and day out. It is like work. Though you have the priviledge of getting off as and when you like. But no work = no $$. 5. It is a LONG journey. At least 6 mths to a year for futures traders. You better have sufficient $$ to cover living plus learning expenses. Expensive and DEPRESSIVE, if you do not make it. Most of the time people can take the monetary loss. But the pride and ego can be damaged extensively. Depression is common in my industry. Though no body wants to talk about it. Stress of not making/lossing money is very real. So do think twice before doing this FULL time. If you are still young, then you can give it a good shot. Time is on your side. But if you are like a said, a family man. Do your sums and learn as much as possible before jumping in. Please don't believe those courses that advertise that you can make $1 Million from say $20k as starting capital. Take it with a BIG PINCH of salt. What they usually do is they have several trading accounts and the ones that is most successful, they use it for advertisement. Most likely you did not see the BIG losers. Most would be traders do not have any idea how hard trading can be. Both investing and trading is hard work. I am still learning every single day and I make mistakes, just not the same ones. The work that goes behind both investing and trading is pure hard work which few ppe. see. I do both so I know how much work I put behind them. You cannot expect to go party every evening, drink beer, play golf over the weekend and hope to understand something as complicated as the stock market. It is PURE HARD WORK, the mental kind. Both Trading and Investing is hard work. The question is how many draw downs can you take before you get washed out of the game? Draw downs are losses. If you have six to eight 10% losses in a row, you most likely out of the game. The game is different when you are drawing a salary and trading on the side versus just trading for a living. The pyschological makeup will change cos' now you will feel that YOU NEED to make money in the market in order to survive, not just like the prior when you feel like making money or not in the market does not affect your lifestyle. It is your INNER DEMONS that you have to deal with once you lose the security of that paycheck. I have been there and done that. But to me its a passion to discover myself. Do you hate yourself or the game when you lose money? I love this even when I lost more than 85K back 6 yrs ago. To paraphrase Ken Fisher " If you love it when you are losing money, you will like it even more when you make money" It is the passion that will drive you. If you are unsure, stay out for the sake of your family and your money. Money from the market is just the result of being a success at what you do. The passion to succeed and trade well is more important. The money will naturally follow. Here is an advise from Darly Guppy: "You become a full-time trader by graduating from a part-time trader and when your trading income is greater then your current wage income. In this situation you have already accumulated sufficient savings to make full-time trading, with its irregular income flow, a real possibility of success." Trading involves risk, your money on the line everytime you put it out in the market. Teaching it is better, confirmed money in their pockets but none in yours ;-) Most wanna-be traders get washed out within 6 months. That is the stats, whether you believe it or not. They don't realized that it is alot of hard work, even harder than your current job. If the course trainers are that good, why would they bother teaching the course? They would be out there trading. Just like to be a good doctor or engineer takes years, to be a good trader also takes years, not a simple 3-5 day course. Along the way, you will find out more about yourself than you can possibly imagine. Be careful. Value Investing for the long-term can also make money as Warren Buffet have shown and it is very low-stress compared to trading and can be done part-time for very little time involved. For instance, you can run a full-time business or have a full-time job and invest part-time. Thus, you must ask yourself is full-time stock trading really what you want?
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