The answer is simply, yes. Day trading is profitable. How long does it take to become profitable? It seems that varies.
For me, it was inner pain, despair, despair and then a grace that I cannot describe. Then I started making profits.
I’d like to preface that before starting day trading, I worked in healthcare for 10 years as a Medical Representative That’s why I don’t come from a related field in this field. I never made much money.
That’s when I started putting out books online about day trading, swing trading, position trading, etc.
I started, I failed, then started doing well. When I became quite comfortable with my successes with regular stocks, I started swing trading individual stocks with less success and lost some less money than I had.
This is separate from your own money. When you don’t have a lot of it, you become very protective of it. That would be my biggest weakness.
I also learned that trading persons stocks to me was dumb. I have read that many people have had success doing it, but I was not having success with it.
That’s when I started learning about the futures markets. That’s a day traders environment.
Reading, creating your own risk management plan, etc.etc. I started live trading. After much prayer I decided I’d start an entirely new full-time career: day trading.
I lost almost all my money within 3 months. Harm, after the defeat. Some benefits that made me feel excited and hopeful, that my ‘luck’ has changed.
Starting with only 30k left to go up to $900. What took me about 15 years to deposit was gone in 60ish business days.
You cannot imagine the pain and suffering I felt, because I have kept it to myself.
I could not tell anyone that I have failed so badly.
I burst into tears, a panic you’ve never felt in your life. I was broken, beaten, humbled, demoralized and thrown down.
I prayed and begged God for help and guidance. Mostly, I asked him to understand my wife and give peace to my feelings and mind.
I figured it was still what I was suppose to do, even though I failed. God never took that drive for me to keep doing this.
Then within a few weeks something happened that I can only contribute to God’s answer to prayer:
Through patience and intense testing of what I was doing, I developed a plan that began to turn out to be fruitful.
I took the 900 Dollar I had left and started using my strategy. I was amazed at the success of the plan (as long as I followed it!) and I burst into tears to thank God.
I don’t want to make it a redemption story, but I can’t do it without that story.
Now to your question: Yes. It is profitable. For me (and for many other independent traders, as I am not the only one with my story) it turned out to be a substantial loss in profit.
The biggest teacher is the discipline of failure.
My Learning
Keep your chart simple. If it looks like someone has thrown trend lines, moving averages, entry/exit signals, clouds, oscillators etc at your screen, you are doing it wrong.
Learn about volume. It is the single most important confirmation piece of technical analysis that gives truth to the price movement. Such is my opinion.
Learn about order flow. It is as (or more) important as the quantity. Because order flow shows you what buyers/sellers are doing in real time. You can see the top and bottom contracts being added or removed. You can see the difference between buyers and sellers competing on price fluctuations. It is more of an art than a science.
Recognize that losing is very common. It is part of the ‘game’. You will suffer. The market will always move in the direction that will hurt the most people the most. But you have to decide how much loss and damage you will bear.
Don’t trade just for the sake of trading. Don’t trade just because you are at your trading desk (or home office, or whatever you call your trading area). It was tough for me because impulsivity put me in some bad trades, still does.
Set a daily loss limit in your software that prevents you from trading on the day it is hit. One of my biggest mistakes (and I still make it sometimes) is ‘revenge trading’. This is when you have a loss or two, big or small, and you feel like you want to ‘get it back’. It will destroy your account and success.
do not follow. This was difficult for me to do. My plan would trigger an entry for long/short and I would miss it, and watch it move and I start thinking, “That’s 3 points of movement I just missed! There’s more to it.” should be.” And then you enter and it goes against you. This will kill your account.
Don’t listen to anyone other than yourself. Once you let other people’s opinions influence your preconceived plan, you begin to doubt yourself and lose confidence in your decision making. I’m a naturally insecure person so this remains a challenge for me, but it’s not that bad anymore.
You are not alone, so don’t be alone. Find a trading coach or peer group. There are great groups to connect with the most humble people you’ll meet and help provide education, support and validation of your struggles.
Take care of yourself physically. The body satisfies the mind. I suggest strength training over cardio. I say this because strength training is the practice of lifting heavier and heavier weights, with the sole purpose of failing, so that the failures of tomorrow lifting higher weights are you. This is the perfect analogy to market momentum: any resistance that is easily found is a sign of little effort. When your lifting goes easy, you’re not trying hard enough. When prices move smoothly, participants are not trying hard enough.
God bless you all and I pray that you find success, wisdom and peace in your day to day business. It’s the funniest, most liberating and hardest job I’ve ever done.
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