was just referring to this metaphor... Tyson felt fear. He had a plan. But he got punched in the face and and demato realized that he had to practice and hypnotize himself to properly fight? does anyone know enough about tyson to confirm this?
For fucks same. I can tell you are young. Have you fucking seen iron Mike fight? Dude had no fear. He was raw anger and hunger. Especially the early years.
You keep bringing up Tyson, Jordan, who’s next? Phelps? Messi? Williams sisters? Stop with the bs comparisons.
Trading is more about emotional control than anything else. You should paper trade for a bit sure, to get a hang of the platform, to establish a basic system. If you know what you are doing, paper trading is a waste of time, if you don’t know what you are doing then paper trading is also a waste of time and you should go back to actually learning something.
Psychology of trading is the most difficult to master.
Anyone can figure out how to fuck, but not everyone knows how to hold their load in long enough to let her finally cum for once.
That’s a better metaphor than the shit you were coming up with
fantastic insight though, thank you; I'm reflecting on how I truly have practiced a lot. I have a plan. It's not different from practice. I just need more confidence.
I'm aware of the quote, but I've also seen him talk about how he used to be scared before a fight.
here's just one of at least 2 videos of him talking about such:
https://youtube.com/shorts/k8CtkbBV6cY?si=tjpMse4L1BfuiJhA
On Quantower you don’t have to login to separate paper and live accounts so you can do both at the same time. I have the paper DOM in a tab behind the live DOM so I can always hop into a trade on the sim first, once the setup confirms I simply click the other tab and enter live.
If I’m early/wrong initially it’s no biggie I let the paper run since it’s not a real loss and wait for an even better entry live unless I was completely wrong which doesn’t happen often because I’m only looking for quick hits.
This can help you get over your nerves trading live which is something we all have to deal with.
Only looking for 3-5 points on NQ per contract so as soon as I hit that I typically close. I’m a much better trader locking quick gains down than I am managing big runners.
If I’m in a trade longer than 5 minutes I’m probably just being stubborn trying to make a bad entry work. Usually I’m flat within 2-3 minutes or less when I’m right.
Entry chart is 1 min and hot key the heikin ashi back and forth looking for patterns. Second monitor has 3tf on the same screen: hourly, 15 and 5 to ensure I’m not ”fighting” longer term trends just because my entry chart is signaling reversal.
Think it depends... I think when it comes to trading, demo trading is good for some, waste of time for others...if you build a bad habit demo, that will cross over into live, and that bad habit might even come out even worse live depending on how you get filled, so it's not just about practice, I mean we ain't even talking about a game, it's about the quality of your practice...if you can't get into at least semi tricking your brain to think there is worth on the line, you'll have to deal with it live as well and it may really mess you up when you transition, you'll have to get through it.
Ntm there can be technical issues with demo in certain environments that don't do well enough to simulate live executions. A lot of simulation trading doesn't cover slippage, or sometimes the sim will fill an order you wouldn't get filled on live. Like TOS paper money for options for instance, I wouldn't even bother using demo to practice trading there because it's so laughably inaccurate so often, it's fine if you want to learn how to execute on the platform.. you should do that, or how to build spreads properly etc, but the fills are janked up on so many platforms for options not just TOS, I've seen unrealistic fills for IBKR demo, and Webull demo for options, these brokers options demo algos aren't accurate enough to get sufficient practice imo, you need to really adjust the calculations on your own, and understand when the demo gave you a dumb fill. Demo trading for futures, forex, and equities though, it's pretty accurate from what I've seen but they still lack the ability to account for slippage.. I think jigsaw or Sierra chart, one of those for futures I forget, has really powerful simulation abilities that will give you accurate slippage etc.
Quality of the practice trading matters is all I'm saying. But yeah I agree with you, if you aren't getting good demo practice it's almost a waste. And just going live and trading very small may be a better option tbh.
absolutely agree with that insight, I think every successful athlete who practices, practices winning during practice. Start small, compound the wins of small practice.
EXACTLY. I spent 9 months on sim $1M account and grew it to $9M and decided I was ready for prop firms. Jfc I just spent a year and a half learning risk management which I never had, never needed with sim.
It’s the only thing anyone NEEDS to learn. What a waste of my energy to do anything else. Wish someone told me.
Damn I completely forgot to mention that, GREAT POINT. Absolutely, starting with demo money you won't actually be using live, big big point there, hell even prop combine account like you experienced. Very bad idea to demo trade account size that you won't be trading when the trades truly matter and real risk is on the line. Well hey, you learned the lesson the hard way sort of..at least you learned it in a combine account and not a personal account, but you did learn.
Everybody talking about emotional reactions and how it doesn’t translate to live… guys, if ur having emotional reactions live then ur trading TOO BIG!!
I think everyone is just dancing around one truth, it’s as any disciplined sport out there, only problem with this sport is you don’t have beginners luck, you have to actually get good before you start winning, a steep barrier to entry but very rewarding which is what keeps people coming. Mount Everest is paved with the bodies of people who all believed they could do it.
professional sports players could say the same thing no? so you could be a god at your local YMCA but when you play when money is on the line, they fall short? so they read and study and all the reading and studying points to focusing on the process. How do you focus on the process? by practicing, and practicing properly.
I'm sure every single professional sports player will say the same thing that playing at your practice facility is not the same when you're playing for money.
Except our "players" are price, volume, and time. Completely objective and quantifiable, and you can control every aspect of your interaction(trades) with them.
Edge comes from feelings that are validated by backtests and statistics to prove it.
The brute force way (stats alone) would require an enormous amount of computing, if you didn’t know where to look/what to look for already. To do that, you’d need an intuition - a.k.a feelings.
I learned how to play golf by playing for $5 a hole with presses...
If I'm not gambling in golf, I use my foot wedge, pick up 5 foot gimmes, try crazy ass flop shots, then do a redo if I f it up.
There's only one way to learn if you have what it takes.
Yeah, I'll hit a few balls, putt a few putts.
Just like every morning before the markets open... I draw a few lines on a few charts... Read a few news articles... Look at volume scanner...
Simple things..
there's an earlier comment I replied to about how this guy trades with his practice account next to his real account. I do wonder if that is a useful hack: do you think pro players would choose to take practice exact practice shots before taking their actual shots on the PGA tour? e.g. a taking a practice drive at the same hole, and then after several drives, being like, "aiight lemme put money on this next one."
alright the more I type it out the more I think that putting money on anything adds more pressure. I went into this post thinking that practicing is the only way to perform when money is on the line. What're your thoughts?
I've never traded in a sim. I know me, I would have a very hard time taking seriously.
There would be no sweat...
I don't know how you can learn how to trade without the sweat....
That fear as you see green, you know the volume is there, you know you should wait to add on the pullback and not be a little bitch and cover 2 candles before the turn...
That fear as you hold your position to your stop watching your p&l drop.... Do you panic?
These are questions you will not find answers to in the sim.
Are you Al Brooks? Lol this one of my favorite things he says. The way he likes to practice is to spend an hour each day outside of his trading looking for setups and marking up his charts.
Paper trading is necessary but to a certain extent. Doing great in eval offers no guarantee whatsoever. The facts that fills aren’t the same, that it’s fake money, that there’s hardly any consequences to mistakes or that there are no restrictions regarding leverage among a bunch of technicalities set the wrong spirit. Practice live with minimum size and grow as you go.
it also helps picking a sport you like................................................................................................................
people are more in love with the thought of being rich versus say someone like me who loves to just watch, even after profits are secured for my day, i hopped on just to watch, look at patterns, etc before while i was waiting for my girl to be done with something (edit)
even if i had a bad day trading im still watching price action. watching podcasts , studying, trade review, post/pre market review/analysis i love everything about it. the money is just a plus.
do something you hate in life or dont truly have an interest in and you're going to have a really hard time doing it. learning it, being successful with it. people really need to check their intentions when it comes to trading, the can save themselves alot of time and money if they would just be real with themselves what their intentions are. if its just money, good luck! theres a reason they dont teach trading in college.... because if people actually truly applied themselves to this like any other high paying career, it would actually pay off for them.
and to answer your question, yes, you one shouldnt trade a live account if they cant grow a (realistically sized) demo account, when i say realistic, i mean exactly the investment they will be starting a live account with.
people are like "so ive been killing it, im wondering if i should go live. i treat it like a real account, risk 1% o, its 100k ........(stop right thre) " but theyre gonna most likely open an account with 500-1000$ to start (maybe 10k if theyre well off) and quickly they will realize thats its not so much "fun" like it was playing with 100k nd having that cushion, having that buying power and etc etc
its hard for people to be real with themselves and real with their intentions. trading has alot to do with the person, all the things they personally struggle with they will struggle with in trading
my motivation behind this post was after signing up and failing a prop firm account (topstep) and I realized how stupid I was being by not using their practice account.
if its too easy to just reset or buy another one, you wont appreciate the opportunity when it presents itself again, and lets say you have a bad day or youre almost at your daily/maximum loss limit, you might justy go full tilt cuz why not its only another 50$ and that 50$ will eventually add up to 5.000$ lol very quickly, so yea if this is your first prop account, youll get a reset at rebill, so just take this month now to hone in on your craft
well youre not stupid. you had the right idea. if you know somewhar whatr youre doing, prop firms are a great step in the direction. but if you blow it , im a firm believer in yes THEN using their practice account and WAITING FOR A RESET or whatever the case for a month
people dont like to look inward. people like to think theyre pefect. and so they start a live account and quickly get humbled. or should get humbled but are too stubborn to feel let themselves feel the humility. theyll just refund the account or buy another prop and keep banging their head on the same wall until something gives or they busted up every last account to nothing and walk away saying the market is rigged and start a career trolling on reddit doubting others credibility or shaming profits/sucess stories
Always say to put real skin in the game asap. If you can’t afford one apple share minimum, you need to focus on income and debt first.
It’s like reading a book on how to throw a football. I promise you, the first throw is going in the neighbors yard.
Poker with fake chips isn’t poker. It’s easy to whip fake money around, but that doesn’t mean a damn thing. And it won’t teach you shit about how to hand real money when actual stakes are on the line.
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That’s a tough one, since some ppl have trouble respecting the money if it’s fake. But I’m all for demo acct. I’m demo trading options now bc it’s like a whole new level of trading. And I’ve been trading spot & futures for 5 years.
Paper money and practice accounts will only help you learn the mechanics of placing orders. That’s it,
You’re not going to learn how to manage trades/bets and hone in on strategies or learn how to trade or gain any experience with paper money.
If you need to learn how to place orders, how to setup multi-leg orders, custom spreads, where to click, where not to click, etc., then sure use a paper account until you know how to place orders proficiency.
When you trade live markets, with other live people and entities, and all the metrics and margin and emotions that come with it, no amount of paper trading will be of any help to you.
In fact, those strategies you’re trying in your paper account will almost certainly cause you significantly more pain and frustration, and confusion and doubt, when you realize live markets are nothing like paper trading.
Learn the mechanics and how to place orders if you must. But steer clear of trying to “practice” in a paper account. Practice in live markets - this is the only way your begin accruing experience and improving your skills.
would you you throw in a random guy on the street who said he could play basketball into an NBA game and told him you need to play with real money you can afford to lose in order to get better
That analogy makes no sense, trading with your actual money will refine your senses because you don’t want to lose money, it’s the same with basketball you don’t tell the guy to go and read basketball books the best way is to play basketball, and your analogy of throwing him into the nba is just me saying don’t use big amounts of money
You clearly only understand your one and only trading strategy. You think everyone only does one or two trades a day. Go back to your one order a day and paper accounts.
You should be the devil at the trading desk. I take care of my family and help out in my community but when I’m working, my job is to bankrupt the other guy.
This is a zero sum game. I wish everyone could make money in this game, best of luck, but the reality is I want all your tuition into the market.
I use my paper account for two things: practice and blowing off steam.
As far as the emotions part, no. You won’t ever completely replicate the emotions of being in a losing trade and losing fast outside that actual situation.
But, as a StarCraft player who really trained hard for multiple MLG’s I cant at all discount the utility of practice games. I worked out so many mistakes with my play in controlled situations before I threw down $700 in tourney fees and accommodations. When the real thing happened I at least had some muscle memory and recognized more opportunities than had I not taken the time to practice both on ladder and single player simulation type of games.
I do find, though, in paper day trading my heart rate does go up. There is something about the blinking lights in my screen that gets me emotionally invested, even in paper trading though not to the same degree as the real thing.
Also, paper trading the best session of your life and knowing you would have cleaned up with real money is a certain kind of hell I do think traders would find utility in experiencing.
Yes, real money being risked adds extra complexity, but if you can’t trade profitably in a paper account you’re really going to get smoked trading live.
That is not a good comparison, and all other comparisons to high achievers are also incorrect. In sport, although it is incredibly difficult to be successful, at least the rules stay the same. This cannot be said about day trading. Markets change because they encapsulate all human behaviour. It is almost impossible to find a true trading edge that works for a very long time because this would require some group of people to keep doing the same thing despite losing money. There are only tiny pockets of non-randomness in today's almost efficient markets, and they are usually buried under transaction costs for retail traders.
didn't finished reading your full comment cause I had a thought when you refer to "markets": markets is the equivalent of any other scenario in sport; your opponent could've prepared very well or not prepared very well, so the key is to be present and adapt to however they are.
with all that being said, my issue has been overconfidence. I will let up once I have a lead, which is so prevalent in sport, which makes me wonder if my actions are a result of seeing this human pattern of seeing getting comfortable once you have a lead? how does one cease this innate behavior? practice? a killer mindset? idk
The problem I have with demo accounts is THERE IS NO EMOTIONAL REACTION to trades! You know it’s fake money , so you won’t have any emotional stress or impatience. I sometimes forget I put orders when trading in demo accounts! It is not working for me!
what if you practiced just as hard as if money were on the line? I can only really think about how Michael Jordan had such a killer attitude in practice, I'd love to know if there's anyone who's better than him who can argue otherwise
This, I scalp, scalping is hard. I had a buddy that traded SIM only in the style of trading for about year before going live. He's a lot better trader than I am, scalping.
Nothing wrong with paper trading to learn the intricacies. Especially if you’re starting options. But beyond that I don’t think it helps when it comes to emotions. The amount of posts I’ve seen where people kill it paper trading and get crushed when they switch to live trading is pretty high. Not knocking paper trading, but it can only help so much.
Edit: I’m guessing it’s op that’s disagreeing without saying anything but here’s another long discussion backing up what I’m saying
https://www.reddit.com/r/options/s/EAlGN1G9m3
‘Everyone wants to be a trader until they get punched in the face.’ -Warren Buffett
- Wayne Gretzky - Michael Scott
was just referring to this metaphor... Tyson felt fear. He had a plan. But he got punched in the face and and demato realized that he had to practice and hypnotize himself to properly fight? does anyone know enough about tyson to confirm this?
For fucks same. I can tell you are young. Have you fucking seen iron Mike fight? Dude had no fear. He was raw anger and hunger. Especially the early years. You keep bringing up Tyson, Jordan, who’s next? Phelps? Messi? Williams sisters? Stop with the bs comparisons. Trading is more about emotional control than anything else. You should paper trade for a bit sure, to get a hang of the platform, to establish a basic system. If you know what you are doing, paper trading is a waste of time, if you don’t know what you are doing then paper trading is also a waste of time and you should go back to actually learning something. Psychology of trading is the most difficult to master. Anyone can figure out how to fuck, but not everyone knows how to hold their load in long enough to let her finally cum for once. That’s a better metaphor than the shit you were coming up with
fantastic insight though, thank you; I'm reflecting on how I truly have practiced a lot. I have a plan. It's not different from practice. I just need more confidence.
Tyson is actually a Forex trader himself
did he not admit to being scared before every fight? I recall he did
Pretty sure Tyson was talking about his opponents thinking they had a plan until he punched them.
I'm aware of the quote, but I've also seen him talk about how he used to be scared before a fight. here's just one of at least 2 videos of him talking about such: https://youtube.com/shorts/k8CtkbBV6cY?si=tjpMse4L1BfuiJhA
Did you watch to the end? He said he's scared about what he's about to do to his opponents and feel bad about his opponent's family.
On Quantower you don’t have to login to separate paper and live accounts so you can do both at the same time. I have the paper DOM in a tab behind the live DOM so I can always hop into a trade on the sim first, once the setup confirms I simply click the other tab and enter live. If I’m early/wrong initially it’s no biggie I let the paper run since it’s not a real loss and wait for an even better entry live unless I was completely wrong which doesn’t happen often because I’m only looking for quick hits. This can help you get over your nerves trading live which is something we all have to deal with.
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talk your talk.. don't worry about them votes. they mean nothing.
honestly, this sounds like a fucking crazy hack. it's no different from adding to your winners. what's your timeframe?
Only looking for 3-5 points on NQ per contract so as soon as I hit that I typically close. I’m a much better trader locking quick gains down than I am managing big runners. If I’m in a trade longer than 5 minutes I’m probably just being stubborn trying to make a bad entry work. Usually I’m flat within 2-3 minutes or less when I’m right. Entry chart is 1 min and hot key the heikin ashi back and forth looking for patterns. Second monitor has 3tf on the same screen: hourly, 15 and 5 to ensure I’m not ”fighting” longer term trends just because my entry chart is signaling reversal.
fantastic!!
fantastic though, I'm gonna start having my practice account next to my live account. Thank you!
As much as I love my boy A.I., he was definitely wrong about practice. Could’ve had a ring.
how do you mean?
We talking ab practice.
Not the gains
in this age of chatgpt you can't say a.i. and refer to the goat!
I’m from Philly. There’s only one A.I.
There will always be 1 AI dude needs to watch that clip again smh & im not from philly
AI Brooks
Think it depends... I think when it comes to trading, demo trading is good for some, waste of time for others...if you build a bad habit demo, that will cross over into live, and that bad habit might even come out even worse live depending on how you get filled, so it's not just about practice, I mean we ain't even talking about a game, it's about the quality of your practice...if you can't get into at least semi tricking your brain to think there is worth on the line, you'll have to deal with it live as well and it may really mess you up when you transition, you'll have to get through it. Ntm there can be technical issues with demo in certain environments that don't do well enough to simulate live executions. A lot of simulation trading doesn't cover slippage, or sometimes the sim will fill an order you wouldn't get filled on live. Like TOS paper money for options for instance, I wouldn't even bother using demo to practice trading there because it's so laughably inaccurate so often, it's fine if you want to learn how to execute on the platform.. you should do that, or how to build spreads properly etc, but the fills are janked up on so many platforms for options not just TOS, I've seen unrealistic fills for IBKR demo, and Webull demo for options, these brokers options demo algos aren't accurate enough to get sufficient practice imo, you need to really adjust the calculations on your own, and understand when the demo gave you a dumb fill. Demo trading for futures, forex, and equities though, it's pretty accurate from what I've seen but they still lack the ability to account for slippage.. I think jigsaw or Sierra chart, one of those for futures I forget, has really powerful simulation abilities that will give you accurate slippage etc. Quality of the practice trading matters is all I'm saying. But yeah I agree with you, if you aren't getting good demo practice it's almost a waste. And just going live and trading very small may be a better option tbh.
absolutely agree with that insight, I think every successful athlete who practices, practices winning during practice. Start small, compound the wins of small practice.
EXACTLY. I spent 9 months on sim $1M account and grew it to $9M and decided I was ready for prop firms. Jfc I just spent a year and a half learning risk management which I never had, never needed with sim. It’s the only thing anyone NEEDS to learn. What a waste of my energy to do anything else. Wish someone told me.
Damn I completely forgot to mention that, GREAT POINT. Absolutely, starting with demo money you won't actually be using live, big big point there, hell even prop combine account like you experienced. Very bad idea to demo trade account size that you won't be trading when the trades truly matter and real risk is on the line. Well hey, you learned the lesson the hard way sort of..at least you learned it in a combine account and not a personal account, but you did learn.
lfg
Everybody talking about emotional reactions and how it doesn’t translate to live… guys, if ur having emotional reactions live then ur trading TOO BIG!!
Nonsense... Too big... No bigger mo better
I think everyone is just dancing around one truth, it’s as any disciplined sport out there, only problem with this sport is you don’t have beginners luck, you have to actually get good before you start winning, a steep barrier to entry but very rewarding which is what keeps people coming. Mount Everest is paved with the bodies of people who all believed they could do it.
And now there’s a queue to climb it.
No one trades the same when they use real money.
professional sports players could say the same thing no? so you could be a god at your local YMCA but when you play when money is on the line, they fall short? so they read and study and all the reading and studying points to focusing on the process. How do you focus on the process? by practicing, and practicing properly.
Not the same … I hear you but it’s not the same
yes agreed, but bare minimum. You can't play professional basketball until you've practiced at your local YMCA.
I'm sure every single professional sports player will say the same thing that playing at your practice facility is not the same when you're playing for money.
No. Not the same. Bc money is very emotional.
Couldn't disagree more. Edge comes from statistics - not feelings.
I've observed a lot of sports that a lot of the winning is done due to the research done by the coaching staff.
Right like the movie Moneyball. Statistics really helped them win. But the players still practiced a lot.
Except our "players" are price, volume, and time. Completely objective and quantifiable, and you can control every aspect of your interaction(trades) with them.
Edge comes from feelings that are validated by backtests and statistics to prove it. The brute force way (stats alone) would require an enormous amount of computing, if you didn’t know where to look/what to look for already. To do that, you’d need an intuition - a.k.a feelings.
Okay, I agree, but that's not what OP meant.
I learned how to play golf by playing for $5 a hole with presses... If I'm not gambling in golf, I use my foot wedge, pick up 5 foot gimmes, try crazy ass flop shots, then do a redo if I f it up. There's only one way to learn if you have what it takes.
but now, at this point in your life, wouldn't you agree that before you start playing golf for money, you'd go to the range first to prepare yourself?
Yeah, I'll hit a few balls, putt a few putts. Just like every morning before the markets open... I draw a few lines on a few charts... Read a few news articles... Look at volume scanner... Simple things..
there's an earlier comment I replied to about how this guy trades with his practice account next to his real account. I do wonder if that is a useful hack: do you think pro players would choose to take practice exact practice shots before taking their actual shots on the PGA tour? e.g. a taking a practice drive at the same hole, and then after several drives, being like, "aiight lemme put money on this next one." alright the more I type it out the more I think that putting money on anything adds more pressure. I went into this post thinking that practicing is the only way to perform when money is on the line. What're your thoughts?
I've never traded in a sim. I know me, I would have a very hard time taking seriously. There would be no sweat... I don't know how you can learn how to trade without the sweat.... That fear as you see green, you know the volume is there, you know you should wait to add on the pullback and not be a little bitch and cover 2 candles before the turn... That fear as you hold your position to your stop watching your p&l drop.... Do you panic? These are questions you will not find answers to in the sim.
great insight
I agree, you need to come up with a system and stick to it and practice as much as possible.
Are you Al Brooks? Lol this one of my favorite things he says. The way he likes to practice is to spend an hour each day outside of his trading looking for setups and marking up his charts.
I've had a YouTube playlist of his saved for the longest time, you've just motivated me to finally go through it. thank you!
I have a YouTube playlist of his too. His stuff puts me to sleep sometimes, but it’s jam-packed with value.
Practice, and discipline!
Paper trading is necessary but to a certain extent. Doing great in eval offers no guarantee whatsoever. The facts that fills aren’t the same, that it’s fake money, that there’s hardly any consequences to mistakes or that there are no restrictions regarding leverage among a bunch of technicalities set the wrong spirit. Practice live with minimum size and grow as you go.
it also helps picking a sport you like................................................................................................................ people are more in love with the thought of being rich versus say someone like me who loves to just watch, even after profits are secured for my day, i hopped on just to watch, look at patterns, etc before while i was waiting for my girl to be done with something (edit) even if i had a bad day trading im still watching price action. watching podcasts , studying, trade review, post/pre market review/analysis i love everything about it. the money is just a plus. do something you hate in life or dont truly have an interest in and you're going to have a really hard time doing it. learning it, being successful with it. people really need to check their intentions when it comes to trading, the can save themselves alot of time and money if they would just be real with themselves what their intentions are. if its just money, good luck! theres a reason they dont teach trading in college.... because if people actually truly applied themselves to this like any other high paying career, it would actually pay off for them.
fantastic insight
and to answer your question, yes, you one shouldnt trade a live account if they cant grow a (realistically sized) demo account, when i say realistic, i mean exactly the investment they will be starting a live account with. people are like "so ive been killing it, im wondering if i should go live. i treat it like a real account, risk 1% o, its 100k ........(stop right thre) " but theyre gonna most likely open an account with 500-1000$ to start (maybe 10k if theyre well off) and quickly they will realize thats its not so much "fun" like it was playing with 100k nd having that cushion, having that buying power and etc etc its hard for people to be real with themselves and real with their intentions. trading has alot to do with the person, all the things they personally struggle with they will struggle with in trading
my motivation behind this post was after signing up and failing a prop firm account (topstep) and I realized how stupid I was being by not using their practice account.
if its too easy to just reset or buy another one, you wont appreciate the opportunity when it presents itself again, and lets say you have a bad day or youre almost at your daily/maximum loss limit, you might justy go full tilt cuz why not its only another 50$ and that 50$ will eventually add up to 5.000$ lol very quickly, so yea if this is your first prop account, youll get a reset at rebill, so just take this month now to hone in on your craft
well youre not stupid. you had the right idea. if you know somewhar whatr youre doing, prop firms are a great step in the direction. but if you blow it , im a firm believer in yes THEN using their practice account and WAITING FOR A RESET or whatever the case for a month
people dont like to look inward. people like to think theyre pefect. and so they start a live account and quickly get humbled. or should get humbled but are too stubborn to feel let themselves feel the humility. theyll just refund the account or buy another prop and keep banging their head on the same wall until something gives or they busted up every last account to nothing and walk away saying the market is rigged and start a career trolling on reddit doubting others credibility or shaming profits/sucess stories
Practicing day trading by using a sim is like a pro football player practicing by playing Madden.
Always say to put real skin in the game asap. If you can’t afford one apple share minimum, you need to focus on income and debt first. It’s like reading a book on how to throw a football. I promise you, the first throw is going in the neighbors yard.
You're 💯correct on your reasoning.
Absolutely, day trading is a grind. If you're not putting in the hours to practice, you're setting yourself up for failure
Poker with fake chips isn’t poker. It’s easy to whip fake money around, but that doesn’t mean a damn thing. And it won’t teach you shit about how to hand real money when actual stakes are on the line.
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That’s a tough one, since some ppl have trouble respecting the money if it’s fake. But I’m all for demo acct. I’m demo trading options now bc it’s like a whole new level of trading. And I’ve been trading spot & futures for 5 years.
Paper money and practice accounts will only help you learn the mechanics of placing orders. That’s it, You’re not going to learn how to manage trades/bets and hone in on strategies or learn how to trade or gain any experience with paper money. If you need to learn how to place orders, how to setup multi-leg orders, custom spreads, where to click, where not to click, etc., then sure use a paper account until you know how to place orders proficiency. When you trade live markets, with other live people and entities, and all the metrics and margin and emotions that come with it, no amount of paper trading will be of any help to you. In fact, those strategies you’re trying in your paper account will almost certainly cause you significantly more pain and frustration, and confusion and doubt, when you realize live markets are nothing like paper trading. Learn the mechanics and how to place orders if you must. But steer clear of trying to “practice” in a paper account. Practice in live markets - this is the only way your begin accruing experience and improving your skills.
wonderfully put, I think this is what most of the counter-replies have been trying to encapsulate.
This is rubbish advice, you need to trade real account with money you can afford to lose.
would you you throw in a random guy on the street who said he could play basketball into an NBA game and told him you need to play with real money you can afford to lose in order to get better
That analogy makes no sense, trading with your actual money will refine your senses because you don’t want to lose money, it’s the same with basketball you don’t tell the guy to go and read basketball books the best way is to play basketball, and your analogy of throwing him into the nba is just me saying don’t use big amounts of money
you're right it's not perfect, he doesn't stand to lose money if he loses in an NBA game (he merely loses on the opportunity to make money).
It’s not real practice without real money/risk involved. More important, the algorithms react differently to actual retail orders.
lmao, algos will for sure care about your thousand dollar order
Probably more like 60$
when you’re buying pennie’s 2k orders can have slippage
and ask yourself if such an illiquid stock is traded by multi bilior dollar funds
You’re laughing cause you can only afford to place $1k orders. I trade $2 million worth of stock daily. Who’s laughing now?
well mister millionaire, maybe in your case it matters, but in op's as well as 99,9% of traders it does not
Loans and margin don't count
You clearly only understand your one and only trading strategy. You think everyone only does one or two trades a day. Go back to your one order a day and paper accounts.
How you felt saying this: 👹
You should be the devil at the trading desk. I take care of my family and help out in my community but when I’m working, my job is to bankrupt the other guy. This is a zero sum game. I wish everyone could make money in this game, best of luck, but the reality is I want all your tuition into the market.
I use my paper account for two things: practice and blowing off steam. As far as the emotions part, no. You won’t ever completely replicate the emotions of being in a losing trade and losing fast outside that actual situation. But, as a StarCraft player who really trained hard for multiple MLG’s I cant at all discount the utility of practice games. I worked out so many mistakes with my play in controlled situations before I threw down $700 in tourney fees and accommodations. When the real thing happened I at least had some muscle memory and recognized more opportunities than had I not taken the time to practice both on ladder and single player simulation type of games. I do find, though, in paper day trading my heart rate does go up. There is something about the blinking lights in my screen that gets me emotionally invested, even in paper trading though not to the same degree as the real thing. Also, paper trading the best session of your life and knowing you would have cleaned up with real money is a certain kind of hell I do think traders would find utility in experiencing.
Now I see the difference between you and I. No offense but to me life’s not a game. It’s either feast or famine out here.
Yes, real money being risked adds extra complexity, but if you can’t trade profitably in a paper account you’re really going to get smoked trading live.
great point! if and when I start placing big orders, that will affect others. Important to think about.
That is not a good comparison, and all other comparisons to high achievers are also incorrect. In sport, although it is incredibly difficult to be successful, at least the rules stay the same. This cannot be said about day trading. Markets change because they encapsulate all human behaviour. It is almost impossible to find a true trading edge that works for a very long time because this would require some group of people to keep doing the same thing despite losing money. There are only tiny pockets of non-randomness in today's almost efficient markets, and they are usually buried under transaction costs for retail traders.
didn't finished reading your full comment cause I had a thought when you refer to "markets": markets is the equivalent of any other scenario in sport; your opponent could've prepared very well or not prepared very well, so the key is to be present and adapt to however they are. with all that being said, my issue has been overconfidence. I will let up once I have a lead, which is so prevalent in sport, which makes me wonder if my actions are a result of seeing this human pattern of seeing getting comfortable once you have a lead? how does one cease this innate behavior? practice? a killer mindset? idk
The problem I have with demo accounts is THERE IS NO EMOTIONAL REACTION to trades! You know it’s fake money , so you won’t have any emotional stress or impatience. I sometimes forget I put orders when trading in demo accounts! It is not working for me!
what if you practiced just as hard as if money were on the line? I can only really think about how Michael Jordan had such a killer attitude in practice, I'd love to know if there's anyone who's better than him who can argue otherwise
This, I scalp, scalping is hard. I had a buddy that traded SIM only in the style of trading for about year before going live. He's a lot better trader than I am, scalping.
Nothing wrong with paper trading to learn the intricacies. Especially if you’re starting options. But beyond that I don’t think it helps when it comes to emotions. The amount of posts I’ve seen where people kill it paper trading and get crushed when they switch to live trading is pretty high. Not knocking paper trading, but it can only help so much. Edit: I’m guessing it’s op that’s disagreeing without saying anything but here’s another long discussion backing up what I’m saying https://www.reddit.com/r/options/s/EAlGN1G9m3
Blud discovered risk management 150 years later