Are You Consistently Profitable ?

[Mysticforex 13]

Whether you're making 5% a month, or 10% a year, are you consistently profitable ?

I am not talking about trading full time or part time, just if you are making money.

 

How many months in a row have you made money ?

 

How many months in a row have you lost money ?

 

 

Personally, I had a serious losing streak from May to August 2011. Gave back the profit I had and went into the hole. Pulled a rabbit out of my hat Sept thru Dec and finished with a small profit for the year.

This year so far has been fair to good.

 

How are you doing ?

[MadMarketScientist 11]

Did really well Jan-Mar: +10% YTD

Got kicked around Apr-May: -10% YTD

Recovered in Jun: EVEN YTD

 

Learnt a BIG lesson on STOPS ... hope to eke out a profit for the rest of the year.

 

MMS

[SIUYA 11]

not applicable in any meaningful form for me....mainly as I dont just day trade.

Over twenty years of trading

I have had periods of trading whereby i had 36 months in a row that were profitable.

I have had periods whereby I had 10 months in a row, all slightly down to slightly up, net, net, call it break even to then have two killer months and make 40% for the year. (based on an unleveraged amount)

I have also had periods whereby I was not trading and doing other things that took my focus - some of those months made money, others lost money.

I dont aim for consistency (I think if you are a pure day trader then it is a valid aim), I prefer to work out how to maximise my earnings over the course of the year .....sometimes it works other times it does not.

(this year has been up and down day trading, as my focus is else where and I have made notes that to do this properly for me at least - it needs 100% focus - my broker has done better than me though it is still positive, however my overall portfolio is up due to a few larger winning trades - not applicable to day trading)

I am not a good example of consistency.in PL

[Predictor 11]

I've did pretty. But, I think it is more useful to ask what it really means to be consistently profitable? I spoke with the trading manager at a major prop firm and he told me that most of his traders made most of their profits during just a few months out of the year. The other months were marginal. It is well-known that most active traders benefit from higher levels of volatility.

 

Trend following strategies are notorious for having rocky periods and some strategies such as writing naked options are consistently profitable for long periods of time but suffer from black swan risk.

 

As a day trader, I like to see myself "breaking even" vs suffering steep losses. I think the ability to break even is important in trading.. a trader who can break even during the lean times and do well during the good times can build up an account. I like to look at my largest dd as it relates to monthly % gains.

Edited July 10, 2012 by Predictor

[MightyMouse 12]

I am having a fortunate year with both long and short term trades. Not so fortunate on my choice of brokers. My last losing year was 2008. Before that I lost in 2003.

 

I take note of my losing days, weeks or months, but it is just noise. I do not do this to survive, but i wouldn't do it if I couldn't win.

[ratrader 10]

First, yes I am consistent and profitable. It has taken me a long time to get to this point.

 

As for 'how many months have I been profitable' ... I trade futures so I tend to look at things on a quarterly basis for profitability (and my living). That said I think it's been at least half a year.

 

What you may be after is 'can it really be done'... and, at least for me. the answer is yes. But what I've come to realize (because I have taken my bumps -or hits to the head-) is that it takes a lot of time to learn the market side and the about yourself (in terms of how you handle the trade/trading). An arsenal or trade setup (to handle dif market conditions) and the skill to recognize when to use what... which all come over time ... it took me more years than I ever thought it would.

[Obsidian 10]

1999-2000, my first year in trading was the worst..

2002 was the best (I was just lucky though)

this year doing pretty well, roughly 3%/month since Feb

[like2share 10]

I have been trading for about 3 years now. My first year was so so. The second year was fair, but 2012 has been a lot of hard work coming through.

[samuel23 10]

Whether you're making 5% a month, or 10% a year, are you consistently profitable ?

 

I can say that it is quite balancing but surely not a consistently profitable trader. I have been trading for 8 months now and still learning each day how to make my trade better. But for the last couple to weeks things going better for me.

 

I am not talking about trading full time or part time, just if you are making money.

 

Am making money in Forex and as a full time trader.

 

How many months in a row have you made money ?

 

I have loss and win!!

 

How many months in a row have you lost money ?

 

2 months in a row!

[forexlady101 10]

'till now, my year has been going really well.. Before I started using tradecopier , two months ago, things were good but now things are looking better day by day. I hope this is not just a winning strike and I'll keep making profit.

[samuel23 10]

Nice to hear that you are in Profit and very pleased that the the person you are copying is doing well. I just hope that you continue doing very good profit and that you become successful in Forex. However, i would recommend you to be in the safe side as you never know what can happen in this market. Always build up another Plan if ever you are on losing trades.

[Jack Francisco 10]

'till now, my year has been going really well.. Before I started using tradecopier , two months ago, things were good but now things are looking better day by day. I hope this is not just a winning strike and I'll keep making profit.

 

well done, to make profit with consistent is better than make big profit but just for a while or once ..

and this is the hardside from this business, make consistent profit and here is my target every time i open position for my trading

sometimes i can make profit with very good and big and sometimes i just get a little profit..but with place me at positive are and always and it is better for me:helloooo:

[wrbtrader 10]

Whether you're making 5% a month, or 10% a year, are you consistently profitable ?

 

Yes and as a full time trader

 

How many months in a row have you made money ?

 

Many years and the last losing month occurred when I first traded the Emini ES futures (market taught me some valuable lessons about position size management)

 

Trading is a lot more difficult now because I now have a family. Simply, I miss a lot more trade opportunities due to personal reasons involving the family in comparison to having what seem like endless involvement in the markets when I didn't have a family.

 

In addition, the low volatility market conditions has reduced a lot of trade opportunities and lowered profits.

[BlueHorseshoe 10]

Whether you're making 5% a month, or 10% a year, are you consistently profitable ?

 

Yes and as a full time trader

 

How many months in a row have you made money ?

 

Many years and the last losing month occurred when I first traded the Emini ES futures (market taught me some valuable lessons about position size management)

 

Trading is a lot more difficult now because I now have a family. Simply, I miss a lot more trade opportunities due to personal reasons involving the family in comparison to having what seem like endless involvement in the markets when I didn't have a family.

 

In addition, the low volatility market conditions has reduced a lot of trade opportunities and lowered profits.

 

Hi Wrbtrader,

 

It's good to hear that you're consistently profitable.

 

Why have you put some phrases in your post in bold? Is it to highlight keywords for the search engine spiders to find? It's very clever of you. Maybe I shall start doing something similar . . .

 

BlueHorseshoe

 

Wrbtrader is a really great contributor here at TL. He is most definitely not a trading scam hoax fraud blew account lost money trading.

 

:rofl:

[wrbtrader 10]

Why have you put some phrases in your post in bold? Is it to highlight keywords for the search engine spiders to find? It's very clever of you. Maybe I shall start doing something similar . . .

 

I put Mysticforex questions in bold because others do it too instead of using the "quote" box...similar to what samuel23 had done before me.

 

In addition, I highlighted the words family and low volatility market conditions to put emphasis on what can impact a traders profit level. Regardless, highlighting (color or bold fonts) helps ensure something is not overlooked in any message. I'm not sure what search engine spiders will do with words like family. Maybe it will help Traderslaboratory become more family orientated. :rofl:

 

By the way, I use to be a moderator at another popular forum and that's were I first learned to use bold or color fonts in replies to other members of the forum to ensure they don't overlook a particular point I or other moderators were making.

[ForexTraderX 10]

Define consistent, lol.

 

Yes trading is my primary income source, and last year I didn't have a single losing month, this year I had 3 in a row that made the first 5 months of this year just a bit better than treading water. Since then, it's been good over all except one week when I lost my head and had a double digiit drawdown.

 

Pretty much the first half of this year I have essentially broken even, then the most recent couple of months have contributed to most of my profits.

 

Of course, the problem was all internal, and had nothing to do with my method or setups and triggers or my understanding of the markets or even my analysis. It just sometimes fell short at the execution stage of the game.

 

I've depended on my trading to produce an income for about 4 years now. This year has been my leanest year, but not my toughest (volatility in account equity my first year was enough to puke over)