Replies to post #102 on Koolaid Discussion Zone

[overachiever]

Yep and let's not forget the emotional factor of second guessing your decisions once you see a trade when real money is on the line. Case in point. I noticed the EURO should retrace to the 133 level when it was sitting at 133'82 because it had traded 132'82 in the European session and the lowest it had traded in the US session was 133'40ish. I put on the trade but came out of it with only a few tick profit because it showed me a false rally. Now I am sitting here watching the Euro get slimed and am kicking myself for being such a pansy on that trade. Real money always makes a difference. I have been trading for well over 30 years and it still influences my decisions.

It is always easier to call the market when you have no skin in the game.

[Blinton]

I disagree completely.

We use market orders on extremely liquid ETFs. The volume we trade is so insignificant that fills aren't a matter of if but how long they take to execute. And generally live money fills on the ETFs happen in under 2 seconds on average. Even if you account for worse case scenarios for fills, we are still raking in dough.

It's not like we're trying to paper trade with institutional accounts, LOL.

Instead of focusing on my live paper trading, I think we should talk about the many monk graduates who are trading with money and are having a lot of success. The system works, that's all that matters. The rest is moot.

And just of the record, I'm using live paper trading software... not "watching a chart and saying I'll by here and sell there". We're trading off of live actual data, piggy backing on numbers that are so large that our small trades are nearly identical to action with a cash account. You're taking about worrying about the difference between a single mouse turd in an entire rice silo.

It's different because you have no idea whether you'd really get execution when and where you want it. A few seconds could make a difference. The size of your trade--puny compared to program trades--could make a difference.

You might not get hit at all. In live trading, you'd then have to decide whether to wait, or to adjust your order or let it go entirely, and so on. A great many more factors are involved in real life than when you're just watching a chart saying: I'll buy here and sell there.