Can scalping make money for retail traders???

[rachelbarnes]

Day trading success rate is <1 % of traders make any money,according detailed searches on google, by searching for success rate of day traders.Scalping is even riskier, because the scalper  risks more and takes small profits.Would the trader not be better off, trading longer term and swing trading?

 

[Mercury]

As with pretty much everything the answer is "it depends".  If your mentality is to need to constantly watch every move at 1 or 5 minute charts (even ticks) and never to hold over night and certainly not over the weekend then Day trading is for you.  Such people need to find a system that works for intra-day moves.  I tried it when I first started and realised it wasn't for me so researched the topic and found many examples of where people have sworn off day trading in favour of long term/swing trading.  I prefer this because I feel I cannot hope to compete with the high speed computer trading and I don't want to be glued to the screens all day (cannot be anyway as I have other things that occupy my time).  So I developed a method, from multiple existing sources, to allow me to analyse in detail at various time-frames looking for trends and more particularly swing points with a higher than 50/50 probability of success and low capital risk if wrong.  This suits my risk appetite, analytical strengths/personality, and keeps me from over trading (a killer!).

However you will find people on the Forum who think and operate exactly opposite to what I have just outlined and that may well be working for them.  So it is horses for courses I think.  The only observation I would make is that novice traders tend to start with day trading because they don't know what else to do.  They don't have a methodology (system) they have researched, tested and developed to suit their own personality, strengths, weaknesses etc and don't actually understand fully what all the technical indicators and so on really do.  Therefore they watch every move to try and manage risk by getting out if the market twitches against them.  They have not mastered their own psychology, indeed probably have not even thought about it.  They have not worked on demo for months, maybe even years before jumping right in.  No wonder so many retail traders lose, it is because they do not approach it like a business.  Would you just set up a business with no experience, training, expertise?  You wouldn't last long and so it is with trading.  You have to have an edge, a reason you can beat the stats...  It takes hard work, experience (including losing, we learn best from mistakes rather than successes), deep pockets and resilience.  This is regardless of the time-frame, method, system etc you use.

 

[rachelbarnes]

On 22/11/2018 at 18:03, Mercury said:

As with pretty much everything the answer is "it depends".  If your mentality is to need to constantly watch every move at 1 or 5 minute charts (even ticks) and never to hold over night and certainly not over the weekend then Day trading is for you.  Such people need to find a system that works for intra-day moves.  I tried it when I first started and realised it wasn't for me so researched the topic and found many examples of where people have sworn off day trading in favour of long term/swing trading.  I prefer this because I feel I cannot hope to compete with the high speed computer trading and I don't want to be glued to the screens all day (cannot be anyway as I have other things that occupy my time).  So I developed a method, from multiple existing sources, to allow me to analyse in detail at various time-frames looking for trends and more particularly swing points with a higher than 50/50 probability of success and low capital risk if wrong.  This suits my risk appetite, analytical strengths/personality, and keeps me from over trading (a killer!).

However you will find people on the Forum who think and operate exactly opposite to what I have just outlined and that may well be working for them.  So it is horses for courses I think.  The only observation I would make is that novice traders tend to start with day trading because they don't know what else to do.  They don't have a methodology (system) they have researched, tested and developed to suit their own personality, strengths, weaknesses etc and don't actually understand fully what all the technical indicators and so on really do.  Therefore they watch every move to try and manage risk by getting out if the market twitches against them.  They have not mastered their own psychology, indeed probably have not even thought about it.  They have not worked on demo for months, maybe even years before jumping right in.  No wonder so many retail traders lose, it is because they do not approach it like a business.  Would you just set up a business with no experience, training, expertise?  You wouldn't last long and so it is with trading.  You have to have an edge, a reason you can beat the stats...  It takes hard work, experience (including losing, we learn best from mistakes rather than successes), deep pockets and resilience.  This is regardless of the time-frame, method, system etc you use. 

 

thaankyou!

[Caseynotes]

Hi @rachelbarnes, that's an interesting little tag you have added to the @Mercury quote above, what does it mean? 

And I see another on the MT4 Benefits ...   thread you started, 

what do they mean I wonder?  

[Caseynotes]

4 hours ago, Mercury said:

As with pretty much everything the answer is "it depends".  If your mentality is to need to constantly watch every move at 1 or 5 minute charts (even ticks) and never to hold over night and certainly not over the weekend then Day trading is for you.  Such people need to find a system that works for intra-day moves.  I tried it when I first started and realised it wasn't for me so researched the topic and found many examples of where people have sworn off day trading in favour of long term/swing trading.  I prefer this because I feel I cannot hope to compete with the high speed computer trading and I don't want to be glued to the screens all day (cannot be anyway as I have other things that occupy my time).  So I developed a method, from multiple existing sources, to allow me to analyse in detail at various time-frames looking for trends and more particularly swing points with a higher than 50/50 probability of success and low capital risk if wrong.  This suits my risk appetite, analytical strengths/personality, and keeps me from over trading (a killer!).

However you will find people on the Forum who think and operate exactly opposite to what I have just outlined and that may well be working for them.  So it is horses for courses I think.  The only observation I would make is that novice traders tend to start with day trading because they don't know what else to do.  They don't have a methodology (system) they have researched, tested and developed to suit their own personality, strengths, weaknesses etc and don't actually understand fully what all the technical indicators and so on really do.  Therefore they watch every move to try and manage risk by getting out if the market twitches against them.  They have not mastered their own psychology, indeed probably have not even thought about it.  They have not worked on demo for months, maybe even years before jumping right in.  No wonder so many retail traders lose, it is because they do not approach it like a business.  Would you just set up a business with no experience, training, expertise?  You wouldn't last long and so it is with trading.  You have to have an edge, a reason you can beat the stats...  It takes hard work, experience (including losing, we learn best from mistakes rather than successes), deep pockets and resilience.  This is regardless of the time-frame, method, system etc you use.

 

Doesn't seem to show up when I quote the post, very strange.

[london]

not with  IG algos tring to wash you out