How much do you make with day trading? (Interview/Research)

Trading
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Hi,

I recently lost my job and I don’t want to go back to the grind, I am exploring alternative sources of income so that I can have more free time and enjoy my life.

I want to ask you all for your experience and advice regarding day trading. Most importantly I want to know these things from you:

  1. What is your average return on investment? (% of profit)
  2. What’s your risk appetite?
  3. What instruments and industry do you trade in?
  4. How long have you been trading? (i.e your experience)

You don’t need to tell me your capital or income or strategy, just want some numbers which are achievable.

If you want to help me personally:

I am a newbie in the trading world and my initial investments have been failures mostly, but that’s okay because I was ready for a loss and didn’t really do proper research. I have some capital (less than 5L) that I can use for trading, do you think I can make enough money to live by with it and maybe even grow?

Thank you for the information and advice everyone :pray:

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You may want to read this post from the one person here who is most qualified to provide insights relevant to your situation.

To me, this is the one sentence in that post which stands out:

Here is the thing though: less than 1% of active traders earn more money than a bank fixed deposit over a 3-year period.

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If you’re young in your 20s, there’s no point trying to master the market with a 5 lakh rupee account. What return do you expect to make realistically? 25%? That’s just about 1.25 lakhs per year.
It takes years of experience to become consistently profitable. Exit opportunities are few after trading. As in, your skills don’t really translate to other areas, as opposed to say, working at a fund.

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You can check out this post → Guys post your daily trading status post. More than 1k people participated there.
But DO NOT fall for the false hope (like screenshots/video screen shots etc).

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When it comes to sharing screenshots, I always say that profits are public and losses are private.

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haha :rofl: , That’s true.

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Actual profitable traders are not here instead they were busy enjoying the money they have made from markets

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Let me do a hol it right there moment. I don’t know what your previous job was, but if you think trading will take less grind, then think again.

Trading will take your soul, wring it and put it back for the journey ahead. It’s not at all rosy. Its grind grind grind everyday. You just have to love the grind, the pain and the game. There is no other way, in this madness.

Does it matter, If someone says, he is making 20%/100%/5%/-60% returns? I don’t think that would help you or anyone in any way.

Trading is intimate. It’s your personal narrative. 1000 is rent money for someone, then again nothing to someone. We tend to fail most, when we associate money in this game. Oh! I lost 3000, I could have bought a nice airpod. There goes your mindset.

There will be lots & lots of days when you ll doubt yourself. Nothing seems to work. Hey, you get the story. It doesn’t matter, what others numbers are or what others are doing! It matters where you are in this journey. And why are you doing this other than the money?

If you came for the money, you will be hit with lots and lots of disappointments. Then you quit, or not. That’s where the rubber meets the road.

An archer hitting the bulls eye seemingly with less effort, inhales lots of experience, practice. Do you think you can pick up the bow and arrow and hit the bulls eye? Yes, you might. Now, do it so that you can bring the olympic medal.

Don’t rush my friend.

I am 53, and I have been trading since I was about 22. And there has been lots of ups and downs and I am still fighting somehow -Jason Shapiro

Now, fill in the blanks.

I am ___ and I have been trading since I was about _____.

Make your narrative rich.

I know it’s not the exact answers you are looking for. But you can google so much. As someone said, Learning is not the issue, intention is.

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Yes @ronin_sha is 100% correct.

You are into the wrong perception that trading is easy. IT’S NOT.
If it was easy then everyone will be in it.

You think it’s easy to make money in trading ? Is it easy ? NOPE

Btw, you need to do this only if you are passionate towards the markets not just for the sake of money. It’s not all about money.

And also you said you are a newbie, so you cannot start straight away.
One last thing, How do you think 5 lakhs in enough ? (that too as the main income source)

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Let me help you with more data.

I am in a field where I file returns of my clients. Out of which I have around 55 clients who invest and trade in stock market.
Not more than 3 have positive trading income.
Investors do have profits but you can’t expect more than 20percenr CAGR.
As a salaried employee am sure you can make much more. Plus remember you can also employee these 5lakhs in FD or some debt funds and get at least 6 percent if more more.

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@Jason_Castelino

  • Are you a CA and also a trader ?

those people are full time traders ? or have other souces of income ?

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Yes. I am a CA. Not sure if I can call myself a trader. Hahahhaha. But yeah, I do both.

Most of them are having their own business. Earn money in business and blow it off in stock market. Boooommmmm.

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The only Advice I would give you is - find another job and start trading parallelly.

High chances are that you will make loss initially - Learn from them. Read books , watch videos and learn from them. Make a trading system ( a system which tells you entry / exit rules ) , develop trading psychology. It would take few years. During all these years save as much money as you can and build trading capital. Once you are profitable for 2-3 years in all types of markets and your gut feeling tells you that you can do it fulltime - then take a leap of faith. Until then, do not let go of the safety net of a regular income JOB.

Stock market is the last place where you can make easy money . Do not get fooled by the present bull run. Don’t get carried away by the screenshots of returns posted in social media.

if you are committed to do above then you can fullfill your dream :

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That’s pretty much it. A friend has been short since 15500 and now doesn’t know what to do. Doesn’t want to sell and accept the loss because he can’t accept that he was wrong.

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Yeahhh. And stock market is very addictive. Whatever money they make in business they lose in stock market.
I know a couple of them who handled over their credentials to a third party who promised them 50 percent returns in a year. Lost 20lakhs in 2 months and then he stopped funding that account. He didn’t even want to get tax audit and carry forward the loss.

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Thank you for sharing your input everyone, especially @ronin_sha. It is now clear that I don’t have neither the capital or the smarts to make a decent living out of trading.

I’ll look for other sources of income for now.

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Hey man, don’t tell that story about yourself. The underlying theme was the game is hard not easy.

why I got the feeling that I somehow influence what you can or cannot do. Man, don’t let others opinions sway your decision.

All I say is you got to hang long enough just to see enough hands. But it’s all my perspective.

Nobody is the same. Make your own narrative.

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Few pointers from my experience from life:

  1. As time progress , you will have both smartness and money with experience.Just keep on aiming to chase your targets by learning and reading.
  2. Your fight is with you , in any business (Also for trading) there are 1% of people making > 99% rest . Thats true for anything in life/free market weather its job or business. So won’t get a concrete number as everyone circumstance are different. Its only you who knows best your circumstances.
  3. Trading or investing these days also requires time and lot of learning.So you can only be a full timer when you have gained that experience.Same with job( you only change or quit when you have sufficient experience right?). Trading is hardest of any trade thats for sure as its ‘Art of harnessing the randomness’ .
  4. Life is long and markets are not going anywhere, you can do trading even after 60’s when you retire as well but there will be limitations with job.

So in nutshell , no body in any forum cannot be close of making the decision other than you. So keep on building the skill once you think all is set then you can quit, then you may jump on business of trading

You can paper trade meanwhile , i find the tool very good for learning trading/investing

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@ronin_sha Don’t worry, you did not give me undue influence, I was influenced by your experience and other facts shared by everyone in this thread.

I was looking at trading as a sort of “out”, but it is clear that it isn’t very easily achieve that unless you have a large capital (which I don’t posses at the moment). There is also motivation, I am motivated by money and that would only make things harder for me.

@AlgoEye Thanks for the advice, I may try paper trading the next time I feel like dipping my toes in the market.

@kartiks Thanks for sharing.

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:heart_eyes: great useful information