SPY lurked here for 45 days or so - I have a daughter graduating UNC in the spring. Buying her a Rolex for graduation. Started an account with 1K to pay for it. Just for fun. Anyway, up to $5k, and hoping to double that.I really enjoy the banter and insights. Some good callouts too. Several of you are legend status in my mind. Anyway I was in calls and doubled down 3 times and that wick about 10 minutes ago hit my daily goal. Still learning but thought I would say thanks.
December's stats for my account, and I hope some new traders can benefit from seeing it. 31% account net gain. 49% gross gain with 18% loss. I'd encourage other experienced traders to share their performance in the comments if they want(don't make it a pp measuring contest), just so new traders can get an idea of realistic expectancy.
If someone is shooting for 100%+ in a month(Some months like this past November do perform that well but it is not very often), one day it is going to come crashing down as 90-100% loss(Many have lived this reality before becoming profitable). A 31% account gain in one month is amazing. If that doesn't sound amazing to someone, their account is simply too small for their expected gains.
90% of traders lose because 90% of traders start under-capitalized and expect to make the profits of a $100k+ account on a $5k or less account. Someone with a $100k+ account can afford to lose 1K 5 times in a row, and it doesn't matter for their equity curve long-term at all. What happens when you lose 1K 5 times in a row on a $5k account? You have lost 100% and can no longer trade.
Losing as a trader is largely due to unrealistic expectations. I caught the down moves from 99k to 91k, 101k to 92k, 96k to 91.5k as major trades of the month with a few scalp longs that didn't matter too much, and a short opened that will now be closed win or lose in Jan. Could I have gambled and made 1000% across those 3 trades? No because being over-leveraged and over-sized actually would have seen me liquidated and losing 90-100% instead of having account growth on the month.
TLDR; You want consistent, sustainable gains to be profitable over the long-term. If you get rich quick, you're going to go broke(to 0) even faster. If you don't think it will happen to you, ask the over-leveraged traders with stop losses that got ignored(why a flash crash happens), and they got liquidated for 100% losses on December 5.
ETHUSD We're simply retesting the upper limit of the symmetrical triangle pattern before going for a new ATH. As long as big brother behaves today, we might get another shot at above 4K today.
BTCUSD Bitcoin down $10k in 3 hours. Already back up 4K in 4 minutes lol. Volatility city! Liquidating leveraged longs and shorts is fun for the whales.
XAUUSD BTC at 100K, now that's insane!! I remember back in 2011 when I kept seeing "bitcoin miner" on Pirate Bay and thinking, oh that must be a virus or something and then getting into crypto in 2017 when it was still 1K before it got to $20K. Life is funny kids, you never know you missed an opportunity until it passed you...parentheses closed...back to gambling lol
SPY lurked here for 45 days or so - I have a daughter graduating UNC in the spring. Buying her a Rolex for graduation. Started an account with 
1K to pay for it. Just for fun. Anyway, up to $5k, and hoping to double that.I really enjoy the banter and insights. Some good callouts too. Several of you are legend status in my mind. Anyway I was in calls and doubled down 3 times and that wick about 10 minutes ago hit my daily goal. Still learning but thought I would say thanks.
BTCUSDT Happy New Year everyone! 
ETHUSD We're simply retesting the upper limit of the symmetrical triangle pattern before going for a new ATH. As long as big brother behaves today, we might get another shot at above 
XAUUSD BTC at 100K, now that's insane!! I remember back in 2011 when I kept seeing "bitcoin miner" on Pirate Bay and thinking, oh that must be a virus or something and then getting into crypto in 2017 when it was still 
