Student Results – Volatility, Profitability, and Belgian Beer
As another week comes to a close in the markets I thought I would fire off a quick update. I've been receiving a lot of email lately asking for student updates and more articles and I'm happy to oblige. I'm still waiting on some recent student charts as we just wrapped up the current trading week so the updates below show a number of charts and results for the STA students from last week.
I know it's been a while since the last post but it's been a very busy period for myself and STA. Between focusing a lot of effort on the Samurai Trading Academy students, doing my own trading along with a few interesting research projects on the side, and my continued travels around the globe, well... the schedule has been pretty packed. I am a bit more settled in one place for now though so I hope to have some more posts on the STA blog in the coming weeks.
Just to give a quick update on myself, I've now moved to Belgium after spending a couple of months enjoying the sun in Arizona to start the year. The last time I was in Belgium was over a decade ago and I absolutely loved it.
Great cities and towns, wonderful people, and absolutely amazing food and beer.
The beer in particular was an eye-opener. Back in those days I was your typical North American lager drinker without much of a clue that there were worlds of beer I had yet to explore. Coming to Belgium set me on a path into the fascinating world of brewing and I've always longed to come back and experience the unique offerings here once more. It's become my mission to search out the best "hidden gem" beer bars and to try every obscure monk-brewed ale I can find and over the last month I think I've done an excellent job of it.
For the time being I've really settled down here in Belgium with a nice apartment to use as a base for further exploration of the towns and countries nearby or to occasionally stay "home" and soak in the local culture.
Having this location flexibility and freedom is exactly why I decided many years ago to become a day trader and it's a huge part of what drives my passion for this business.
I wanted the freedom to be able to choose when and from where I would work and just in the past year I've managed to trade from Thailand, Japan, Malaysia, Canada, USA, Belgium, Netherlands and Germany. I also gave a token attempt in Cambodia, Indonesia, and even Laos, but let's just say that there are still a few places in this world that aren't quite up to par with the day trader's required internet standards.
The months ahead are currently undecided so anything is possible and I'm weighing a variety of options. I might head to Southern France (as I attempt to improve on my admittedly poor French skills), maybe Spain, or possibly even the long haul to a more exotic locale. If anything being a full time trader can actually be a bit overwhelming simply because it opens up such a huge world of possibilities. When you can work from anywhere it makes it increasingly difficult to stay in one spot for long!
Now on to some student updates...
TH
This is exactly the sort of result I love to see. A solid win rate, good reward to risk, and an excellent overall weekly result. TH is actually one of the newest traders I've been working with as he has under a month of experience but so far we've seen some very good weekly numbers coming in.
Obviously we still have a ways to go even if the results so far have been in the 10-15 point per week range that we aim for here at Samurai Trading Academy. That's because in this business consistency is everything, so TH still needs some extra weeks under his belt in order to build his skills and confidence. We're definitely on the right track though and the truth of it is that this is an excellent result for a newer trader and TH should be very proud of it.
GM
Here we have a trader who has integrated some of her methods with the STA day trading system quite successfully. GM has managed to quite seamlessly use some of her more aggressive entry techniques around market opens and during strong moves to take advantage of some extra potential in the market. This sort of result isn't what I would consider "typical" for a newer trader but is certainly achievable for those with more experience in the markets.
Interestingly, even though GM has been using some techniques from her past experience they actually line up very well with some of the Advanced methods in the STA Curriculum. I'm continuing to work on those areas to expand them for more experienced traders who have a comprehensive market understanding and I think that for many it will allow similarly exceptional results like we see from GM here.
JM
JM is another trader who has seen excellent consistency over recent weeks. I wanted to include his results as well because I think they are a perfect example of the power of trading expectancy.
As you can see, JM had a win rate of just 50% this week yet made an excellent profit. Many newer traders spend far too much time and energy focusing on trying to achieve a 80% or even 90% win rate by taking very small wins compared to their overall risk simply because they are afraid to lose. What this often leads to is an unsustainable situation where mistakes get made and even just a few losses in a row wipe out all the gains due to the wildly lopsided reward to risk ratio.
At STA we aim for something more balanced that is powerful in the hands of traders with a variety of experience levels. By having an excellent reward to risk ratio (usually 2:1 or even higher for experienced traders) it removes a great deal of the emotion involved in winning or losing a single trade. Anyone who has been trading for a while knows the importance of keeping a calm and focused mindset when they trade and understanding the strength of your trading edge is a huge part of having that mentality.
Potential Earnings
When I make these posts I always get a few emails asking me how the results in points translate into actual profits. The chart below should provide a bit of context. Keep in mind that this doesn't include some of the fees/commissions which vary depending on the size you are trading.
To get a more thorough understanding of how a day trader makes their income in the markets you can also read Part 3 of our Emini Day Trading Series called How Money is Made as an Emini Day Trader.
- Strike While The Iron is Hot - March 1, 2021
- The Path to Becoming a Full Time Trader - February 22, 2021
- Looking to 2021 and Beyond - January 20, 2021
