Almost 80% of Private Day Traders Lose Money | Hacker News Reader

Almost 80% of Private Day Traders Lose Money

curiousgnu.com

17 pointselmar6 comments

Three trades in 12 months means you probably have a lot of people who, put a few dollars in, played around, lost money, and soon quit. I would be interested to see how the graph changes as the minimum number of trades rise.

People who initially win in gambling will kick around money for longer than those who lose on their first play.. So excluding immediate dropouts can make a gamble look like an investment.

Survivorship Bias?

I think survivorship bias indicates a segment that survives at a higher rate due to an actual trait and then its trait is presumed to have been a norm at the start. Survivorship Bias would imply there is an actual factor beyond gambling and we are just too optimistic about its frequency.

More simply, once you exclude people who only bet once you are excluding a disproportionate number of negative bets simply because betting a second time is based on the first outcome. If you want to do exclusions you have to exclude the outcome of the 1st n bets even from players who keep playing.

But then you get something that is also misleading as players can get more and more conservative on the way out the door. I.e. taking guaranteed pennies in splits and buyouts as they realize their big payouts from roller-coasters were not as certain as they thought. There should be a strategy that does similar to the return from a safe investment, so that also isn't interesting.

It's also optional to share your results. Which way does that bias? Guys who go broke in a week may be ashamed. Guys that make millions may want their info private.

At the end of the day, day trading is one of the most rigged forms if gambling you can do. Learn blackjack or video poker if you want to gamble. Your average return will be much better.

So 1 out of 5 break even or make money?

Not as bad as I thought.

I think it can be an interesting hobby, if you only trade with 'losable' income. Gambling is always in favor of the house, and aside from Poker and Blackjack, there is no skill involved in general.

At least if you are into day trading, you are most likely engaged in the world news, information technology and math. You could do worse.

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