Most people ought to read David Hume, but they don't; and even if they did........well, you know the rest of the story.

Jim Cramer tried and then was forced to make an apology on air after Gundlach tweeted that he would be doing all future interviews on Fox Business because of Cramer.

I never read much of anything for 20+ years of my adult life. I just read Adam Smith though and will put Hume on my list as well. That being said, I have a really long list of things I need to read/study.

Nearly every investment you make will go down at least 50% at some point. The whole point of an emergency fund is that it's safe and easy to get when you need it.

Feelings are more important than given credit for (since many of us at least attempt to be a logical nerd), there's a lot of people that just get stressed out if they're in stocks and they hear every day stocks went up/down. Down hurts way more than up makes them feel good obviously. Those people are better off not being in the market.

No

If someone's entire net worth is only 6 months of living expenses then they have a lot bigger problems to worry about than where they should keep their money.

This is certainly not true but even if it were you could just increase the size of your "emergency fund" to cover the drawdown.

Newbie question regarding trading: what is the most efficient way to learn?

I expect the common answer, if you get one, to be: don't even bother.

If you factor in the unpaid time studying the markets, the amount of capital you need to risk in order to beat the spread and commission fees, as well as the very high taxes you pay (40% on short-term capital gains), plus the reality that the strategy you are using has very little to no edge, then it makes trading seem not very worth it.

But this is coming from a guy that doesn't trade, but looked into it.

Would be interested in hearing from others that do.

depends on your goals

Ok, but what if you have a lot of capital and nothing else to do with your time?

Buy some target date funds and hang out with your friends/family/kids at the beach?

I was looking into investing and after a few hours of research found out that the highest +EV move for me was to just stick all my money in index funds, HODL for 30+ years, and spend the rest of my time and energy on things I want to for fun. But YMMV

I don't have any friends/family/kids and I think trading could be a fun use of my time.

Then open a paper trading account or put a small % of your net worth in an IB account and the rest in another account. But there is almost always hobbies you could have that are more fun than losing at a repetitive math game, it's just a matter of discovering them.

My goal would be to transition from making a living at online poker to something similar that would eventually pay as much or more.

I have a lot of time to learn and a real interest in placing bets. I’m currently reading some books but I feel like I’ve spent a lot of time and am no closer than I was when I started to having a clue what to do.

Admittedly I know absolutely nothing about the stock market.

Curious if you could just straight bet a stock over
A period (month, 3 months, 6 months, etc).

Say X stock is $100 and I feel it’s going
to tank..how can one bet against it? Is it possible?

If there is recommended reading material I’d be interested.

what you're looking for is either shortselling or buying/selling options.
neither is what you should do as a beginner though.


(https://xkcd.com/2094/)

me too

speak to someone qualified or learn on your own about preservation of wealth, live off the dividends and etc, and do whatever the **** you want

DreamCrusher,

Snowman from LLSNL used to be a day trader. Also a guy on here, Mr. Baseball, day trades as well.

They both use Technical Analysis, which isn't very complicated to learn.

its probably more boring and more repetitive than being a poker pro, which is why I didn't bother pursuing it. It also doesn't have the same RIO you could get by trading options so you can never get rich from it, but can grind out small profits.

Toothsayer scoffs at it, but there are plently of people out there that make $ with it.

Thanks for the heads up. I'll definitely study some technical analysis and see if it interests me.

I've heard this theme many times that you can't be profitable because you can't beat machines. My thought on that is of course you can't beat the machines if you are playing their game. It's not reasonable to expect that a human can do what a machine does better than the machine. I do think it's reasonable to assume that there are niches one can discover that can prove to be profitable though.

I'm guessing the general consensus is that worse players can not have an edge vs better players (everyone playing their "A" game). For instance, if I sit at a poker table with a bunch of players that are better than me then I shouldn't be +EV right? Well, if I approach the game the same way as them, and think about the game like they think about it and take lines similar to the lines they take then I absolutely would be -EV in that game. However, if I play a style that is entirely unique and think about the game in a way that they have never thought about it then I can actually create an edge vs these better players thanks to information asymmetry. If I play with them enough they will eventually figure out how I play and adjust accordingly making me -EV in the game. Although, in live poker figuring this out could take quite a long time, and could potentially never be fully understood by the better players due to limited sample size.

If one was to discover an edge, an exploit, or a niche in trading and/or investing and this person made a nice return would the other traders even know this person existed and if they did wouldn't they just chalk it up to lol variance?

it is lol variance

Variance is quite interesting. I'm following a trader on YouTube that started his Vlog on January 23rd of 2017 with $43k. He tracks every single session on YouTube and by January 29th of 2018 he had run that up to $287k while also working as a teacher/tutor. When someone runs it up like that they are automatically going to assume that they are just a crusher! Although, an experienced trader watching his vlog would likely say he doesn't know what he's doing, is making lots of mistakes, is risking too much money on high risk plays, and is just running super hot.