- Joined
- Sep 17, 2010
- Messages
- 174
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$330
User Power: 9%
Hello everyone,
My name is Joshua Spates. I'm a 23 year old Day Trader and I'm quite good at it, ...at least as good as someone who dabbles in risk/reward ratios could be. I'm up 180% for the year but far off from rich. I don't have a fastlane millionaire story, but I will tell you mine, and perhaps some of you will find it interesting.
This is neither the beginning nor end of my story but targets the heart of the matter. I grew up in city of chicago, and my parents divorced when I was 13. My father was a great guy, and very dependable however, my mother was an emotional unpractical women.
I still love her however there is no denying she lead the family off the slowlane unto the sidewalk mostly just to spite my father. My mother blamed him for not providing the upper-class lifestyle she thought she was entitled to, and preventing her highly impractical dreams.
I reminded her of him in every way so you can imagine how my childhood played out. Since she would rarely ever spend money on because something out of my control would anger her and I would get blamed, I became an entrepreneur at a young age to support my high school habits.
I became quite good at buying and selling things(games, snacks,refreshments, parts etc) for slightly higher values and became known around the school for it. Unfortuately, as the years went by my mother's spending habits and non-existent family plan brought us from barely middle class to barely lower middle class.
Nothing "new" entered our house for years, our fridge was always near empty, the future was a taboo subject. I had just turned 20 years old and I ended up working 3 jobs so I could continue to afford to go College. If I didn't party, didn't buy prepared food, kept my cell phone plan to the minimum and worked 40-50 hours a week I could save 200 dollars a month after taxes.
Everyone around me was having a blast with college and there I spending every waking hour studying or working for a job that was 6+ years away, that I was only pursuing because "health care was stable and paid good".
There I was defeated and miserable, watching my youth fade away as I was informed that because I was such a great employee I would be getting a 25 cent raise instead of a 10 cent raise. I quickly went home and calculated inflation and figured out that even with raises I was actually making less money every year.
That couldn't be possible I thought, there was no way my extra hours and near perfect attendance was going to result in me actually making less money next year, however as I checked, and triple checked my reality darkened. It was true, and I'd bleed money for the next 6+ years and might not even be able to afford to finish past a bachelors.
It was Christmas, I owed 1k in credit card bills, had 140 USD to my name, and just caught wind that tuition would be raised by another 2,000 USD next year. No one could afford to give gifts, and besides from being thankful that everyone was still alive I had nothing to look forward to. I sat there thinking that there was no way I was cursed to this life.
Life didn't mark us to a life barely above the poverty line with sinking future. We got in that situation by a series of actions over a period of years. And thus there must be way to reverse the situation by taking a different series of actions. I started reading biographies of men who had come from nothing and pulled themselves to the top.
I wasn't interested in men who were born into money, or had great connections since birth, nor was I interested in success stories about women. I figured women would naturally be treated in a different way that would make their beginning steps non-relevant to me. I found great stories, that motivated me to try harder, yet nothing I could emulate and start right then with the minuscule amount of capital I had obtained.
However, then I stuck gold and found a book called Reminiscence of a Stock Operator which covered the start and end of the famous trader Jessie Livermore. He started with just 5 dollars and had grown it to 10,000 USD in a little over 2 years. He never took a serious job in his life after being a boy and went to trading his own line to over 100 million USD, losing all of his money twice, and twice becoming a multiple millionaire again.
I read everything I could about trading for 2 months, and took my last 100 USD and put it all into a stem cell company called ACTC. Within an hour it had received some kinda news and I was up over 100%. I freaked out and put in my sell order so fast I almost broke my old PC doing it. "XYZ shares of ACTC SOLD" was the message I saw and my 100 USD was suddenly 200 USD.
I had never made money so quickly and effortlessly in my entire life. It was so surreal for me I thought I was dreaming. When the DOW was falling 100+ points everyday, and everyone was supposedly getting slaughtered in the markets I had just made a cool 100% and beat the DJIA 10 times over in under 60 minutes.
But best of all no one could fire me, and I didn't need a degree to play. I could potential trade everyday (or so I thought before i learned about those day trader regulations) and make a killing. I was hooked.
I suddenly had a new purpose in life, I wasn't a student, I wasn't a frat boy (Joined a frat but had to quit due to expenses and 0 time), I wasn't security, a jewelry store assistant, or a pharmacy technician. I was a trader, and this was the first classification I was proud of in a long time.
I spent every single waking moment living and breathing trading. I was obsessed. This was the gift from God I had begged for every night and I finally a chance to escape my situation.
I lost my a$$ many times, and always managed to make it back. I felt like a boxer who knew if I could only survive the onslaught of blows I'd come out the victor. I put every single dime I could squeeze into my account and eventually it took over my school. The thoughts of studying health care seemed terrible to me, and I quickly switched my major to finance since those professors didn't mind me trading in the middle of class.
It got to the point when classmates could tell if I was making or losing money by the almost involuntary hand motions I made as I traded. In under a year I had turned that "100 dollar" investment into 5k USD adding about 700 USD of outside money, then made a horrible mistake right before tax season and netted out with 2k.
I had gotten so cocky I felt I couldn't dare lose and would be a 100ker in no time. I broke my trading rules as I "had the gift" and they were no longer useful. Boy was I stupid.
Regardless losing 3k meant nothing to me in the grand scheme of things since I still had my "stake" (I thought of it as an extension of my soul at the time" and could always just make it back.
I traded more seriously through out the next year and eventually turned that 2k int 23k in less then 9 months. I was the man. I quit all of my jobs, and aced through my finance classe. A man like me didn't need a job I was blowing up faster than I could adjust too. I was burning through money like it was water, and the only thing that stopped me from buying a car was the fact that I my BMW brand new and was only a few months away so I figured I would wait.
I even gathered a large following during this time and eventually opened a private newsletter once pming people one by one proved to much. Then I hit a brick wall.
25k was the magical number to be allowed to day trade without restriction, which meant I could scalp as much as I wanted to and potentially make a killing. I was 5k away, and tax season was right around the corner which meant I'd lose a ton of that 20k. I had to act fast, but all the stocks I used to make cash from had dried up and were consolidating.
A buddy of mine suggested options to me which were suppose to be like penny stocks with the liquidity of the bigboards. This sounded almost too good to be true and I bought it hook line and sinker. My first option play was based on expiration. I didn't know too much about expiration at the time, but knew just enough to get by. I tested the waters with 2k, and made 4k+ within a day.
That baby jumped 212% and I was 1k away from 25k. Now here is when I made the dumbest mistake of my life.
I was the man I thought, I had the luck of Adonis, I simply could not lose. Why settle for 25k which would be reduced after taxes. I was going to make a sweet 50k+ in one smooth move.
It was an FDA approval play, and expiration was near. It was a sure bet my buddy told me and everyone on the street was positive it would go. (I cant even recall the ticker there have been so many) I put in 16k (over half of my 24k Stake) and split up my buys at various times at various days of the week.
When the day of the FDA decision had reached I was already up another 80% on the 16k. However, that wasn't enough for me, this was a 10 bagger. This was my legendary moment. I was going to make 144k + right before tax season and buy a BMW, custom.
I was going to park it right in front of the school, in front of the no parking sign, let it get towed and pay for the impounding fee and impress every young gold digger on campus.
I awakened the next morning to find out the FDA approval on hold. The underlying was tanking big time. No problem I thought Id take a loss, 40... maybe even 50% and come out beaten but ok. What were the chances it would go to 0 right? Unfortuantely those chances were very high. I had yet to realize that bad news in options was much different than bad news in stocks.
My option opened -99.7% and I had lost everything besides the 8k I left out of the trade. Then taxes hit and well... sigh.
Lost an amazing opportunity because of my bull headiness, and after tuition fees etc I barely had more than 5k to my name. I started trading safely against built it up to 10k, and have put any amount over that into various start ups that should launch within 7 months.
I took a real knock out blow and lost the championship fight but I also learned a ton. I'm still in the game.
My name is Joshua Spates. I'm a 23 year old Day Trader and I'm quite good at it, ...at least as good as someone who dabbles in risk/reward ratios could be. I'm up 180% for the year but far off from rich. I don't have a fastlane millionaire story, but I will tell you mine, and perhaps some of you will find it interesting.
This is neither the beginning nor end of my story but targets the heart of the matter. I grew up in city of chicago, and my parents divorced when I was 13. My father was a great guy, and very dependable however, my mother was an emotional unpractical women.
I still love her however there is no denying she lead the family off the slowlane unto the sidewalk mostly just to spite my father. My mother blamed him for not providing the upper-class lifestyle she thought she was entitled to, and preventing her highly impractical dreams.
I reminded her of him in every way so you can imagine how my childhood played out. Since she would rarely ever spend money on because something out of my control would anger her and I would get blamed, I became an entrepreneur at a young age to support my high school habits.
I became quite good at buying and selling things(games, snacks,refreshments, parts etc) for slightly higher values and became known around the school for it. Unfortuately, as the years went by my mother's spending habits and non-existent family plan brought us from barely middle class to barely lower middle class.
Nothing "new" entered our house for years, our fridge was always near empty, the future was a taboo subject. I had just turned 20 years old and I ended up working 3 jobs so I could continue to afford to go College. If I didn't party, didn't buy prepared food, kept my cell phone plan to the minimum and worked 40-50 hours a week I could save 200 dollars a month after taxes.
Everyone around me was having a blast with college and there I spending every waking hour studying or working for a job that was 6+ years away, that I was only pursuing because "health care was stable and paid good".
There I was defeated and miserable, watching my youth fade away as I was informed that because I was such a great employee I would be getting a 25 cent raise instead of a 10 cent raise. I quickly went home and calculated inflation and figured out that even with raises I was actually making less money every year.
That couldn't be possible I thought, there was no way my extra hours and near perfect attendance was going to result in me actually making less money next year, however as I checked, and triple checked my reality darkened. It was true, and I'd bleed money for the next 6+ years and might not even be able to afford to finish past a bachelors.
It was Christmas, I owed 1k in credit card bills, had 140 USD to my name, and just caught wind that tuition would be raised by another 2,000 USD next year. No one could afford to give gifts, and besides from being thankful that everyone was still alive I had nothing to look forward to. I sat there thinking that there was no way I was cursed to this life.
Life didn't mark us to a life barely above the poverty line with sinking future. We got in that situation by a series of actions over a period of years. And thus there must be way to reverse the situation by taking a different series of actions. I started reading biographies of men who had come from nothing and pulled themselves to the top.
I wasn't interested in men who were born into money, or had great connections since birth, nor was I interested in success stories about women. I figured women would naturally be treated in a different way that would make their beginning steps non-relevant to me. I found great stories, that motivated me to try harder, yet nothing I could emulate and start right then with the minuscule amount of capital I had obtained.
However, then I stuck gold and found a book called Reminiscence of a Stock Operator which covered the start and end of the famous trader Jessie Livermore. He started with just 5 dollars and had grown it to 10,000 USD in a little over 2 years. He never took a serious job in his life after being a boy and went to trading his own line to over 100 million USD, losing all of his money twice, and twice becoming a multiple millionaire again.
I read everything I could about trading for 2 months, and took my last 100 USD and put it all into a stem cell company called ACTC. Within an hour it had received some kinda news and I was up over 100%. I freaked out and put in my sell order so fast I almost broke my old PC doing it. "XYZ shares of ACTC SOLD" was the message I saw and my 100 USD was suddenly 200 USD.
I had never made money so quickly and effortlessly in my entire life. It was so surreal for me I thought I was dreaming. When the DOW was falling 100+ points everyday, and everyone was supposedly getting slaughtered in the markets I had just made a cool 100% and beat the DJIA 10 times over in under 60 minutes.
But best of all no one could fire me, and I didn't need a degree to play. I could potential trade everyday (or so I thought before i learned about those day trader regulations) and make a killing. I was hooked.
I suddenly had a new purpose in life, I wasn't a student, I wasn't a frat boy (Joined a frat but had to quit due to expenses and 0 time), I wasn't security, a jewelry store assistant, or a pharmacy technician. I was a trader, and this was the first classification I was proud of in a long time.
I spent every single waking moment living and breathing trading. I was obsessed. This was the gift from God I had begged for every night and I finally a chance to escape my situation.
I lost my a$$ many times, and always managed to make it back. I felt like a boxer who knew if I could only survive the onslaught of blows I'd come out the victor. I put every single dime I could squeeze into my account and eventually it took over my school. The thoughts of studying health care seemed terrible to me, and I quickly switched my major to finance since those professors didn't mind me trading in the middle of class.
It got to the point when classmates could tell if I was making or losing money by the almost involuntary hand motions I made as I traded. In under a year I had turned that "100 dollar" investment into 5k USD adding about 700 USD of outside money, then made a horrible mistake right before tax season and netted out with 2k.
I had gotten so cocky I felt I couldn't dare lose and would be a 100ker in no time. I broke my trading rules as I "had the gift" and they were no longer useful. Boy was I stupid.
Regardless losing 3k meant nothing to me in the grand scheme of things since I still had my "stake" (I thought of it as an extension of my soul at the time" and could always just make it back.
I traded more seriously through out the next year and eventually turned that 2k int 23k in less then 9 months. I was the man. I quit all of my jobs, and aced through my finance classe. A man like me didn't need a job I was blowing up faster than I could adjust too. I was burning through money like it was water, and the only thing that stopped me from buying a car was the fact that I my BMW brand new and was only a few months away so I figured I would wait.
I even gathered a large following during this time and eventually opened a private newsletter once pming people one by one proved to much. Then I hit a brick wall.
25k was the magical number to be allowed to day trade without restriction, which meant I could scalp as much as I wanted to and potentially make a killing. I was 5k away, and tax season was right around the corner which meant I'd lose a ton of that 20k. I had to act fast, but all the stocks I used to make cash from had dried up and were consolidating.
A buddy of mine suggested options to me which were suppose to be like penny stocks with the liquidity of the bigboards. This sounded almost too good to be true and I bought it hook line and sinker. My first option play was based on expiration. I didn't know too much about expiration at the time, but knew just enough to get by. I tested the waters with 2k, and made 4k+ within a day.
That baby jumped 212% and I was 1k away from 25k. Now here is when I made the dumbest mistake of my life.
I was the man I thought, I had the luck of Adonis, I simply could not lose. Why settle for 25k which would be reduced after taxes. I was going to make a sweet 50k+ in one smooth move.
It was an FDA approval play, and expiration was near. It was a sure bet my buddy told me and everyone on the street was positive it would go. (I cant even recall the ticker there have been so many) I put in 16k (over half of my 24k Stake) and split up my buys at various times at various days of the week.
When the day of the FDA decision had reached I was already up another 80% on the 16k. However, that wasn't enough for me, this was a 10 bagger. This was my legendary moment. I was going to make 144k + right before tax season and buy a BMW, custom.
I was going to park it right in front of the school, in front of the no parking sign, let it get towed and pay for the impounding fee and impress every young gold digger on campus.
I awakened the next morning to find out the FDA approval on hold. The underlying was tanking big time. No problem I thought Id take a loss, 40... maybe even 50% and come out beaten but ok. What were the chances it would go to 0 right? Unfortuantely those chances were very high. I had yet to realize that bad news in options was much different than bad news in stocks.
My option opened -99.7% and I had lost everything besides the 8k I left out of the trade. Then taxes hit and well... sigh.
Lost an amazing opportunity because of my bull headiness, and after tuition fees etc I barely had more than 5k to my name. I started trading safely against built it up to 10k, and have put any amount over that into various start ups that should launch within 7 months.
I took a real knock out blow and lost the championship fight but I also learned a ton. I'm still in the game.
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