Item — HN Reader

Not sure why you're being downvoted. HN seems to have an aversion to the idea that some people can beat the market. Yes, it's hard, but there are certainly strategies that have performed well historically (value, momentum, selling volatility, as well as the more specialized ones you mentioned), and look like they'll do so going forward.

It's odd how very few on HN doubt the ability of HFTs to make money, but when it comes to active management the assumption is that no one can really add value.

2 comments

I'm being downvoted because people on HN are smart but have been sold a bill of goods that people don't make money trading, and that creates an emotional reaction. As if wall street firms can all make billions but literally nobody else can make a dollar trading. Maybe they lost money and convinced themselves that the game is rigged. Who knows.

People like btian below feel they have a moral obligation to protect the innocent from the charlatans, and hey at least that's noble, even if it is misplaced.

I don't think the way I trade is right for most people. Primarily because it takes time and many people don't care to invest time in managing their money. Also because it takes a lump sum of capital that many people do not have. But the idea of making very high probability trades using leverage is not even provocative, it's boring and the antithesis of "get rich quick". It's about grinding it out, carefully balancing your delta risk to guard against "black swan" events, managing trade timeline to reduce gamma risk. Anybody can get an education in this stuff, it's not black magic.

I avoid talking about this stuff on HN because the downvotes come in swarms, which is something i SMH at -- ideas getting censored here of all places -- but I don't like the "nobody can make any money trading" folks to have the airwaves solely to themselves.

Do you have any resources I can use to get a deeper understanding about your strategy? I consider myself a moderate level investor, but when I look for real information about what you are talking about I feel like I'm finding late night informercials versus actual valid information. I also think the number of snake oil salesman is why HN frowns upon beating the market talk.

I currently do research based stock trading and momentum based e-mini futures to give you an idea of my level of knowledge and risk tolerance. I've done okay with both, but I would like to continue to improve.

Check out TastyTrade.com -- their archives, their daily shows Market Measures, Closing the Gap, and others.

I think there are two fundamental reasons why even intelligent, technical people look down on making money through finance. One is lack of financial literacy and deep understanding understanding of how it works. Second is that with finance, one can make money without creating a tangible product or service- anathema to the engineer mindset.

While I do not do finance for a living, I have scratched the surface and recognize that there are infinite interesting problems out there in finance waiting to be solved.

Because his comment has zero value.