Matt, I applaud you. I am ON RECORD here at SI years (2 1/2 at least) ago pointing out these very problems with the daytrading industry.
Fortunatly, I am a born skeptic, so I figured out the 'hustle' in about 5 minutes. I would also warn newbies about self-churning when I traded in a room. The owners loved that.
That said, a skilled daytrader can and does make very good money in this market. It's not clear what percentage of active daytraders can truly be called skilled, but it can't be very high. One problem is that much of daytrading in NON-intuitive, and must be learned through experience. Takes time and a good head for it.
I saw the trade for teenies scam being run at the now defunct BLOCK Trading, and it was clearly a scheme to make the house lots of money, and the traders very little if any. Also, why didn't BARRON's name names??? If the firms are guilty as charged, why not protect the public with full disclosure. Legal dept. no doubt.
I have railed against the high commission structure for some time. Do you mean to tell me, that with all the computerization and falling prices we still have to pay an avg of $40 a round trip???? That's a lot of money to pay for an electronic book entry somewhere, and come right out of our pocket, into someone elses. We need more price competition, now.
PS I like your portrayal of Houtkin as a Cook-like figure. Did you catch the shameless self promotion when he was interviewed after the shooting? Slime. |
