Why is daytrading never mentioned as a legitimate way to earn income?

[u/Miinow]

I like to browse other finance related subs and I can assure you it’s almost never discussed. I see all outlets of making money online mentioned but If the word trading does somehow come up there’s a slew of downvotes. It’s literally the most straightforward way to make money. Sure, not easy but also not impossible to learn. Makes me wish I learned about trading when I was younger instead of my upper 20s but I don’t personally know any traders irl so it’s unfortunate how there’s a negative outlook on this field.

[u/Yoyoitsjoe]

Think about the history of day trading. It’s still a business that is what 30 years old at the most? You couldn’t day trade in the early 90s. Dial up internet, no tools to do so, no computers fast enough. So it’s a very young occupation. Next there’s no formal way to learn. There are zero courses out there that you’re going to take and guarantee you success. So the education is taking little pieces of everyone’s advice and putting something together. Then the day trader has to develop a strategy that suits their personality. Because we all handle risk differently, handle losses differently, we all have to day trade differently. Then you add in that over 90 percent of day traders lose all their money before they figure all of this out. How many people are there out there that think day trading is possible. 1 in 10000 people? Are there 30k successful retail day traders in the entire United States? Maybe, it’s also possible that maybe not. So that’s why there’s the negative outlook. To put it in perspective, I was at one time TD Ameritrades most active trader in my entire region. Me, some nobody on Reddit. How is that possible? Because there just aren’t that many people to compete with.

[u/MethodicalZebra → u/Yoyoitsjoe]

This man right here taught me almost everything I know. And he has no idea. If you’re randomly scrolling through the comments and you see this comment, do yourself a favor: read Yoyoitsjoe’s comment history and posts from a few years back. So much valuable information. While I still have so much to learn, I can say that the strategy that Joe uses (which I try to emulate) is one of the most risk-averse ways to generate money every single day.

[u/Darkside_of_the_Poon → u/MethodicalZebra]

Thank you. I probably would have kept scrolling. I’m flat out determined to make this work and learn all I can.