100: Bao, @Modern_Rock – Overcome Adversity, Dominate a Niche, Become ‘the House’

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Well, here we are, traders, episode 100 of the Chat with Traders podcast. Triple digits. It's a century. Wow. Um, with that, I have to say, whether this is your first time listening right now or if you've listened to every single episode three times over, I genuinely want to say thank you. And I appreciate you for supporting this podcast. It's certainly been a journey this far and I feel as though things are really just beginning to warm up.

Now, my guest for this special milestone is someone who I've been trying to bring on since before episode one was even released. But persistence has paid off. So folks, I'd like to introduce you to BAO, or maybe better known as Modern Rock, on Twitter. Bao is an independent day trader who made the large majority of his fortune trading penny stocks on the OTC bulletin board market.

Before trading, he was a software engineer in Silicon Valley, but I won't say too much more about his backstory, because we discuss his early days when he encountered much adversity at length during the first part of this interview. Following on from this, we talk about the biggest trade of Bao's career, discovering your own niche, managing confidence, consistency tips, how to progress as a developing trader, and heaps more as you can imagine.

Lastly, if you do like this episode and you haven't already done so, please leave a review in iTunes. Just go to chatwithraders.com forward slash iTunes and follow the simple steps. It's a quick and easy way to show your support for this free podcast and it helps big time. Anyway guys, without any further delay, I'm your host, Aaron Firefield, and for episode 100 of the Chat with Traders podcast, please welcome BAO, aka Modern Rock.

In my opinion, what what the most valuable thing that people were missing is is the mindset of like You know what man, it's it's a process. It's not just jumping in and learning how to freaking short a stock or You know, trade a parabolic, you know, it's uh it's just

You know, y you you gotta set your life up a certain way, otherwise you'll fail. That's my opinion. All right, man. Well let's just start off. Let's go like way back, like way, way back. I know you were born in Vietnam, you moved to the United States. What was that like for you? Let's just start right there.

This is during before the immigration of the U.S. Any Asian. So this is like 1980. You know, that when I moved here, it was in Oregon. I was the only Asian in the whole school. The other minority was one black guy in my class named Ray Ray. And me and him happened to be friends. So this Asian kid, me and Ray Ray, were the only two minorities in a school in Oregon Where it's completely white. So

You know, right off the start it was just, you know, I already ha was having bullies and all that stuff. So Right, you know, uh and so y y you basically either have to grow a thick skin or get into a lot of fights and get thrown out of school. So I decided, you know, I'm gonna suck it up and make it my effort to say, you know what, screw you. You know, I I I'm gonna grow up one day.

And be your boss. So that was my whole thinking throughout my childhood growing up. My whole thing was study hard, work my ass off, and they don't know who the hell I am. You can beat me up all you want, but one day I'm gonna be your boss and you're gonna come and beg me for a job. So that was my mentality growing up.

And actually it did it did. I seen some people like also, Oh, I you m I remember you from high school, I go screw you. You you used to pick on me. Now you're coming and and begging me for a job. So, you know, that that was like basically every immigrant's dream, you know, like you know So I have a lot of friends, I either join a gang or get into fights, you know. I I just decided just to stick to myself, you know. Physically get beat up once in a while, but then you know, I study hard.

Became a nerd and then I'm talking to you Sure. So why did your parents decide to make that move from Vietnam and and what was that like? Was that a tough move to make, like for them? Like I don't really know what your situation was like. Well, this is Vietnam, so it's during the war and all that stuff, so I don't want to get in too much of it. But it it was like during the Vietnam War and all that stuff, so

It was basically like very very similar to how it is now with Trump and all that stuff. So that's why I was v I'm very adamant about it online. Because like, you know, if they stopped immigration from Vietnam, I wouldn't be here. And everyone now is like, Oh, you know, you got it made, you're living the American dream, but it's like

It's a long process and you know, you can't discriminate and not everybody's a bad person, you know. Everyone comes to America looking for an opportunity. It's not just America, it could be anywhere. I would have been successful in Vietnam too. You know, it doesn't matter where I am, it's de pa it's based on you. But the fact is, you know what? There's a lot of

There's a lot of innocent people, good people, and then they're not all bad just because they can't speak your language, right? Totally, totally. So what was what was life like sort of after school? Maybe walk us through that bit.

Well, I moved to California, which was a kind of c culture shock from Oregon when I was probably in the fourth grade. And you know, I pretty much stuck to myself. I I was kinda a weird kid because um, you know, you're always feeling different and you're the only minority all the time. Um so we we w s I I actually skipped the grade, so that it made it even worse.

Cause I I guess they thought I was bored. I wasn't bored, I was just didn't have any friends. I stuck to myself. So you know, so then they advanced me one grade up and so I don't know. I just go to school. Just just being a normal kid who's trying to fit in. Right. And did you go to college or like study anything after school? Yeah, I I went to UC Davis. So th this is a very interesting story too. So so I I I got into a bunch of different schools for engineering.

And I got I actually got to uh U C Berkeley. So I'll I'll tell you how I got into so this is an interesting uh segue into how I got to to um to trading. So I was an engineer. And I w I got accepted to all the schools I applied to. And so when I graduated college Um There's different levels of discrimination. Okay. There if you have no

College education, you can only be so far. But then I had a good college education. I went to UC Davis, which is a good school here for engineering. But then there was a different level of discrimination. I wanted to get a really high like high ranking job when I graduated. And over here is all based upon what school you go to. Did you go to Ivy League? Did you go, you know? So I did get into some of the top schools. Like I got into Berkeley, but I d I didn't go because

As an immigrant I no one told me that was a good school back then. I didn't know. I went to a a really horrible high school. So no one told me how to prepare for this. So this is you know, and so They rejected me from all these jobs. So I had one job offer coming out of college.

Remember this is all relative, right? So other people that didn't go to school go, wow, yeah, a good job. But for me, it was like, do I work my ass off? And no one would accept me because I was discriminated because I was a minority and I didn't go to the top schools. And so I so basically I was discriminated being

of uh uh go not going through a top school. So I said, screw this. So I was like, you know, I I I d I did engineering for like a bunch of years and I f just felt like they're they were not advancing me because I didn't go to let's say uh Ivy League school, right? And so

I moved to New York for work. I quit my job and then everyone was starting doing it day trading. So then I started doing day trading. The reason I did that because you know what, I was fed up with my job where they they were discriminating me.

upon, you know, all this stuff. So if I had went to an Ivy League, which I got into as well, you know, I I would have been so easygoing, would have been complacent. So this is this is the whole thing about America. Once you're complacent, you really don't want to try And do something different or try to advance yourself, you know, you it's too easy. So the reason why I kept trying and trying is because nothing was easy for me growing up.

If it was so easy for me, I would I would be such a lazy kid. I wouldn't do anything. I would have got a s a cushy job being an engineer, you know. But the fact is I had to w buzz my butt all the time. It made me realize, you know what, man, I I can do better than this. And so therefore I I went to trading because everyone was doing it and I liked it. Cool man. Well a couple of things. Why did you choose engineering over everything else you could have gone for?

Uh because as a as an Asian kid you got a choice between engineering law school or being a doctor and engineer was a le the least of the the education I needed. Right. That's funny. So, you know, that's a good point you bring up about people You know, having it too easy, having been too comfortable

What would you say to someone who's maybe in that kind of mindset, living like that, wants to go further but just kind of lacks that motivation? What do you think needs to needs to change in their mind to be able to to push forward? Well, they need to hit rock bottom. They need to have some sort of adversity, right? There there comes a time where when too easy so it's like

Something's gonna happen to your life and you don't know how to deal with it. And that's when you know, like let's say you your parents always gave you an allowance. My my mom never never gave me an allowance, you know. I had to work my ass off, get a school and go get a job and you know. And so imagine if your mom cut you off. Now you're like, Oh crap, I never had a job in my life. What am I supposed to do? So now now you you know y now you face adversity.

The sooner you realize that, you know what, man, it's like instead of having to to face adversity to learn from it, you can circumvent it. You know, like be proactive instead of reactive, right? And so it's very tough as a kid though to teach someone like this. But if you're older, you can understand. You know, like you don't have to hit rock bottom before you realize, you know, that your life is gonna be going to hell.

Yeah. I mean in some ways it is kind of refreshing to have a failure like that because then you've sort of got nothing else to lose and you've just got like The the only way you can go from that point on is is upwards. And that and that's why I think m that was the reason that got my trading career successful. Because when I when I started trading

So how how I got straight in was like I I had a good job. So I I was doing software stuff and I was making a lot of money. I was making like 250 grand a year back then, which is a huge amount of money today, inflation, right? Um And so I th I I like trading, but I treated it as gambling. Oh, I would lose my money, I would refill my account because why? I had a I had a slick job that always forwarded me to pay. You know, every time I lost, I don't care, I put more money in, right?

And so if you always have that safety net, and once again, complacency, right? I was complacent with my job. I made a lot of money, but I was bored of my job. I wanted to try this trading thing because trading thing I loved it. It was exciting. But at the same time, I was complacent and I I had a safety net, which was my job. My job always afforded me to bail me out of every single bat mistake of a trade.

I would lose all my money, refresh it, you know, this is and so after a while I was like, dude. I I took a so I was up so this is the days before pattern day trading. So I only you know you you can have 20 grand in your account and you can still trade. So I would have like 20 grand in my account. And I would be up like 30 grand on that account.

f in one day, like three hours, but I wouldn't take the money. I was like, dude, this would go up to a dollar. I could I could I I I could be rich. I could be a millionaire. And then the very same day I went from So my account had 20,000. So I made, I was up 30. So it had 50,000 in it. The same exact day went up. I ended up the day with like 5,000 in my account.

So at that very point I realized, you know what, man, this is stupid as hell. I worked my ass off and I kept refreshing my account. Something has to change. And so now I'm stuck sitting with us with like all like my money completely wiped out in my account. Holding this garbage stock that went up three hundred percent in one day and then went straight down. And so what I did was like, you know what man, I I'm gonna invest myself. I realized so

So this was a turning point of my life. Before I would dabble in trading, I would I didn't take it seriously because I had a backup job. So now what I did was like, you know what I I make money every single day and I always blow it on one stock because of greed. I don't take the money and I think it's gonna go go to infinity and it always comes down and I'm stuck holding the bag. And so what I did was I took money out of my house.

This is a dumb, dumb thing. I don't advise everybody, but you know, for me, I I look back and it's like I I was profitable in every single trade except the times where I got greedy and I don't take the the gains. So I actually took a mortgage out f of my house. So I own a house. So I took a mortgage out on that house for like like fifty grand.

But but now it's a different story. I have no backup, no nothing, no safety net. If I lose this 50 grand, I lose my house. I'm screwed. You see what I'm saying? So this is the adversity. I my back is to the wall. This is rock bottom for me. You know, there's no more playing around, no more bullshitting, right? And so I became very disciplined. Instead of swinging 30 grand up and down, I would take my three thousand dollars a day and walk.

Because that was my entire nesse, right? If I lose this, no one's gonna bail me out. I don't have rich parents. You know, everything I worked for, I bought the house, but now I took the money out of the house. You know, and so with that mentality, trading became a serious profession. It was not gambling anymore. Before I was gambling.

So once your mindset switches from the fact that, hey, something is gambling, oh, it's a coin toss, 50-50, to, you know what, man, this is not gambling. You can become the house if you played smart. And so my mentality switched and so I became very conservative again. And so I started, you know, slowly training and making money and not not doing these wild swings like a gambler would.

That's a crazy risk to take a mortgage out on your own house. I mean, why did you do that? Like did you need that fifty K so bad? I mean, you said you had a a good paying job at the time. What what motivated you to take that fifty grand mortgage on your house? Be because it was a battle myself. At the same time like I mean, I'm I I hate failure. And I was like, you know what man, I I I cannot let this be a failure.

The the thing is this, it's um I had enough confidence in myself to know that I mean I'm an engineer, so I take I take calculated risks. And so I I I went back to my trades and I examined why I lost. It's not because I didn't know how to trade. It was just because I was too damn greedy. And the greed stems from the fact that I had a good paying job. And so so what what happened was this. I took the money out.

And then I I started doing well by taking small gains. And so I gave myself this is a crazy story. So I gave myself a goal. After a while I was making more money trading than I was my job. Right? And I gave m so it it come to the point where it's like, okay, you can't do both. You have to choose one or the other. And so what what I did was I gave myself some s some crazy goal, which was

Two times uh what my my pay would be. So in order for me to quit and go full time, I needed to trade and profit and have in my account two times what my yearly income would be. So that that came out to be five hundred thousand dollars. And so after a few years, and I was like, oh shit, I reached that point. What am I gonna do now? So that's so now is another risk. So basically every every time I'm doing it, I'm investing in myself.

You know? And and the the difference now is like, you know what, man, I'm gonna quit my job and do this. But it's not gambling because dude, I've built my whole life up to this point. I'm not I I and I know I'm not gonna throw it away like I used to. Because I have no safety net anymore, right? I have no job, everything. So so I pretty much went all in. I quit my job and I started training. And so that that's how I I guess I I I I quit my job, f I transitioned from from the corporate world.

by saving money and then using d the day trading to make money. Because a lot of people want to quit, but they they they they need to prove themselves first, right? So they need to give so for me, I say you need to save at least two years of your income in order for you to quit your job.'Cause'cause otherwise you'd be stressed out having to pay bills every month. And you have to be able and you have to be able to prove yourself that you know what, you can support yourself doing this shit.

I wanna play I wanna play football in the NFL, but I'm not gonna you see what I'm saying? It's like everybody wants to be a traitor, but everyone wants to be a poker player, but you you have to be able to be realistic with yourself as well.

For sure. And one thing I I found kind of interesting at the start of your response there is you said that you take calculated risks. What do you mean by calculated risks? Would you mind fleshing that out a little more? Calculated risks is basically not a coin tie. I always look at the failure. If I fail, what's gonna happen? So when I quit my job to do this, the only reason I would quit is I I said I saved two years, right, of uh trading profits, right?

And so yeah, so what's the r th what's the harm? I I have enough money to live off for two years and if I blow it, um I go back to my job. So I always ha always have to have a like like some sort of like backup plan. But it's also not a safety net kind of deal, but it's like I work my ass off to get to this point.

But at the same time it's like I'm not stupid to realize I'm gambling like like YOLO. People say, you know, you only live once, YOLO. It's like, no, that that's how you freaking died, dude. If you if your mentality is YOLO, you'll It it's like what if you you don't die today, you live tomorrow, now you're broke and you spend all your money partying and you know a and gambling. Exactly, exactly.

And just going back to the point before you quit your job, what were you doing at the time? I I I got a feeling you were working in Silicon Valley at the time. What were you doing there? Yeah, I I was a software engineer doing um bank banking, uh online banking stuff. Um then I moved to New York, then I did sales for a company uh Fair Isaac, FICO Score. They did they do the credit uh credit

So like whenever you apply for loan and stuff, there's a credit score. They they invented the credit score. Fair Isaac F FICO score. That's what I did. Yeah, we we did we we did some crazy shit. Uh rules engines, neural network, artificial intelligence. Artificial intelligence stuff. So I I I work with a bunch of nerds. Full on. That's very cool. Um so walk us through maybe the next couple of years of your trading career after you made that jump to go full time.

How did you go during those first couple years? I was doing quite okay. I was very conservative. So I'll tell you the good and the bad part of what I did. So so when I I when I did the full flip over, I I traded very small to be honest. Like each position would be like five thousand bucks, five thousand, ten thousand dollars. It wasn't a big position. And I and I was consistently making money every single day. So I'll uh so when I quit I was making like three to five hundred thousand a year.

You know, just training very small. I would never lose, dude. I'll just freaking make my grind it'd be like a grind, but I loved it because it was my passion. When I quit this, it was never meant for me to be rich. I never thought I was gonna be rich. I just thought shit, I hated my corporate job. hopefully uh this passion of trading Well make a little bit like the same i it's okay if I made less. I I never anticipated to be ever making a lot of money.

But I I just loved it so much where I was like, you know what, if if I can support myself doing this, I I'd be very happy. So for me it was the passion. It was never about the money. The money one day I woke up, I realized, oh shit, I had some money. But it was never about the money. You know, I I'll just love to do what I did. So

So why did was I I was very conservative because remember this is all I had. I quit my job dude. As a as an Asian guy, you y you don't quit your job to do this stuff. My parents, everyone called me crazy, called me a gambler. It's like what the hell you're a gambler? He's like, you know, they're ashamed of me. And so I I there was no way I could have felt. If I failed, I'd be I'd be the laughing stock. I I had to pr pretty much commit suicide.

That's pretty drastic. For for an Asian family, that's but that's not drastic. That's that's uh that's the honorable way out. Right. So I mean tell us a little bit more about that. I mean, like what were some of the comments you got from your family uh from some of your friends at the time. Uh even some of the people who you

w used to work with what did they think about when you we told them that you were going full time into this to be a day trader? Oh what do you uh as expected, like gambling. Even today man. Even today will say it's gambling.

So do do you think that a lot of your friends and family think that you've just gotten lucky? May a lot of them do, but I think after after ten years they realize oh shit, he knows what he's doing. And so that was the reverse. So so this is the thing that's kinda sucks. So in the beginning it was like, oh

You're gambling. You just got lucky. One day you're gonna lose all your money. You're gonna lose all your money tomorrow. Watch. Oh, you didn't lose your money yet? Next week you're gonna lose it. Oh, this you didn't lose it this year? I guarantee you next year you're gonna lose it. And then now it's kind of like oh shit.

Bow Oh, it's easy. He wakes up and he makes like a million dollars a day. Easy. It's easy work. See what I'm saying? So I get the full spectrum. So it it So basically there's really no appreciation that, hey man, this is hard work. You know. So I go from it's a gambling, um, you're lucky it's gambling to, oh, it's so easy for you. You can just do this in your sleep. I was like, no, dude, I gotta work wake up at four a.m. every day and and bust my balls, right?

And so it's like I don't I so I don't know which one's worse. You know, I w I actually I wanna go back to the first split uh the first one because now it's like, oh it's easy. When I go out, Bow will pay for it. He'll wake up tomorrow and and make the whole paycheck. And I'm like, no, dude, it's not guaranteed. You remember? It's gambling.

So now convincing people because now I'm actually convincing people it's gambling, just so they leave me alone because they don't ask me questions and stuff, which is a true story.

So one thing which I can't ignore, which you said, we can't skip over this. You said you were pretty much making money each and every day. Like to some people. That just seems so unrealistic as a trader to make money every day. Like how are you doing that? It like how are you able to make money pretty much every day? So this is what I learned a long time ago. So when I first started trading, I was training everything.

Penny stocks, uh hundred dollar stocks, uh all sorts of stuff. Anything that moved, right? Then I realized, dude, man, I can't I don't know what the fuck I was doing. I would make money, lose money, but the thing is I was never um proficient or the master of any one little thing. So I I realized you have to pick one little area and become the master of it. So I like to call it like finding my finding your niche.

So that's kind of like my saying I've been saying for a long time now. You gotta find your niche. It may not be pretty or popular, but you know what? You're gonna become the master of that one little area. And and you know, and be successful at it. So what I did was I I I became a bulletin board penny stock. Um so that that was my niche. People would make fun of me and say, Oh, you're not trading IBM?

You train what? This weird ass stock for two cents, ten cents? So I have friends that used to do prop trading back then. They would trade hundred dollar stocks, GM stock, and they'd just laugh at me. But they don't know how much I made. They would swing up and down ten thousand a day, two thousand, you know. They were never really consistent, right? But I'm just turning my, you know, my you know, I my money every every day, you know? Uh and and so but at the end of the year

You know, if you don't have any lo m big losses that those it adds up very quickly, you know. And so so that was my whole my whole thing. I became so it's all the thing I like to say is like, you know, it's better to be The master of one, the the jack of all trades. All these guys, oh I know how to do everything. Well, I don't know how to do shit. I only know how to do this one thing, but I do it damn well. You see what I'm saying? So in my opinion, that is the best way.

to to make money trading. Pick one area and you become the master. And I happen to pick an area where I don't have to compete with the smart guys. The smart guys are not trading these little stocks. They're trading freaking IBM. These these analysts on Wall Street, Goldman Sachs is not trading me. They're fighting um Amazon.

Why the hell am I gonna compete with them in Amazon? What you know you see what I'm saying? So I picked an area where I was like, okay, only a bunch of dumbasses. So I'm competing with dumbasses. I'm not competing with like you know the infinite um resources of Goldman Sachs. And so that's why I became successful. I picked an area where not many people traded and back then it had a lot of liquidity, man. You know. And so I just kept my mouth shut and just this just worked in my little niche.

Yeah, so I think this might be an interesting point is you said there that you're not competing with Goldman Sachs on these trades that you're entering into, you're competing with, as you called them, dumbasses. So what difference does it make though? It i is because th the no one's really gonna overpay for a hundred dollar Amazon stock. You you you got big funds.

Pushing it down. So for those type of stocks, the the the price imbalance is not gonna be much. In order for you to for so this is how trading works, right? You you take advantage of the the price fluctuation. So if a stock is priced too perfectly, it's not gonna fluctuate up and down much.

And the people that's gonna control that stock are the guys with the big heavy pockets, the funds. And so whereas if you c if you trade the little stocks which I used to do, now the SEC kinda shut it down. So it it it's a kind of dead market now. But um So so I became the Goldman Sachs of the little of the little stocks. You see what I'm saying? So So I I so I I can muscle stuff around.

I'm not the the m the the guys at home who have a full time job anymore who oh this stock is up t twenty five fifty percent. Oh shit, it's it must be keep going up. So they're gonna load up on that stock, go to work, and come home and check their account. You see what I'm saying? And so a lot of times like they like if if a stock is up a hundred percent, they're like, Oh my god, I'm gonna hold it for life. This thing is gonna make me rich.

And so during the day the stock tanks, they're not there. They're not selling it, you see what I'm saying? There there are no algorithms for them. But Amazon, that th those guys are there all day long, dude. So what you're saying is that a lot of the patterns and the market behaviour was a lot more predictable and easier for you to read and anticipate, essentially.

That's that's exactly right. Got it. Got it. And it's unregulated kind of deal. No one's looking at a little little shady little area, right? So the the point you're making here about finding your niche and kind of dominating it, how would you suggest other traders think about Deciding on their niche. The thing with me is I I you have to do it. And then I realized shit man I'm losing my money on all these stocks. And so that I gotta eliminate trading these stocks.

What am I making money on and what am I losing money on? Everyone's different. You can be the master of trading Amazon. I'm not saying don't trade Amazon. For me, it didn't work for me. I have a lot of friends that trade that stuff perfectly. But for me, I couldn't do it. You see what I'm saying? There's certain stocks I couldn't do, but there's certain stocks I sell at some some people like, oh, I can't touch painting stocks.

I I get killed and so th it's not for them. So you have to basically go back to your trades and examine which ones you win and which ones you lose. And I was like, dude, I kept losing it when I had training like Amazon. So That just cut it off altogether. I don't I don't even need to bring up the symbol. So basically re basically review your trade. It's it's very simple. You know, if you if you go to if you go to the casino

And you make all your money playing blackjack and you lose all your money playing roulette, stop playing roulette, dude. Unless it's for fun, right? Exactly.

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It sounds like once you went full time a lot of it It sounds like you almost had it too smooth in some ways. Like you were making money pretty much every day. That was a negative. So let me tell you the negative and the positive there. Yeah, well that's what I want to get to is like what what challenges did you have? Like what were some of those greatest challenges you encountered? You remember what remember when I said when when you're too complacent shit goes to hell and all that?

So it was very predictable for me to make my little small money. Because I I never took a chance. I was like, why why rock the boat? I'm happy doing what I'm doing, you know, it's working. But the things I realized, you know what, man, it things like this don't last forever.

You know, you find a you find a little niche and you and you take advantage of it. Like you milk the towel, eventually the cow's gonna die. So what you need to do is milk as much milk the cow for as much milk as it can before the cow dies. And so my problem I thought, Oh, the cow's gonna live forever. So I kept on milking a little bit and then, you know.

And then towards the end I then I realized, oh shit man. I'm making money every single day trading super tiny size relatively, right? So I started once I started upping my size, then it's like, oh crap, the same strategy did work. But by then Everybody else caught on, everyone started trading it and then the Wolf of Wall Street movie came out. And uh SSC started banning All these stocks.

halting all these stocks that they're saying is a scam. Then they started, you know, then the market makers saw that I was making too much money and they were losing money from me'cause I I I I I would like kill them in a trade and then th they they would shut me down. So then I got so at the end of my career, what happened was this.

I I got shut down from most of the routes. They wouldn't let me trade anymore. And and the SEC shut down pretty much all of those kind of plays. Uh Those bulletin boards started coming back now, but for for a good two years from like two years, two to three years it was dead, man. They they shut every uh Wolf of Wall Street made made it very popular, that movie. Uh so they they thought everything was a scam and so they shut everything down.

What do you mean by the market makers shut you down and banned you from routing to certain venues? What what's that about? So when you trade these um Bolton board stocks, these penny stocks, uh you had to route it to let's say at night. night capital markets or a schwab or something. So so it's not like how it is in Nasdaq. Nasdaq you have an E C N which is an electronic system. Over there you have to route it to a market maker, like night, N I T E. Um and so

So y there's no way to go around them. If you want to fill the stock you have to ride route to them. And and when they really r at the end of the month they realize their P and L is down and they're like, Who the hell is banging me for this? You know, and so it I got shut down. And so Which which leads me to this the the the uh the the biggest trait of my my life, which I guess a lot of people like uh

Uh I guess my claim to fame. I don't know what the word, but this was not what I think my claim to fame. But uh um so it was Fanymane. F N M A. That one day I made um 1.5 million in like four hours. So after that the market maker shut me down. I killed Citadel. I raped all their s so basically in order to to get this I ha I had to basically play against them.

So they would show huge sizes, like hundreds of thousands of shares. I would just sweep them all. And they're like, so now they're dead. So basically, well, so my whole career culminated to this one day, February, uh May 9th, 29th, 2013, where I decimated the market makers. And the very next day, all the algos disappeared from from that stock. And then uh I got banned. They shut my accounts down.

And so that that was the beginning of pretty much the end of the penny stock era. How did you know you were banned? Did they just actually close your account or did they send you a letter? Like what happened? They uh they they called my broker and they said you better shut him down before he shut before we shut the entire firm down. And are there any legal like like how does that stack up legally? Uh, see that's what's screwed up, man. Th this whole you cannot fight you cannot fight

a billion dollar company. If they want to shut you down, they shut you down. What are you gonna do? They they claim that they have they reserve the right to do business with anybody they want. And so they say we uh they don't have to even give you a reason why. They never gave me a reason why. They just shut me down.

Right. So one day I woke up and and every single broker said, they shut you down, dude So you obviously got to keep your profits? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I just was not allowed to trade anymore.

And so so so that's that so that led to another thing. So I never thought this stuff would end. And so I really never thought about what would happen if this thing was over. And so that that would the so the the the biggest day of my life, my career wise. should have been the happy say. But in essence, I look back and I I already told my friend. I told Nate he's he runs investors live.

He told me, dude, this is the worst day of your life I go, I know, man. I go, You would never hit this high ever again. And so after that day the whole thing unraveled and then um And I had to find a new niche to trade. So imagine I I've been doing this since I started trading. This niche, right? And now it's like the niche has been taken away from me. They shut the whole thing down, right? So then I have to transition to now NASDAQ stuff.

So that's that's n yeah. But let's go back to like, you know, people think this was my biggest a achievement. Uh w I d I don't think so. My biggest achievement in my opinion is being consistent all those years. It's not even talking about the money. I I can care less about how much money it was. It was just basically being able to every day

Perfect a system where, dude, man, it's like a ninety percent success rate. I'll give you an example. My my best year, I I only have eight days, something like that, seven to ten days. Out of 306 oh 330 days of trading, only s only seven to ten days where I actually had a loss. Thank you. I I was like three hundred and Twenty wins, ten losses days. I mean so so that to me is like proves that it is not gambling if you are disciplined enough and stick to your you know, your game plan.

So I had that niche mastered. Oh yeah. And then they then then that day they they took they took it away, so Okay, so a couple of things. Ninety percent success rate. When you say a ninety percent success rate, you're talking about like your PL at the end of the day, right? Not your actual strategy, like not every trade you put on. Yeah. So I mean I w I I hate talking about success rate win rate but I was

I I I track it by how many days, you know. Yeah, you're right. It's not yeah. I I mean I made tons of trades. I made like five hundred trades a day. I made like a million trades during during that time. So um but the end of the day, as long as your PL is up.

So when you made one point five million dollars in a single trading day, what did that feel like? Before you got shut down, before you realized you'd been shut down. What did it feel like that night? So this is this is how you get to that point. I didn't freaking know I was up that much. So I was so into the trade, I didn't even look at the PL. And then when I turned over and I looked at people, I almost shit myself. And and when I looked at it, that's when I started to bail.

Maybe I would have made more if I didn't look at it. So the thing is like when you get into your groove, it's it's not for me, like I told People don't believe that it's not the money, man. If you're passionate about what you're doing, it I care less, you know? If you're passionate and you're good about it, the money will come. Don't think about the money. Think about mastering your process, your niche, your work, your passion. You master your passion.

And then the the rewards will come. For me, training was I never thought I was gonna make money. What the hell do I need money? I don't I mean I'm a very simple guy if you look at me and I don't

You know. Um this was just my going back to the kid. Remember when he said, you know, one day I'm gonna be your boss and say, Screw you, you get y all the all your bullies are gonna regret bullying us, you know? So my my whole lesson was kinda like, you know what, man? Um You know, I was trying to prove to the world I had a chip on my shoulder.

You know, and so and then that's what led me to always try to be the best at what I did. Yeah. Now you talk about like needing to really love doing what you're doing and have a actual passion for the market. I mean Why why do you feel as though you have a passion for trading? Like what gets you excited about trading if it's not just for the money? In the beginning it was gambling and gambling for Asians is very exciting. Things in our blood, dude.

Um for for an Asian tradition is this dude. Asian New Year comes, the whole family gambles. The first thing you do is you gamble. When you wake up you that that's what you do on On Chinese New Year. It's to gamble. That's the funniest shit. So gambling is part of our whole culture. But I was never a big gambler.

I I mean this is how I so when I was making a a shitload of money, I would go to the casino and I would never bet more than twenty-five or a hundred dollars on a single black jaw can. I mean this is this is how I am. I was like why would I g gamble trade for a living. It's stupid throwing it's stupid to be the the the trump at the table versus being the house when you trade, you know? So that was so so that that kept me a a lot of trouble when when um'cause my my my mentality was never like

to to gamble blindly. But the excitement of of trading is just It's the same thing as uh when people gamble, but the difference is this is a calculator of gambling. I could I could bail anytime I want. Not when I'm betting a like a big hand of blackjack and shit, I got sixteen. What the hell am I gonna do? There's absolutely no control.

Yeah. I think a lot of people who are on the outside of trading have a hard time getting their head around that kind of concept that a lot of traders actually aren't. don't enjoy going to the casino and gambling, you know what I mean? Because they feel as though they genuinely don't have an edge unless they have a strategy down pat, you know what I mean?

Dude, I I I to this day I like I I go to Vegas, I don't gamble. It just freaks me out, dude. I w I see that Yeah. I went to Vegas like for the first time, I think like two years ago. And I think I spent about fifty dollars gambling the whole like five nights I was there. And um I don't know if that makes me really strange, but I just I didn't see the point in it. Did it make did it make you scared? For me it scares the shit out of me, yeah. It's just'cause I'm a control freak, man.

It's not the money, it's just the fact that fuck I'm I'm so stupid. It's like this dude just took my money and have no choice but to give it to him. Yeah, yeah, you're like, Oh man, I could have spent that on so many better things. Yeah, so

Yeah. So maybe walk us through what happened after you got shut down. I mean, you had to kind of reinvent yourself in some ways. How did you go about that? So life is full of adversity. So that that's that's the whole theme of this interview. I'm trying to stress. You know what, man? If I can do it, anybody can do it. It has nothing to do with being

Meaning anything ac except like you know what man, have trust in yourself, have a plan, not be a good person, you know. Don't cheat, don't steal, don't do any of that shit, you know, just work your ass off, people beat you up like they did me, it's okay. you always gonna have adversity, regardless of how how rich

or powerful or experienced you are. So now I've so once once again I thought I had the whole world in my hand. I mastered this niche. I'm like, damn, I'm gonna be filthy rich. If this so this is You know, like my my biggest year would be like three point three million. You know? That's that's crazy doing this shit, right? So that's that's that's sort of shit. So I was like doing like seven figures for a lot, you know. So

So it got to the you know, the grand scale where dude man, if I was if I could do three million a year for fucking ten years, I'm fucking filthy regret. Um Boom, SSC comes, shut the whole industry down. So now I'm I'm I'm like, holy crap. I've just reached the pinnacle of my career. And they just took everything away from me. So now I have to start over as a uh as a newbie. So now I have to reinvent myself, figure out a new niche. So now I started trading Nasdaq stuff.

And it's a whole different ballgame, man. I was like, fuck. You know, I would used to be the Goldman Sachs of the Bulletin board. I'd never lost big trades. Boom. When I started over there, I started taking freaking hundred thousand dollar losses. I've never taken that much losses before. My biggest loss uh trading penny stocks was uh three hundred thousand. That was but that was because I was up three million uh that year, so I didn't give a fuck. But which is stupid, but you know. Um

But besides that, never taking these crazy losses like a hundred grand. My biggest loss would be like twenty five grand, fifty grand. I mean, and and compared to how much I was making, that would that was like nothing, you know. Um I have months where I I was making like a million bucks in a month, you know. Um But anyway, so when I switched over, now now I'm like a newbie dude.

Every niche, every different thing you do, you you you you're no longer the master of it. You you y it's like, yeah, I I understand the basics of it, but Shit man, in order to know it inside and out and to be able to make money on a consistent basis, you you you can't just be a jackall trades, right? Yeah, you gotta be like you you gotta pick something, a discipline to do it. So So I sent you that spreadsheet where we shows like this loss on late L A K for$126,000.

I mean so that that's so when I switched over, those are the type of losses I was seeing. So now it humbled me hella fast. It was like I was like, oh shit, what the hell am I going to do? I'm not, I'm not fucking good like I thought I was. I came over and I thought, eh, I'm gonna freaking be the best uh NASDAQ train in the world too. Nope. Rude awakening. So I had to Pretty much humble myself, start over. Take money out of the accounts and just make sure I don't fucking blow up.

Start with very small positions. And so this is the same thing. You have to build your experience and your confidence. So my confidence was whacked down to nothing. Remember, I came down from I came from like a$3 million year to like making like nothing.

Just starting over, you know? And which is in in essence is good. Making nothing is better than losing three million. You see what I'm saying? So a lot of people like, oh the I you know, this is easy. I can switch and do something, you know, I I used to be the king of this. I'm gonna be king of that not, dude. You see what I'm saying? You have to like You you have to be able to humble yourself and say, you know what, man, I p I'm I am now an amateur once again. I'm a student.

So how did you move on from that point? Like you you said you came over to Nasdaq stocks, you started taking these really big hits, like a hundred thousand dollar plus losses. Um, I mean, what was the cause for that? Were you too cocky? Did you just think your same strategy was gonna work um in a a different market that moves in different ways? You know, what was the root of that?

Uh because back in the bullying board days this is there was not enough liquidity to get into a million dollars of a stock. So so to lose like 126,000, I was in like a million dollars of stock. You see what I'm saying? And so there's just so basically it's just like holy crap I I threw the kitchen sink at it and that's and that thing won't budge.

So how did you go about finding a new way of trading? Like what did you do? Like'cause you said, you know, you're now essentially an amateur all over again. Did you how did you develop a new strategy to profit in this new market? So you know what? In my opinion, I am still learning. I I I never wanted to teach when I was trading bulletin boards just like I don't want to ever teach now'cause I never think I'm a master.

I think the moment you think you're a master is when you get dinged dude. To media people go teach me. I'm like, dude, I don't f I'm still learning. Same thing was when I was making millions a year. I was like, I'm still learning, dude. And so So I I would so the caveat is I would always be a student. I would be a student for life. But what I'm doing now is I'm starting over like I so now I'm thinking, how do I become so good at trading the penny stocks?

So I'm trying to get back into that m mindset where You know, I start back doing smaller trades and figure out F trying to find my niche within this new market? 'Ca still when you say how did I find my niche, I really I think I found my niche, but who knows? It's it's still too soon. The only way I'll know is in another ten years when I when I only when I look back, right?'Cause when you're in it, you really don't know.

And so I'm always trying to learn, in my opinion. That that's the best way to do it. He's like you stay on your toes and you always try to learn. So I examine what I'm doing wrong. So now I cut off a lot of stuff. I used to trade a lot of uh ETFs and I got burned on a lot of stuff, so now I cut them all off. So it's the same process as before, you know, y you find out what you the only way the only way to know is is to do it and of and unfortunately it's a cost of tuition.

You know, I lose I lose these dollars. It's and uh you can either think of it two ways. Think of it as, oh, I got unlucky and I lost a hundred grand. Or for me, it's more of like, dude, that was a hundred thousand dollar lesson. That was tuition. And I better make damn sure that I got my money's worth from that education, right? Yeah, yeah. Uh it's an expensive price to pay. So how do you

I think what might be cool if we could talk about is maybe sort of the psychology and a bit more about the mental aspect of trading. Like how do you have the confidence to pull the trigger after a bad trade like that? Yeah, that's that's the biggest thing. Um when you're making money, your confidence is off the charts. And and you know how it is when you're confident, you can do no wrong. And then boom, sometimes you get overconfident. There so there's it has to be a balance.

So when I'm on a crazy streak, I I start to get cocky and I go And I think I could do no wrong. And then then that that's what happened So the biggest in my opinion the biggest hurdle for any trader, any experienced trader is you can make money, let's say a hundred days in a row. Is that one loss could take can wipe out your entire year. You see what I'm saying? It doesn't matter how much you made before. It's how to control that one loss.

And so that was what I mastered before. I mastered before how to immediately just take the loss and not and not have it affect me. And so but when you when but when you're a novice once again, every loss of you is is kinda like a personal loss. Like damn I suck, I suck, you see what I'm saying? Sometimes you take it too personal. So you gotta be almost like a robot to like So so I call like you know, you have to be like it's I call trading like a reflex.

And this is how algorithms and algos they they're robotic, dude. Sometimes you have to have to be robotic. It it has to be like a reflex for you to like, oh, I see the situation. Either I go in or I go out. You don't hesitate, you don't think, you don't, you don't over every time you doubt yourself is when you get screwed up. And so that loss I did, I was like, oh man, I don't, I don't want that loss, I could have easily taken like five or ten thousand dollar loss.

You know, which is a lot, but it's better than a hundred and thirty thousand dollars. And after a while you're like, you know, so so before that would never happen. But when I started new I was like Cocky, I was like, dude, that's embarrassing. I don't want to take that loss. Or like, or like maybe it's tricking me. It it must be tricking me. If if I if I take the loss, it's it's gonna go my way. Nope. You know? So you you you you you make all these excuses in your head.

And so what happens is, dude, I I wasn't ready for that kind of size to trade. So you have to build yourself up, first of all. You have to it's like everybody wants to get to that next level. Getting to that next level doesn't just mean increasing your your size, dude. You need to be able to have enough bankroll.

uh uh to to be experienced of, to to be able to take the hit, things like that, right? And so a lot of traders wanna go quickly. And so my advice to them is, dude, your bankroll is huge. You know, so

In order to get to the next size, you better make sure your bank role can can can support that. And then when you lose, like okay, I'll go back to your question, like it's the confidence. So what what I usually do, which helps me because I've taken a lot of these losses when I tr switched over. I've never had

many losses in my entire life of this size until I started when I switched over. I mean there were like six figure losses like boom boom boom. And I don't know how the hell I didn't lose all my money, but no, I would make it back. But it's like but the thing is like And it just kinda like every loss you make, it the the confidence level is just multiples higher, like exponential, right? It's not just a hundred thousand dollars you lose, it's a hundred thousand dollars.

to like the factor of ten, how stupid you are and oh my God, you know, like what am I gonna do now I lost my money, you know, stuff like that. So So how you rebound? Well, you have to start from basics. So I rebound every time I do that, I would rebound by making one trade at a time. Make a thousand dollar trade. Make two thousand dollars, you see? So have a couple of days of green in a row. So I get back to my old routine.

a few days of greener in a row, then you start to forget and you're like, Oh no, now now you become more confident. Then you can increase your size once again. So it's always getting back to basics. After a big loss, always get back to basics. And after a big win, you better be disciplined enough to also get back to basics. instead of saying, Oh, I have a big win. So so the problem with winning, uh, to me is this. Um

It's very dangerous. I I know a lot of people who who have a good streak and then they just blow up. It's because They always think I had a good streak. Oh my God. Imagine I put in twice as much money. My streak would have been even more huge, right? So so now that their next trade, they're like, dude, I'm gonna double up the next trade because I was right the last hundred times I did this. And then boom, you're dead. So so you g so it's all part of the discipline, right?

Yeah. I'm glad you brought that up because I did want to ask you about like the other end of the spectrum, about how you handle, you know, large winners and, you know, when you do get on a good run, how you like don't get ahead of yourself in some ways. So Um yeah,'cause I think that's equally as important, right? Yeah, that's exactly what I say. You got you you gotta make sure because

When you get on the street, like I said, man, the one thing is you become cocky. You're like, shit, I should have put more money in that trade. I knew it. I knew it'd go up. Why didn't I put more money? So what I'm gonna do in the next trade, I'm gonna do a makeup trade.

That's the makeup trade that kills you. I'm gonna make up for the fact that I was a pussy and I didn't put more money in that last trade that I won. So now I put double the money in. And y you know what happens, right? Always goes down. So so Yeah. So I call it the makeup trade, which is equivalent to the revenge trade. So when you're down, you want to double up so that you can make back your money quicker, right? So that's the revenge trade when you're down.

So when you're winning you do the makeup trade'cause you're like making up for the fact that you're you're too chicken to put more money in. But a lot of times I tell people this, dude, it's it's not Trading smaller size can actually make you more money because you can hold it longer. You can you can be more clear-minded and not be freaked out. Because if you're scared, it means you you you went in too big.

You know, it's like if you get shaken out, it means you went too big. So you have to find the right balance of size. Cause a lot of times like if you if you were smaller, you wouldn't have been shaken out. Cause you're like, okay, I still with my plan. I'm not gonna go broke. But if you if you size it way too big, any little deviant. Yeah. So I mean here we've kind of talked about

How to get the confidence after a losing streak and how to keep a level head when you've got a streak of of winners as well. What about when you realize that you're just not trading as well as you normally would. You're not trading at your best. Um you're just sort of

Um maybe out of sync with the market a little bit, like you just can't get a good gauge on what's going on and you're just not really getting anywhere. How do you deal with that? Yeah, I I mean I've I've gone through slumps a lot of times. The only thing you do is scale back your size. And stop stop thinking about how stupid or an idiot or you know, you Like when I trade I don't think about anything. I just think about trading. It becomes like a reflex for me.

The moment I start thinking about money, how I gotta pay bills or oh crap, what that that could have what that loss could have paid. Um I start doubting myself. When you start second guessing yourself like that is when you're just doomed, dude. Maybe you should just not even trade that day. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. Uh in order to trade comfortably, you have to get your personal life in order.

You know, so that's the key thing that uh listeners should understand too. It's like when when when your personal life is shit, your training is gonna be shit. And when you say personal life, like what sort of things are you talking about? Like your relationship, your your job, like Exactly, exactly. All that stuff.

You i it's like you're fighting with your freaking spouse, your girlfriend, and then you're out then you go back and you're pissed off and you're trading, it it's gonna affect your trade, right? Or when or or when even then like you don't have money.

If you don't have money to pay the bill, stop fucking trading. Get your life in order before you trade. Because if you have no money, it's like it's like entering a poker table and you're the shortest stack. You're gonna freaking lose. Those sharks are gonna kill you, right? So sometimes it's best to

come to um the battlefield with a gun. It's uh a minimum of a gun instead of a freaking knife. Some some of these guys they they tried so hard to trade. Like, oh I got four hundred bucks. What what the hell is four hundred dollars? The commission is like 20 bucks already. You're dead. You see what I'm saying? But it's okay if you understand that that's a tuition you pay to learn.

A lot of these guys are a lot of these guys like, I have a thousand bucks, bad. Let's make me rich. I'm gonna turn a thousand dollars into a million bucks. Bullshit. That thousand dollars is basically your tuition money, dude. You have to understand that it's gonna be learning, right? Don't fall for these uh furus. I call it so I coined this term long time ago. So you hear that around the internet? That's me. I coined it. Furu. F-U-R-U-R-U-R-U- You. It's basically a fake guru.

So you have to see all these guys selling shit and selling services. I'm the guru. I'm the guru. I'm selling you all this crap. And they they it's like, Oh, you know, I turn a million doll I turn a thousand dollars into two th like dude, I don't know how real or unreal it is, but

That's not realistic. That one guy may be able to do it, but you ain't gonna be able to do it. You know? That's funny. I was waiting for you to bring that up. Yeah. And so I mean, it's a basically simple rule of thumb, dude. If you have the secret formula

To make gold. Why the hell am I gonna sell it to you for a hundred bucks a month? I was I had the formula back then for for bullying boards, I had the formula to make gold. I you know, I knew the formula. I would never sell it for any price. You see what I'm saying? So it's like don't be conned by these guys. It's like they can't trade, therefore they they sell you this crap. And and so which way uh so I wanna say one thing really like uh I I tweeted something right before this thing. Um

They're they're asking like, oh, who are these life coaches? Oh, this guy's a life coach. He teaches people to be successful. I go on his page and he and he talks about how I used to be broke. Now I'm successful. So I I treat as a rema reminder to myself. If I ever become broke, I will sell a course on how to become successful rich.

That's pretty much what they do. It's like, um, I'm poor, so I'm gonna sell so don't be so I tell these students like don't don't fall for that stuff, man. Um so I I created a site called the training fish. It's uh M Rock Rules on Twitter and pretty much I I have like tons of tweets and I I it was my way to give back on teaching people the basics of training and uh how to be there. So MROC rules. So I so basically people teach people say what um maybe one day I'll do a course, but

You know, I'd rather do for free for now. If if I if I if if I ever win the lottery, I I would I would definitely do for free for everybody. For sure. And that's uh I I'd I definitely suggest anyone listening to this podcast right now to actually follow What is it? M at M Rock Rules and the rules is where the Z, right?

Yes, with a Z. But but it's on my page. It's on my uh all the information's on my Twitter page, Moderator underscore rock. So I I have that part. Yeah, yeah. A lot of good info. Um now just while we're still talking about psychology here. I know a big issue for a lot of traders is FOMO, fear of missing out. How do you suggest others try and combat?

This uh this fear of missing out. Don't worry, I still I still have that same exact problem. You'd never have that same problem. The fear of missing out. It it stems from greed. And uh greed and and envy.

'Cause I'm like, oh shit man, I don't want to miss out'cause my friend's gonna make hella money and then you still get your friend you see what I'm saying? So it's a all these questions are all personality questions. So like I tell people trading Only ha only a small part of training is mechanical.

I can teach anybody the mechanics of clicking the buy button, the sell button. But the problem you have later on is the is the mental aspect. When people blow up it's never because they don't know how to trade, it's because They broke a rule. They know they they they should not be adding to losers to infinity. They know that th th they just gotta take the loss. Or or they know that they shouldn't be entering something early because of FOMO.

So it's a lapse in discipline and so it's a mental thing. So when when when people ask these questions, the only person that can answer is yourself. It's like why are you entering it early? Because you because of what reasons. So for me is I have a lot of problem where so for me Uh an example would be like, oh man, I it it just sucks if I hear my friend or whoever make all this money and I didn't make it.

And I'm like, damn it man, I'm gonna suck. There's two ways I can look at like, damn, I'm an idiot. Or I'm smarter than this guy. How the hell he made more money than me? And so that's where all these problems come in. So then the next trader the next trade I'm gonna double up on my side. And then boom, you get hit. Or I'm gonna make sure I don't miss this trade. And then that's the fear of missing out and you get entered early and get crushed. So see it's all

psychology. So shut so the and shut everything out. So sometimes it's better not to fucking even go on to Twitter, to go online, don't talk to friends. Just concentrate on yourself. Don't need to ask people how much they make'cause that's only gonna affect your brain too.

Be happy with making what you're making. So imagine you're happy making a hundred bucks a day. You hear some your friends making five hundred bucks a day. That's gonna really screw your brain up and it'll throw your game off too, you know? And so so a lot of times it's like, dude, man, turn turn everything off. Just focus on yourself. And back back when I started, it was really helpful because they didn't have Twitter, didn't have anything like this.

And so I think that was another reason why I was successful. I was just basically in my own element, in my own zone and not have to worry about how much people are making or competing or talking.

Crap about you, you see what I'm saying? Were there any other traders who you did speak with frequently though when you were coming up as a trader? So I had a really good system, so I needed to teach someone a system. So I w there was I don't wanna really throw him his name out or anything, but uh he he did quite well. He made millions of dollars. So my system did work. What do you mean by he he made a system or or you made a system? Well I had a very good system of of of um

You know, after after a while. So that that's how I be I made money every single day. So basically I became very good at that one niche, right? And so I needed someone to help me find those stocks. So there's a certain criteria of stocks, certain pattern to look for when when you scan. So I've mastered, I could back then I could look at a stock and tell you with with like 85% certainty if it's going to go up or down.

based upon like certain certain um criteria. And so I I showed someone how to do this and so they found the stocks. So the more stocks you find, the more you can make, right? And so I I used to be I mean I would hold like 10 positions overnight. And each one would make me a bunch of money, and then it adds up, right? I don't need to make much. If we hold 10 positions overnight, each position makes 500 bucks. That's five grand just off the bat.

Five thousand every single day multiply three hundred days, that's a million bucks right there, right? Without having the trade. Okay, so there was no one when you were still kind of learning the ropes on on how to, you know, find your way as a trader, there was no one who you were kind of Um who you could speak to and ask for help and that sort of thing. I started so long ago. There were none of this stuff. So when I first started, there was this guy.

Stock gappers. And so it was in New York. He used to be my friend. And so we ran a chat room. So that's how I like got into it. He was doing it. I was doing so. I started doing it And so I guess, you know, we haven't really talked for a long time, but so that was the one person that started this whole thing, but he kind of disappeared. And I you know, so but but really n no. Uh

Uh there was no Twitter back then. There's no nothing, dude. So it was just er I just did it myself. There's there's a lot of people that um that I helped, like Nate. I've known him since he was like nineteen. There's a bunch of people in his chat room. Um

I was I was like the oldest guy though. So so I started all this stuff a long time ago. Sure. So I think what what w might be really beneficial for people who are listening to this podcast is if we can kind of I guess summarise some of what we've been talking about and kind of bring it all together um and and really drill down into the development, trader development side of things.

So, you know, if you had to start all over again, how would you do it? Like with hindsight on your side, what steps would you take? Like think about someone who might be listening to this podcast that'd been keen on trading for six months, twelve months, two years, whatever. Uh they're still in that I guess what you could classify as the beginner stage. What's where do they go? The the number one thing you should study is charts.

go to like stockcharts dot com or something. There's a bunch of like online reading how to how to read a chart stock. learning resistance and all that. To me, uh charting is the number one tool when you start out. If you know how if you know resistance and support and can draw a trend line Half of your problems are over. So ha so that's number one. Number two is determining what stocks to trade.

Um that's half of the half of the easy part of trading there. It's like there's a bunch of different stocks you can trade. It's like why choose one over the other? Um so So learning what I I can't really help. the only experience uh only through experience you can figure out like which stocks you should avoid and like

Choppy stocks with no trend should avoid. I I outlined a lot of this stuff on my pre-tip um rock rules as well. Um but basically so there's two things, right? You learn you have to learn to chart, dude. Um Figure out so you have to learn how to Do a scan. There's a bunch of free scans on on online you can look. Um and so based upon that you can look up the chart and see which stocks are smooth to trade and which one's just choppy and will fake you out. Um

People worry too much about level two and all that stuff. It's like over time you'll you'll figure it out. But uh charting is the most important thing. Learn and read a chart. Don't look at level two when you start out. Uh for bulletin boards, level two is very important. For Nasdaq, it's not as important. Charting is more important. Uh together they're v you you need both, but if you start out uh charting um and basically have some rules you print out you don't you don't break.

Rules are very important when you start out. It helps you from blowing up. You know, so um I I provide a lot of these rules on my my my free tip site too. And uh knowing the right broker to use'cause n it it sucks now because now there's a pattern day training rule. Um, you have to have 25,000 a day trade. My suggestion is if you don't have that, is to split up your money. I don't know how much money you have. Let's say you have five grand.

Instead of putting it into one account, you can put it into two accounts and so you have twice as many trades of uh uh A week, right? Um another thing would be until you get to over 25 grand, it's very hard to make money, man, because uh the fees will just kill you. The moment you make over 25 or get fifty grand in your account, you can open up Uh brokerages where the fees are pretty much free.

Like I get rebated for um for ECNs. Like every time I put an order out for ARCA, I get rebated. So basically if I get rebated, uh it's free. They pay me to trade. And then the commissions, so it offsets the commission. So basically in theory I can trade for free.

Uh whereas if you have a small account, it'll just nickel dime you dude to death. And then all the money you make is just gonna be paying commission and stuff. But like I said, when you when starting out with that small account, m you have to remember it's tuition. And so my su my suggestion, just like I did when I I started out trade trading, I didn't jump in, dude. I worked my ass off. I went to get a job. I saved. So these guys that wanna get started.

Nah dude you have to put in a lot of work before you even get to the point where you when you can open an account and be serious. So basically get your life in order. If you don't have a savings, why the hell are you training dude? You can you you can learn nothing wrong with learning But but get your life in order before you can do this. You you know, like have some savings, you see what I'm saying? Stuff like that. So so because that teaches you responsibility.

Versus if you have nothing going for yourself in your life and all you have is this training account, you're gonna treat it as gambling.'Cause you have nothing to lose. YOLO. You see what I'm saying? And so my advice to everybody is like, dude, go to school. I worked my I worked and traded at the same time. I had a job. You know? So you basically gotta get your life in order'cause I guarantee you don't have your life in order, your trading is gonna go down to two.

Now, this kinda I think this kind of leads on from that point and I think this is something that a lot of traders maybe struggle to get their head around and and think about and there might be a bit of a disconnect in some ways as well. How would you categorize the major milestones or stages between being a new trader and the level someone like yourself is playing at? Like, you know, someone who's made millions of dollars trading.

What are the milestones to get to that level? Like, what are the different stages? So um that's a very good question. So the first milestone is to understand the um all the terminology of trading. What is a buy order, what is a sell order. We laugh at that, but when I figured it all out, I was like, oh crap, that's a big milestone for me. Another milestone would be charting. Oh, I know I can see a resistance line and a support line. You know. So that's a very good point.

Like education, any formal education, you need to have milestones and meaning goals. Don't just say, I want to learn a trade. Well, that's like a million steps between there, right? And so put yourself miles on like today this I'm gonna learn how to how to learn uh support graphs. What's a resistance line? You see that? So charting and all that terminology and then uh learning my platform.

So I I'm an engineer, so like I over whenever I get a new platform, I I customize it, I tweak it, I look I know everything I think about it. And so that's another milestone. So so comfortable I can do anything as a flash, you know. Some people just, oh, all I know is buy and sell. No, dude, you need to go and play around with every single button. Cause that that'll teach you like all the all the stuff about stock.

And the next milestone would be um getting if you don't if you're not patterned day trader, get over pattern day trader. And and for me, uh a good gauge is this. I created a um an Excel calendar where every day I would put in uh my P and L. And green is r uh up, uh red is down. And so every day make yourself accountable, put it in. So your goal would be, I'm gonna try to get through this week without a single loss day.

You see what I'm saying? So that that was how I started doing the green the the green challenge streak I had. And so after that that's why I was like, dude, I hate it when I beep it was down. So I made sure I would close at the end of the day up all the time. So just being co conscious of that and gave myself a goal, I was like, Oh my god, I I have five days in a row of being green.

You know, that that that's a big accomplishment for some people, you know. Uh for a lot of people. So maybe that's something they could try to do. So once they get consistency, that's that's the ultimate goal of a day trader. It's not how much money you make, dude. It's being consistent. If you're consistent, you are making money. You know, it's not oh I my goal is to make a million bucks. No dude your goal is to be able to have five winning days in a row and the next day you lose

you only lose a day or two of work or or not even a day. Do you see what I'm saying? It's not gonna wipe out a year of your of your gains. So basically the m the ultimate goal is to be consistent. Yeah. I like how you highlight consistency as being something that's like just Extremely important. What tips and pointers do you have for someone to try and gain that consistency? Like, is there any key ingredients to that?

Once again it's your discipline and your rules. Print it out, stick it up somewhere. Um I bow this all the time. Uh I I I I I know I shouldn't be adding to a loser over and over, but I you know. And then so I implement a bunch of different things. One one thing would be um if you're up for a day

Take just eat the loss and not turn a winning day into losing day. That could be one of your rules you can have. You see what I'm saying? And then just walk away before you lose it all. Um another one could be max loss Like if I have five thousand, ten thousand dollars a day lost, don't don't don't trade anymore. So you have to you everybody's different. You you have to know your own

Like for me, I break all sorts of rules because I because I was able to get away with it in the past. Which which is also the problem when I transition to a new niche. You see what I'm saying? That's why I blew up like that, right? Um, so you have to have some sort of rules. So it's like if if I if I take my own advice, like I would have a hard stop at losing twenty grand, I wouldn't be losing$120,000 that one day. I will calm down, you know.

And so y you know yourself and so you have to place upon yourself these disciplines. Yeah. Now this is a question I ask quite frequently, um, as listeners will be well aware of. And I do like to ask this question, so I'm I'm really keen to hear how you answer it.

Why do you believe most traders never succeed? Because they treat it as gambling. There's a couple of things. One is they think it's gambling. YOLO They have no plan, no system. The stock is up a hundred percent. Why aren't you taking some off, dude? You see what I'm saying? YOLO. Um another thing is lack of preparation, lack of So th there's this whole reason I told you about the backstory and all this stuff it because

It's very important. You ha it i you have to be a responsible person, first of all. You have to be real you have to be respectful of money. If if if you're not if you treat this as gambling, you're not very respectful of your money and you're gonna lose your money. Um discipline. A lot of this once again comes with personality. See all is in your person it's not mechanics, not because you're stupid. You can be stupid and make make a kill in this industry.

It it's whoever has the most discipline and can stick to their game plan is the one that's gonna be successful.

No, that's really good. Well let's uh let's start to wind things down here. Just a couple of questions I'd like to ask you. I guess uh this one's kind of Outside of trading, is there anything you do outside of trading to, you know, grow your wealth or that you have interests in? Anything else you do, like do you do any longer term investing, do you do real estate?

What what is there anything which you're involved in besides trading? Yeah. That that reminds me of something very important as a uh as a trader in general and as also someone c up and coming. Get a network of friends that are traders. Uh gets get some that are mentors that are above, you know, and gets and more importantly, get some that's on your level so you can discuss. That's how things are going. Have a training partner, have a trading buddy.

Um I feel that is gonna speed up your success. Because if you if you have a buddy who's on your same level or whatever, both of you guys can work together to learn. Um But but but yeah out outside of it I my my in my opinion uh trading um Dude man, training's the hardest freaking industry in the world because

That's the only job I go I could work for a freaking entire day and and not only do I not make money, I have to give someone money. Even Mc guys like McDonald's will make more money. Even sleeping in will make money a lot of times, right? And so So when you have it, you gotta save it. So the so real estate is the is the best place to put your money, in my opinion. Um

Oh rent I I don't really want to talk about this stuff, but um rental incomes would be like the best thing to do. I I you know. But uh Okay. But the the mo mo the thing is save you money. All right, Bowell, w are there any final words of wisdom which you would like to leave us with? Is there anything you'd like to add or and to what we've already discussed? Um yeah. Take the mic. Slow and steady. Consistency is the number one thing. Um, you know, like don't don't don't get ahead of yourself.

Know yourself, discipline, something. Don't compare yourself with others. That's the worst thing you can do. You can see someone with a nice car. You know, and you and it's passionate. You have to make sure you want this for the right reasons. My passion was never about doing this to be rich, get a nice car, stuff like that. If you're doing that, do there's so many other things you can do to make money like this without jeopardizing um your fortune. Otherwise you're gonna lose. So

So be passionate. Passion is the number one thing. And be passionate for the right reasons, okay? Um for me, it was helping my family. Things like that, you know, and not just having fancy cars. And I think if you do that, karma will reward yourself and you work harder. You have you have a main driving reason.

'Cause if if your only passion is to to have a nice car and when things get tough, you're like, Oh screw it. I don't need that nice car. I'm cool with my Honda. You see what I'm saying? Versus I have to do this because my family's depending on me.

You see what I'm saying? There's a big difference. You cannot quit when your pent family is a parent, but you can quit when when your Honda is just good enough for you. I truly appreciate you coming on, man. This has been a lot of fun. Yeah. Thank you very much. Awesome, dude. Thanks, Aaron. You've reached the end of this episode of Chat with Traders, but rest assured there are more episodes. soon. if you'd leave a rating. with traders.