When should I withdraw for monthly income?

[Drizzle_268 1]

Hey fellow traders.

Let's say someone starts with a 7-8K account, do you guys think it's a good idea to withdraw every month or keep growing the account? My goal is to withdraw once there is a profit so I can live of trading options.

My main concern is if an account has only 7-8K and one withdraws every month, and they get a losing trade of 14-18% wouldn't that affect the total account and reduce the chances of making more income in the other months?

Please correct me if I am wrong and what advice can you offer?

Thanks!

[Ringandpinion 1,657]

You're right about the withdrawals and such but you've put the cart before the horse.  Learn to trade, get consistent, see how much profit/loss you can make consistently, then think about what you might be able to do with that source of income.  What you are saying is that you intend to start making a living as a mechanical engineer.  I don't want to shoot you down but it'll take you a while to learn the skill/trade/art of trading, just like being an engineer or nurse or business manager.  And not just a couple of months.

[Drizzle_268 1]

15 minutes ago, Ringandpinion said:

You're right about the withdrawals and such but you've put the cart before the horse.  Learn to trade, get consistent, see how much profit/loss you can make consistently, then think about what you might be able to do with that source of income.  What you are saying is that you intend to start making a living as a mechanical engineer.  I don't want to shoot you down but it'll take you a while to learn the skill/trade/art of trading, just like being an engineer or nurse or business manager.  And not just a couple of months.

Your 100% right! The reason why I asked is because I was just curious and wanted to know exactly what I would do because I like to plan out things. 
 

Thanks for the response!

[Ringandpinion 1,657]

@Drizzle_268 I was thinking about this further after my reply.  I was exactly where you are many years ago.  Fortunately, I quickly realized that I could make better money in a much more financially responsible way, continue plying my trade.  I went to an options class and a couple of follow ups just on a lark in the 90's.  At first I bought the whole line, we are talking about the dot com 90's, all you needed to make money was a pulse, or so I was told.  I realized it would take a lot more for me to do it without just making it a gamble.  So I played with options off and on for 20 years, making a little money and learning a little but continuing to work full time.

 

My point is that if you believe that this is something you can do with a couple of months hard training, it will put immense pressure on you psychologically, as it did me.  That's why I dropped it so quickly, I was not about to embark on the learning path in a way that already had me tied up in knots.  It was 20 more years before I retired early and applied myself to options trading full time.  It doesn't matter how good at options trading you are, if you have that huge load of psychological pressure, you are going to screw it up.  Just my 2 cents. 

 

The last 3 years, learning and applying it full time has been fun, especially the last 1.5 years with SO.

[Drizzle_268 1]

4 minutes ago, Ringandpinion said:

@Drizzle_268 I was thinking about this further after my reply.  I was exactly where you are many years ago.  Fortunately, I quickly realized that I could make better money in a much more financially responsible way, continue plying my trade.  I went to an options class and a couple of follow ups just on a lark in the 90's.  At first I bought the whole line, we are talking about the dot com 90's, all you needed to make money was a pulse, or so I was told.  I realized it would take a lot more for me to do it without just making it a gamble.  So I played with options off and on for 20 years, making a little money and learning a little but continuing to work full time.

 

My point is that if you believe that this is something you can do with a couple of months hard training, it will put immense pressure on you psychologically, as it did me.  That's why I dropped it so quickly, I was not about to embark on the learning path in a way that already had me tied up in knots.  It was 20 more years before I retired early and applied myself to options trading full time.  It doesn't matter how good at options trading you are, if you have that huge load of psychological pressure, you are going to screw it up.  Just my 2 cents. 

 

The last 3 years, learning and applying it full time has been fun, especially the last 1.5 years with SO.

Thank you so much for your input!

I am thinking of giving myself around 3 to 4 years before I can make any money or become consistently profitable, currently I have my own businesses and that’s what’s brings me income.

I have a lot of time my hands and I don’t mind using it to learn options trading.

 

 

[Ringandpinion 1,657]

1 minute ago, Drizzle_268 said:

I have a lot of time my hands and I don’t mind using it to learn options trading. 

You are clearly better at running a business that I was, I barely had time to breathe.  Be careful what you wish for, LoL, it grew and I became a desk bound administrator.  When I sold it, the relief was so great it is hard to describe, I was about ready to take a long walk off a short pier.  I miss having a dog in the fight and taking all my aggression out on getting more work and completing what we had, but not enough to make me ever want to try again.

[Kim 7,943]

On 10/14/2021 at 7:36 AM, Drizzle_268 said:

Hey fellow traders.

Let's say someone starts with a 7-8K account, do you guys think it's a good idea to withdraw every month or keep growing the account? My goal is to withdraw once there is a profit so I can live of trading options.

My main concern is if an account has only 7-8K and one withdraws every month, and they get a losing trade of 14-18% wouldn't that affect the total account and reduce the chances of making more income in the other months?

Please correct me if I am wrong and what advice can you offer?

Thanks!

You want to start with 7-8k, withdraw every month and live of those profits? Am I reading this right? Even if you make 100% per year (which would put you among the best traders in the world), that's $7-8k of "income" per year.

On a related note, the whole concept of trading options for income is wrong. I recommend reading Debunking The "Trading Options For Income" Myth

As others mentioned, the first goal of every novice trader should be learning. Profits will come if you are dedicated and willing to learn. But you are right, 3-4 years is a reasonable timeframe to give yourself, similar to University degree.

 

[gf58 771]

To build on Ringandpinion and Kims points, the other danger that an income plan builds in is psychological: you need to trade to made an income.

 

In practice youll have some good months where you print money (Last years Peloton ratio trades) and other months when there just arent as compelling opportunities. Being forced to take a trade for income reasons forces you to take more risk than you nessesarily want to which makes the p&l hurt more than it should. Being able to not trade for income and take only the trades that you want is a much more psychologically healthy space and one which is much less likely to lead to burn out.

[TrustyJules 3,212]

On 10/14/2021 at 1:36 PM, Drizzle_268 said:

Hey fellow traders.

Let's say someone starts with a 7-8K account, do you guys think it's a good idea to withdraw every month or keep growing the account? My goal is to withdraw once there is a profit so I can live of trading options.

My main concern is if an account has only 7-8K and one withdraws every month, and they get a losing trade of 14-18% wouldn't that affect the total account and reduce the chances of making more income in the other months?

Please correct me if I am wrong and what advice can you offer?

Thanks! 

As @Ringandpinion mentioned for me as well its easier to earn money the old fashioned way however in future I intend to use trading as a supplement to income. Considering when to withdraw is a good question and for the moment my approach would be to withdraw at the beginning of the year what you need for the full year. Mind you my conclusion is arrived at on the basis that I intend my capital to be large enough to stretch to the far future despite repeated withdrawals. The income from trading just pushing back that date somewhat or creating some additional buffers for whatever purpose.

The thinking behind it is that it makes for a clean start to the year. Rather than saying I need to make (e.g.) 50K trading, it says I am starting the year with (e.g.) 500K and aiming e.g. 8% a year and hope for a bumper one every now and then and above all avoid catastrophic losses. Then at the end of the year you have whatever you made (or lost) dock 50K from it and start again. This removes the psychological mania - which is powerful in all of us - to trade for trading sake. This impulse is much harder to control than people think - like @Ringandpinion stated it takes some time to get used to trading. Even now I can see that some types of trades I do are more consistently profitable than others and yet I find it hard to disregard the ones which are going south more often.

If you are in addition under pressure of having to make the end of month to meet bills, you will start taking risks that should be avoided. In plain words: trading with money you cannot afford to lose whereas you must NEVER trade with money you cannot afford to lose. In the approach above it is of course not excluded that the principal will be lost but because the money for the year is set aside, you can always go 'back to pa's gas station' and earn money the old fashioned way if you see that come to pass.

[Ringandpinion 1,657]

This morning is a good time to mention the options trading version of the Darwin Awards.  I have a straddle that should have been closed yesterday, I noted it on my initial review first thing in the morning but didn't close right then because it met some of my criteria for holding it through earnings.  Holding through earnings is not something I do very often, but I figured I could come back to it before the end of the day.  Yeah, right.  I forgot.  This morning I'm almost certainly going to get a $2k fat lip, at least, hopefully I'll keep all my teeth.  I would be really pissed at myself if I couldn't afford to lose that money, so mad that I certainly wouldn't be trading right.  Said mistake would probably have induced several other mistakes and on and on.  Sometimes I think psychology is the single most important aspect of trading.  I'm still not amused about my mistake, but I can live with it.

 

On another theme, maybe we should create the SISP "Award of Excellence" for trades like this morning's blunder.  We could even offer a certificate.  I'm sure I would be able to paper an "I love me" wall with them in a year.

[Tablegreens 14]

Thanks for the insights on setting profit targets on some defined timeframe (weekly, monthly) as this is one psychological area i struggle with.  i have set such targets and the stress and pressure isn't healthy capital and health wise when the target goes in and out of realistic territory as mr market does not behave according to my wishes at all times.  i find that backing off/lowering % return or target is much easier psychologically and allows me to pass on trades that don't fit my criteria but might have taken if i was looking to reach a certain % return.  my general approach is to build a big nut such that a small % return can cover bills and expenses and anything above would be gravy, that might be 3-50 years away but learning all the way in between and the supplemental income will be easy at that point.

I will say that without much of a target % return set, this recent sep/oct swoon i didn't break a sweat riding through it and found opportunities as they came about.  I like that much better

[Drizzle_268 1]

On 10/19/2021 at 4:48 AM, TrustyJules said:

As @Ringandpinion mentioned for me as well its easier to earn money the old fashioned way however in future I intend to use trading as a supplement to income. Considering when to withdraw is a good question and for the moment my approach would be to withdraw at the beginning of the year what you need for the full year. Mind you my conclusion is arrived at on the basis that I intend my capital to be large enough to stretch to the far future despite repeated withdrawals. The income from trading just pushing back that date somewhat or creating some additional buffers for whatever purpose.

The thinking behind it is that it makes for a clean start to the year. Rather than saying I need to make (e.g.) 50K trading, it says I am starting the year with (e.g.) 500K and aiming e.g. 8% a year and hope for a bumper one every now and then and above all avoid catastrophic losses. Then at the end of the year you have whatever you made (or lost) dock 50K from it and start again. This removes the psychological mania - which is powerful in all of us - to trade for trading sake. This impulse is much harder to control than people think - like @Ringandpinion stated it takes some time to get used to trading. Even now I can see that some types of trades I do are more consistently profitable than others and yet I find it hard to disregard the ones which are going south more often.

If you are in addition under pressure of having to make the end of month to meet bills, you will start taking risks that should be avoided. In plain words: trading with money you cannot afford to lose whereas you must NEVER trade with money you cannot afford to lose. In the approach above it is of course not excluded that the principal will be lost but because the money for the year is set aside, you can always go 'back to pa's gas station' and earn money the old fashioned way if you see that come to pass.

THANKS FOR THE GREAT ANSWER!!!!!

[Bablosik 1]

You're rushing things a little. A novice trader needs to practice a lot to learn how to use the tools of various platforms. In addition, you should have a fine sense of the financial market.

[Drizzle_268 1]

23 minutes ago, Bablosik said:

You're rushing things a little. A novice trader needs to practice a lot to learn how to use the tools of various platforms. In addition, you should have a fine sense of the financial market.

Thanks for the comment! I agree I was rushing into it with the wrong mindset. Thanks for the comments here I’ve changed my mindset … I am implementing the basics, starting next month. I am giving myself 2-3 years to learn.

[BraxtonPratt 0]

Hi there, guys. Sorry for reviving such an old thread, but I need your help. I've lost my job, so I'm currently looking for a new way of making money. I used to work as a sales manager, but I couldn't l handle that extreme pressure... So, I'm open to any of your suggestions, even if it's a card game. I need money.

[Ringandpinion 1,657]

1 hour ago, BraxtonPratt said:

Hi there, guys. Sorry for reviving such an old thread, but I need your help. I've lost my job, so I'm currently looking for a new way of making money. I used to work as a sales manager, but I couldn't l handle that extreme pressure... So, I'm open to any of your suggestions, even if it's a card game. I need money.

Rather than repeat what is posted above, I'm going to suggest you read it.  If you need money, then you don't have enough to lose and trading will just take what little you have left, a card game is even worse.  But it has been my experience that people that are desperate for money and even mildly consider a card game as a solution, have to run completely out before coming to their senses.  I wish you good luck, go find another job.  Note:  If you can't stand the pressure of being a sales manager, options trading or any trading is not for you.