Saturday 11 October 2014

Soccer is (not) made for trading!

In the last seven days I made a profit of 324.51 Euro. Actually I should be happy, but I am not. How you can see at the printscreen below all the green came from soccer. What's wrong about it?


Football bets are a hobby for me, it's just gambling. There is no real system behind the profit. It's a bit of luck and game reading, nothing more. In my opinion it's almost impossible to make sustainable money with soccer. There are a lot of betting disadvantages. First of all the odds react abruptly. When a goal is scored, we see a huge movement. The referee has a big influence with (red) cards and penalties, which can affect the trade in a negative way. Beside there are less swings. Often the time clock is running against you (for example if you need a goal). In the end the liquidity not often reaches the level of big tennis matches. That's the reason why I am not really interested to become a soccer trader. I just bet it for having an additional excitement while watching a football match.

My target is still to become a tennis trader, but the figures are looking disappointing so far. Is it alarming? I can give an answer with two letters: No! First of all the sample is too small. Two or three good trades, and I will return in the green zone. Second I made some terrible mistakes, especially the Petkovic trade was weak. Beside the strategies are not yet at the final stage. Two or three bets I would win with the last corrections we made. Today's trade (Lopez) was a clear "no bet-situation", and I should not enter the market, at least not so early. I made the necessary corrections in the strategy guide. In comparison to the Petkovic trade I could reduce the loss with tighter money management.

In Switzerland an apprenticeship has normally a duration of three years. I have to compare it with a serious education, but without a teacher. It takes time, and the negative happenings will help to improve the strategies and my trading behavior. The financial figures are not the most important for the moment. When we continue with the hard work, the good results will come for sure. Perhaps it will take another half year or more, but the direction seems okay.

Next week we will start a serious controlling of the executed trades. At the moment it's just a reporting of the financial outcome and a small comment of the trade. In the future we will have exact numbers which strategy is the most successful and where we have to make adjustments.

14 comments:

  1. HI BRULATI

    I FOUND INTERESTING TENNIS TRADING BLOG http://www.betgreen.co.uk/blog/ AND WEBSITE http://www.quantbubble.com/.I HOPE IT GONE HELP YOU WITH YOU TRADING.
    AND ONE MORE YOU HAVE TO READ THE BOOK ''TRADING IN THE ZONE''. IT HELP WHIT YOU TRADING DISCIPLINE .
    GYTIS

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    1. Thanks, Gytis. I added Betgreen to the blog roll. I am following him already at facebook. It's quiet interesting. Quantbubble i took on the link list.

      I heard about this book. Sultan talked about it. I think I should buy it. Thanks for the tip! I will search it tomorrow.

      Regards, Brulati

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  2. hi Brulati...3yrs is a reasonable expectation time frame to become proficient. Its about the same time frame it took me to show a consistent profit on horse racing on the "fair" have a good journey along the way....enjoy..and remember it"s not life threatening....above all make it your dream don"t look for some one to "sell it to you....Tommy (australia)

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    1. Thanks! Yes I try to set realistic targets. My impatience cost me already 58'000 Euros with the scammer. Now I take my time. It's not the end of the world if I don't succeed, but I try my best.

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  3. I watch your print screen and I think must be some big problem with money management
    after giorgi petkovic match you did 5 trades with profit but you not even cover 40 % you loss from that match

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    1. Thank you for your feedback. Petkovic was a desastrous trade, I wrote about it. It was a lack of money management and wrong strategy. This issue is solved. Lopez vs. Nadal I traded the player instead of the market. At Murray vs. Ferrer I hoped for a late momentum change, it didn't happen. So the profit was not that big. Bouchard and Pliskova were scratches. If I would not do it, I would end in a loss.

      I am not really concerned about this printscreen. It needs time to improve and learn from the mistakes. You see a similar development at Sultan's blog. When I still make the same errors in half a year, then it will be alarming. At the moment everything is in the green zone.

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  4. What about simon -lopez match where was problem?

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  5. The entry was too early. It was a kind of newbie mistake. I should consider the starting price and not just laying an odd under 1.25. Staking was okay and money management too. A loss of -200 Euro is not a problem. There are just missing the good greens so far. Probably I have to do all the errors until the point I succeed.

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  6. Maybe you should do more tradings but with lower stakes that give better screening of your strategy

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    1. Thank you for your feedback, much appreciated!

      Stakes are already "low"... the money management is pretty tight. Most of the traders use stakes up to 2-3% of the bank. I don't go over 1%. In my opinion it's also important to trade with adequate amounts. Your behavior is different when you trade with "too low" stakes.

      Perhaps you think that I have to test the strategies (more). This stage we passed already (with backtesting and proofs from other traders) and there are only missing small adjustments. If I execute the trades in the correct way and there is no negative variance the greens will come. Now we had both together... The sample is not big enough to blame the results.

      You can't become a professional in three weeks, but you have to act like one to get the right mindset. I will read this book to improve more. For me it would not work with lower stakes, but every person is different.

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  7. i sold my 2nd house already and money need to arrive in bank within next 15 so please wait and in end of month i give back all in one time
    in fabio we trust
    see you in brussels or in davis cup final
    you dont know where you put your feet

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    1. That's great news. It seems that this year Xmas and birthday is on the same date: 30th October.

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  8. It could help you to read back your previous blog posts. You speak a couple of times about learning from mistakes and then in the next blog post you speak about a repetition of a mistake. It looks like at the moment you could gain more by eliminating the big losers than by working on the strategies. An added benefit of that is that it is way more costly when you have to learn about discipline once your betting amounts are larger. Now that your betting amounts are still relatively small, you should teach yourself discipline, so that you don't have to worry about it later on when your strategies are fully functional and you really want to go for solid profits.

    After reading the above it sounds quite negative and that's definitely not my intention. Just want to give my two cents about what's most important in trading in general. For myself, I just trade on tennis matches now and then as a hobby, while trading in financial markets is my job, and I am happy to say that although my strategies probably suck, I'm still having some small positive results, because the trading discipline is kind of second nature.

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    1. Thanks Rico for your honest feedback. I like it.

      Discipline is still a topic, but is not so bad like the readers think. I shouldn't post the profit+loss statement after ten days because the sample is not big enough. It gives a wrong overview. The losses (excluded Petkovic) are not the problem. Even Sultan was red after the first week of the new season...

      Everything is okay in comparison to the bank. The problem are the green trades. Bad variance and missing killer instinct destroyed three- or even one four digit-profit. When I would have one or two 200 Euro profits and one of 1'000 Euro nobody would talk about Petkovic and Lopez. I just wanted to be transparent, but it was the wrong time to go so deep in the financials.

      Nevertheless discipline is not my strongest skill. In other case I would not lose more than my limit (-250 Euro). I am sure that the book "trading in the zone" will help me. In general I would say that my discipline is on a level of 6 or 7 of 10. The figures and probably my comments sound like I am a 1 or 2. I don't see it as biggest issue. The bigger problem is the missing winner mentality and killer instinct. It's still more hoping on the right outcome instead of trading 100% the market. That's the reason for the missing big greens.

      I will wait with publishing my next figures to avoid wrong impressions. I will keep the transparency but I prefer a longer time frame. I mean to publish a four digit profit like Sultan and beside no numbers at all are a joke. Everybody should recognize at this point that something is smelly. I don't like to give this feeling, because a blog lives from honesty and discussion. You can only have it with facts. I just ask for a bit more time to reduce the (negative) variance I had at the new start.

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