Why do they do it?

Not at all.

Now I have thought about it, I can see why the timeframe would not matter. Extreme events occur over all timeframes. Just took me a little time to get there.

I've just read one of the most popular threads on this forum (I couldn't help noticing most of the followers being new members).

The vendor sold them the system few months ago. As I understood, after him selling the first system (it was not performing according to the expectations), he introduced new improved version (and presumably took some money for that version as well). At the beginning he was posting regularly and now he hasn't posted for some time.

The followers already parted with their money (not much, but never than less every little helps the vendor) and they are following the system which is not making money. Now they are having thoughts along these lines: it's been bad for 2 months only - give it some more time to get realistic idea etc.

What can one conclude from this experience? First thought that comes to my mind is the vendor is good at using people's greed and maybe not that good at trading.

It's sad to see all that new traders enthusiasm being abused on a massive scale.

Clearly if a vendor is chopping and changing systems every two minutes then theres something not quite right

I was reading a thread yesterday in which a bunch of new members where complaining about a system. The desiger of that system had lost 120 pips during the month of January, and they therefore concluded that this service was a SCAM (and they are probably right in this case).

However, If we assume that the system goes on to make 2000 pips over the next 12 months, we are looking at 5% drawdown. If the vendor loses a similar amount in february, thats only a 10% drawdown.

These dunces have expectations that are completely unrealistic. Its funny, but its sad too, and until they remove themselves from the sorts of environment that constantly fills their heads with nonsense about making 100 pips a day, they'll continue to lose simply because they dont actually understand what it means to win.

Isn't this just a reflection of one of the beginners' biggest hurdles they have to overcome: the determination to cut losses? My trading improved enormously once I accepted (and put in to practice) that there's no future in throwing good money after bad & to get out of a trade as soon as it's evident that it's going nowhere.

Indeed - the only difference is whether you do that before you enter of afterwards.

All I can say about Phantom in this respect is - he's entitled to his opinion.

Good book though, right?

Scaling out helps immensly in day trading. Psychologically it is of benefit because you get to book some profits early. Then you can peel off some more as you get to the next major hurdle and then sit on the rest (or 4 or 5 scale outs) for a pressure free larger move. If you always shoot for the moon all in, all out, you'll be stopped out all the time. Conversely, if you always shoot for the nearest target, you'll be chipping away with tiddlers.

Of course, each to his own.

I'm looking at an account statement that disagrees.