Replicating other people´s trades - a viable strategy for the noob?

[n0vice]

Take this guy, for instance, who claims that you can "make money" by using his service:
Don Harrold's Premium Stock and Money-Making Services
YouTube - donharrold's Channel

Is there anyone on these boards who have tried out this guy´s "live stock trading room" and can give me an estimate of the returns you can expect by simply following his advice?

My thinking goes like this, if you are fairly new to the trading game why not simply be "passive" and let others do all the work for you? Why not just sit home all day and do whatever some "genius" thinks is best? If it works it works right?
A major question that pops into my mind is what kind of annual return a noob could "easily" make by simply following other people´s instructions.

So I´m wondering if anyone has experience with these kinds of trading services and can tell me if they are really any good or not. And if they are, why don´t "everyone" simply quit their job and make money off their capital base by trading from home instead?

All information and opinions on this subject would be greatly appreciated.

 

[rharmelink]

You could check out collective2.com -- a collection of various strategies that people have to offer for subscription. And the website keeps track of their strategies.

Be wary -- some are based entirely on backtested results and go to pieces in live trading.

 

[n0vice]

Thank you for the link, rharmelink. It looks interesting. Do you have any personal experience with using any of the systems on that site? Are they any good? Typically, just how hypothetical are the "hypothetical returns" presented for the various systems?
If one used various systems with automatic trading, could that help to reduce over all risk?
How much of an annual return can one realistically expect to make by using some of the systems on that site?

I appreciate your input

 

[rharmelink]

I have no personal experience with using any of the methods at Collective2. I think most of your questions can be answered by the FAQs and help screens at Collective2.

But at least you have some documented history to go on, since collective2 does it independently of the designers. Too often, I've seen investment websites post-edit their performance results, to make the performance look better than it is.

Another excellent source, which is hurting on its current trade:

Decision Moose

But the signals have been live for some time. The main issue is that signals are given over the weekend, but historic returns are based on Friday closing prices.

 

[n0vice]

Thanks for your replies, rharmelink. If anyone on the boards have any personal experience with using systems or any other kind of "passive" trading (i.e. replicating other people´s "tips/decisions) please share them here.
I am very much interested in what is a realistic annual return if one uses different "promising" systems or other ways of trading to increase the size of one´s portfolio. I figure that if you started out with 500 000 dollars and managed an after-tax/after-inflation annual return of 15% for 15 consecutive years you could end up with over 4 million dollars after just 15 years, which should be more than enough to never even have to worry about trading or working for a living ever again. I suppose 15% annual return after tax and inflation would translate into more or less a nominal annual return of around 25%. Question is, is this doable/realistic for a person who doesn´t really know how to trade on his own but who has the time to follow whatever advice the "professionals" have to offer at a given time?