Why Do Most People Fail At Retail Trading?

[borzy]

Well, the biggest shift for me on hfm was fixing risk to 1R, pre-writing exits, and journaling every trade - edge shows up only when execution gets boring and consistent

 

[MustardHaven]

I think a big reason most people fail is the expectation of overnight success. They treat it like a lottery ticket instead of a skill, so they overtrade, risk too much, and quit the first time things don’t go their way. Real progress is boring and slow: solid risk control, patience, and sticking to one approach long enough to actually learn it.

 

[Amphibology]

Apart from impatience and greed, the failure is usually not having a real process. Most people never define a simple edge, they don’t track results properly, and they change the rules after every loss, so nothing ever has a chance to work. The biggest shift for me was treating it like training: small risk, fewer trades, and reviewing what I did instead of what I “felt.”