The need to be right VS the need to make money

[BSD]

I don't agree with everything he says, but Brett Steenbarger does get more right than wrong, and this is another post of his that hits the nail on the head:


"Over the last few days, I've had the opportunity to talk with everyday investors as well as my usual contacts with prop traders and portfolio managers. One of the distinguishing themes in these talks has been stubbornness versus flexibility: the willingness and ability to maneuver and adapt to changing market conditions versus the need to stick with positions and be proven correct.

Among the traders, the ones who have done well in the recent market decline are those who have been selective in their risk exposure, riding short-term market moves, limiting overnight headline risk, and shifting positions tactically to adjust to volatile conditions. They have focused on making money--and limiting loss of capital. They've been quick to recognize when they're wrong, at times getting stopped out once, twice, three times before finally riding the anticipated market move.

The traders who have performed most poorly are those that have been stubborn. They have had strong views of markets and have stuck with those views, even in the face of markets that have moved against them. Convinced that markets are overdue for reversal, they have faced large losses as weakness has led to further weakness. They have been more concerned about being right than making money; they've been reluctant to be stopped out, instead waiting for markets to validate their opinions.

Interestingly, I'm seeing the same dynamics among individual investors. Some have made proactive adjustments to their portfolios to reduce risk, including reducing exposure to vulnerable investments (financial stocks, preferred shares, high yield bonds); some are also revising their views of the financial future, looking for themes and sectors that will benefit in a changed economic environment (firms that generate cash and are less reliant on borrowing; firms that appeal to consumer value rather than luxury; safe yields among beaten down bonds). Other investors are frozen, immersed in hope that "things will come back". They remind me of the dot-com investors who, stunned by losses of 50% in their holdings, insisted that a bottom was at hand. Sadly, many of these shares declined by more than 75% before we saw a durable market bottom--and many of those companies never survived the decline.

This is one of the paradoxes of trading and investing: you need distinct views to put your money at risk, and you need to persist with these views in order to ride winners. At the same time, you can't become married to these views; you need to quickly revise and even abandon your outlooks in order to limit losses. We can trade and invest for ego needs, and we can trade and invest to make money: over the long haul, we can't do both. It takes a strong ego to formulate and act upon one's ideas; an even stronger one to step back from those ideas in the face of non-confirmation."

LINK:
TraderFeed: The Need To Be Right Versus The Need To Make Money

Also keeping in mind his observation from working with top traders that:

Brett Steenbarger:

"...As a rule, maximizing batting average/minimizing drawdown comes at the cost of lowering overall system profitability...."



-Richard Dennis former Turtles partner William Eckhardt corroborated that in Market Wizards:

William Eckhardt:

The Win/Loss Ratio
“One common adage on this subject that is completely wrongheaded is: You can’t go broke taking profits. That’s precisely how many traders do go broke. While amateurs go broke by taking large losses, professionals go broke by taking small profits. The problem in a nutshell is that human nature does not operate to maximize gain but rather to maximize the chance of a gain. The desire to maximize the number of winning trades (or minimize the number of losing trades) works against the trader. The success rate of trades is the least important performance statistic and may even be inversely related to performance. …

What really matters is the long-run distributions of outcomes from your trading techniques, systems, and procedures. But, psychologically, what seems of paramount importance is whether the positions that you have right now are going to work. Current positions seem to be crucial beyond any statistical justification. It’s quite tempting to bend your rules to make your current trades work, assuming that the favorability of your long-term statistics will take care of future profitability. Two of the cardinal sins of trading - giving losses too much rope and taking profits prematurely - are both attempts to make current positions more likely to succeed, to the severe detriment of long-term performance.
Market Wizards



-Billionaire hedge fund manager Bruce Kovner:

Michael Marcus taught me one other thing that is absolutely critical: You have to be willing to make mistakes regularly; there is nothing wrong with it. Michael taught me about making your best judgment, being wrong, making your next best judgment, being wrong, making your third best judgment, and then doubling your money.

Whenever I enter a position, I have a predetermined stop. That is the only way I can sleep. I know where I'm getting out before I get in. The position size on a trade is determined by the stop, and the stop is determined on a technical basis. I never think about other people who may be using the same stop, because the market shouldn't go there if I am right.
Market Wizards



- Richard Dennis (Turtles daddy, who turned 400 bucks into several hundred million):

When things go bad, traders shouldn't stick their head in the sand and just hope it gets better.

You should always have a worst-case point. The only choice should be to get out quicker.

The worst mistake a trader can make is to miss a major profit opportunity. 95 percent of profits come from only 5 percent of the trades.



- Bill Lipschutz (Biggest earning earning trader for many years at the then investment bank Salomon Brothers before he started his own hedge fund):

I don't have a problem letting my profits run, which many traders do. You have to be able to let your profits run. I don't think you can consistently be a winner trading if you're banking on being right more than 50 percent of the time. You have to figure out how to make money by being right only 20 to 30 percent of the time."
New Market Wizards



An observation echoed by Kenneth Grant, who in "Trading Risk: Enhanced Profitability through Risk Control", depicts his experience as risk manager for some of the best and most successful hedge funds, amongst others Paul Tudor Jones funds and Steve Cohens SAC Capital, that:

Across all market conditions, trading styles, time frames and traders, one rule holds true:

10% of all trades inevitably account for 90% of profits !




- George Soros:

I don't care when I'm wrong. I cut my losses and move on to the next opportunity. Trading is not about being right, it's about how much you make when you are right.



That is not to say that high hit rate doesn't work, it does with low risk/reward ratios, it is just not as net profitable and not scalable / compoundable.

What does not exist however is high hit rate AND high risk/reward ratio, what does not exist is the guy who is right 70% of the time AND has a reward on average 3 times his losses, at least not in the real world of real track records.

Such a person would become the richest person in the world within a very short time frame, but that guy is a buy and holder instead.

 

[wasp]

The need to be right VS the need to make money

Which do you (anyone here) think is more important?

Just because it is written, does not make it so ........

IMO, through experience and time, skill and the need to be right is more important. Not from an ego based POV but I think, the more one understands the process, and more understands the market, the more context and reasoning is behind cutting losses and/or running winners.

Sure, one can win money over the long run with the most feeble of strategies but I'd rather understand my processes (and the market participants) rather than 'cut my losses' and move on with blissful ignorance.

Making money becomes a by product of the much more important skill of being right more than one is wrong.

The need to be right isn't 'doing a Spanish' and holding positions and not taking losses, but rather cutting those losses due to a change in market conditions which you understand and therefore are right, to change your viewpoint.

 

[BSD]

Good point mate, but as for me I don't believe in understanding markets any more than I believe in understanding sleep.

(And science doesn't have a clue about sleep either yet btw.)

To me both simply are.

To me a market is just the sum of the actions of it's participants that all have their totally own agendas and ways of doing business as traders and / or hedgers, and hence not anything eminently understandable, as at any point absolutely anything can and will happen that is simply the result of buyers being stronger than sellers at the moment, or of sellers being stronger than buyers at the moment, or of both sides being roughly equally strong at th emoment, and just because my analysis of price or indicators or indicators suggest that price should rise / fall / stall right about now, all it takes is Mr. Soros taking an opposing view and putting money after that to blow my trade straight off in the opposing direction, never mind my clever analysis.

To me net profitable trading is based on the same principles casinos or insurance firms make their money on, on the understanding that one does not need to know what happens next in every individual case, that a slight edge over time is all that is necessary, that we are making money in what is simply a probability game.

 

[Adamus]

That is not to say that high hit rate doesn't work, it does with low risk/reward ratios, it is just not as net profitable and not scalable / compoundable.

Not quite sure I follow you there. From my way of looking at it, your biggest loss defines how scalable your system is. If you have a low hit rate where one or two trades out of ten make huge profits, I don't believe it's any more scalable than a high hit rate with lower profits.

The amount you can reasonably leverage your position depends on the size of the loss you expect to make. And if you can't leverage, you can't scale.

Or do you mean something else?

 

[foredog]

To me net profitable trading is based on the same principles casinos or insurance firms make their money on, on the understanding that one does not need to know what happens next in every individual case, that a slight edge over time is all that is necessary, that we are making money in what is simply a probability game.[/QUOTE]


Very true, the only problem is getting your head around it.

It's easy on paper but when you've put on two or three losing trades in a row then there can be that internal struggle to put on a fourth even though that could be your best trade ever.

 

[Bladerunner]

own observation

The need to be right VS the need to make money

Which do you (anyone here) think is more important?

Just because it is written, does not make it so ........

IMO, through experience and time, skill and the need to be right is more important. Not from an ego based POV but I think, the more one understands the process, and more understands the market, the more context and reasoning is behind cutting losses and/or running winners.

Sure, one can win money over the long run with the most feeble of strategies but I'd rather understand my processes (and the market participants) rather than 'cut my losses' and move on with blissful ignorance.

Making money becomes a by product of the much more important skill of being right more than one is wrong.

The need to be right isn't 'doing a Spanish' and holding positions and not taking losses, but rather cutting those losses due to a change in market conditions which you understand and therefore are right, to change your viewpoint.

good few posts

own observation

by not taking the loss and understanding why you are required to at a particular time no matter what that other little chap says who is sat on your other shoulder


=

missed opportunity every time and always better to really wind you up

I prefer shorter timeframe runs and most of my actual trading intra day, even in this timeframe (5min entry) it makes no sense to second guess the market and hold a loser for an extra tick hoping for a better price to close at.

one big bar against you even 1 in 20 really matters in the long run


just for you for markus

Babe Ruth & Accuracy
MICHAEL COVEL (February 16, 2005)
Babe Ruth and Home Runs
What Does This Mean for Your Trading?

Winning percentage in your trading: Does it really matter? Did you know that Trend Followers win on average 40% of the time?
George Herman Ruth, hero of New York, hero of baseball and arguably one of the greatest sports legends of all time, will always be known for his home runs. But he had another habit that isn't talked about much: striking out a lot. In fact, with a lifetime batting average of .342, the Babe spent almost two thirds of his time trudging back to the dugout. From a pure numbers perspective, he saw more failure at the plate than success. But when he got a piece of one, well?it was enough to give any pitcher nightmares. There's a reason why Ruthian is still a well known adjective in sports writing, conveying the awe and power of a grand slam in the bottom of the ninth.
Ruth understood full well that the hits help a whole lot more than the strikeouts hurt. He gave his philosophy in a nutshell with these words: Every strike brings me closer to the next home run. And when reporters asked him how he dealt with the occasional slump, he replied: I just keep goin' up there and keep swingin' at 'em.
The lesson for traders is this: if you have realistic confidence in your method and yourself, then temporary setbacks don't matter, because you will come out ahead in the long run.
To further illustrate the point, consider a modern day example: the blue collar joe v. the entrepreneur. The blue collar joe is paid the same lump sum every two weeks like clockwork (with the occasional miniscule raise paced to keep up with inflation). In terms of winning percentage, blue collar is king: his ratio of hours worked to hours paid is one to one, a perfect 100%. He has a steady job and a steady life. Of course, the security he feels is something of an illusion - his paycheck comes at the whim of his local economy, his industry, and even the foreman of his plant. And the pay isn't exactly impressive. It gives him a solid, livable life- but not much more.
In contrast, consider the entrepreneur. His paydays are wildly irregular. He frequently goes for months, sometimes years, without seeing tangible reward for his sweat and toil. His winning percentage is, in a word, pathetic. For every ten big ideas he has, seven of them wind up in the circular file. Of the remaining three, two of those fizzle out within a year - another big chunk of time, money and effort down the drain. But we can't feel too sorry for the poor entrepreneur who spends so much time losing. He has a passion for life, he controls his own destiny and that last idea paid him off with an eight figure check.
The irrelevance of winning percentage is nicely summed up by another legend named George (Soros): it doesn't matter how often you are right or wrong - it only matters how much you make when you are right, versus how much you lose when you are wrong.


latter all

have a good weekend all :clover:


Andy

 

[BSD]

Great stuff Andy.

You have a great weekend too

Sure, one can win money over the long run with the most feeble of strategies but I'd rather understand my processes (and the market participants) rather than 'cut my losses' and move on with blissful ignorance.

To get a bit more concrete, my understanding is that markets move in waves or cycles or trends or whatever one chooses to call them that are based on humans tendencies to, since the start of time right up till this moment, move from irrational euphoria to irrational panic and right back again in an eternal vicious cycle of emotions running wild, and this human tendency is simply mirrored in the way price prints its endless waves.

Now, all I try and do is wait for a new wave to form. Andy our surfer will probably agree that not all waves are created equal, so many a time one will hop on hoping for a good ride only to be rudely thrown off again because the wet elements had different plans at the time, and the same happens to me in my trading, it looks like a good new wave up, it feels like a good new wave up, it talks like a good new wave up, but then...

what happens then...

what happens then...

Mr. Soros appears on the scene again and enters an opposing order to mine without asking me first, and what happens to me ?

?

I crash right off my lovely wave that jumped like a whale but landed like a clown fish and have to go paddling out waiting for the next one to be a biggie.

Or the one after that.

The only way I can ride a big wave for the duration is by ignoring a lot of the chatter, mumbling, and general goings-on during the ride, by sitting through wiggles and other retracements all attempting to derail my attempt to ride the wave for all it's worth.

That said, in stormy times like these - Choppiest environment in 50 years ! - I admittedly hold out for getting out far earlier than I usually would, by only trying to have some fun at the beginning of the ride, and then hopping off with what I got.

But I never lose sight of what Mr. Livermore taught me very early on:

“I think it was a long step forward in my trading education when I realized at last that when old Mr. Partridge kept on telling the other customers, “Well, you know this is a bull market!” he really meant to tell them that the big money was not in the individual fluctuations but in the main movements – that is, not in reading the tape but in sizing up the entire market and its trend.

And right here let me say one thing: After spending many years in Wall Street and after making and losing millions of dollars I want to tell you this: It never was my thinking that made the big money for me. It always was my sitting. Got that? My sitting tight! It is no trick at all to be right on the market. You always find lots of early bulls in bull markets and early bears in bear markets. I’ve known many men who were right at exactly the right time, and began buying and selling stocks when prices were at the very level which should show the greatest profit. And their experience invariably matched mine – that is, they made no real money out of it. Men who can both be right and sit tight are uncommon. I found it one of the hardest things to learn. But it is only after a stock operator has firmly grasped this that he can make big money. It is literally true that millions come easier to a trader after he knows how to trade than hundreds did in the days of his ignorance.

Disregarding the big swing and trying to jump in and out was fatal to me. Nobody can catch all the fluctuations. In a bull market your game is to buy and hold until you believe that the bull market is near its end. To do this you must study general conditions and not tips or special factors affecting individual stocks.”
Reminiscences of a Stock Operator

That book is pretty much all anybody who wants to start trading really needs to make it big, definitely still my absolute favourite !

And what a character, what a character, he certainly not only knew how to print money, but he also liked girls, and he knew how to have fun !

 

[BSD]

Not quite sure I follow you there. From my way of looking at it, your biggest loss defines how scalable your system is. If you have a low hit rate where one or two trades out of ten make huge profits, I don't believe it's any more scalable than a high hit rate with lower profits.

Adam, what I meant was that the higher the hit rate, the smaller the profit per trade is, where at the highest spectrum you have scalpers with hit rates of 90 or what % going after a pip / tick/ point / whatever per trade, and that's then not scalable for liquidity issues, so the higher your hit rate is the lower your eventual net profitability ends up being.

 

[foredog]

I'd guess a simple way to put it would be that Trader A has a 70% win rate but his average profit is 10 ticks, average loss is 10 ticks...Ok , up 80 per 10 trades, but when he hits a bad patch if his win rate drops to 50% he's not getting anywhere

Trader B Has a 40% win rate, he loses 10 ticks on 6 trades but makes 100 ticks on good ones, 340 ticks profit

if he hits abad patch and his win rate drops to 20%, then 80 ticks losses, 200 ticks profit so he's still net 120.

Don't know if that clears it up a bit.

cue lots of posts on why is it 20% etc..............................

 

[BSD]

Totally agree Foredog. (Lovely pic there btw )

Expectancy is really key in determining if you're set for greatness or a career of asking if people want fries with that:

1: Relative size of profits vs losses.

2: Percentage winning trades.

3: Transaction costs (commission & slippage).

4: Trading opportunities. (Won't get you far if you have some algo driven correlation based trading model that has been right 99% over the last ten years, but only trades once a year for an average profit of 50 pips, while the one % losers come out at minus 150 pips.)

Suppose most of you guys know this here:

Random Equity Curve Simulator of a trading system. Learn it before you trade

 

[firewalker99]

Adam, what I meant was that the higher the hit rate, the smaller the profit per trade is, where at the highest spectrum you have scalpers with hit rates of 90 or what % going after a pip / tick/ point / whatever per trade, and that's then not scalable for liquidity issues, so the higher your hit rate is the lower your eventual net profitability ends up being.

I'm afraid that's not entirely true. Your example about scalpers only goes as far, but it would be wrong to assume there is a causal relationship between a high win rate and a lower net profitability.

Just because it is written, does not make it so ........

Indeed... we all look for things that have been written or said by some one before us. It's human behaviour to look for elements that confirm our opinion or our bias. The same thing happens when we enter a trade: most people look for confirmation and are temporarily blinded by signals that tell them their trade is in trouble. But it's not because we like to ignore contrary opinions, we are by definition correct.

What does not exist however is high hit rate AND high risk/reward ratio, what does not exist is the guy who is right 70% of the time AND has a reward on average 3 times his losses, at least not in the real world of real track records.

I never realized until today I was living in a imaginary world

 

[luckyd1976]

The need to be right VS the need to make money

Which do you (anyone here) think is more important?

You can be right and Still lose money...

Profits are all that matters in this game.

If your profitable; Clients, New Accounts, Friends, Family, and Media dont question your views. Right or Wrong. They in fact seek them out.

 

[Splitlink]

I'm afraid that's not entirely true. Your example about scalpers only goes as far, but it would be wrong to assume there is a causal relationship between a high win rate and a lower net profitability.



Indeed... we all look for things that have been written or said by some one before us. It's human behaviour to look for elements that confirm our opinion or our bias. The same thing happens when we enter a trade: most people look for confirmation and are temporarily blinded by signals that tell them their trade is in trouble. But it's not because we like to ignore contrary opinions, we are by definition correct.

Confirming signals are one of the trader's worst enemies. They mess up more good trade decisions than they are worth but most traders who use them feel insecure.

The answer? If I feel the need for a confirmer, I reduce my trade size and, when it is on its way I add to it later.

 

[Paul71]

Indeed... we all look for things that have been written or said by some one before us. It's human behaviour to look for elements that confirm our opinion or our bias. The same thing happens when we enter a trade: most people look for confirmation and are temporarily blinded by signals that tell them their trade is in trouble. But it's not because we like to ignore contrary opinions, we are by definition correct.

 

[BSD]

I never realized until today I was living in a imaginary world

It has never been proven by anybody with a track record in the real world, put it that way.

And the reason is really rather simple...

If indeed people existed who had win rates of 70% with rewards on average of around say 3 times their losers they would be the richest person on earth within a very few years.

Is there a person here who claims they have that ?

Are they a billionaire ?

Thought not.

But the real deals, the real money makers, the Billionaires from trading in real life, are the guys I quoted earlier, the Market Wizards, the Richard Dennises, the George Soroses, the Steve Cohens, the guys with the low hit rates in other words, matter of fact I got a PM from a hedgie on this board abit back in a similar discussion telling me that they have hit rates of 20, 30 % at his hedge fund doing great on a net profitable basis, and that a focus on hit rates is strictly a non-scalable irrelevance.

Kenneth Grant, who in "Trading Risk: Enhanced Profitability through Risk Control", depicts his experience as risk manager for some of the best and most successful hedge funds, amongst others Paul Tudor Jones funds and Steve Cohens SAC Capital, that:

Across all market conditions, trading styles, time frames and traders, one rule holds true:

10% of all trades inevitably account for 90% of profits !


And that includes multi-billionaire Steve Cohen himself.

This is not some theory, these are hard facts, real life benchmarking of the very best in trading, of people who are billionaires.

Put it this way: If somebody still claims they have a high hit rate AND high R/R I'll ask em if they are a billionaire, and able to prove that.

Because they should be, with a trading style like that, and compounding.

If it is not compoundable, it's just pointless wanting to be right vs wanting to make moneay again that may earn you a great salary, but will never have you howling with the top dogs.

Trading's objective is to make the most out of the leastest.

The winner is who has made the most money, that is the way traders keep track.

Right.

Anyone care to prove that George Soros and Steve Cohen don't have a clue what they are doing, anyone care to prove that they are high hit rate, high R/R, AND have a scalable style ?

I guarantee that we will never see such proof, because it does not exist.

 

[BSD]

Not only do the best and top hedge funds NOT achieve high hit rate AND high R/R, but hey, don't rely on their stats, just do the maths yourselves:

Random Equity Curve Simulator of a trading system. Learn it before you trade

Input a win loss of 3:1, and winning percentage of 70%.

LOL.

That is an equity curve that goes up in a STRAIGHT line.

Ever seen one of those in real life ?

Now, next go to a compounding calculator:

Math Cheat Sheets at SmartMoney.com

And you will see, that even taking taxes, withdrawals for living expenses etc etc into account, there is still nothing you can do with such an imaginary system that would prevent you from overtaking Mr. Buy-and-Hold-and I-have-no-idea-where-the-market-will-be-next-month-let-alone-next-year, Mr. W. Buffett himself, in other words, off of his perch at the number one sppot of the worlds richest individuals in absolutey NO time at all.

So where are the whiz kids that would put the guys with the proven track records - and that earned Billions - to shame, where are THEIR track records ?

Where are THEIR Billions ?

LOL !

 

[annaanna]

Here are my trades.. I love to short

10-17-08

QQQQ

Short sell Nov 33 put @ 3.23, buy @ 2.71, .+52, $5200

Buy Nov 31 call @ 2.80, sell @ 3.58, .+78, $7800

Buy Nov 33 put 2.74 & 2.57, 2.40, AVG 2.57 (100 contracts) buy @ 2.80 + .23, $2300

sell 31 call @ 3.51 & 3.64, 3.81, AVG 3.65 (100 contracts) buy @ 3.20, +.45, $4500
ES short AVG @ 959.85, cover @ 933, +26.85 (10 contracts) x $50, $1,342.50, $13,420
----------------------------------------------------
NDX Nov 2008 Call NDVKA ss @ 24.60, buy (10 contracts) @20.00, +4.60, $4,600

ANR Nov 2008 45 Call ANRKI Buy @ 4.10 holding

$5200
$7800
$2300
$4500
$13,420
$4,600
__________
$37,820

I have a live trading room, want to watch me trade...

email me [email protected]

blog Day Trading Stocks Options Future Emini

 

[firewalker99]

BSD,

Your two previous posts are leaving out some crucial elements. I'll be general and I'm not talking about anyone in particular here, but:

(a) Trading with billions at stake is a different ballgame than trading small size, I'm sure you're well aware of that.

(b) Having a profitable plan, a high win rate and a high risk:reward does not say anything about having the discipline to follow or execute that plan. It doesn't tell you anything about how good the trader can follow his rules.

(c) Not everybody feels comfortable with trading huge size. One trader I think of has been trading 2 lots for 10 years. If he puts on 5 or 10, which he could easily do, he gets totally stressed and messes up.

(d) Combining a high win rate with a high profit per trade, means the number of high probability trades drops significantly. This might mean that on some days you don't get a signal.

 

[BSD]

Fire, it's about getting to the billion.

And what it's really about is my claim that people who assert that high winning % AND high R/R's can co-exist cannot back that up, that they're full of hot air.

That it's nothing than BB bragging to impress gullible albeit clueless newbies.

By contrast I have posted facts of what those that made the most money in trading have done in a way that is provable.

High hit rate is totally irrelevant to making that billion in the first place.

George Soros started with a mere few 100K, Richard Dennis with 400 bucks.

And all earned fortunes with low hit rate.

Not only that, but I myself know many traders, some of whom got pretty rich, and not a single one of those has high hit rate AND high R/R's.

Anyway, this is just a waste of time as in the real world no proof exists that both can co-exist.

What's of sole relevance is that it is absolutely not necessary either to earn a billion.

I honestly believe that anybody who claims that the two can co-exist AND be scalable is just a typical BB braggard with a scruffy collar and cheap car in real life.

We will never see proof, because it CANNOT be proven, because it's just BS.

Paul Tudor Jones sets his traders up in a way that is almost as profitable for them as starting their own hedge fund.

I promsie to personally call his fund up until I get the person who can prove that they can combine the two a job there.

But again, we will never see proof, nobody here will ever open an account and establish a track record and prove that to us, because its just BS.

 

[firewalker99]

Not only that, but I myself know many traders, some of whom got pretty rich, and not a single one of those has high hit rate AND high R/R's.

The greatest trick the devil ever pulled, was convincing the world he didn't exist.

Suppose I move my stop to breakeven after I'm in a trade for 1 minute and suppose I hardly get stopped out before that minute what would that say about my "risk" (I might get a lot of BE trades but that's beside the point in this particular example)?