[wsam29]

They teach you how to scalp stocks because it requires a lot of margin to make any decent money, by doing so they retain your talent/skill so you don't run off and trade your own capital.

They preach volume, in and out, in and out, 1 tick here, 1 tick there, its almost a game of bingo if you ask me. you don't get a general feel of the bigger moves when your micro-nano scalping. But yeah, it is all random that us why you feel you really have no clue what you are doing. I felt like that I made my first $10,000 day trading the SP. What ever I did I could not repeat because it was just going with order flow, but what were my entry criterias? (currently working on some that I can live with and trade day in dayout)

What was the reason for that large order being pulled and seeing a large print on the tape? Its the games they play on level two. Only super fast execution order entry can you play those games which are suited towards prop. firms. As for attempting to apply strategies and ideas to your prop. firm it will not fly with them because they have a tried and true system, why mess with a good thing when you are making money for them? they also see it as, why risk 0.10 on 1000 shares when you can swing a 10,000 share trade and risk or make 0.01?

Even though I was only prop. trading for a couple months, it took a while to readjust to sitting back and letting the trade work rather than in, out, in, out, because commissions alone will chew you up! That is where you may have troubles adjusting because they got you so "brain" washed so to speak.

The reason I switched was the leverage, you need lots of capital to trade stocks for a living, even if you get more favourable margin rates. not to mention knowing what type of execution platforms that are out there, really big disadvantage when you think about it if you are trying to trade like they are.

having also experianced trying to trade with level 2, I would say tape reading and scalping the e-minis would be a good start since you are able to make lightning quick decisions and your eyes are already accustumed to seeing numbers fly by, just be mindful of the commissions and fees invloved that will chew into your profits or increase your loses.

the rest as to where to enter, exit, is really your personality and temperment. meaning are you the type to sit and wait for a test of the pivot point? resistance 1? Or in my case a simple price/tick/volume divergence is good enough for an entry for me. There are many ways to skin the cat, you just need to kind the right knife now to get the job done consistantly.