STOP SETTING SMALL TRADING GOALS! Want to know the most dangerous mistake ambitious developing traders make when setting career goals? Hint: It isn’t aiming too high. It’s setting the bar way too low. Let me share a story from our prop desk. During a recent monthly review with Team Max, one of our traders announced his numbers: he pulled in $1 million in net trading profits in August. When he first sat on the desk, his lifelong dream was to make $1 million in a year. Last month, he did it in 21 trading days. Max had an even better month, and I wanted to get his reaction to his monster performance. After the meeting, I reached out to Max directly on Gchat: Me: "You ever think when you were starting you would make 2m plus in a month?" Max: "Def not lol" A couple of years back, we actually kicked around the idea of publicly tracking Max for the trading community to see if he could break $1M in a month. At the time, he hadn't broken this level yet. We ended up scrapping the project as we were worried it would focus on the wrong things. Fast forward to today: Max cleared over a couple of million dollars last month alone and is heading into his second consecutive 8-figure year. For him now, a million-dollar month isn't even close to the benchmark he aims for. Yet during that exact same review, a couple of our younger traders who made solid six figures were lamenting their month. They felt dejected comparing their numbers to the seven-figure producers on the desk. Three years into their careers, an outcome that would stun 99% of independent traders felt unsatisfying to them. That psychology reveals a critical truth about trader development: Arbitrary P&L Goals are Self-limiting: When you fixate on a dollar target early in your career, you anchor your ceiling to who you are today—with your current limited skills, risk tolerance, and PlayBook. The Process Multiplier: When you double down and triple down on your daily process, build technology, trade alongside elite traders, collaborate, and push size on your A+ setups, your growth becomes exponential. Your early career goals end up looking comically small in the rearview mirror. Happy, But Never Satisfied: As Chris Mullin, former NBA Hall-of-Famer, used to say, and as we preach to our desk constantly. Even after pulling millions out of the market, this desk spent the meeting dissecting where they left money on the table: leaving 25% on the Bitcoin breakout, breaking down what worked on MRNA, and focusing on pumping the brakes during low-opportunity tape. Trading can be a tough game at the start, but the upside is limitless when you stop capping your potential. Don't let arbitrary dollar targets limit what you can accomplish. Double down on your process, surround yourself with peers who raise your standards, pump the brakes during slow markets, and aggressively press your A+ setups. Your ceiling is far higher than your wildest imagination. #Trading# #DayTrading# #SMBCapital# #PropTrading# #TradingPsychology#

Video popped up on my feed: “You’re not profitable because of what you do outside of trading.” Lads, the psychology slop genre has gone too far. I can put a Buddhist monk in front of a terminal - he’s generally not gonna make any money. You need some sort of edge, strategy that’s +EV, or even a broad idea of a market effect that you’re trying to monetise. There has to be a sensible foundation for the actual trades you take, and then ‘psychology’ can help with reducing unforced errors. Most of the trading psychology stuff is cope; it allows you to focus on breathing exercises instead of confronting that your clicking is completely random.

Nothing is too interesting to me here in the market. I'm currently in Europe for the entire summer, and honestly it's helped my trading ALOT. My trading frequency has gone way down - I've still been checking into the market but just watching mostly. The last month I've taken mostly very short term trades (day trading). Up until a month ago I was still trying to go for bigger wins. For me these bigger wins are mid 5 figs+, and it just got to a point where I would roundtrip these amounts many time throughout the month. It was just super frustrating. Since then I had decided to switch it up and barely even hold anything overnight. It's helped my trading psychology ALOT and also put me into a good rhythm I didn't have before. People forget - myself included - that these small wins and losses really add up... whatever that small figure is for you (insert here). For me it's 4 figs... I would treat that a pretty much breakeven. But when you think about it, if you make these small amount even a few times a week before you realise you're up mid 5 figs+ by end of month. This also has an inverse effect, you take 'small losses' (paper cuts) that can really add up. Then you look back on the month and think 'wtf I'm down mid 5 figs how did this happen'. To put this into perspective I am up roughly $150k the last 30 days purely from taking these 'small trades'. Not bad. Anyway, this is probably the longest time I've gone without tweeting. But it's just the current market environment. There's just really not alot to say. We got the move up, we got the rotation to onchain and now we're seeing rotation from RH to other chains. This usually marks close to the end of the trend. Stay sharp and chat soon.

ICYMI NEW POD We Cover: 🔸 The trader’s mindset 🔸 Using LLMs to trade 🔸 Is Warsh actually hawkish? 🔸 Dollar-yen intervention 🔸 Bitcoin’s lost narrative & more! @donnelly_brent @fejau_inc TIMESTAMPS: 00:00 Intro 02:00 Trading Outside The Box 06:38 Trading Psychology And Risk 12:46 AI As A Trading Tool 19:33 How LLMs Shape Markets 25:19 Kevin Warsh And The New Fed 33:37 The Yen Intervention Playbook 41:40 Is Government Debt Sustainable? 43:00 Has Bitcoin Lost Its Narrative?

Want to know what actually separates a trader who gets completely wiped out by a brutal market drawdown from an 8-figure inspiring trader? Hint: It isn’t that the superstar never loses, never feels the sting of a losing streak. They lose. It hurts. Frankly, it sucks. It’s that they use their worst drawdowns as a catalyst to rebuild their process and improve their edge. @MaxGanik is currently heading toward his second consecutive 8-figure year. He sits on the top trading team at SMB Capital—a group that pulled in ~$50M in trading profits in 2025 and serve as an inspiring role model for what collaboration can do for your P&L. Max is easily one of the best active discretionary traders in the game today, and yet, still pushing to get better. At the SMB Annual Event, Max pulled back the curtain on "The Drawdown That Completely Changed How I Trade." He walked our community through the painful 2022 bear-market slump and a painful personal drawdown that fueled him to reinvent his entire approach: Respect Market Shifts (Dynamic Playbooks): The market changes fast—often by the month. You cannot trade a dead, mid-range tape with the exact same PlayBook and aggression that worked in an explosive momentum market. When relative volume drops and ranges contract, your edge drops with it. Top traders recognize that environment quickly and pump the brakes. Systematize Your Setup Grading: Max evolved from relying purely on intuition to building a rigorous, structured grading system. When you define your A+ trades with absolute clarity, your equity curves improves dramatically. Treat Each Strategy Like a Separate Business: Max doesn't use a lazy, blanket risk number across the board. His swing trades, mean-reversion ideas, intraday scalps, and small-cap setups are completely distinct businesses with their own custom risk parameters and sizing. Protect Your Mindset Like Capital: Warning! Warning! Warning! Your trading psychology is an asset that must be protected. Taking undisciplined, sloppy losses in dead conditions ruins your mental capital, sabotaging your confidence when the next genuine A+ opportunity finally hits your screen. Earn the Right to Scale A+ Risk: Sizing up is earned. By strictly categorizing setups, executing your PlayBook with discipline, and letting winning trades expand your mental comfort zone, you build the foundation to scale risk safely from $300k to $500k+ on your highest-conviction ideas. Trading can be an unforgiving sport. The market will pummel your poor decision-making, and your past winning PlayBooks will fail you at times. But your ultimate ceiling is never defined by a bad streak—it is defined by your willingness to adapt, decode underperformance, surround yourself with awesome and curious teammates, and relentlessly refine your process and edge. Take advantage of this rare live masterclass from a thriving young trader sharing what the market really demands. From all of us at SMB, we hope this video adds value to your trading. #DayTrading# #PropTrading# #SMBCapital# #TradingMindset# #RiskManagement# The Drawdown That Completely Changed How I Trade via @YouTube

I think you do nothing and outperform here. There’s a solid case for time base capitulation yet to unfold. Unless you have a really good reason to click buttons - then don’t at all. Boredom will cause a lot of unnecessary losses. Occupy your time with other things. Focus on sharpening your trading psychology.