Introduction
I was down over fifty thousand dollars on my lifetime account, and I was like, I’m now at zero. Right? I’m now starting from zero profit, zero loss. If there was one piece of advice I would have for someone who is trying to learn and is going through it and following people on social media, it would just be this: find people that resonate with you and follow them, not everybody. My name is Jake, but in the trading world, I’m known as Rake Trades. This is my story of how I went from blowing my entire life savings to making six figures on a single trade. It’s a journey about hitting rock bottom, and more importantly, the exact process I used for recovering trading losses and building a sustainable career. This isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme; it’s a testament to the fact that trading can be a shortcut to financial freedom, but there are no shortcuts to becoming a successful trader.
The $50,000 Low and My Turning Point
I found out about trading during my last half of college. I saw someone post a Robinhood screenshot on Instagram where they were up like $100 in a day, and I was like, I would like to be up $100 in a day. That sounds really nice. What started as a curiosity quickly turned into an obsession. For the first two years, I was burning money. I wasn’t trading; I was gambling. I was chasing dopamine hits. I had the worst habits of all time—everything you read about on Reddit that people warn you not to do, I was doing it.
I was trying to flip my account. I’d take my $2,000 account and try to turn it into $5,000, thinking, then I’ll start being safe. There were times I’d get a paycheck on Friday, deposit it, and by the next Wednesday, it would be gone. This happened for months. The goal was always to make back what I had lost. I was hyper-fixated on getting back to break-even, telling myself that’s when I’d start using risk management. As we all know, that’s the worst way to trade. Every single big loss I had stemmed from trying to make back the initial losses.
What was it like losing that $50,000? It was brutal. That money was four years of savings from high school jobs and college internships. I never thought about quitting—I had seen people be successful at this—but there were some really low nights. I’d just be in my room, smoking, watching TV, feeling like this part of my life sucked. I had only lows; there were no good highs to balance it out. It was one of the hardest periods of my life.
My Breakthrough: A Blank Slate for Recovering Trading Losses
The turning point was a conversation with my dad. He was supportive but told me, “Hey, I love you, and I’m always going to be in your corner, but you’ve been at this for a couple of years and haven’t made any progress. Something’s got to change.” He helped me realize I needed to forget everything that had happened and start with a blank slate.
One of the most powerful things I did was switch brokers. My old broker showed my lifetime P&L, and I was always staring at that negative $50,000. Every time I had a good day, it still felt like I was just chipping away at a mountain of debt. Switching brokers gave me a fresh account where my lifetime P&L was gone. Mentally, I considered that money gone and started from zero. It was a simple act, but it was a huge psychological hack that allowed me to start fresh without the baggage.
Finding Structure in the Chaos
After resetting my mindset, I needed a strategy that actually worked. I found a few key mentors who changed everything. The first was a guy named Kansas City Shuffle, who taught me the nitty-gritty details of the market. The second was Eric from Major League Trading, who gave me a level system that is the most accurate I’ve ever used. But the biggest game-changer was a book: Al Brooks’ “Reading Price Charts Bar by Bar.”
That book is dense and dry, but it changed how I viewed charts. His thesis is that individual candles tell a story, and if you can read them, you can understand what’s going to happen next. I printed out charts and went through them, marking them up like he did. For the first time, I felt like the chart made sense. It wasn’t random; it had structure. That gave me the concrete rules and framework I desperately needed to stop gambling and start trading.
The Power of Asking the Right Questions
Another key to my success was building strong relationships with my mentors. I learned that the quality of your questions determines the quality of your answers. Instead of asking, “Why are we long here?” I would ask, “I’m looking at X, Y, and Z, and A, B, and D all line up. I’m looking to do this. What would you think of that?” This showed I had put in the effort and was thinking critically. It made mentors want to help me more deeply, and I built amazing personal relationships that have been invaluable to my growth.
Taming an Addictive Personality for Trading Success
I have a very addictive personality and bad ADHD. In the beginning, this fed into all the worst trading habits: overtrading, revenge trading, you name it. But I realized I could use this trait to my advantage. I decided to shift my addiction from the dopamine hits of bad trades to the dopamine of following a perfect process.
I became addicted to my morning routine. I wake up at 4:30 AM, do cardio, shower, and then put on my “funky pants”—crazy patterned pants. The rule was simple: if I wasn’t awake enough to get out of my sweats and put on real pants, I wasn’t awake enough to trade. I make my bed, and 10 minutes before the market opens, I listen to “Best Day Ever” by Mac Miller. This routine became my anchor. I was addicted to it. This addiction to the process was my “Nike swoosh” moment—that slow, gradual progression that suddenly shot up and allowed me to scale my position sizes dramatically. I went from averaging $500-$700 a day to $3k-$4k, and eventually $7k-$8k a day.
Jake Rake Trades Trade Statistics
My journey wasn’t a straight line. It was filled with ups and downs, but by focusing on data and process, I was able to turn the corner. Here’s a look at some of the key numbers and milestones from my trading career.
- Lost over $50,000 in the first two years of trading.
- Traded for four years before going full-time in early 2021.
- Scaled daily average profits from $500 to over $8,000.
- Now capable of making six figures on a single trade.
- Still takes significant losses, like a recent $40,000 loss, proving the journey never ends.
| Period | Key Event / Account Status |
|---|---|
| Year 1-2 | Down $50,000 from initial savings |
| Year 3 | Blank Slate Mindset & Finding Mentors |
| Year 4 | First taste of consistency |
| Early 2021 | Went Full-Time as a Trader |
| 2021-Present | Scaled to 6-Figure Trade Potential |
Key Trading Insights from Jake Rake Trades
If you take away anything from my story, let it be these core principles. They are the foundational pillars that supported my transition from a gambler to a consistent trader. These aren’t just theories; they are battle-tested lessons learned from real pain and real progress.
- Embrace the Blank Slate: Forget past losses. Psychologically reset, even if it means something as simple as switching brokers to remove a negative P&L from your sight.
- Find Your Structure: Trading doesn’t have to be complex. My strategy is built on three pillars: Trend Analysis, Levels, and Candle Analysis. Find a simple, structured system that makes sense to you.
- Get Addicted to the Process: Channel your personality traits into productive habits. Build a routine that you stick to religiously. Your success will be a byproduct of your discipline.
- Journal and Analyze: You can’t improve what you don’t measure. I used a yellow notepad for years, but tools like TradeZella make it easier. The key is not just recording data, but analyzing it to find patterns in your wins and losses.
Jake Rake Trades Trading Strategy
My approach to the market is methodical and rule-based, designed to remove emotion as much as possible. It’s built on the foundation of price action, understanding that a chart is either in a trend or a range, and learning to read the story the candles are telling. It’s a strategy that works across Futures and options, and its principles are universal.
The Three Pillars
My entire system rests on three core concepts. I don’t use indicators or volume on my charts. For me, they are just noise. These three pillars are all I need to assess a trade setup.
- Trend Analysis: This includes deep multi-timeframe analysis. I don’t just do a simple top-down; I understand how a pullback on the weekly chart requires the daily chart to shift into a downtrend. The intricacies between time frames are crucial.
- Levels: I use a highly accurate level system derived from my mentor Eric. These are specific price zones where I anticipate reactions. They serve as my reference points for entries and exits.
- Candle Analysis: Inspired by Al Brooks, I read individual bars to understand the immediate battle between buyers and sellers. A break above a candle’s high or below its low has specific expectations that guide my decisions.
My Four Rules for Entry
Before I ever enter a trade, I require four conditions to be met. If one is missing, I don’t take the trade. It’s my checklist for keeping me disciplined and preventing me from chasing setups that aren’t high-probability.
- 1. Is there a level or the opening print to use as a reference point?
- 2. Am I trading with the dominant trend?
- 3. Is there a trigger (a signal bar or entry bar) present?
- 4. Are my key timeframes aligned with each other?
Jake Rake Trades Tools
While my strategy is simple, I rely on a few key tools and resources to maintain my edge and discipline. These are the things that have had the biggest impact on my journey, from learning the market to executing my plan day in and day out.
- Reading Price Charts Bar by Bar by Al Brooks: The single most important resource for understanding price action. It’s a dense read, but it’s the bible for understanding how to read a chart candle by candle.
- TradeZella: An automated journaling software. While I still use a yellow notepad for my post-market routine, TradeZella is invaluable for its trade replay feature and for deep-diving into statistics when I’m in a rut.
- A Reputable Broker: Switching brokers was a key psychological step. It’s crucial to use a high-quality broker that you trust and that doesn’t negatively impact your mindset with constant reminders of past losses.
- My Morning Routine: This is my most important tool. The “funky pants,” making the bed, the pre-market workout—it’s all a mental hack to get my brain in the right state to follow my rules without fail.
Common Trading Mistakes to Avoid
I made just about every mistake in the book. Learning to avoid them—or at least manage them—was critical to my survival and eventual success. These are the pitfalls that I see trap new traders over and over again. Recognizing them is the first step to overcoming them.
- Revenge Trading: Trying to immediately make back money you just lost. This is driven by emotion, not logic, and almost always leads to bigger losses. My $40,000 loss on Snowflake was a direct result of this.
- Strategy Hopping: Constantly switching from one indicator or strategy to another without ever mastering one. I did this for my first two years. Find something that works and stick with it long enough to make it your own.
- Holding Baggage: Letting past losses or missed opportunities influence your current trades. Trading a name you just lost big on, or chasing a setup you just missed, puts you on tilt. You have to learn to let go and move on to the next opportunity with a clear head.
- Not Journaling Properly: Just tracking trades isn’t enough. You have to analyze the data to find themes. Why are your winning trades winning? Why are your losing trades losing? Without this deep dive, journaling is a waste of time.
Conclusion
My journey from losing $50,000 to making six figures was not a straight line. It was a mess of failures, small wins, psychological battles, and eventually, a commitment to a structured process. The “holy grail” of trading isn’t a single indicator or secret pattern; it’s the accumulation of small, positive habits and rules that are personalized to you. It’s about recovering trading losses not by finding a magic bullet, but by building a bulletproof mindset and routine. Trading is a marathon, not a sprint. Embrace the chaos, learn from your losses, and never stop trying to become a better version of yourself. If I can do it, you can too.