How much do day traders make?
Almost nothing, on average — and less than zero after costs for the large majority. The honest answer is not a salary figure but a distribution: a small number of large winners, a very long tail of losers, and a median that sits below the return of simply holding an index fund.
The short answer
In the largest study of persistent retail day traders — every individual who day traded Brazilian equity-index futures over a multi-year window — 97% of those who traded for more than 300 days lost money, and only 1.1% earned more than the Brazilian minimum wage (Chague & Giovannetti, 2020). The best trader in the whole sample made about US$310 per day, which is roughly what a mid-career professional earns without the risk of ruin.
Salary sites that quote a "day trader salary" of $60k-$120k are reporting job postings at proprietary trading firms — employees on a desk with firm capital, risk limits and a base salary. That is a job, not retail day trading, and the two get conflated constantly.
Why the average is misleading
Day-trading income is not normally distributed. A handful of participants capture outsized gains, which pulls the arithmetic mean far above what a typical person experiences. The median retail day trader loses money. When you read an income claim, ask three questions: is it net of spreads, commissions, financing and tax? Is it measured over more than one year? And is it drawn from account records rather than self-report?
What the costs take
Every round trip pays a spread and a commission; leveraged positions pay financing; short-term gains are taxed at the highest marginal rate in most countries. An active retail trader can easily pay 10-30% of their capital per year in total frictions. Barber & Odean found active US traders underperformed passive holders by roughly 6.5 percentage points a year — before tax. That gap is the salary most day traders are actually paying, not earning.
A realistic comparison
A diversified global equity index has historically returned roughly 7-10% real per year with no screen time and minimal cost. On $30,000 of capital, that is a few thousand dollars a year for doing nothing. To beat it by day trading, you need a consistent net edge over professional counterparties — the exact thing the data says almost nobody has.
Sources
- Chague, F. & Giovannetti, B. (2020). Day Trading for a Living? SSRN.
- Barber, B., Lee, Y., Liu, Y. & Odean, T. The Cross-Section of Speculator Skill. Journal of Financial Markets.
- Barber, B. & Odean, T. (2000). Trading Is Hazardous to Your Wealth. Journal of Finance.
- ESMA / FCA mandated retail CFD loss-rate disclosures.
What the long-run studies actually found
Five independent datasets, four countries and three decades point the same way: the share of retail day traders who make money after costs is small, and the share who make a living from it is smaller still. These are audited account records, not surveys or self-reported returns.
| Study or source | Sample | Headline finding |
|---|---|---|
| Barber, Lee, Liu & Odean | Taiwan, 1992-2006 | Under 1% of day traders earned reliably positive net profits; the top 500 covered their costs, everyone else funded them. |
| Chague, De-Losso & Giovannetti | Brazil, 2013-2015 (1,600 traders) | 3% were profitable and only 0.4% earned more than a bank teller. None who persisted improved with experience. |
| Barber & Odean, Trading Is Hazardous to Your Wealth | USA, 66,465 households | The most active fifth of accounts underperformed the market by about 6.5 percentage points a year. |
| ESMA and national regulators | EU/UK retail CFD accounts | 74-89% of retail CFD accounts lose money — a figure brokers are legally required to publish. |
| Jordan & Diltz | USA, 324 day traders | About 20% finished profitable over the period; losses were concentrated among the least experienced. |
Where the money actually goes
Before a trader beats the market, they must beat their own cost base. Every round trip pays a spread, usually a commission, and some slippage. At a realistic $8 per round trip, cost drag alone can exceed the entire account within a year.
| Trader profile | Round trips per year | Annual cost | Share of a $25,000 account |
|---|---|---|---|
| Casual — 5 trades a week | 260 | $2,080 | 8% |
| Active — 5 trades a day | 1,250 | $10,000 | 40% |
| Very active — 20 trades a day | 5,000 | $40,000 | 160% |
| Scalper — 50 trades a day | 12,500 | $100,000 | 400% |
Key terms, defined
- Day trading
- Opening and closing a position in the same instrument within one trading session, aiming to profit from short-term price movement.
- Spread
- The gap between the buy and sell price. It is an immediate, guaranteed loss at the moment a position opens.
- Leverage
- Borrowed exposure that multiplies both gains and losses. It shortens the time to ruin far more than it raises expected return.
- Slippage
- The difference between the expected fill price and the actual one, largest exactly when volatility makes trading look most attractive.
- Drawdown
- The fall from an account's peak to its trough. A 50% drawdown requires a 100% gain to recover.
- Expected value
- The average outcome of a strategy repeated many times. For retail day trading, it is negative after costs.
Frequently asked questions
How much does the average day trader make?
Less than zero net of costs. In the Brazilian futures study 97% of persistent day traders lost money and only 1.1% earned above minimum wage.
Can you make $1,000 a day day trading?
A very small number of people do, usually with large capital and institutional infrastructure. In the largest study of retail traders, the single best performer averaged about US$310 a day.
What is a realistic day trading income for a beginner?
Realistically negative in the first years. Beginners face identical spreads, commissions and counterparties as professionals, without the capital buffer to survive variance.
Why do salary sites list day trader salaries of $60k+?
Those figures come from job postings at proprietary trading firms, where traders are employees using firm capital under risk limits — not self-funded retail day traders.
Can day trading be learned with enough practice?
The Brazilian futures study followed traders day by day and found no improvement with experience: persistence increased losses rather than skill. Unlike chess or surgery, markets give noisy, delayed feedback, so practice does not reliably build expertise.
Do courses, signals or prop-firm challenges improve the odds?
There is no published evidence that paid education changes outcomes. Course fees, subscription costs and challenge fees are additional guaranteed costs added on top of an already negative expected value.
What is a realistic annual return for a retail day trader?
For the large majority it is negative after costs and taxes. A diversified index fund returned roughly 7-10% a year on average over long periods, with no screen time and far lower cost.
Read the whole argument
Day Trading Kills collects the full body of evidence across 28 chapters, names the industry incentives that hide it, and lays out the alternative in detail.