This is probably one of the most common questions asked about traders who also sell signals, create content, or teach.
And honestly, I think it's the wrong question.
Trading income is directly related to the amount of capital you trade with.
A trader can have a genuine edge and still not have enough capital to generate meaningful income from trading alone.
So naturally, traders look for ways to scale their edge beyond their own account.
Some create educational content.
Some build an audience on YouTube.
Some offer signals.
Some trade through prop firms.
Some manage other people's capital.
None of these things are inherently bad.
In fact, for many traders, they're simply different ways of scaling their edge beyond their own capital.
Prop firms can provide access to more capital, but they also come with fees, rules, restrictions and their own risks.
Education and content can be useful if the person actually has something valuable to teach.
And selling signals can be perfectly legitimate too.
The problem isn't how a trader chooses to monetize their skills.
The problem is when the product itself has no credibility behind it.
- Low-quality educational content.
- Fake or deleted signals.
- Only showing winning trades.
- Screenshots from trades that happened weeks or months ago.
- No verifiable track record.
If someone is selling signals, I don't really care that they're selling signals.
I want to know:
Can they actually trade?
To me, that's where the conversation should be.
Not:
"Why are you selling signals if you're a good trader?"But:
"If you're a good trader, can you prove it?"That's a much more interesting question.
What do you think?
Do you see selling signals, creating trading content, or teaching as a legitimate way for a good trader to scale beyond their own capital?
And more importantly, what would you consider enough evidence that a signal provider can actually trade?
I used to believe strongly in the "those who can't do, teach" philosophy, I still do. Actually I think while selling signals can be a way of scaling the traders edge, Manny traders who you see on the Internet selling courses and paid premium channels don't actually make their money through trading. They're more of influencers and marketers than traders.