The point
Seven in ten individual intraday traders in the equity cash segment lost money in FY2022-23, according to SEBI's own study. The reason sits in the job description. Intraday trading asks for full-time hours, a written rulebook, spare capital and a loss that changes nothing in your life. If you have a career, you are filling that role part-time, and the numbers below describe how that goes.
What does intraday trading actually ask of a person?
It asks for the hours of a job, the tools of a desk and the rules of a risk manager. Buying and selling inside one session looks like a small activity from outside. From inside, it is a position that opens and closes before the day ends, so the work repeats every market day.
Here is the spec, written the way a hiring manager would write it.
Hours
The job runs while the market is open, and the decisions cannot wait for a lunch break. A trader who steps away from the screen leaves open positions unattended, which is the one thing the day's structure exists to avoid.
SEBI's study puts a number on how much work the active end of this does. Traders with more than 500 trades in a year were the "very frequent" group. Five hundred trades is more than one trade for every day of the calendar year, before a single weekend or holiday is subtracted.
Tooling
A trader needs live prices, order types that fill when intended and a record of every entry and exit. The record matters more than it sounds. Without it, nobody can tell a good method from a lucky week.
Capital
The capital has to be money whose loss does not alter a household. SEBI reports an average trade size of ₹35,333 in FY2022-23, down from ₹76,205 in FY2018-19, because a large number of new traders arrived with smaller trades.
Risk limits
A trader sets a maximum loss per trade and per day, in rupees, before the session opens. The limit is written down because a number decided mid-loss is a number that drifts.
A written rulebook
The rulebook says what qualifies as an entry, where the exit goes and what happens after a bad day. It is written down, and it also says when the trader stops for a week.
A loss that changes nothing
This line is the hardest to meet. A trader who needs the day's profit to cover a bill is no longer following the rulebook. The pressure of the bill makes the decisions.
What does the SEBI study say about who holds this job?
It says most people holding it lose money, and the more they do it, the more likely they are to lose. SEBI studied individual clients of the top 10 stock brokers. Those brokers account for around 86 per cent of the individual client count in the equity cash segment. The study covers FY2018-19, FY2021-22 and FY2022-23.
The findings, in the study's own figures as reported by Business Today and Business Standard:
- More than 70 per cent of individual intraday traders in the equity cash segment made a net loss in FY2022-23.
- The share of loss-makers rose to 80 per cent among traders with more than 500 trades in a year.
- The share of loss-makers among traders under 30 was 76 per cent.
- The average loss was ₹5,371 in FY2022-23.
- Loss-makers traded more often, on average, than profit-makers.
- The number of intraday traders among the top 10 brokers rose to 6.9 million in FY2022-23 from 1.5 million in FY2018-19.
Source: Business Today and Business Standard, both reporting SEBI's study released on 24 July 2024. Both pages were read for this article.
Read the second line again with the hours section in mind. The people trading most are the people losing most. Effort and result move in opposite directions here, which is unusual in a job.
How much do costs add to a loss?
They add more than half again. SEBI found that loss-makers spent an additional 57 per cent of their trading losses as trading costs in FY2022-23. Profit-makers spent 19 per cent of their trading profits as trading costs.
Take the study's ratios and apply them to round numbers.
A loss of ₹10,000 comes with costs of 57 per cent of that loss: ₹10,000 × 0.57 = ₹5,700. The total out of pocket is ₹10,000 + ₹5,700 = ₹15,700.
A profit of ₹10,000 comes with costs of 19 per cent of that profit: ₹10,000 × 0.19 = ₹1,900. What stays is ₹10,000 − ₹1,900 = ₹8,100.
The two sides are not symmetric. A winning trade hands back a bit more than four-fifths of its gain, and a losing trade costs more than the number on the screen. The cost sits on top of both outcomes, and the person trading most pays it most often.
Source: arithmetic by Qatobit on the ratios in the Business Today report of SEBI's study. The ratios are SEBI's, the rupee amounts are round figures chosen for the example.
Why is the part-time version the hard one?
Because the spec above has no part-time clause. A person with a career can supply the capital and some of the tooling. They cannot supply the hours, and the rulebook tends to be the second thing to go after the hours do.
The study shows who competes for the same trades. The pool of intraday traders grew from 1.5 million to 6.9 million in four years. The share of traders under 30 rose to 48 per cent from 18 per cent. More people, with smaller trades and less time, are taking the other side of each other's decisions.
My view: a person who checks a screen between meetings is not running an intraday strategy. They are making a series of unplanned decisions at the pace of their calendar. SEBI's numbers put the problem in the structure of the job rather than in the person.
What is the investor's job spec?
It is short, and it fits the same format.
Hours: a monthly decision, plus a yearly review. Tooling: an allocation written down and a platform that carries it out. Capital: money with a horizon of years, sized as a share of the portfolio. Risk limits: the share of the portfolio any single sleeve may reach. Rulebook: the allocation itself, and the rule for when to bring it back to target. A loss that changes nothing: this one is the same as the trader's, because a drawdown still hurts.
A worked case at portfolio scale. A person puts ₹25,000 a month into an index, which is ₹25,000 × 12 = ₹3,00,000 over a year. The decisions that year are one allocation choice at the start and twelve SIP debits that run on a schedule. On a ₹5 lakh lump sum into a Qatobit index, the basket fee is 0.35 per cent: ₹5,00,000 × 0.0035 = ₹1,750.
The whole job fits in those lines. To see how an allocation gets set before any pick, read what asset allocation is and what it decides. For the rule that brings a portfolio back to target, read portfolio rebalancing when one holding falls 10 percent.
Which job are you actually doing?
Run the two specs against your own week. Count the hours you can give to a screen on a market day. Read your written rulebook, if one exists. Check the largest loss you could take on one trade without changing a plan you have for the year.
Suppose the honest answers are "a few minutes", "no document" and "I would feel it". Then you are filling the trader's role without its conditions, and the SEBI figures describe that position. If the answers describe a monthly decision and a plan with a horizon, you are already doing the investor's job.
Qatobit is built for the second spec. A QSI index is a permanent allocation product, rebalanced monthly on a published methodology, and a SIP into an index runs on the schedule you set. A reader who wants that structure in crypto can invest in QSI Growth or start a Bitcoin SIP, an Ethereum SIP or a Solana SIP. The crypto index explainer shows how a basket is built.
Frequently asked questions
What share of intraday traders lose money in India?
More than 70 per cent of individual intraday traders in the equity cash segment made a net loss in FY2022-23, according to SEBI's study. The share rose to 80 per cent among traders with more than 500 trades in a year.
How much do trading costs add to an intraday loss?
SEBI found that loss-makers spent an additional 57 per cent of their trading losses as trading costs in FY2022-23. On a loss of ₹10,000, that is ₹5,700 more, for ₹15,700 in total.
Is intraday trading suited to someone with a full-time career?
The job spec asks for market-hours attention, a written rulebook and capital whose loss changes nothing. A person with a full-time career can usually supply the capital and not the hours, which is the gap the SEBI figures describe.
What does an investor's job look like next to a trader's?
An investor writes down an allocation, sets a SIP or a lump sum, and revisits the plan on a monthly or yearly rhythm. A QSI index rebalances monthly on its published methodology, so the monthly decision is carried out for the investor.
How often does a QSI index rebalance?
A QSI index rebalances monthly on its published methodology, with a fee of 0.35 per cent per rebalance and no annual management fee. You can invest in QSI Growth or start a Bitcoin SIP, an Ethereum SIP or a Solana SIP.
Crypto investments are subject to market risk. Not financial advice.
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