What do you think quants get wrong about discretionary traders?

Question

The quant vs discretionary trader is a heated debate. Both sides have valid points, both sides have weaknesses.

Quants tend to say that discretionary traders are just gambling, their methods aren’t verifiable therefore you can’t distinguish luck from skill, that technical analysis doesn’t work, and the strategies available online have no edge, etc.

But there are a lot of traders who make it with discretionary trading.

And as the nature of trading is, the majority of traders in both methods don’t make any money.

What do you think quants overlook?

Posted Apr 9, 2026, 7:58 PM UTC

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