Investment returns are more than twice the salary with no drawdowns. I don't want to go to work anymore.

Before trading stocks, I always had trouble getting the timing right on when to buy and when to sell. I ended up tinkering for a long time, and when all was said and done, my returns were about the same as what you’d get from buying a wealth-management product. It just felt like I’m not cut out for stock trading.
Starting in 2023, I began trading options and futures. In the first few months, I made small investments as I learned and practiced, trying all kinds of strategies. I often ended up getting slapped in different directions. In 2024, I started doing only hedging strategies. I kept summarizing and improving, and the returns gradually became more stable. Up to now, there have been only two temporary big drawdowns. One is 924, and the other is this year’s early period when the IC and IM futures basis narrowed sharply, but because it’s a hedge within the same underlying product, you can’t maintain that kind of extremely deviated pricing for more than a few days. In the end, the position quickly closes out the unrealized loss. Measured by monthly delivery dates, the returns show no drawdown.
Core strategy: initial principal is 500 units, neither increasing nor decreasing. Each month’s profitable portion is directly placed into a six-month reverse repo. Even if there’s a major mistake, there’s a foundation to bounce back. I only do hedging strategies. When opening a position, I can calculate the maximum possible loss and keep it within 5%. I open positions only when the price is significantly deviated relative to the norm. When prices return to normal, I close the position. When opportunities aren’t obvious, I stay in cash and wait. I don’t bet on up or down, and I’m not greedy. I strictly follow the strategy. As a programmer, I’ve considered every possible scenario, and for now I don’t see any major risks.
Although my stock account hasn’t dared to buy AI-related stocks over the past two years, I’ve still benefited from the AI boom. Because my job is adjacent to AI (soft- and hardware development related to data center communication and control), my salary growth has been pretty fast, but I also feel the threats brought by AI—especially Claude Code that the company has been promoting recently. As long as the prompts you input are accurate enough, it really can help you quickly complete most of your work. Previously, I would work 2 to 3 hours a day, and during the rest of the time I’d mess around. After using AI, if there’s work to do, you just hand it to AI, and in about an hour I can finish the day’s work. So for programmers, being replaced by AI is only a matter of time, and making plans ahead of time is necessary. The company cuts staff every year. Recently, I told my leader that there would be layoff quotas and asked if they could give one to me first. After 10 years at the company, with nearly 100 in compensation, don’t take it for nothing—so I thought. The leader was really shocked; after I talked to him for half a day, he said that even if there were quotas, it wouldn’t fall to me. Later, he said he would raise my salary. He submitted it, waiting for approval from the U.S., but my salary no longer has much appeal to me. Family expenses of more than 100,000 per year are enough. Once you pass 40, you can clearly feel your body isn’t as good as before. After sitting in the office for 8 hours every day, my neck and lower back don’t feel right. They say the average life expectancy for Chinese men is 67 years, and it feels like I won’t be able to bounce around for long. I’d rather live comfortably however I can.

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