Retirement dreams may evaporate for homeowners who follow conventional investment wisdom. Financial news dominates the media. People receive financial information via the internet, TV, and radio. You hear about gains, losses, ratios, percentages, and every imaginable term relating to money and the stock market. You also hear of investment strategies involving stocks, bonds, municipal bonds, indexes, and even commodities. One recent TV ad exhorts you to "experience the excitement of Forex trading". For those not familiar with the term, it's about venturing in foreign currencies.

Years ago, the term "trading" did not mean investing. But it has become common in investment terms. Can you "trade" to build wealth? Is it possible to "trade" to reach retirement? You're told of trading platforms and strategies, and if you're a gambler at heart, it seems enticing. However this article is for ordinary working people to have a comfortable nest egg for the future and be able to retire. The lure of gambling-type excitement, as opposed to the mundane aspect of saving for retirement, hyped by smooth media promotions (some featuring attractive spokesmodels), conjures up a subconscious implication that attaining wealth is exciting, simple, and attainable using your computer.

Does this sound logical? Well, one way to find out is to open a brokerage account and start trading. Or, if you already have a brokerage account, just begin. One thing in particular makes trading easy - S&P Index Futures. Why is this easy? Simply because it eliminates all the tedious research necessary for choosing stocks. S&P Futures are perfect as a speculative investment. They move either up or down. You don't have to guess which stock to select, and you can make money if it goes up or down. You're invited to come back when your money is gone.

Back so soon? Perhaps you learned what so many others have found out: that virtually nobody can trade their way to retirement. Ask anyone who has tried it. Read up on it on the internet. Above all, don't listen to talk of easy gains that are claimed by those looking to make your money their money. You'll discover these assertions are from those who stand to gain from your trading activity. They are people and businesses who foster the trading "habit" by providing either a trading platform or "education" to "help you make better trades". Notice something? These people don't do any trading themselves, they promote trading to others. It's very important to realize that in the real world where dollars are made and lost, the professionals don't take on risk, and trading is putting money at risk.

Now you see that the real professionals don't really trade. They make their money from other people's trading activity. It's a fact that trading involves placing many buy and sell orders daily. The smart money knows this, and use this knowledge by providing trading platforms, promoting their use by hyping the "excitement" or "easy money" of trading to an gullible public, and then charging a fee for each buy or sell order that a trader places via the platform.

Therefore, the true professionals don't take on risk. They don't trade securities, and avoid doing so unless they have inside information that assures a profit. They know it's nearly hopeless to retire through trading, and that it will most assuredly prevent most people from retiring, because they will lose money. Smart money shuns risk, but instead makes money from the risk-taking of others. Their business model eliminates uncertainty, with no negative activities that inevitably leads to trading losses. The bottom line is, if you make or lose money, the smart money makes money, and always avoids risk.