The €35,000 Lesson About Algorithmic Risk
I did not lose that money trading manually. I lost it trusting a software algorithm that had a verified 17-year track record, optimized for swing trading and targeting 0.1 to 0.2% daily profit. It sounded reasonable. The returns were consistent. For almost a year, it worked.
What I did not fully understand was the risk-structure. My trading capital sat in my own brokerage account. Not in a simulation. Not in a funded account. My savings.
Then in February 2022, the first Russian missile hit Ukrainian soil. The system's open positions had not reached their profit targets. They did not close. They went deeply red. What followed was a long, messy sequence of 4 weeks where I came to understand one thing clearly: 100% of my capital was always at risk, depending on whether the algorithm could close positions profitably. A 17-year track record became irrelevant in one morning.
The losses across the community using this system totaled 1.6 million euros. The weight of that outcome pushed the developer to end his life. I do not share this lightly. But it is the honest context for why FairFlow is built the way it is.
The Structural Insight That Changed Everything
For a year after that, trading was off the table. Then I met my now business partner and close friend. When I heard he worked in trading, I nearly ended the conversation. But one habit I had picked up from books like Rich Dad Poor Dad was this: listen to any concept fully before dismissing it.
What he introduced me to was not just futures trading. It was funding partners — companies that provide institutional trading capital to verified systems, instead of requiring traders to risk their own savings. The implication was immediate. If your capital is never in the account, you cannot lose it. The risk equation changes completely.
We did not need a 17-year track record before going to market. We needed a system that could prove itself in a controlled, risk-limited environment first. We go to market when we are ready.
Three Years of Staying
The "only" remaining problem was building a profitable AI trading system. If I had known at that handshake that this would take three years of failures, near-breakdowns, and complete rebuilds, I probably would have hesitated. Looking back, I know that journey was the proof. When something does not work, we stay, figure it out, and build it better.
That is the foundation. Not theory. Not inspiration. Three years of staying.