We are in the midst of one the most severe recessions in history and yet there is still an opportunity to make money and be successful. I have personally seen a man go from nothing to wealthy within the last two years with just the stock market.
But why Day Trading? Isn’t it gambling?
In this blog post I’m going to clear up some common misconceptions about day trading and also explain why it’s very easy to get started. Those who blindly throw their money at the stock market with no plan or strategy are gambling. Is it not gambling if you have a plan of attack (a plan that gives you an edge over the market not just “trying to make money day trading”).
The first part of developing your plan is finding a strategy that works
You can either create your own strategy from scratch or find one that is already proven to work. Creating your own strategy is no easy task. You have to do countless hours of back testing and research to find the right combination of probabilities and indicators. Finding a strategy that works is also no easy task. With all the information on the internet it’s very hard to decipher what works and what doesn’t. I was fortunate enough to team up with a friend early in my career to develop my own stategy which I currently use in my own trading.
I will be sharing that strategy and more day trading tips at my Day Trading Website
Make sure the strategy you decide on incorporates both high probability and a solid risk structure. You obviously don’t want to use a strategy that only wins 30% of the time, if it does then make sure your winners are bigger than your losers. You also don’t want a strategy where you risk a lot to gain very little (risk $100 to only gain $10). Be mindful of the ever changing market environment, volume and volatility are always going to change.
Can your strategy withstand a sideways market with very little volume? Do you want to trade smaller timeframes to catch every move in the market or larger timeframes to catch bigger swings? Make sure your strategy can adapt with the market environment otherwise it’s useless.
Now let’s talk about investment, there are strategies out there that cost anywhere from $2,000 to $20,000. Compare that to opening your own business or franchise. A McDonald’s franchise is rumored to cost around $1 million and Subway roughly $100,000. You can find business to open that cost less than that but the point is that it doesn’t cost that much money to get started day trading.
Your initial investment with day trading is minimal in comparison to most other businesses.
Consider learning how to day trade story, I took out $25,000 in private student loans when I was in college to buy a strategy and have capital to trade. While you do need money to day trade the biggest investment with day trading is time. And I will be up front its not easy learning how to be a day trader.
The time it takes to learn a new strategy really depends on how much time you want to dedicate to it. Very few people have “the instinct” for the market to be able to know exactly when to get in and out. Since trading is a performance activity most traders have to develop their skill in the market. Find a coach that will help you study and review your trades to fix your mistakes. The more you’re able to study and review, the easier it will be for you to become a professional day trader.
The biggest tip that I can give you is never to take shortcuts. Once you take shortcuts you develop bad habits and those are very hard to break. We have been able to teach many people how to become WanderingTrader’s as many people want to day trade and travel around the world.
Hi marcello, I’ve been following you on twitter for awhile now and I just am now really checking out your site…cool stuff you got goin on man!!
Would you say 5 grand USD is too small an initial capital to get into day trading? I am not looking to become Carlos Slim overnight, but a couple % points a month is nothing to sneeze at. Do you deal only with the US market and do you dabble in FOREX? Im interested in a simple enough strategy to get my feet wet.
I would actually say that 5k is just enough, my strategy does work on Forex. I have a lot of guys that actually trade forex
Hi Marcello
I’ve just discovered your site and honestly, I am still dubitative wondering what is behind and when am I going to discover that you are actually selling something…I do like your blog design, very simple and sober. Looks nice, serious and professional. What does mean : trading “for” you?
The first contact with your blog was this valuable post of yours about ninjatrader vs tradestation. I stay on this first good impression and ask if there is some way to get involved in your academy considering traveling to you is not foreseeable with my husband, my young children, job etc…?
I keep on reading your site to understand what is exactly the deal, as so far I am 100% agree with your vision of things.
Hi Lachenille thanks for the post. I do offer a training program as part of my day trading academy at http://thedaytradingacademy.com. If you like you check the information I have there and let us know if you have any questions.
Sebastian, if you are young I would go for it. However if it would take you more than a year to save up that amount, I would focus on building more initial capital and test a strategy in the mean time. You’ll be tempted to jump in after seeing large gains while playing on the sidelines, but I suggest you focus on understanding the specific profducts or companies you want to invest in.
I work at the CBOE and have much experience trading gold and wheat futures, as well as stocks and options. Having worked with different traders and firms, I seldom hear them advertise the forex markets to clients with little trading experience with such ease, at least not without going through a beating of understanding the risks they can take. Unlike most stocks which give you a margin of about 2x your cash invested, you can get margin of 10x and more of your cash…essentially 50,000+ of trading power with your 5,000 cash, versus 10,000 of trading power with stocks. You can make more money, but you can lose money much faster due to the high volatility on the forex markets.
My recommendation, enjoy the journey towards financial empowerment by having as much control over the money you have . Don’t worry too much about the end game, and don’t leave your money in the hands of others to decide what to do with it.
hey…..Marcello………..this is sagar from india……..i hope u enjoyed a lot while ur trip in india…..and thanks for this beautiful website and ur day trading wesite and i am also same in ur wavelength …. FREEDOM TO LIVE MY OWN LIFE……so i like to travel a lot and expose as many different places and same time earn good money….so please let me know that whether you are providing any online classes or tutorials for learning day trading because i cant come over there until i earn some good money…..so please let me know ………….
Hi Sagar we do have an online day trading academy where we teach people online. Please go to http://thedaytradingacademy.com and we can let you know about availability into the program