How To Get Started Day Trading
How To Get Started Day Trading Step-By-Step Guide:
Step 1: Decide What You’re Interested In Day Trading
Stocks, Futures, CFD’s, Forex, Crypto? This decision may need to be made based upon how much money you have in your account to start day trading with? If you have more than $25,000 you can day trade stocks as much as you want. If you only have $2,000 you can day trade the Futures as much as you want.
Or if you only have $500 you can day trade CFD’s and day trade anything you want like Dow, Nasdaq, Gold, Stocks, etc. Even if you only start with $2,000 CFD’s are really a fantastic option to go with as you can control how much you make per tick very easily and for very cheap costs.
Step 2: Find A Broker That Has What You’re Looking For
If you want to get started day trading stocks then you must find a stock broker online such as Interactive Brokers, or Schwab, E-Trade, Robinhood, Webull, TradeStation, and many others to choose from. There are many things to consider when choosing a broker:
a. Trading costs including cost to make each trade and possible costs for using their software and getting the quotes and data about the market and the prices of stocks and their charts. Each broker is different and you have to compare them.
b. Margin costs which include margin to open up a contract within the furtures markets as well as margin costs for borrowing money (using margin) with stocks. Some brokers are very cheap for borrowing money like Interactive Brokers, others can be a bit more expensive. Which at the same time Interactive Brokers is maybe the most expensive for their margin requirements to open up a contract within the Futures markets.
c. Time to fill orders and success at doing so. Each broker can vary on how long it takes to get your orders filled. Some brokers are much better than others. When you day trade you want to get your orders filled as quickly as possible. When you day trade the futures most brokers in my experience are relatively quick in filling orders like 1-2 seconds time frame. But with stocks this time can vary to a greater degree. For instance with Interactive Brokers using the Smart (default) system you get filled very quickly like 1-3 seconds. But with some brokers this can be more like 5-10 seconds and even not get fully filled only partially filled but still incur the full trading commission cost. With Interactive Brokers you do get fully filled the vast majority of time. There are even better brokers than Interactive Brokers for day trading where you can even route your order to the nearst ECN or Market Maker at the bid if you’re selling or ask if you’re buying to get in right away. However I have found that with Interactive Brokers using Smart system you get in right away anyway. There are many brokers that work as good as Interactive Brokers.
d. What you choose to day trade will determine how much money you need and what the overall costs are. If you choose to day trade stocks and make more than 3 day trades within a 5-day rolling period then you will need to have $25,000 USD in your trading account. But you could avoid this rule by simply “gapping” stocks, where you buy at the end of the day a hot stock in the market and then sell it the next morning at the open. You could even setup your order to sell where it will sell during pre-market hours and make your profit before the market opens. This will not be considered day trading because you held overnight. Or you could simply choose to trade the futures, where you are allowed to day trade all you want as there is no day trading rule within the futures markets, only with stocks. But if you want to day trade the futures then you will need a certain amount of money to be held aside in your account for “margin” to hold an open contract of the Dow (YM), or S&P 500 (ES), or Nasdaq (NQ), or Gold (GC), or Oil (CL). And each of these contracts require different prices at different times with different brokers. Some brokers can be very cheap, like CFD brokers for these instruments can be $25 for 1/10 full contract so make $1 per tick on Oil and Gold instead of the normal $10 per tick. Or open a regular futures brokers and day trade these instruments for $500 for one open contract and make $5-$10 USD per tick. All the way up to Interactive Brokers which requires about $10,000 for Dow to open one contract, $12,000 for S&P 500, $12,000-$14,000 for the Nasdaq, same for Oil and Gold. There are many different ways you can go to day trade the markets and each way is a valid way to make money at day trading. The main difference between Stocks and Futures and CFD’s is the cost involved to trade them and make money, other than that they are virtually the same. So do not worry which one you go into because all three of these ways are very good for day trading and making money.
Step 3: Open Up A Demo Account (Practice Account)
It’s critical for you to open up a “demo account” or “simulated account” with your broker and start practicing placing orders with their trading software. Different brokers, different software, different apps can be very different from each other.
For instance, if you want to start buying and selling stocks or futures you will have to either get in and out using Market Orders which fill instanly at the current market price, or you will have to enter in your orders manually or use a bracket order for all three orders, entry, exit, stop which are combined together as apart of one order where if filled the other two orders (exit, stop) will become active and will cancel once either exit or stop gets executed (fills).
If you didn’t use a “bracket order” then you would have to manually cancel either the stop or the exit which would still be there after your other order got filled whether that be the stop or exit.
If you manually enter your orders then you will have to learn which orders you should be using and how they work. This can get rather confusing when you first get started but it’s something you will need to learn. Here are your choices for entering into the market whether long or short.
a. Market Order – an order to activate immediately at the current market price.
b. Limit Order – an order used to activate at a better price than current price. Lower if going long, higher if going short.
c. Stop Order – an order used to activate at a certain pre-determined price by you either below or above current price and once activated (reached price) to execute trade at Market (current market price)
d. Stop Limit – an order used to activate at a certain pre-determined price by you either below or above current price and once activated to limit the price that it will be filled at to a certain price range you determine in advance. Let’s say you want to go long once the price reaches $15.50 how to place the order? You can use two ways, either place a “Buy Stop” at $15.50 and once it hits that price it will go off at Market, maybe you get filled at $15.58 at Market (ask price). But if you use a “Stop Limit” you can do the same order but limit the price you accept to get filled at so you could place your Limit Order on the Stop Order (Stop Limit) at 15.55, or 15.51, or 15.50. You could even do better than your Stop price by putting your “Buy Stop” order at $15.50 but then putting the Limit at $15.25, or put the Limit at $15.00 so that you can only get filled at $15.00 and no higher. This would mean that once the price reaches 15.50 the stop order will activate, if the price then drops down to 15.00 you’ll get filled there. This can be a very useful order to use and as long as you’re using the right day trading system these orders are very good to use. You can also use Sell Stop Limit orders for going short as well and do the same thing where once the price goes down and reaches 15.00 and the day trading system calls for going short, you have your Sell Stop Limit in place and the Stop set at 15.00 and the Limit set at 15.25, so that once the price reaches 15 and the Stop Limit activates, if it then moves back up again to 15.25 you’ll get filled at 15.25 or higher (better price)
The best way for you to get started day trading is to open up a “demo account” so that you can use simulated money on the markets to buy and sell and place orders and familiarize yourself with the software you’re using and how all the orders work. And at the same time you will practice trying to make money at the market not really knowing what you’re doing and quickly learn you’ll get slaughtered very quickly if you don’t have a really good trading system to use.
After you’ve made all your mistakes and placed the wrong orders, went long when you want to go short, used the wrong order and entered the market instead of exiting. And lost your money in simulation but have now learned how to operate the software and successfully place orders in and out of the market knowing what you’re doing in terms of using the software then you are ready for the next step.
Step 4: You Need A Really Good Day Trading System To Use
The better your trading system the better your profits, the better your trading stress, the better your mood, less fear, the calmer your nerves, the better day trader you will be. But it all starts and all emanates from your trading system, and this is why most people fail at day trading because they do not have a day trading system or the system they are using isn’t good enough.
You really do need to have a really good solid system to use that doesn’t just work in the short term during big runups but works everyday over time, and works both long and short because you make just as much money going down as going up so might as well make money going both long and short.
And you need to have a really good day trading system for that, complete with entry price, exit price for profit, and stop price for loss. With an attached mathematics of a very high success rate (above 85%) achieving 1:1 or close to it for loss/win ratio.
Without this knowledge of knowing exactly where to get in long or short, where exactly to get out for a profit and place your order there, and exactly where to take the loss with stop loss order in case the trade goes against you, which can, does, and will happen so Stops are critical to use.
So how are you going to find a really good day trading system like the one I’m talking about? Well you’re in luck because I have spent the last 23 years of my life developing the ultimate day trading system to use. Let me show you and explain to you each one:
Day Trading Stocks Video Course – If you want to day trade stocks and take multiple different day trades or just one day trade per day then this course is for you. You can day trade virtually any stock using this system, the more it’s moving the better so try to day trade hot stocks and good moving stocks. You will be able to nail trades with mathematical precision using this day trading system.
Day Trader Master Video Course – This is virtually the same course as stocks but for the futures markets instead. You can trade the futures around the clock 24 hours per day, so no matter what time zone you’re in you can trade the futures and I have a course for that time zone. This day trading course can be used in all time zones for all trading instruments.
My day trading system which is taught within each one of these day trading courses will take all the guesswork out about day trading, and in order to be successful that’s exactly what you need to do, because if you have to make money by guessing then you will lose. Real day trading is based upon a day trading system or day trading technique with really good math derived by backtesting and forward testing of the charts.
So if you really want know how to get started day trading then you must learn the best day trading system you can get your hands on and my system is the best day trading system in the world as I show everyday by recording my trades on YouTube.
After you purchase my day trading course and watch my day trading video (about one hour long) you will know exactly how and where to place your trades everyday on whichever trading instrument you choose to trade.
Step 5: You Have Learned How To Get Started Day Trading
Now your journey is just beginning on your way to becoming a day trader.
If you would like to help youself on how to get started day trading feel free to watch my day trading videos below where I show real day trading almost everyday at my YouTube channel How To Day Trade. You will see me using my day trading system to take trades on many different instruments showing how well my day trading system works and how easy it is to do.
By watching my day trading like this it will really help you on how to get started day trading by showing you the kind of day trading software you’ll be using and placing your orders just like I’m doing to day trade in and out of whatever you want to trade like stocks and futures. I think by watching me day trade it will really help you to learn and understand how to get started with day trading and be successful at it just like you see me doing.